Jingle All the Way

by Fern Michaels

  “Okay, I’m going to take my shower, make some coffee, and then we’ll head to my new office. I’m sure it’s nothing like Marcus’s office and I know he takes you there with him. It’s a me office, if you know what I mean. It’s so good to have someone to talk to. I wish you could talk back.”

  Mo marched into the kitchen to look in the refrigerator. Leftover Chinese that should have been thrown out a week ago, leftover Italian that should have been thrown out two weeks ago, and last night’s pepper steak that she’d cooked herself. She warmed it in the microwave and set it down for Murphy, who lapped it up within seconds. “Guess that will hold you till this evening.”

  Dressed in a professional, spring-like suit, Mo gathered her briefcase and all the stuff she carried home each evening into a plastic shopping bag. Murphy’s leash and his toys went into a second bag. At the last moment she rummaged in the cabinet for a water bowl. “Guess we need to take your bed and blanket, too.” Two trips later, the only thing left to do was call her mother.

  “Mo, what’s wrong? Why are you calling this early in the morning?”

  “Mom, I need your help. If Dad isn’t swamped, do you think you guys could come down here?” She related the events of the past hours. “I can’t live in the office—health codes and all that. I need you to find me an apartment that will take a dog. I know this sounds stupid, but is it possible, do you think, to find a house that will double as an office? If I have to suck up the money I put into the storefront, I will. I might be able to sublease it, but I don’t have the time to look around. I have so much work, Mom. All of a sudden it happened. It almost seems like the day the sign went up, everybody who’s ever thought about hiring an architect chose me. I’m not complaining. Can you help me?”

  “Of course. Dad’s at loose ends this week. It’s that retirement thing. He doesn’t want to travel, he doesn’t want to garden, he doesn’t know what he wants. Just last night he was talking about taking a Julia Child cooking course. We’ll get ready and leave within the hour.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “You should see the sparkle in his eyes—he’s ready now. We’ll see you in a bit.”

  Once they reached the office, Murphy settled in within seconds. A square patch of sun under the front window became his. His red ball, a rubber cat with a hoarse squeak, and his latex candy cane were next to him. He nibbled on a soup bone that was almost as big as his head.

  Mo worked steadily without a break until her parents walked through the door at ten minutes past noon. Murphy eyed them warily until he saw Mo’s enthusiastic greeting, at which point he joined in, licking her mother’s outstretched hand and offering his paw to her father.

  “Now, that’s what I call a real gentleman. I feel a lot better about you being here alone now that you have this dog,” her father said.

  “It’s just temporary, Dad. Marcus will take him back as soon as . . . well, I don’t know exactly. Dad, I am so swamped. I’m also having a problem with this . . . take a look, give me your honest opinion. The client is coming in at four and I’m befuddled. The heating system doesn’t work the way he wants it installed. I have to cut out walls, move windows—and he won’t want to pay for the changes.”

  “In a minute. Your mother and I decided that I will stay here and help you. She’s going out with a realtor at twelve-thirty. We called from the car phone and set it all up. We were specific with your requirements so she won’t be taking your mother around to things that aren’t appropriate. Knowing your mother, I’m confident she’ll have the perfect location by five o’clock this evening. Why don’t you and your mother visit for a few minutes while I take a look at these blueprints?”

  “I think you should hire him, Mo,” her mother stage-whispered. “He’d probably work for nothing. A couple of days a week would be great. I could stay down here with him and cook for you, walk your dog. We’d be more than glad to do it, Mo, if you think it would work and we wouldn’t be infringing on your privacy.”

  “I’d love it, Mom. Murphy isn’t my dog. I wish he was. He saved my life. What can I say?”

  “You can tell me about Marcus Bishop. The real skinny, and don’t tell me there isn’t a skinny to tell. I see that sparkle in your eyes and it isn’t coming from this dog.”

  “Later, okay? I think your real estate person is here. Go get ’em, Mom. Remember, I need a place as soon as possible. Otherwise I sleep here in the office in a sleeping bag. If I break my lease by having a pet, I don’t get my security deposit back and it was a hefty one. If you can find something for me it will work out perfectly since my current lease is up the first of May. I’m all paid up. I appreciate it, Mom.”

  “That’s what parents are for, sweetie. See you. John . . . did you hear me?”

  “Hmmmnn.”

  Mo winked at her mother.

  Father and daughter worked steadily, stopping just long enough to walk Murphy and eat a small pizza they’d had delivered. When Mo’s client walked through the door at four o’clock, Mo introduced her father as her associate, John Ames.

  “Now, Mr. Caruthers, this is what Morgan and I came up with. You get everything you want with the heating system. See this wall? What we did was . . .”

  Knowing her client was in good hands, Mo retired to the kitchen to make coffee. She added some cookies to a colorful tray at the last moment. When she entered the office, tray in hand, her father was shaking hands and smiling. “Mr. Caruthers liked your idea. He gets what he wants plus the atrium. He’s willing to absorb the extra three hundred.”

  “I’m going to be relocating sometime in the next few weeks, Mr. Caruthers. Since I’ve taken on an associate, I need more room. I’ll notify you of my new address and phone number. If you happen to know anyone who would be interested in a sublease, call me.”

  Caruthers was gone less than five minutes when Helen Ames bustled through the door, the realtor in tow. “I found it! The perfect place! An insurance agent who had his office in his home is renting it. It’s empty. You can move in tonight or tomorrow. The utilities are on, and he pays for them. It was part of the deal. It’s wonderful, Mo—there’s even a fenced yard for Murphy. I took the liberty of okaying your move. Miss Oliver has a client who does odd jobs and has his own truck. He’s moving your furniture as we speak. All we have to do is pack up your personal belongings and Dad and I can do that with your help. You can be settled by tonight. The house is in move-in condition. That’s a term real estate people use,” she said knowledgeably. “Miss Oliver has agreed to see if she can sublease this place. Tomorrow, her man will move the office. At the most, Mo, you’ll lose half a day’s work. With Dad helping you, you’ll get caught up in no time. There’s a really nice garden on the side of the house and a magnificent wisteria bush you’re going to love. Plus twelve tomato plants. The insurance man who owns the house is just glad that someone like us is renting. It’s a three-year lease with an option to buy. His wife’s mother lives in Florida and she wants to be near her since she’s in failing health. I just love it when things work out for all parties involved. He didn’t have one bit of a problem with the dog after I told him Murphy’s story.”

  Everything worked out just the way her mother said it would.

  The April showers gave way to May flowers. June sailed in with warm temperatures and bright sunshine. The only flaw in Mo’s life was the lack of communication where Marcus was concerned.

  Shortly after the Fourth of July, Mo piled Murphy into the Cherokee on a bright sunshiny Sunday and headed for Cherry Hill. “Something’s wrong—I just feel it,” she muttered to the dog all the way up the New Jersey Turnpike.

  Murphy was ecstatic when the Jeep came to a stop outside his old home. He raced around the side of the house, barking and growling, before he slithered through his doggie door. On the other side, he continued to bark and then he howled. With all the doors locked, Mo had no choice but to go in the same way she’d gone through on Christmas Eve.

  Inside, things were neat and tidy, but there was a thick layer of dust
over everything. Obviously Marcus had not been here for a very long time.

  “I don’t even know what hospital he went to. Where is he, Murphy? He wouldn’t give you up, even to me. I know he wouldn’t.” She wondered if she had the right to go through Marcus’s desk. Out of concern. She sat down and thought about her birthday. She’d been so certain that he’d send a card, one of those silly cards that left the real meaning up in the air, but her birthday had gone by without any kind of acknowledgment from him.

  “Maybe he did give you up, Murphy. I guess he isn’t interested in me.” She choked back a sob as she buried her head in the retriever’s silky fur. “Okay, come on, time to leave. I know you want to stay and wait, but we can’t. We’ll come back again. We’ll come back as often as we have to. That’s a promise, Murphy.”

  On the way back to her house, Mo passed her old office and was surprised to see that it had been turned into a Korean vegetable stand. She’d known Miss Oliver had subleased it with the rent going directly to the management company, but that was all she knew.

  “Life goes on, Murphy. What’s that old saying, time waits for no man? Something like that anyway.”

  Summer moved into autumn and before Mo knew it, her parents had sold their house and rented a condo on the outskirts of Wilmington. Her father worked full-time in her office while her mother joined every woman’s group in the state of Delaware. It was the best of all solutions.

  Thanksgiving was spent in her parents’ condo with her mother doing all the cooking. The day was uneventful, with both Mo and her father falling asleep in the living room after dinner. Later, when she was attaching Murphy’s leash, her mother said, quite forcefully, “You two need to get some help in that office. I’m appointing myself your new secretary and first thing Monday morning you’re going to start accepting applications for associates. It’s almost Christmas and none of us has done any shopping. It’s the most wonderful time of the year and last year convinced us that . . . time is precious. We all need to enjoy life more. Dad and I are going to take a trip the day after Christmas. We’re going to drive to Florida. I don’t want to hear a word, John. And you, Mo, when was the last time you had a vacation? You can’t even remember. Well, we’re closing your office on the twentieth of December and we aren’t reopening until January second. That’s the final word. If your clients object, let them go somewhere else.”

  “Okay, Mom,” Mo said meekly.

  “As usual, you’re right, Helen,” John said just as meekly.

  “I knew you two would see it my way. We’re going to take up golf when we get to Florida.”

  “Helen, for God’s sake. I hate golf. I refuse to hit a silly little ball with a stick and there’s no way I’m going to wear plaid pants and one of those damn hats with a pom-pom on it.”

  “We’ll see,” Helen sniffed.

  “On that thought, I’ll leave you.”

  At home, curled up in bed with Murphy alongside her, Mo turned on the television that would eventually lull her to sleep. She felt wired up, antsy for some reason. Here it was, almost Christmas, and Marcus Bishop was still absent from her life. She thought about the many times she’d called Bishop Engineering, only to be told Mr. Bishop was out of town and couldn’t be reached. “The hell with you, Mr. Marcus Bishop. You gotta be a real low-life to stick me with your dog and then forget about him. What kind of man does that make you? What was all that talk about loving him? He misses you.” Damn, she was losing it. She had to stop talking to herself or she was going to go over the edge.

  Sensing her mood, Murphy snuggled closer. He licked at her cheeks, pawed her chest. “Forget what I just said, Murphy. Marcus loves you—I know he does. He didn’t forget you, either. I think, and this is just my own opinion, but I think something went wrong with his operation and he’s recovering somewhere. I think he was just saying words when he said he was used to the chair and it didn’t bother him. It does. What if they ended up cutting off his legs? Oh, God,” she wailed. Murphy growled, the hair on the back of his head standing on end. “Ignore that, too, Murphy. No such thing happened. I’d feel something like that.”

  She slept because she was weary and because when she cried she found it difficult to keep her eyes open.

  “What are you going to do, honey?” Helen Ames asked as Mo closed the door to the office.

  “I’m going upstairs to the kitchen and make a chocolate cake. Mom, it’s December twentieth. Five days till Christmas. Listen, I think you and Dad made the right decision to leave for Florida tomorrow. You both deserve sunshine for the holidays. Murphy and I will be fine. I might even take him to Cherry Hill so he can be home for Christmas. I feel like I should do that for him. Who knows, you guys might love Florida and want to retire there. There are worse things, Mom. Whatever you do, don’t make Dad wear those plaid pants. Promise me?”

  “I promise. Tell me again, Mo, that you don’t mind spending Christmas alone with the dog.”

  “Mom, I really and truly don’t mind. We’ve all been like accidents waiting to happen. This is a good chance for me to laze around and do nothing. You know I was never big on New Year’s. Go, Mom. Call me when you get there and if I’m not home, leave a message. Drive carefully, stop often.”

  “Good night, Mo.”

  “Have a good trip, Mom.”

  On the morning of the twenty-third of December, Mo woke early, let Murphy out, made herself some bacon and eggs, and wolfed it all down. During the night she’d had a dream that she’d gone to Cherry Hill, bought a Christmas tree, decorated it, cooked a big dinner for her and Murphy, and . . . then she’d awakened. Well, she was going to live the dream.

  “Wanna go home, big guy? Get your stuff together. We’re gonna get a tree, and do the whole nine yards. Tomorrow it will be a full year since I met you. We need to celebrate.”

  A little after the noon hour, Mo found herself dragging a Douglas fir onto Marcus’s back patio. As before, she crawled through the doggie door after the dog and walked through the kitchen to the patio door. It took her another hour to locate the box of Christmas decorations. With the fireplaces going, the cottage warmed almost immediately.

  The wreath with the giant red bow went on the front door. Back inside, she added the lights to the tree and put all the colorful decorations on the branches. On her hands and knees, she pushed the tree stand gently until she had it perfectly arranged in the corner. It was heavenly, she thought sadly as she placed the colorful poinsettias around the hearth. The only thing missing was Marcus.

  Mo spent the rest of the day cleaning and polishing. When she finished her chores, she baked a cake and prepared a quick poor man’s stew with hamburger meat.

  Mo slept on the couch because she couldn’t bring herself to sleep in Marcus’s bed.

  Christmas Eve dawned, gray and overcast. It felt like snow, but the weatherman said there would be no white Christmas this year.

  Dressed in blue jeans, sneakers, and a warm flannel shirt, Mo started the preparations for Christmas Eve dinner. The house was redolent with the smell of frying onions, the scent of the tree, and the gingerbread cookies baking in the oven. She felt almost light-headed when she looked at the tree with the pile of presents underneath, presents her mother had warned her not to open, presents for Murphy, and a present for Marcus. She would leave it behind when they left after New Year’s.

  At one o’clock, Mo slid the turkey into the oven. Her plum pudding, made from scratch, was cooling on the counter. The sweet potatoes and marshmallows sat alongside the pudding. A shaker of sesame seeds and the broccoli were ready to be cooked when the turkey came out of the oven. She took one last look around the kitchen, and at the table she’d set for one, before she retired to the living room to watch television.

  Murphy leaped from the couch, the hair on his back stiff. He growled and started to pace the room, racing back and forth. Alarmed, Mo got off the couch to look out the window. There was nothing to see but the barren trees around the house. She switched on more lights, even
those on the tree. As a precaution against what, she didn’t know. She locked all the doors and windows. Murphy continued to growl and pace. Then the low, deep growls were replaced with high-pitched whines, but he made no move to go out his doggie door. Mo closed the drapes and turned the floodlights on outside. She could feel herself start to tense up. Should she call the police? What would she say? My dog’s acting strange? Damn.

  Murphy’s cries and whines were so eerie she started to come unglued. Perhaps he wasn’t one of those dogs that were trained to protect owner, hearth, and home. Since she’d had him he’d never been put to the test. To her, he was just a big animal who loved unconditionally.

  In a moment of blind panic she rushed around the small cottage checking the inside dead bolts. The doors were stout, solid. She didn’t feel one bit better.

  The racket outside was worse and it all seemed to be coming from the kitchen area. She armed herself with a carving knife in one hand and a cast iron skillet in the other. Murphy continued to pace and whine. She eyed the doggie door warily, knowing the retriever was itching to use it, but he’d understood her iron command of No.