Christmas on Mimosa Lane (A Seasons of the Heart Novel)

by Anna DeStefano

  “Sorry…” she said, not able to catch her breath so she could beg to stay anyway. “Sorry…”

  “Oh, sweetie.” Mallory pulled her into her lap and hugged her hard and soft at the same time. “Don’t worry about it. It’s just an old thing I picked up somewhere. And I bet we can glue it together. It’s no big deal.”

  But Polly couldn’t stop crying no matter what her friend said. She couldn’t stop seeing the broken cookie jar, and the pins inside that she wanted to throw away again, and the flowers she and Mommy had planted last spring, and the bunny and the bee and the bird that she’d imagined coming to play the next time she and her mommy grew something.

  She cried, hating the sound of it and the feel of it, and hating her pins and Mommy and the stupid garden that was all grown over and dead now, where nothing would want to play ever again. She didn’t know how long she’d cried while Mallory held her and rocked her and never said Polly had to stop. So she didn’t. The memories her mommy’s pins always brought back kept coming, and they were making her sad when they used to make her happier than almost anything, so she kept crying.

  Then as each memory passed, it got easier somehow to hold on to her friend more and the memories less. Just like with each pin she’d brought over from home, it had been easier to bring over more, because doing that really had been okay the way Mallory had promised. Like remembering now was okay, too, even though it had made her so angry she’d broken Mickey Mouse. Because Mallory was picking her up and walking into the living room. She sat on her couch with Polly in her lap and curled her feet under her. And she still wasn’t saying anything or wiping Polly’s face or trying to make her tears stop.

  Polly looked up at her friend, then at the glittery Christmas tree Mallory was staring at. Mallory had said she’d rather have Polly’s pins and her mommy memories than her tree. Polly didn’t understand that. It was the best tree in the whole world. It made Polly feel better just looking at it. It had from the start.

  And now that they were looking together, it felt even better. She snuggled deeper into her friend’s lap, thinking about what Mallory had said about things being better when you had someone to share them with. Mallory laid her cheek on Polly’s head the way Daddy used to when he read her stories in the big rocker in his and Mommy’s room, and the way he did now when they watched videos on the couch most nights. And it didn’t feel sad anymore, or angry, or scared. It felt really, really good, making Polly want to stay right there forever and wish Daddy was there, too.

  It was getting harder to keep her eyes open, she was so sleepy. She gave up trying when she felt Mallory sigh and snuggle closer, too, like they could stay just like this all night.

  The tree was still there, after Polly closed her eyes, and so were her mommy’s pins. All of them sparkly and bright and beautiful in her mind. A perfect Christmas dream was waiting for her, with bunnies and birds and bees dancing all around her and Mallory, while they and their mommies snuggled on the couch watching…

  Chapter Thirteen

  Unable are the Loved to die

  For Love is Immortality…

  “You’re a very brave girl” the nurse said, after Mal had been X rushed away from the ER cubicle where they’d taken her mama.

  She slid into a cracked, creaky chair. She was so tired. It had been so long since she hadn’t been forcin’ herself to stay awake, listening to Mama’s breathin’ get worse. She wanted to curl up on the cold, hard seat and close her eyes forever.

  She wasn’t brave.

  She was scared, more scared than she’d ever been.

  She’d told. First to the people at the shelter, because she didn’t think her mama was breathin’ at all. Then to the nurses and doctors at the hospital, because they said they couldn’t help if they didn’t know more.

  How long had they been on the street? How many times had she and Mama been sick? Had any medicine ever made Mama feel bad? How old was Mal, anyway, and was there someone else they could call? Because they needed to know even more if they were gonna keep Mama alive. They hadn’t seen a case of the flu this bad in a long time.

  “I wanna stay with my mama.” Mal was about to cry. Mama couldn’t stand it when she cried, or when she told. But Mama wasn’t with her now. Mai was all alone and she’d already told and she could feel the cryin’ coming like if she started, she might never stop.

  She’d messed it all up. She hadn’t gotten her mama better. She hadn’t known enough about what to do. She hadn’t kept them goin’. It was all gonna be over now. That’s what Mama would say. And it was gonna be bad, and it was Christmas, and Mal didn’t think she could take it, and she just wanted to see her mama and make sure she was okay. She wanted to hear Mama say again that they could keep goin’.

  “Don’t worry.” The nurse crouched down in front of her chair. “Your mommy’s going to be fine. Until we can get her settled, why don’t you tell me who we can call to take care of you? Do you know a number we can call, sweetie?”

  Her mommy?

  Mai had never had a mommy. And she hadn’t been a sweetie since a long time ago, since the last time her grams had called her that—the day Mal had gone to school, slipped out the bathroom window like Mama had said, and met her mama in a nearby park so they could go away together. That was the day she’d promised to stay with Mama always. To never go back. To never tell.

  But she hadn’t been able to wake her mama up at the shelter—no one had. Which meant she might not wake up at all, even now. And even if she did, nothin’was ever going to be fine again. Mama was bad sick. And people weren’t just gonna let Mal stay there and wait for her to get better. Someone was gonna come for her now. Someone was gonna take her away, like Mama said.

  Another person in scrubs, a man, rushed up to the nurse and said something. Then the nurse said something back. Mal listened but couldn’t hear all they were whispering. Their faces were turned from her as if that would make her not be there. But she heard a lot of the words, some that she kinda understood. All of them sounded bad.

  Like indigent and vagrant and bronchial pneumonia and weeks of recovery and ICU. She didn’t know what septic was, but that sounded the worst of all, the way the man whispered it even louder.

  “She’s lucky the shelter called us when they did,” the man said in a more normal voice, which meant he wanted Mal to hear. “That kid let her pulse ox get down to under sixty. The woman must have been half dead for a day or so. Her lungs are full of fluid. She still might not make it.”

  “Shhh…” The nurse looked back at Mai. “She’s just a little girl.”

  “Sorry.” The guy shrugged. “But I don’t know what gives with these people. Someone’s going to have to pay for their health care, regardless. Why not come in off the street in the middle of flu season as soon as they get sick. That way it won’t cost a fortune at least, before we get them well enough to turn ’em back out. Tell the kid her mother’s stabilized and in and out of consciousness, but she’s being moved to ICU. No underage visitors. Doctor’s orders. And call Defax. She’s going to need someplace else besides here to stay. From the looks of them both, someplace that’ll find a permanent home for her. I doubt the state’ll let that woman have her back.”

  The nasty man left then. Now all Mal had to do was make the nurse go away, too, at least for a little while. But her heart was pounding too hard to think straight. They wouldn’t let Mama have her back, he’d said. They were gonna take Mal away forever. Give her to strangers.

  The woman knelt again. Mal just sat there not looking at her, with all that she and her mama owned clutched in her lap. She’d insisted on taking Mama’s shopping bags with her when one of the shelter ladies drove her to the hospital behind the ambulance.

  The lady hadn’t really wanted Mai in her car. She hadn’t really wanted the pile of bags Mal had refused to leave behind, either. Mai knew how dirty and smelly she and all their stuff was. You didn’t notice it so much till you were with clean people in a clean place like this. But once
you were and you saw how they looked at you and tried to hold their breath, it made you want to crawl into the bathroom, into the sink, and scrub until people didn’t treat you like they might catch somethin’ if they got too close.

  “Do you have people?” the nurse asked. Her nose wrinkling, she put her hand on the sleeve of Mal’s nasty-smelling coat. It was actually her mama’s nasty-smelling orange coat that Mai was wearing over her own things, so she didn’t have to leave anything behind at the shelter. “Where did you say you were from?”

  Mal just stared at her. She hadn’t said. She wouldn’t say, not to the shelter people or the ambulance people or hospital people once they got here. She didn’t want to tell them anything more until she talked with her mama, which they weren’t letting her do.

  She dug her hand under the coats and her sweater and the two shirts she always wore. “’Cause you can never be sure,” Mama always said, “when you’ll have to leave where you are. And it’s always better to have on more clothes than you need, in case you have to start over.” Mal curled her hand into her jeans pocket and then around her quarter.

  She didn’t want to start over. She wanted to wait for Mama to get better enough. She wanted to keep goin’. She hadn’t wanted to give her mama up, she really hadn’t, no matter how bad this winter had been. She looked at the nurse, wanting her to say that the man had been wrong. That it wouldn’t be weeks. That Mal wouldn’t have to go.

  “I know you love your mommy,” the nurse said. “But she wouldn’t want you out here scared like this. Look at you. You’re shivering even in all those clothes. I can get you something clean to wear, and we have a shower in our break room. We can get you cleaned up and something to eat. But we’ve got to find you someplace to sleep, honey, and I know your mommy would rather that be with someone you know than with strangers. It’s the middle of the night. There has to be someone you can call.”

  Clean. The word felt dirty, because it wasn’t where Mama would be. Sleeping. Mai wouldn’t be able to. All she knew how to do when Mama was sick was to stay awake, on watch. Hungry. That was just the way it was. Mal didn’t mind so much, not as long as she and Mama were hungry together.

  “It’s Christmas,” the nurse said. “Don’t you want to be with your family for Christmas?”

  The tears were there before Mal could stop them. They were running down her cheeks and under her chin and into the corner of her mouth. It had been so long since she’d let herself believe she could have a Christmas, she didn’t know how to feel what the nurse was wanting her to feel, not without crying. Because Mama would hate her. She’d hate her forever if Mai wanted Christmas and clean and sleep and not being hungry more than she wanted to stay with her.

  Mal could have her grandparents and all the other things she dreamed of when she did sleep—Christmas most of all—or she could have her mama.

  And suddenly she was six again and standing in the bathroom of her school staring out the window, making the same decision. Which did she want more: the life she could have if she stayed where she was, or the one waiting for her if she left? She was as scared of goin’ now as she had been then.

  But she was scared of staying, too. She was scared for Mama. No matter what Mal did, nothin’ made her better. She’d been getting worse all along. And sicker the last few years, because she wouldn’t eat the food Mallory got for them or take the medicine she stole or get out of the rain and the cold, even when they had a shelter to go to with people who cared and didn’t want to turn them in and would take them to the hospital in their own cars if they had to, no matter how bad they smelled or looked. And most of all, Mama wouldn’t stop drinkin’ and making herself even sicker.

  The man was right. They coulda gotten help sooner, only Mama wouldn’t. Just like she wouldn’t get better, even if it meant keepin’ Mai. She never had, not in six years, just like Grams and Papa had said Mama never would without doctors to help her.

  Mal was so scared. And cold and cryin’ and dirty and tired. And she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t stop cryin’ or wanting her grams and papa now as bad as she wanted her mama. And she wanted the rest of what she never let herself dream of anymore. Especially a real Christmas. After all these years, Mal had wanted a real Christmas most of all.

  “I’m going to get you something to eat and drink,” the nurse said, lookin’ like she wanted to hug Mallory but couldn’t make herself do it. “You wait right here. You’ll feel better once you eat something. You’ll see.”

  She left, and Mal was finally alone. She could run now. No one would be able to find her, and she could take care of herself as long as she needed to for Mama to get better. It’s what she should do. What Mama would say to do. Instead she wiped her face and snuck across the big room with all the plastic chairs and pushed through the doors to the area inside where they took care of people. She snuck all the way down the hall while nurses and doctors were too busy to even know she was there.

  She slipped through the curtain to the corner place where her mama was alone now, hooked up to machines and tubes and a bag of something clear that hung on a pole near her head. She looked at her mama and back at the last six years, at never getting better and never making it and every winter getting worse than the last.

  Mama didn’t want to get better. She didn’t want sleep or food or Christmas…or Mal. Not as much as she wanted to keep goin’. And Mal couldn’t do it anymore.

  She put their bags down so she could open the knots that kept one of them closed, carefully undoing everything without tearin’ the handles so she could tie them back up and Mama would never know she’d been inside. If the hospital let Mama keep them at all when she went to wherever ICU was. Mai pulled out what she’d been looking for.

  After tying the bags back up she took off her mama’s coat and laid it on top of them. Then she walked the rest of the way to the bed and placed the shabby doll beside her mama, swallowing at how dirty it looked next to the clean sheets. The tears were back. Because it was all Mal had to give, and her mama wouldn’t want it or keep it or want Mai once she woke up and found out what Mai was about to do. But Mal had to try. One more time, she had to try to make her mama want her enough to get better.

  Mal could barely even picture Grams and Papa now. She wanted to stay with her mama. She really did. But too many things had gone wrong. She couldn’t fix all them on her own. Mama had almost died, Mai was so bad at fixing things.

  “We’ve gotta let the people who can help her, help her,” she remembered her grams saying. “Your Papa and I done done all we can. We’re making her sicker now by letting her keep goin’ like she is. And we can’t do that. You can’t do that, Mallory Jane. We don’t know enough how to help her. We’ve gotta let the doctors take over.”

  They’d been planning to call the hospital where people who were sick like Mama went. The next day. The day Mama snuck out of her bedroom window and Mai snuck out of school and they’d gone away together. ’Cause Mai had told then, too, when she’d promised Grams she wouldn’t. They’d be back before that Christmas, Mallory had thought when she’d told Mama Grams and Papa’s secret. Then everything would be better. Fixed. Sparkly and bright. Perfect.

  “Merry Christmas, Mama,” she said, stepping away from her doll and the bed, from Mama and the family they should have been but never were. “I love you so much. Please don’t go away…No matter what I have to do next, please don’t go away forever.”

  She dug her hand into her pocket for her quarter. Tears choking her, she backed away, trippin’ over their bags on the floor. She fell, then pushed herself to her feet and ran through the curtain, right into someone who was standin’ there.

  “Hey!” It was the nasty man from before. “How did you get back in here?”

  Mal ran. She ran through the doors to the room with the chairs, then out of the hospital and down the street, for street after street, shiverin’ now that she was outside and it was snowing still and she didn’t have two coats on. She ran till she was sure no one was fol
lowing, then she ran some more, hunting for a phone booth even though it was hard to see. And all the time she was cryin’.

  “You’re a brave little girl,” the nurse had said.

  Mal crashed into a phone booth and shoved the door closed behind her to keep the wind out.

  A sick green light flickered on, making it not so dark. She reached for the phone and pulled out her quarter, but she didn’t put it in the slot. She clenched her arm to her side wishing she had her doll back to make her feel braver somehow, like a big girl one more time.

  Would Grams and Papa even want her back? Would they still come for her after all this time?

  She put the quarter in and punched the numbers. Almost right away a voice said she needed more money, or to press zero to talk to someone. The lady who answered after zero said that if Mal had no more money she’d have to make a different kinda call. Collect, the lady said.

  “What’s your name, darlin’? Who you callin’ at this time of night on Christmas Eve? You in some kinda trouble?”

  A golden kind of light from across the street made her look closer, through the dark and the snow. It was a Christmas tree like the one she remembered from home, better than she did the faces she’d left behind. It was all lit up and magical. It was the kind of tree that families had, the kind happy people sat around all the time and looked at because it made them happier. The kind of tree she’d thought she and Mama would have by now, somewhere together where it was better and safer and happier than Mal had ever dreamed of.

  “My…” Mallory scrubbed her tears away and told herself that dreaming of perfect Christmases was for stupid babies. She wasn’t a baby anymore, and she’d never be that stupid again. “My name’s Mallory Jane Phillips…And I need to call my grandparents. I…We need to go home”