by R. R. Banks
We had been sitting for a few minutes when I saw a figure step up in front of the fire. It took a moment to recognize that it was Coy. He now had a length of silver tinsel wrapped around his waist and a scarf embedded with tiny battery-operated lights looped around his neck. He held out his arms, looking for all the world like a geriatric snowman, and the crowd fell silent.
"Good evening everyone. Those of us who had the privilege of growing up in Whiskey Hollow know the story of why we celebrate the Grand Illumination, but since we are lucky to have so many visitors and new friends with us this holiday season, I'm going to retell the tale for everyone."
There were a few scattered cheers throughout the crowd.
"Alright, alright. Here we go. Gather your youngins, and I will tell, the story of the flaming Christmas bell." He took a breath. "OK, that's enough of the rhyming. There are some words in here that I can't rhyme. So, we had ourselves a bit of a time getting a Liberty Bell in the first place on account of us technically, but not really, but sorta not being a part of the United States anymore. Our reasons being rooted entirely in aggravation over the aftermath of the Second Whiskey Rebellion. Apparently, our formal letters of resignation had been lost in the mail, and how someone could be so terrible of a person to lose mail I'll never understand, and there was a bunch of confusion among hollow folks when the Army showed up and made camp. We figured we were under attack, and they were just escorting a bell to some other city. So, in order to avoid a fight, a bunch of the old boys got together with the Army boys all sly-like, and got them blind-eyed drunk on moonshine. While them boys were passed out, the old Holler boys carried them off to Everton and they woke up embarrassed, lost, and without their big bell.
Well, now we had this giant bell that the old boys carried into the center of town, and there was a big party about how we had outsmarted the Feds, and everybody got predictably drunk and one thing led to another again. Next thing you know, somebody, and I won't say who, but legend has it their last name rhymes with 'Padge', had fallen asleep on top of a pile of hay down by the bell with a lit cigarette in their mouth. This was before they had learned the dangers of the devil tobacco and we can't really blame them their oversight because they hadn't yet written those little warnings on the cigarette boxes. But anyway, that hay caught fire and sent a blaze ten feet tall around the barn he was in and burned all the way next door, where the armory was.
Now, the Army boys had gathered themselves up by this point, and it being Christmas Eve, they were pretty sore about being away from home and knowing they were going to get a good screaming to about losing that bell. So, after a bit of investigating, they found out about the hollow and had gathered themselves up to go charging in and take the bell back. Well, low and behold, the second they get into the middle of town, in the dead of night, freezing as it was, the fire had reached the armory and had lit all the gunpowder up. The explosions were so danged loud that it sounded like God Almighty himself had come stomping down to yell at everybody, and the Army boys turned tail and ran as far as they could. The fire burned up real good and sent itself blazing back toward the bell, which then turned a bright, bright red with heat and glowed so much that people from all around the hollow came down, figuring they would find out what all the fuss was about with the explosions.
By the time the whole town had gathered, one of the Army boys, who had deserted when the explosions started, came out of hiding, holding a shirt over his head and hanging onto his rifle to steady him so it looked like a big old cane. By the light of the bell, he looked like Moses himself to a bunch of the hollow folk and they spontaneously started singing Christmas carols and celebrating all over again. Nobody had the heart to tell them that they had just mixed up a bunch of Bible stories because it was just such a moving moment. The Army boy, well, he was just happy not to be lynched, and joined in on the festivities.
A few months later, that Army boy became our first ever town sheriff, and by the next Christmas everybody figured since the bell had been such a hit, and had scared off the Army like a miracle, we should turn lighting it up into a tradition. At first it was just a little bonfire underneath the bell, and it'd turn the bell a little red with heat, but by the time electric lights become a big deal, well, we practically invented stringing them up for Christmas. So now, every year, we celebrate the Grand Illumination of the Christmas Bell here in the hollow, and you can see the glow from all the lights clear up to Eagleton. Not that you'd ever want to go up there, though."
I looked up at Cletus where he stood behind our log.
"Did that actually happen?" I asked.
Cletus made an uncertain sound and shrugged.
"Some of that was a little shaky, but he got the core story down. I don't know, though, he's the only one around who claims to have been there when it happened, so who's to say?"
I heard a few creative profanities muttered from behind the bonfire, some cracks and pops, and then suddenly the object behind the fire burst into brilliant light. Now I could see that it was a wooden frame holding what looked like a well-aged bell. I'd spent a few summers in college traveling around the country visiting the Liberty bells that resided in the capital cities of each state. I had to admit that this bell looked remarkably like those, and I had to wonder if somewhere in some hidden government file there was a note about one of the bells going missing.
"Everyone come on up and enjoy some s'mores and hot cocoa" someone called from the side the fire.
"I brought along a couple of festive bottles of Cletus's Clementine moonshine," Cletus said, producing too seasonally decorated bottles of what I could only assume was his personal moonshine.
Nobody seemed eager to accept one from him, but Cletus wasn't deterred. He popped open one of the bottles, pulled a collapsible cup out of his pocket, and filled it up. I expected him to toss it back, but instead, he offered it out to me. I hesitated, and he pushed it towards me with more insistence.
"Come on, Holly, it's your first Christmas in Whiskey Hollow. Clementine moonshine is tradition around here."
"Then why is no one else drinking it?" I asked under my breath, sliding my eyes over to Graham.
"Because everyone else has already participated in the tradition," he answered.
"How about you?"
"Oh, no thank you, I'm not much of a drinker."
I scoffed.
"So only when you're getting on a train?" He looked at me strangely and I nodded. "Oh, yes. I heard you muttering in your sleep. Are you seriously now blaming a glass of gin and tonic for the train breaking down?"
"No," Graham said. "I'm blaming the fact that I didn't get my glass of gin and tonic for the train breaking down." He seemed to think about this for a moment. "And blame actually seems like kind of a harsh word," he said. "Why don't we just say that I think that it is a contributing factor."
I reached out and accepted the cup from Cletus. Bracing myself, I took my first ever swig of moonshine. I immediately felt like I could breathe fire, and the hint of Clementine flavor in the back of my throat was strong enough that I could barely get the cup back into Cletus's hand.
"Delightful," I managed to choke through my throat.
"See? It's delicious. A true Whiskey Hollow seasonal delicacy."
"And an ideal door stop," Rue whispered to me as she passed behind me and walked towards the fire.
Graham and I chuckled as we followed after her, accepting sticks with marshmallows on the ends from a bright-eyed young woman standing next to a table laden with cookies and cups of hot cocoa. We found an empty space around the fire and plunged our marshmallows into the flames. I turned mine around in an effort to get it evenly scorched. When it was flaming, I pulled it out and gently blew on it to extinguish the marshmallow. I peeled small bits of the sticky molten sugar from the stick and brought it between my lips, so I can get off of my fingertips. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Graham watching me and I turned my attention to him.
Our gazes held for a few intense seconds b
efore Rue stepped up beside me and offered me a few segments of a bar of milk chocolate. I dipped my marshmallow back into the fire to warm it up a little and then pressed it onto one of the segments of chocolate. I put it in my mouth and let out a little groan of pleasure as the sweet flavor washed across my tongue.
"Now all you need is a graham cracker," Rue said. "Then you can make yourself the perfect s'more."
I slid my eyes over to Graham, watching him eat melted marshmallow off of his fingers.
"No, I don't," I said.
His eyes moved over to mine and I saw something flicker in them.
Dear lord, what am I saying? What has gotten into me?
I thought back to the night sitting in my apartment when I decided to go on the cruise and talking to Vera about my plans. I remembered her surprise at my willingness, and now I understood her caution. Graham had triggered something in me, lit something deep inside me that I hadn't explored and that I didn't understand. These glimpses of it were coming out almost involuntarily, as if what was coiled up within me have responded to Graham and was now beginning to emerge. The glint in Graham's eye and the power that I felt radiating from his body whenever he was close, brought nerves to my belly that left my mind spinning and my heart pounding. I turned back to the fire and focused on toasting another marshmallow to eat with another square of chocolate.
After we'd gotten our fill of s’mores and warmed ourselves up for the walk back with cups of hot cocoa that may or may not have been spiked with moonshine, the whole group started its way back through the village. We had been walking for several minutes before I recognized that we were on our way towards Bubba Ray's restaurant. As we approached, lights burst to life on the roof of the building. I looked closer and realized that the strands of lights had been meticulously wrapped around what appeared to be a series of various sizes of bowls positioned around the roof.
"Are those bowls?" I asked Rue.
"Yes, they are," Rue said. "That is Bubba Ray's most famous contribution to Whiskey Hollow’s annual Christmas celebrations. They've been up there for as long as anybody can remember."
"Why?" Graham asked.
"You're going to have to ask Bubba Ray about that," Rue said. "But I wouldn't expect the true story. I don't even think he really knows what happened the night those bowls got up on his roof. On a positive note, though, them being up there did lead to the creation of two of the hollow’s most treasured commodities."
"What are those?"
"His chili served in the corn bread bowl and the Christmas bowls."
I was staring up at the Christmas bowls, at once struck by their bizarre beauty and contemplating their origin, when I felt Graham's hand wrap around my wrist. He gave me a hard tug, pulling me back up against him. I gasped in surprise, but didn't step back. Both of his hands flattened to the small of my back and before I could process what was happening, I felt his mouth on mine. His kiss was deep and insistent, unhesitant and bold. I was stunned by it, but even more by the feelings that burst and sizzled inside me as his lips moved across mine and the tip of his tongue gently coaxed my mouth to open. I slid my hands up the hard plane of his chest and over his muscled shoulders, wrapping them around his neck to both hold myself steady and draw him closer to me. Suddenly fear and dark, painful emotions swelled through the back of my mind and into my heart, and I pushed away from Graham. He tried to reach for me, but I stepped away, shaking my head.
"What is it?" he asked.
I tried to answer, but I couldn't bring any words past the tightness of my throat. Instead, I turned away from him and ran. I could hear footsteps pursuing me, and I tried to push faster, but the cold air bit into my lungs and soon I wasn't able to go any further. I stopped and whipped around, but instead of finding Graham behind me, I saw Rue.
"I'm sorry. I would have caught up to you faster, but you have an unfair advantage with those legs of yours. I bet you don't have trouble reaching things on grocery store shelves, do you?"
"More trouble than the girl who tackled Graham," I said.
Rue laughed and nodded. When I didn't laugh along with her, her expression fell, and she took another step towards me.
"What's wrong?" she asked. "What happened?"
I shook my head. I didn't want to admit to her what I was going through or what I was feeling. I didn't even want to admit it to myself, but I knew that there was no way that she would understand.
"Do you think you could give me a lift back to the motel?"
"Of course."
"I'm sorry, I know that you're enjoying the Illumination. I can wait somewhere for you."
Rue shook her head, stepping up to me to loop an arm through mine.
"No, it's okay. Once you've seen a mixing bowl full of multi-colored twinkle lights sitting on the roof of a Mexican-Southern fusion restaurant once, you've kind of seen it. Richard has Clementine. I can take you back."
"Thank you."
We fell silent as we walked to where Rue had parked the truck. I climbed into the front seat beside her and she turn the truck around, starting up the other side of the hollow so that she could avoid the crowd that was still enjoying the lights around Bubba Ray's. We remained quiet for several minutes before she glanced over at me.
"Are you sure you're okay?"
"I'm sure." I shook my head and looked out the window beside me. "No, I'm not sure."
I expected her to interrogate me further, trying to draw an explanation out of me. Instead, she reached over and patted my thigh comfortingly, then continued on down the road.
"That's alright. You can't be okay all the time."
We got to the motel and Rue hesitated for a moment before unlocking the door. I turned to look at her and saw her staring at me as if she knew something that I didn't.
"You never really know what's in someone's heart, Holly," she said. "The only way to know is to ask them to show it to you."
I didn't know how to respond. I managed a meager smile and slipped out of the truck then walked towards the room. I prepared myself as I unlocked the door and opened it, part of me hoping that Graham would be inside waiting for me. As the door swung open, however, I realized that the room was dark and empty. I washed my face and changed into my pajamas, shuddering as I got beneath the covers. I lay in the bed trembling, knowing that it wasn't the warmth that was going to soothe me. I drifted in and out of sleep, my mind spinning with a constant reel of Graham and our kiss, and my breakup with Ben. The moments repeated faster and faster until they blended and seemed to have occurred in the same moment. I couldn't separate them. I couldn't focus on either without thinking of the other.
Somewhere in the distance, through my half-waking dream state, I heard a knocking sound. At first, I didn't know what it was, but then I realized it was someone knocking on the door. My mind tried to link the sound to the memories that were coursing through it. As the sound got louder I wondered if I was back in that childhood bedroom with Ben on Thanksgiving morning, trying to focus as I listened to him feebly explain the reasons why he thought that we should no longer be together. Was someone knocking on that bedroom door? Were they listening? Were they knocking to let us know that they were there, that they were witness to what was happening? The thought was humiliating. Even as I tried to let what he was telling me sink in and for it to make sense, nothing that he was saying held any credence. The moment that he started talking I knew the reason. He just wouldn't say it and somehow that made it far worse.
The knocking got still louder, and I heard someone calling my name. The sound of the voice was muffled with my partial sleep, and I couldn't recognize it. Had someone seen Graham pull me into his arms? Were they watching us? Could they see the shock, the surprise, the turmoil, the nervousness? Were they calling my name to stop me because they knew I was making a decision that I would live to regret?
The knocking turned to pounding, finally breaking through my sleep enough that I was able to recognize that it was someone knocking on the motel door and that the
voice calling my name was Graham. I realized that I had used the only key to the room to get inside when Rue brought me back and that he could not get in. I reluctantly dragged myself out of the warmth and protection of the bed and walked to the door. Bitterly cold air hit me as I opened it and I retreated back to the covers having barely even looked at Graham. I tucked my head against the pillow, feigning sleep as I listened to him move around the room, go into the bathroom, and then emerge. He settled into the makeshift bed that he had created on the floor and let out a long exhalation.
"What happened, Holly?"
My heart clenched at the sound of the question. I hadn't wanted him to ask it. I wanted to pretend that moment could simply pass us by and that he wouldn't think of it again. But I knew that that wasn't truly an option. I kept my eyes closed, somehow thinking that that would guard me, would keep me from having to experience all of the emotions that were starting to build in the back of my mind and at the edges of my heart.
"I can't do this," I told him.
"What do you mean? Why can't you?"
"What about your wife?"
The word was painful to even say, but it was something that needed to be spoken, needed to be asked. I couldn't stand there and let him kiss me that way, feeling as though he was reaching within me and getting so close to a part of me that had never been discovered, had never been revealed to anyone else, and still imagine that his heart and his mind where with the woman that had once shared his name and who had given him the child who he loved more than anything. When I was getting ready for the cruise, I had fooled myself into thinking that I would be able to throw caution to the wind. I would be able to be that woman who just strolled into one of the bars or one of the nightclubs and took my pick of the men. I told myself that nothing was going to matter. I was going to think only about myself and not worry about anything else. Now, though, I realized that I hadn't been anticipating any emotion. I didn't expect to feel anything as strong as what I was beginning to feel for Graham. I realized that I couldn't do that to myself. Still so raw from my break-up with Ben, I wasn't ready to allow myself to feel something so powerful only to know that soon it would be taken from me and given to someone else.