The Christmas Sisters

by Annie Jones

  Lee snorted and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “We'll see about that.” As he walked inside, his heavy boots scuffed over the old boards like a schoolyard bully kicking up dirt on the playground.

  Sam sat back and fixed his gaze on the steeple of the Persuasion All Souls Community Church. Big Hyde had tried to warn him. But that hadn't prepared Sam for the reality of the forsaken church or the coldness of the townspeople. What had he expected? The seed of the idea to come back to town and set things right got planted in his brain so long ago that he hardly remembered anymore where his realistic plans left off and his idealism took over.

  The screen door of Dewi's opened and slammed shut again, but Sam had not noticed who had gone inside. Whoever he was, he had certainly not taken the time to offer a wave or invite Sam to come inside and warm up. No, warmth was one thing no one here extended to him. What had he been thinking coming back?

  Maybe the real question was, who had he been thinking about? He told himself he'd come back to serve his hometown, to try to build a future for children growing up here now, and to make amends with people he'd hurt when he was nothing but a troubled kid himself.

  He ought to know by this stage in his life that the lie you tell yourself is the most dangerous lie of all.

  He’d come back for her. For Nicolette.

  He could see her in his mind's eye just as clear this moment as she had been on the night he left her standing on Reggie LaRue's lawn on New Year's Eve. Nic had told her mother she was with a girlfriend, then sneaked over to Reggie's, the scene of wild goings-on the likes of which a girl like Nic would never have even imagined if she hadn't gotten hooked up with Sam. He had promised to marry her and take her away from Persuasion forever. That night, Nic learned once and for all how easily a man who made a promise in passion to a woman could break that promise, even if he knew it would also break her heart.

  It was the lie he told himself that allowed him to do it. The means he found to justify his selfish behavior, to take the easy path instead of doing the right thing. Looking back now, he understood it had been a pivotal point in his life, the thing that had set him on a sometimes dark and ever twisting path. It was that night that had brought him back from the brink many times and brought him back to Persuasion in time.

  There was nothing noble or forward thinking in his actions that night. He just got scared, and being a young man, became arrogant in his fear. So he ran off, telling himself he was doing it for her own good, and left the only girl he had ever loved standing in Reggie’s yard sobbing. He had not done it for her.

  But he had moved back for her. At least partly. He moved back for all the fine reasons he'd recited again and again to the people he left behind. But in his heart, he always made himself add, and for Nic. I'm moving back for Nic.

  And she didn't live here anymore.

  Sam opened his eyes and sighed.

  He tugged the collar of his black leather jacket up around his neck. He'd stay until Easter. If he hadn't made any headway by then, he'd just have to admit it wasn't meant to be and move on. In the meantime, he had work to do. He'd wasted too much time already.

  He wasn't going to think about Nicolette Dorsey anymore. He started the engine. Wouldn't give her another thought.

  He had a greater purpose for his homecoming, for his life as well, and he would focus on that alone. He stretched his arm over the back of the seat and turned to check behind him as he slowly backed the truck out of the space in front on Dewi's.

  Beep. Beep. Beeeep! He heard the friendly warning blasts of a compact car before he caught the gleam of the front bumper followed by a flash of silver. Without thinking he lifted his hand to acknowledge and thank the driver but the car was gone. Almost immediately in its place, framed by the back window of his truck, another car appeared, one of those monstrosities of a vehicle that looked more suited for patrolling the wilds of Africa than tooling around the quiet streets of Persuasion. Following in short order, a dark blue station wagon whizzed by so fast Sam could not tell how many people were in it or who was driving.

  But then he didn't have to get a good look to know, did he? The cars took the corner of Fifth and Persuasion with the skill and showmanship of NASCAR drivers roaring around a banked curve. They made the transition from paved to dirt road like they'd done it all their lives.

  Because they had.

  “Sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas a person'll look up and there they come, one, two, three. Cars flying down the road. Them girls descend on that old place like a flock of snowbirds settling in for the winter.” Big Hyde's prediction rang in Sam's ears even as his own resolve faded to a sweet, aching memory.

  Put Nicolette out of his mind? That was the last thing that could happen now, and he wasn't exactly sure what to think about it.

  “You had no right. You had no right at all to rent out our house without our consent.” Nic never spoke a cross word to her aunts in her entire life, but this? This was just too much to let slide with a smile and a soft response.

  “Honey, it isn't a matter of rights. It's a matter of right versus wrong.” As Fran spoke, Nan nodded her head, her expression the mirror image of her twin.

  Fran and Nan had never married. Despite the fact that their mother had given them the nonidentical names of Francine and Nannette hoping to encourage individualism, to this day they shared a home, a matching wardrobe, the same sweet but stubborn disposition, and a penchant for doing as they durn well pleased.

  “Why have you got yourself all riled up, child?” Aunt Lula rubbed Nic's back in a slow, soothing circle. “We didn't rent out the whole house, just the master bedroom and bath.”

  “With kitchen privileges. No good having a place to sleep and take a--” Aunt Bert normally would have said something blunt enough to curl a mule's tail.

  “Little pitchers have big ears,” Nic warned and made a quick eye movement toward Willa, who had scrambled to kneel on a kitchen a chair, her upper body stretched out over the table to play with the objects there.

  Nic had not wanted to take this trip at all, but her aunts' actions had forced it. She refused to take Willa back to begin her new school experience mimicking the unfiltered language of Aunt Roberta Dorsey Bolden.

  “Mama, these aren't pitchers, these are salt and pepper shakers.” Willa held up a pair of plump pink ceramic pigs in overalls and straw hats.

  “So they are.” Nic smiled and patted her sweet child's back. She saw no need for lengthy explanations about old sayings and their meanings. It would mean little to Willa. Besides, in a world where it did not happen often enough, she liked letting her daughter be right about something.

  “As I was saying, we had to include kitchen privileges. What good's a place to sleep and to do your business,” Aunt Bert lowered her voice to a whisper to make sure her far gentler euphemism did not lose all its impact. “If you haven't got a place to make a cup of coffee and eat a biscuit?”

  Nic tried not to grin at the woman's tenacity.

  Bert folded her soft, flabby arms over her round tummy.

  Nic looked around the very kitchen her aunts had recently granted some stranger the right to use. Big and airy, with tall windows that looked out onto the overgrown backyard, this room had been the heartbeat of the home in her childhood. No matter what the occasion, friends and family always seemed to collect here, filling the six chairs around the oak pedestal table, curling up on the window seat, even leaning against the counters when no other space presented itself. Just being here was the thing they all craved.

  And the noise that created! Chatter and laughter, the clunk of the broken-hinged oven door plopping open then slamming shut again, the whoosh of gas burners coming on suddenly at full flame as Mother or one of the girls took a turn keeping everyone well fed and welcome.

  But there was one person Nic did not feel like making welcome here. “Look, I know you mean well, but this renter, this border you've taken in, has got to go.”

  Fran and Nan, Aunt Bert and Au
nt Lula exchanged bemused looks.

  Nic wished she could moan and groan and pitch a pure-de bona fide hissy fit but she just didn't have the heart for it. Ever since the birth of her daughter, Nic no longer let herself get bogged down in the petty nonsense of finessing around others to get her way. Straightforward was now her style. But where her aunts were concerned it might as well be straight forward into a brick wall.

  Petie should have handled this. Of course, not ten seconds after they hit the front door, her older sister had dashed upstairs, claiming she had a bad feeling about something and had to call home immediately. Collier offered no help either. Still breathless from the life-threatening hugs of the Duets, the baby of the family had breezed into the kitchen, checked the refrigerator, put on a pale, woebegone look, and proclaimed she had to go to Dewi's to pick up a few things or they'd all starve before sundown. Sometimes Nic hated the dramatic streak the other women in her family so enthusiastically embraced. Other times she was just plain agitated that she hadn't thought of employing it before they got the chance.

  “The thing is, we...that is, I...” Nic fidgeted with the edge of the quilted place mat in front of her on the table. “We had other plans for the house that did not entail renting out any part of it.”

  “Well, you never told us.” Nan poured stout black coffee into almost translucent china cups.

  “This is the first we've heard of any plans.” Fran handed a filled cup to Lula, who placed it just so on a delicate saucer.

  “You did leave us in charge of things here, to do what we saw fit.” Lula passed the steaming drink to Bert.

  “To do what you saw fit about taking care of the place, upkeep, maintenance. I thought for sure y'all understood that.” Thought it? Nic knew they understood it. She did not buy this innocent act for one moment. Her dear, darling elderly aunts were up to something. Well, they could just understand this—it wasn't going to work. Nic had too much at stake to let their kindly mischief-making get in her way. “None of this matters, of course.”

  “We didn't think so, sugar, not now.” Lula moved to set a cup and saucer in front of Nic.

  “Because you're going to have to tell that boarder to leave.”

  Lula gulped. The cup clattered against the saucer. Coffee sloshed over the rim. Her eyes grew wide and she sank into the chair as if that were her only hope against fainting dead away onto the cold, pocked linoleum. “Leave?”

  Nic took the cup and saucer from her aunt's hands without so much as batting an eye or spilling a drop. Drama had its place, she supposed, but it had nothing on the calm determination of a mother doing what she must for her child's well-being. “Yes, that's right. Leave. Hit the road. Don't let the door smack ya from behind on the way out. So long. Good riddance. Buh-bye.”

  “But...” Nan's mouth hung open.

  “But...” Fran's did, too.

  “We never could....” Lula wrung her hands.

  Bert puffed up her already sizable chest and huffed. “No.”

  “Excuse me?” Nic sat the coffee down with a thunk.

  “We're not going to do that, Nicolette.” Bert scowled. “Now, I'm sorry if that interferes with some plan of yours, but we've made a promise, and if it's one thing The Duets do not do, it's go back on a promise.”

  “If it's one thang tha dyuettes do nawt do, it's go bayck on a promise.” Willa held the ceramic pigs up belly to belly, smiling snout to smiling snout as she parroted Aunt Bert's drawl.

  Nic wanted to wring her sisters' necks for leaving her to deal with this alone. Like she didn't have enough already on her plate with worries over Willa and money and... She shut her eyes and put her head in her hands.

  “You know something, Willa, honey?” Aunt Lula's grandma-sweet but gravel-throated voice flowed over Nic's frazzled nerves like the warmth of a fire-lit hearth on a rainy winter night. “Here it is just three weeks from Christmas and we haven't even got the decorations out of the back bedroom closet. What say you and me and Nan and Fran go see if we can't dig them out and see what's what?”

  “Dig 'em ouyt and see whut's whut!” Willa echoed, clapping her hands and all but bouncing off her chair.

  Nic mouthed a thank-you to the three women creating a lovely distraction for her child. And for her, too, truth be told.

  Just the mention of the deep, dark, cedar-scented closet that kept hidden away the wonderful treasures of her childhood like the photo albums, beach umbrella, and Christmas decorations flooded Nic with emotions and memories. The thrill of birthday parties, the tranquility of sitting on the porch swing on a summer night, the joy of catching fireflies in a jar, and the marvels of many, many Christmases spent in this very home with everyone she loved close at hand warmed her thoughts.

  By selling the house she would be taking all that away from her child. She was no fool. She knew that.

  But what would Willa reap in return? That's what Nic had to focus on. Yes, she would have to sacrifice something of the past, of Willa's roots and her own, but she would give her child a better future. Or so she hoped.

  “I see how this troubles you, child.” Aunt Bert heaved a weary sigh. “But you have to understand, we've given our word. We can't toss someone out on the street because you got a bee in your bonnet.”

  A sudden surge of frustration, anger, and apprehension pushed Nic to her feet, her voice louder than she intended. “I don't have a bee in my bonnet, Aunt Bert! I have a child! A wonderful, precious child who has got all these needs and I… I…”

  The words strangled in the back of her throat. They always did as if saying it aloud somehow made her a bad mother and a woman too small in her faith. As if admitting the truth of Willa's problems sounded too close to giving up on her baby girl. Nic blinked back the tears and swallowed before going on, softly. “She has these needs...these special needs, and I have got to find some way to provide for her.”

  “Then I reckon you'd welcome the extra rent money.”

  “It won't be enough, Aunt Bert.” She pictured the file in her suitcase with the bill for the first year's tuition. “Not nearly enough.”

  “Then perhaps you need to think about other resources—”

  “Don't you think I've used every resource available already? I have prayed and I have prayed. I have prayed until my throat was almost as raw as the ache in my heart for that fragile, innocent angel I brought into this hard, hard world.”

  “I know you have, honey. We all have and do. But I was thinking more of an earthly solution to your problem.”

  “I have an earthly solution. But for it to work, you first have to get rid of this boarder.”

  “Maybe it would be better if you would get rid of the idea that you have to shoulder all the responsibility for that child all by yourself. She has to have a father somewhere who-—”

  “No.”

  “That's pride talking.”

  “It's reality talking. Trying to locate Willa's father is not an option, and even if it were, I cannot imagine it would be worth the time, money, and sacrifice it would require.” Nic folded her arms around herself and pulled her shoulders up tight. “No, we are going to do this my way.”

  Tires crunched on the gravel drive outside. A purring engine cut off.

  Nic sighed. Collier was back. Collier would be on her side. Any minute now, her little sister would walk through that door to back Nic up and all would be resolved. Just that easy.

  “You don't understand, Nicolette.” Bert set her jaw and her eyes went positively beady behind her small oval glasses. “This renter is--”

  “History.”

  “The new minister.”

  “Oh.” Even Nic felt a twinge of guilt over tossing out the first new minister the town had snagged in over a year. So she took a deep breath. Regroup. Find another way, that was what she had always done. “Maybe he could stay until the place sells. Or better yet, maybe he'd be interested in buying it from us! What do you think? Do you think the new minister might want to buy this place from us?”

>   “Don't know.” Aunt Bert’s mouth set in a kind of a funny half-smile, half-wince as the old door creaked open behind Nic. “Why not ask him yourself?”

  A chill wind wafted through the warm old kitchen like a memory carried in an old familiar song or scent. The whole feel of their surroundings shifted. Nic’s skin drew up into a million tiny goose bumps. Her scalp tingled and her throat went dry.

  Two heavy footfalls sounded over the threshold of her cherished home and then he spoke, soft and low, tentative but like they had only been apart for days instead of years. “Hello, Nicolette.”

  And her heart soared… then sank.

  Five

  “A Minister? Minister?” She slammed her hand flat- palmed on the table, knocking over a plastic napkin holder and setting the salt and pepper shakers wobbling. “I don't know what kind of con game you are running, but I'm not falling for it. Not for one minute!”

  “It's good to see you, too, Nic.” He said it like he meant it—because he did. She was here. He'd expected as much, of course, but the reality of seeing her standing in this kitchen, so close he could reach out and touch her, overwhelmed him in ways no man could fully prepare for.

  She folded her arms and shook back her hair like she knew he could not take his eyes from her. Like she wanted to provide a little flash and strut for his benefit. She stole a quick glance at the doorway that led to the rest of the house. So quick he would have missed it if he hadn't been totally transfixed by her every movement.

  Nic Dorsey. How many days had he thought of tracking her down. How many nights had he dreamed of holding her in his arms again? Every single stinkin’ one since the night he left her here. And here she was, as pretty and feisty as ever. He trailed his gaze over the blush of her cheek, the fullness of her lips, the curves of her body. Prettier, he decided, and probably a whole lot feistier as well.

  She licked her lips, a sure sign of nervous energy, then leaned toward him, her right hand still flat on the table, her expression a shade away from fury. “How dare you come back to this town, pretending to be a preacher, no less. And worse still, worm your way in as a boarder in my home. My home, Sam Moss. What kind of bald-faced lies have you been feeding my aunts to accomplish that?”