by Susan Rohrer
♥ ♥ ♥
As all well-enjoyed parties must, the evening wound to a close. Merry watched through the service window as Catherine stood with Joan by the door, bidding each of their guests a fond good night. Meanwhile, the kids helped Kiki and Arthur to put the diner tables and chairs back into order on the service floor.
Merry turned to the kitchen sink. She began to wash a stack of trays, making peace with her lot. Having plenty to do always helped Merry, especially when things were hard. She did her best to concentrate on the task at hand, and to forget that her dream of a job was quickly coming to a close. Arthur had been right. What had gone up would soon have to come down, including her already plummeting hopes. She wondered how she would survive it, but trusted that somehow she would.
Daniel pushed through the swinging door with a large bag of trash. “There you are,” he said. “Don’t you want to say goodbye to everyone?”
Merry brushed an escaped tendril from her forehead. Staying in the background had been challenging all evening. Going out to enjoy the thanks of their guests seemed harmless enough, but the fact that Merry wrestled with whether or not it would draw attention from their hostess convinced her to opt otherwise.
“That’s okay,” she replied warmly. “It’s Catherine’s place. She arranged everything, you know. She’s even bringing Christmas dinner over to you tomorrow.”
Daniel studied Merry thoughtfully. “Funny. I wouldn’t have guessed she had it in her.”
“Never know what’s inside a person, I suppose,” Merry answered.
Daniel shook his head, his growing affection for Merry showing. “I don’t know about you, Merry. You just seem to be able to bring out the best in everyone, don’t you?”
“What’s there is there,” Merry said. “Just got to polish it up, so you can see it.”
Daniel took it in, seeming to perceive more than Merry felt able to express. A moment of quiet understanding passed between them. Nothing was said, but then again, it seemed best to her that nothing would be.
Catherine leaned in the door. “The sleigh is here, Daniel. Merry, can we drop you?”
Merry turned to Catherine pleasantly. “Thanks, but no. I’ll get the El.”
Daniel lingered after Catherine headed out to the door. “You’ll join us for church in the morning, won’t you?”
Merry’s eyes misted. It was all she could do to bridle her rising emotions. “I’m so glad you’re all going, Daniel. And, believe me, I’d love to. But no. I just can’t.”
Snow continued to fall as Merry walked home from the station alone. It was late, but Mr. Grabinski was outside, shoveling the walk. A train rumbled by overhead.
Life was returning to normal.
“Merry Christmas, Mr. Grabinski.”
The old super scowled as usual. “Not so much, if this keeps up.”
Merry entered her darkened studio apartment and flipped on the light. Rudy stretched from his nap, happy to see her.
Merry picked Rudy up and scratched his neck. “Come here. You didn’t think I’d make you spend Christmas Eve all by your lonesome, did you? Gotcha something.”
Merry sat with Rudy and pulled out a catnip mouse. “You like it, boy?” She playfully moved it near his nose, and then teasingly drew it back. “What’s this, Rudy? What’s this?”
Rudy sniffed the catnip curiously. He pawed at it, and then carried it in his mouth to his pillow.
Merry took her coat off. She hung her elf hat on a hook. There, on the kitchen counter, was the little wind-up kangaroo that she’d bought for Daniel. Sadly, she put it back into its shopping bag. There was no way that she could give it to him now. It would make him think of her, she reasoned, and she knew that just wouldn’t be right.
Merry wandered over to her little Christmas tree with the burned out lights and not a single solitary present underneath. Tears brimming, she tried to encourage herself. She looked out at the falling snow, quietly devastated.
twelve
Merry awakened to the light of the rising sun, sparkling on new-fallen snow. Though Rudy continued to slumber contentedly beside her, she crawled out of bed and padded to the window. Frost edged the panes in intricate patterns. The brightest of white blankets outside was enough to make even Merry’s neighborhood look pretty.
Soon, Mr. Grabinski will be out front, shoveling the walk again, she thought. Like always. Across town, the Bells would be stirring from their beds. Before long, they’d be at their church, singing Joy to the World. They’d come home and open their presents. They’d sit down to eat Christmas dinner, like people who have families do together. They would make new memories. They’d start afresh, just as Daniel had wanted.
Merry inhaled deeply, contemplating her surroundings. This was her world. The Day of Days had arrived in all its shining glory, and for the first time in her life, something inside Merry was wistful about the fact that it had come.
It wasn’t just that her Christmas Coordinator job was ending, Merry realized. It was much more than that. It was that tiny wrapped jewelry box she knew waited for Catherine, nestled in the boughs of the Bell’s family tree. It was those Four Words, that question Daniel would ask Catherine when she opened it, the question Merry had begun to hope she would hear from him in time herself.
So this is it, Merry thought.
This is what it’s like to be in love.
Never in her life had Merry known that feeling. She’d thought about what it might be like. She’d dared to dream that it could happen to her someday. But never in all Merry’s wildest imaginings had it been like this: that she would be so in love with a man like Daniel, yet so utterly alone.
♥ ♥ ♥
Across town, Hayden yawned as Tara led her up the attic stairs to the landing. Ollie climbed up behind them, still in his pajamas. Hayden couldn’t imagine what they were so anxious to show her or what could possibly be worth dragging herself out of bed for so early.
Hayden looked at the entrance to the attic quizzically. It was covered floor to ceiling with green foil wrapping paper. A broad red ribbon with an enormous bow stretched over a tag with Hayden’s name. Hayden stared at it in shock. “This is my Christmas present?”
Ollie tugged at his sister’s robe excitedly. “You gotta rip the paper off.”
Hayden looked at Tara, who nodded her approval. With that, Hayden tore through the paper and into her new room. She scanned it, open-mouthed for the longest time. “Really?” Hayden could feel it as Tara watched her face for a response.
“You like it?” Tara asked.
Hayden stepped into the freshly redecorated space. In addition to a twin bed topped with fluffy pillows, there was a nice computer station. A comfortable seating area was set up beside the dormer window. “That’s mom’s rocker,” Hayden observed.
Tara followed. “Yeah, kind of old-school. But I thought you could sit there, you know. Think about her. If you want.”
Hayden turned to Tara, stunned. “You did this. For me.”
Ollie stepped between them. “I was her elf. It’s from me, too.”
Touched beyond expression, Hayden hugged Tara tightly, grateful tears brimming. She made sure that she squeezed Tara longer and harder than she had since they were little girls, dressed exactly the same.
Ollie threw his arms around his sisters. He looked up at Tara jubilantly. “I think she likes it,” he grinned.
Hayden knew that her new room was only the beginning of surprises in store for her family. She hung back, watching as the others opened their gifts. Her dad loved the new plates her Gramma had turned for him at her shop. And, in return, Gramma had seemed very pleased with the sweater-coat he’d asked Merry to choose for her.
It was fun to watch as Ollie tore into a mysteriously long package she had helped Merry to wrap for him. Though Ollie was clueless as to what it could be, Hayden couldn’t wait to see his goofy little face when he realized what it was.
Peering into the box, Ollie’s eyes bugged. He pulled out a fishing rod and reel, ecstatic.
“We’re going fishing?”
“Got that right,” Daniel nodded.
Ollie jumped up and down, repeatedly. “We’re going fishing!” he shouted, pumping the pole into the air with glee.
Hayden stood with Tara and Ollie, watching with anticipation as their dad opened his gift from them, a shiny red caboose to complete his train set. And just when the day seemed it couldn’t get any better, Tara enthralled Ollie with gallon jar of wriggling worms to go with the tackle box Hayden had picked out for him.
As each gift was opened, Hayden glanced under the tree, near the back, at the package she’d wrapped for Tara. There were so few left. In a way, she was tempted to take the present back, run upstairs, and order a gift certificate for Tara instead. But how could she do something so impersonal after what Tara had given to her? Merry’s words kept ringing in her ears, that the gifts that were the hardest to give were the best ones. That must mean her gift to Tara was great, she thought, because giving it was taking every ounce of strength that she had.
Hayden stalled, waiting till almost all of the packages had been opened. The only one left besides her gift to Tara was the little one her dad had nestled in the boughs, tagged for Catherine. Hayden hadn’t asked what it contained. She didn’t have to. She was pretty sure she knew exactly what it was and it was the last thing she wanted to think about. It wasn’t that Catherine was so terrible. She was beginning to grow on her in a weird kind of way. It was just that the little box seemed like the only flat note in what was turning out to be a pretty decent Christmas, a better one than Hayden had expected it to be.
Finally, it happened. Ollie poked around the back of the tree. “Who’s that one for?” he asked.
The moment of truth had come. Hayden reached under the tree and retrieved the package. As unceremoniously as she could, she handed it to Tara. “Okay, so it’s not as Cucamonga-sized as your present to me, but...here you go.”
Everything in Hayden squirmed as Tara tore off the wrapping, opened the box, and folded back the tissue paper. Inside was the sonnet Hayden had labored so long over, then matted and framed under glass.
Tara gazed at it, quite noticeably overwhelmed. “To Tara?” she read, as if she could hardly believe it. “You wrote your love sonnet about me?”
Hayden curled her lips into a crooked little smile. “I had to write it about somebody.”
Her Gramma sat down beside Tara. “Read it, Honey,” she prompted.
Tara handed the frame back to her sister. “No, you read it, Hayden. Please?”
Hayden hesitated at first, then took a breath and began to read aloud:
“To Tara”
I wish I were the wonder that you are.
Perhaps you do not know how much I long,
To stand and shine alongside your bright star,
To find the vibrant hope that makes you strong.
Your face in my mirror, when e’er I glance,
Your voice, her heart, within resounds,
Leading by birthright, despite circumstance.
Resolved to conquer so much that confounds.
You are not yet so very much like her,
As I would hope and pray to someday be
But through the gift you are her mem’ry stirs,
Resurrecting life, through you, to me.
I fear to say what is so very true:
I love the sister that she gave in you.
Hayden couldn’t bring herself to look up from the sonnet for the longest kind of time. In fact, it was all she could do to finish it. When she finally raised her eyes she saw that Tara’s cheeks were also traced with tears. She saw her Gramma wipe her eyes, then reach over and squeeze her dad’s hand.
Hayden handed the sonnet back to Tara sheepishly. “I only got a ‘B’ on it,” she admitted. “Iambic pentameter got kind of funky.”
Tara threw her arms around her sister. “I don’t care,” Tara cried. “I love you, too, Hayden.”
Ollie looked around at his sisters, his misty-eyed dad and Gramma. “Why is everybody crying?”
Daniel pulled Ollie into a cheerful hug. “It’s okay, Buddy. It’s the good kind.”
Just then, the doorbell rang. Daniel rose. “That must be Catherine.”
Hayden flopped onto the sofa. “Fa-la-la-la-blah,” she groaned.
♥ ♥ ♥
Before long, the Bell family had gathered around their festively decorated dining room table. Catherine backed through the door from the kitchen, carrying a perfectly browned turkey on a large platter. Joan made room on the table amongst dishes of steaming baby green beans, parsnips, and yams with browned marshmallows on top. There was chunky cranberry sauce, apple-pecan dressing, and a cut glass bowl of bright red watermelon rind pickles.
Daniel rose. “Catherine, let me help you with that.”
“No, sit, sit,” Catherine insisted. “This is my gift to all of you.”
As soon as Catherine set the turkey down, Daniel broke into a grin. “Well, Mom...look at that,” he remarked. “You made a new platter to pass down, didn’t you?”
“I did,” Joan nodded, pleased that Daniel had noticed.
“A vast improvement over the last one,” Daniel added.
Ollie held up his matching plate. “I like our new dishes,” he enthused, tracing his finger across the rim. “Look-it, they all have Merry’s name right on them.”
Catherine noticed that Joan stifled a smile as Ollie showed his dad how each dish was edged with holly along with the words MERRY CHRISTMAS, painted into the glaze.
Daniel gazed at the platter, making the connection. “Oh, look at that. I guess they do.”
Catherine absorbed it pleasantly, doing her best to let their references to Merry roll off her arching back. “Daniel, would you like to do the honors?” she said, passing the cutlery set.
Hayden looked around. “Hey, where is Merry?”
“Yeah,” Tara chimed in, “isn’t this supposed to be her big day?”
“Yes,” Catherine interjected, her discomfort growing. “That’s why I told her I’d take care of things for her, so she could have some time to herself, and we could all enjoy Christmas dinner together.”
Catherine couldn’t miss the disappointment that flickered across each of the kids’ faces. She coaxed herself to rise above it.
Ollie quickly appealed to his father. “But when is Merry coming, Dad? I want to show her the fishing rod you got me.”
“And wait till she sees my sonnet,” Tara said.
“And my room,” Hayden added.
Tara turned to her twin. “Merry was totally in on that, you know.”
Suddenly, a mortified expression crossed Joan’s face. “Did anybody get her anything?” Joan searched around the table. Tara, Hayden, and Ollie looked at each other blankly. Catherine saw Daniel grimace, clearly mortified at the oversight.
“I gave her the day off,” Catherine mentioned.
Hayden rolled her eyes. “How about something that she actually wanted? Face it. We’re all total Scrooges.”
Daniel shook his head. “No, it was my place. I should have thought of it.”
Tara moped. “It’s her birthday today, too. This is bad.”
Ollie tugged at his dad’s sleeve. “Let’s call her, Daddy.”
Catherine couldn’t help interjecting. “I’m sure she’d much rather—”
Tara whipped out her cell phone. “Yeah, let’s see if she’ll come over.”
“Oh, I know,” Hayden said. “Put it on speaker and we can all completely grovel.”
Tara’s eyes lit up. “Or carol to her! She would love that. What’s her number?”
Unable to take it any longer, Catherine flatly conceded. “555-7463.”
Daniel turned to Catherine as she abruptly rose from the table, “How did you know—”
“If you’ll excuse me,” Catherine replied. Then, with as much dignity as she could preserve, she strode back toward the kitchen.
“What’s with her?” Hayden asked.
>
Daniel pushed out his chair and stood up immediately. “No call to Merry just yet,” he instructed. “Mom, could you carve, please?”
With that, Daniel quickly followed Catherine out of the room.
As soon as the kitchen door flapped closed behind her, Catherine burst into tears. When Daniel appeared, she tried in vain to dry them. Unable to hide her emotions, she quickly turned away.
“Catherine?”
“I’m fine,” she whimpered. “I’m just... Who am I kidding? I’m a certifiable mess.” Catherine threw her hands up in despair.
Daniel circled around her and faced her. “You look nice to me,” he replied.
“That’s just because I cry pretty,” Catherine blustered. “Mother taught me never to scrunch.”
Daniel nodded, beginning to understand. “This is about Merry, isn’t it?”
“You think?” Catherine blurted. “It’s not like I blame you. I mean, she’s impossibly appealing. Even when she throws the ball completely into my corner, she’s still the unwitting belle of it.”
Daniel looked mystified. “What are you talking about?”
“Last night,” Catherine admitted. “It was all her idea—every enchanting, infuriatingly generous bit of it—right down to hiring Skeeter.”
Daniel reached out for Catherine’s hand, but for the first time, she refused it. “Catherine...”
“I don’t know why I can’t do this,” she mourned. “Sure. I can hold court with the best of society; I can schmooze with heads of state. But put me with a family and I’m completely out of my depth.”
“They can’t help loving her,” Daniel explained.
“Oh, I know,” Catherine replied. “Even I can’t help it. The question is: can you?”
Daniel took the query to heart. When he finally opened his mouth to respond, Catherine cut him short.
“No, no. Please don’t answer that,” she said. “No. Let me just...” Catherine took a moment to gather her composure. “You know,” she continued, “I’ve been thinking about things, and I realize we’d planned to exchange gifts tonight, but the truth is, if we did go through with all that, I...I suppose I’d miss my corner office.” Catherine inhaled, rallying her poise. “Or travel,” she mustered. “Yes. Maybe Paris. Or I might visit my ex in Rome. He sent me a lovely card this year and, well, quite by surprise, I find myself vaguely charmed, and wanting to at least... give it a chance, explore the possibilities. Forgive me?”