The Christmas Pearl

by Dorothea Benton Frank

  Barbara yanked and pulled the belligerent pocket doors to the living room closed so that the tree and all the gifts were hidden from view. Pearl spread breakfast on the sideboard. Soon my family members, dressed in appropriate clothes and thinly disguised hostility, appeared in the dining room, served themselves, took their places at the table, and once again, devoured the meal.

  “I don’t feel like going to church,” George said, pugnacious as ever.

  “George?” Lynette said quietly. “I think it’s important for Teddie.”

  How could he argue with that?

  “I think it’s important for us to pray together as a family,” Barbara said. “No matter what you believe. We have so many blessings…besides, we have a white Christmas. Just the short walk to and from church will be beautiful!”

  How could anyone find fault with that? It appeared that we were finally making some headway, but there came the hiccup. The conversation reverted to where it had left off on Christmas Eve.

  Lynette, having shamed George into attending church, decided to remind him of something for which he should beg forgiveness while there.

  “I still cain’t be-lieve what you said to me last night, George!”

  “Get over it, Lynette,” he said. “How about what you said to me?”

  “My brother and his lovely wife…” Camille said, drawing up the side of her mouth in criticism, looking at me.

  I gave her a stern face. My “enough is enough” speech was on the tip of my tongue, when Barbara stood.

  “All right now. Let’s stop all this evil this instant. I have something to say.” She turned to Camille and nodded to Cleland, George, and Lynette. “Here’s how it is. First of all, Camille? You are my only daughter. Sweetheart?” She said the word so nicely it was heartwarming. “Let’s face facts. You’ve got problems.”

  “Like you’re perfect?” Camille retorted with a definite edge of defiance in her voice.

  “Hush. That’s not for you to say. I’m the mother of this family. It’s time we all shape up or there won’t be a family. Unfortunately, George and Teddie are right about your money issues, but it was contemptible to say anything about it. The fact is that for years I’ve been giving Grayson money to pay your bills. He was so demoralized by your overspending and…well, to be frank, your drug abuse, he couldn’t take it anymore. The only reason he didn’t file for divorce and sue you for custody is that he loves you. He wants you to seek help. He loves you, Camille. So do I. And we love Andrew, but Grayson adores him, Camille. With all his heart. Right after New Year’s, you are entering a treatment program. I’m taking care of Andrew. He’ll go to school in Charleston. It’s all ready arranged.”

  “See?” Teddie smirked.

  “Close your insolent mouth, little girl,” Barbara said in an even tone. “From this moment on, you will mind your manners and have some respect for your elders or there won’t be any Santa for you! At all!”

  As though she had been slapped, Teddie’s angry eyes filled with tears. She pouted, crossed her arms, displaying every kind of snippy body language short of throwing herself on the floor and having a full-blown tantrum. Everyone ignored her except George, who stunned the family and her by saying, “Cool it, kid. Your grandmother’s right.” George may have been insufferable sometimes, but he was smart enough to smell a change in the political wind.

  “Grayson cares?” Camille said. Finally grasping what Barbara meant by entering treatment, she sputtered, “Wait a minute. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Yes, you are. By the way, I’ve invited Grayson for dinner this afternoon. There are enough pills in your purse…well, to stock a pharmacy! Keep only enough for the next six days and give me the rest. And your credit cards. You will do this for the sake of your own family.”

  “I’m not so sure…”

  “Yes, you are,” Cleland said. “You will do as your mother says. For the sake of your family.”

  Apparently, Cleland had purchased a ticket for the bandwagon, too!

  “Okay,” Camille said, looking at Andrew. It was easy to see that she was filled with self-doubt over her ability to kick her addictions. However, when she weighed trying to do so against the possibility of losing Andrew, there was only one choice to make. “I’ll do it. I can do it.”

  For some inexplicable reason, I believed she would. I could see she wanted to reconcile with Grayson. I knew she loved him. Most importantly, she had taken the first step toward accepting that she was the problem, not everyone else.

  Barbara turned her attention to George.

  “Now you listen to me, son. Teddie is your daughter and Lynette is your wife. End of story. You are a family, too. I am putting you all on notice. You will get along, respect each other, and on January fifth, I am sending you all to a family counselor. I’ll come to Charlotte to go with you if I have to. Do you understand?”

  “So will I. Listen to your mother, George,” Cleland said. “She’s right.”

  Cleland was exhibiting all the signs of an inspired epiphany. His support wasn’t everything I wanted for Barbara—I’m talking about fidelity and love—but it was a darn good start. Barbara beamed with confidence.

  “Lynette, I have the name of someone I want you to talk to about anything that’s bothering you…bullying, dieting, parenting, respect…you just name it. She will help you sort it all out. Now would anyone care for another biscuit?”

  “Yes, I believe I would,” I said. Barbara and I smiled at each other with such warmth and compassion that I felt myself flush with pride.

  I pressed the buzzer under my toe. Pearl appeared in her black dress, ruffled apron, and starched crown. She smiled and smiled.

  “What can I get for y’all, Ms. Barbara?”

  She had deliberately given her attention to my daughter as an affirmation of her newfound authority.

  “Everything is perfect, Pearl. I just wanted to thank you for a wonderful Christmas breakfast.”

  “You are entirely welcome, Ms. Barbara! Merry Christmas everyone!”

  “Merry Christmas,” they replied with mixed enthusiasm.

  “We had better get our coats on!” Barbara said.

  The bells of churches all over Charleston were beginning to peal.

  Resigned to the new order of the day, Teddie, George, and Camille grumbled their way to the coat closet. Andrew, Lynette, Barbara, and Cleland were more eager.

  “The sooner we get there, the sooner we’ll get home and find out what Santa brought,” Lynette said to Teddie.

  “Santa. Big deal,” Teddie said. “Who cares about that old bunch of bull?”

  “Miss? We’ll have no more of that kind of talk!” Barbara said, but sweetly.

  Having received more reprimands in twenty-four hours than he had in thirty-something years, George mumbled a stupid joke. “Who died and made our mother the boss?”

  “You really don’t want to know the answer to that,” I said. “Now run along like a good family. Say a prayer for me, all right?”

  “You aren’t coming, Mother?” Barbara said with a trace of worry in her voice.

  “You don’t need me this morning. Pearl does,” I said.

  She nodded to me, trusting my decision, and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

  “I love you, Mother,” she said. “So very much.”

  It had been a long time since I had heard those words. I could feel my heart give a little lurch in my chest. I wanted to cry from joy.

  “I love you, too, Barbara. I am so very proud of you! Now scoot!”

  Pearl was right behind me at the front door. We stood together watching them all sashay down the slippery sidewalk. We saw Barbara and Cleland come to a standstill. She put her hands on her hips. We couldn’t hear what they said to each other. I would ask her later. He put his arms around her. It appeared that at least for the moment, he had agreed to behave himself.

  When they were out of sight, Pearl turned to the manger scene. She shot an eye to me.

  “One gust of rea
l wind and that thing’s gonna be a pile of toothpicks,” she said.

  It was true. The shelter was listing to the west. There was no baby in the manger. It was a pitiful display.

  “What are we going to do about this?” I said.

  “Hmmph! Watch this…” Pearl inhaled. The little building righted itself toward us. Lights appeared all along its edges, inside and out. Then, in the wink of an eye, there was a swaddled baby doll lying in the manger.

  “That doll is the hottest ticket on the toy market. That Teddie is going to holler her head off when she sees it. I gots the whole wardrobe and everything for it under the tree.”

  “She says she’s too old for toys,” I said with delight.

  “Hmmph!” Pearl, in imitation of the most uneducated street child of the day, made the most brilliant statement of her entire visit. She said with a burst of laughter, “She be messing with she own head, too, ’eah?”

  “Right! You’re so right! That poor child! But aren’t they all? What’s next?”

  “That tree!”

  “Whoo hoo! Let’s go!”

  We hurried inside and pulled open the living-room doors, which, given their age combined with their condition, usually resisted over a tugging. Today, though, it was like some unseen hand had greased the tracks they rolled on. Maybe one had! Nonetheless, we stood back, staring in horror at the abomination before us. It was hardly the White House.

  “Holy hairy cats and mangy dirty dogs! That is the ugliest thing I ever did see in my whole life! Before, during, or after!” Pearl said. She started to laugh. “Oooh! Help me, Lawd! Come on, Lawd! We gwine fix dis now! OOOH! Let’s go!”

  She took a very deep breath, waved her hands in the air over her head, snapped both fingers. The tree disappeared in a burst of smoke. In its place stood a regulation balsam fir, well over ten feet in height, lit with hundreds of minuscule gold glowing lights, strands of pearls looped all around it. All of our family’s distinguished ornaments were hung in just the right spots. It was a magnificent feat, and without question, it was the most beautiful Christmas tree to ever grace our home.

  “Pearl! It’s gorgeous! I’ve never seen…” I gasped. “Pearl! Where are all the rhinoceros ballerinas? Those ugly elves?”

  “Gone! Poof!” She looked at me with the expression of an imp, which wasn’t easy for her to pull off, given her size.

  “Pearl?”

  Oh, she was a she-devil when she wanted to be! I knew Camille would come undone to see her tree destroyed. We would have trouble all over again!

  “Gotcha! Didn’t I? Well, I was gonna send them to the big furnace in the sky, but I put it in the family room instead! All that crazy stuff is back there!”

  Not wasting a moment, she snapped her fingers, and the fireplace cleaned itself in an updraft. A new pile of logs lit themselves. In an instant, the drafty old room crackled with warmth. The mantel over the fireplace was laden with old-fashioned garlands. Wreathes decorated every window. Each had a red satin bow. Everything was reminiscent of my youth.

  “Ms. Theodora? That’s the same ribbon. Recycle! Let’s show them how to do this ’eah thing right!”

  “I’m with you, baby! What’s next?” I felt like I was thirty-five!

  Pearl stared intensely at all the wrapped packages under the tree. New ones appeared and they began to shift shapes and relabel themselves. That was quite a sight to behold!

  All the wrapping paper became an opalescent ivory color and the boxes were now tied with red satin ribbon. I began to see a theme emerging. This was Pearl’s Christmas.

  As I followed her through the hall to the dining room, she pointed a finger at the stair rail and at the large hall mirror. They were immediately swagged in greens and ribboned in red satin. She paused for a moment to look in the hall mirror while she adjusted the greens.

  “I’ll be done ’eah soon enough! I gots to get dinner on the table, iffin that’s all right with you? Hmmph!”

  “Who are you talking to?” I said.

  “The meter maid, that’s who. Time’s running out! Now let’s get going. They gwine be home in less than an hour!”

  “What can I do to help?”

  “Nothing! You know you don’t have to do a thing—no, wait! Where’s your grandmama’s Bible?”

  “Heavens! I think it’s in the bottom drawer of the sideboard! Why?”

  “What kind of a question is that? What in the world is it doing in there?”

  “What do you think? Because my heathen family can’t deal with looking at it! Probably makes them feel guilty, bless their hearts.”

  “That’s your job, then. Fix it like your mama used to do. I’ll go make the Reconciliation Eggnog.”

  “The what kind of eggnog?”

  “Reconciliation! I gots to be sure when they make up that it sticks, don’t I? Hurry now!”

  Before she left me she eyeballed the hall table. Our family’s crèche set materialized from nowhere. It was surrounded by greens and votive candles.

  “Hmmph!” I said.

  “Hmmph, yourself!” she said, laughing.

  When Pearl disappeared behind the kitchen door, I got down on my knees to dig around in the bottom buffet drawers. I finally found the Bible in the heaviest drawer, the most difficult to open. There were piles of wrinkled place mats, stubs of old candles saved in case a hurricane blew out our electricity, paper cocktail napkins and napkin rings that we never used. When at last I found it and lifted it out from all the rubble, I figured as long as I was already on my knees I might as well offer a little prayer, so I did. Silently I said, Lord? If You see my Fred, can You please tell him I said Merry Christmas, that I love him? If it’s not too much trouble, can You ask him to make himself useful today, You know, to do what he can to help us? That goes for all my other dead friends and relatives, too. Thank You, Lord, Amen.

  My knees gave me a fit as I struggled to get up from the floor. Happily, I made a fortuitous rise without mishap.

  I ran my hand across the red leather cover of the Bible. A flood of memories came back to me—looking at the pictures with Gordie long before we learned to read, how our grandmother read passages to us, how the story of Adam and Eve had scared us half to death, the beautiful calligraphy, how I marveled at the formation of the letters and the gold leaf when I learned to write in cursive. That same Bible had been as much a part of our day-to-day activities as my mother’s cast-iron skillet.

  I looked at the corner table where it used to rest for the Christmas season. I decided that was where it should go this Christmas day as well. The table was covered with silver frames filled with pictures of family vacations and other landmark events. They could all go in a drawer for the remainder of the season. I wondered if anyone would object. If they did, I would say that this day was not about remembering playing around on a beach, catching a fish, or seeing the Eiffel Tower. Christmas was a serious occasion. The Bible belonged on display. Period. I needed a silver tray on which it would rest, so I went toward the kitchen and the door swung open.

  “’Eah!” Pearl said, handing me the exact one I wanted.

  “Thanks,” I said, thinking it was lucky for me the tray didn’t come flying right through the air. It could have cut my head right off!

  I put the tray on the table right in the center, opening the Bible to the Gospel of Luke, where my favorite story of the birth of Jesus was found. I looked around for extra candleholders. Finding none whose removal wouldn’t make a table or a nook appear to have been robbed, I went to Pearl.

  “I need—”

  “I know.” She pointed to the counter, where four silver candlesticks and four bayberry tapers waited.

  She lifted the large bowl of eggnog and placed it on a tray. With less energy than it takes to extinguish a candle, she blew the kitchen door open to pass through. I shook my head at her otherworldly antics for the thousandth time since her arrival, took the candles and candlesticks, and followed her to the dining room.

  “I’ve got ham bis
cuits and pimento cheese sandwiches to hold them until dinner is ready,” she said. “Remember! They need to drink a cup of this!”

  “Think it will do the trick?”

  “Ms. Theodora? My God and my Gullah heritage ain’t failed me yet, so I imagine they is still up to the task!”

  “Lord, I hope so!” That was a prayer for divine intervention, not a blasphemous remark. “So, tell me, Pearl. What’s for dinner?”

  “Oh! My old sweet friend! What’s your favorite Christmas dinner you ever had?”

  “Me?”

  The walls started to rattle, there were feet stomping overhead, and all the pictures went crooked again!

  “I guess I ain’t the only one asking!” she said, waving her arm at the walls as the pictures righted themselves and the house became quiet again.

  “Or the only one who’s hungry! Goodness! Let me think! The most delicious dinner I can recall right now was when I was about eight. My grandmother got it in her head that we were going to have a traditional English Christmas-day dinner. It wasn’t easy in those days to find a good piece of roast beef or a fattened goose; at least that’s what I remember them saying. Of course, there was no goose to be found, so they settled on roast beef.”

  “Hmmph! You think I don’t remember? Who do you think cooked that meal?”

  “Oh! Of course! You did!”

  “That’s right! Minted peas with little tiny white onions, mashed potatoes, Yorkshire pudding…”

  We started to laugh again. Oh, by golly, this time we laughed until tears were streaming down our faces, whooping until some impatient, unseen force seemed to give Pearl a nudge.

  “Oh, fine! Fine!” she said to the ceiling.

  I looked at her, knowing that message meant we only had a short time left together. The thought of it made me want to break down and cry enough tears to fill the Ashley River. The Cooper, too.

  I looked at my wristwatch. “Five minutes, maybe ten. Then they’ll all be here!”

  “What are you worried about? Let’s close these living-room doors.”

  We slid them together with the sound of a pleasant thump. Pearl went to the kitchen once again to see about what magical event of hers was next to come. I lit the candles around the Bible and all the candles in the dining room. I wondered what Barbara, Cleland, and all the others would say when they returned to see the house all redecorated.