A Sandy’s Seashell Shop Christmas
Page 4
“I’ve never been to Wisconsin.”
“You should check it out sometime.” His slow, easy smile makes the words sound like an invitation. “Pretty country.” Those deep blue eyes are almost charcoal in this light. They find mine, and seem to both ask and answer questions.
“I might.” What is happening to me?
“Industrial engineering,” he offers.
“Huh?”
“You looked like you were going to ask what I was studying.”
“Oh… mmm-hmm. Yes. I was.” Thank heaven he’s completely clueless. Or maybe he’s just trying to take it easy on me. Maybe he can tell that I’m so messed up, I spend my time chasing after a ghost.
“I like it. I gained a pretty good grasp of big machines in the army. The college offers a hands-on kind of degree plan. I’m not a desk-sitter.”
And he doesn’t look like one, either. “I kind of guessed that.”
A car door shuts in the parking lot and an engine starts. Both of us look toward it, reminded that there’s an outside world and sooner or later it’ll show up in here.
“Hey, listen,” he says after the car drives away. “If you and the little corker here haven’t got anywhere to go tomorrow, we’ll have a big shindig at Aunt Sandy’s house…” He offers up what is now my second invitation to their Christmas festivities.
Maybe it’s a sign. Maybe it’s exactly the sign you’ve been asking for. “I’ll think about that, thanks.” Because I don’t want him to feel bad if tomorrow is just another day, I add, “Micah and I haven’t really been celebrating Christmas. It’s just… hard.”
Those blue eyes study me for what seems like forever. What’s going through his mind? “I get it,” he says finally. “Just know the invitation’s open.” He moves forward on his makeshift seat, and I realize he’s getting ready to stand up. A little note of alarm sounds in my head. What if I’m blowing this and I shouldn’t be?
He pauses, then. “Or if you want to… just take a walk on the beach with somebody and talk, or go for a drive. No strings. Just seems like a brother’s family shouldn’t be alone on Christmas.” By brother, he means Aaron, a brother-in-arms. The homage is so incredibly kind and decent, it gives me that tender, slightly teary feeling, but in a good way. The best way.
Jason leans closer and sticks out his hand, and for a minute I think he wants me to shake on it. The confusion must show, because he chuckles. “Jason,” he says. “I guess I should introduce myself.”
“Tiff.” I place my hand in his, his skin warm against mine.
“Yeah, I know. Aunt Sandy told me.”
“She told me, too. I knew your name.”
He doubles forward, shaking his head, and when he comes up again, his smile is dazzling, but it isn’t what catches my eye. Instead, I’m transfixed by something that has slipped from the neck of his T-shirt. It dangles in the dim light, swinging back and forth on what looks like a shortened dog tag chain. The pattern of three stars and a wheat sprig is barely visible along its silver surface. I gasp, slap a hand over its twin, hidden beneath my jacket. The ring on Jason’s chain is smaller, but other than that, they’re the same – each made from silver 2 Afghanis coins.
He’ll grow into it. I want him to know where I met his mom. In my mind, Aaron holds the ring close to the webcam, turning it in his fingers so that I can see it via Skype. First Christmas present from Dad, he says.
“What?” Jason sits upright, glances behind himself. I must look like I’ve seen a ghost.
My lips hang voiceless, and all I can do is point to the ring, at first. That’s what Micah was digging for while he was on Santa’s lap. He’d spotted it under the costume. Finally, a few words struggle out. “That… the ring… where?”
Jason grabs the chain, lifts the ring and cranes to look at it. “Found it on the floor of a LAMS in Arifjan. I looked down, and there it was next to some parts. I don’t know, I just picked it up and… kept it all this time.” His face narrows with obvious concern. “Why?”
My body feels numb, as if I’m watching the scene, rather than living it. I slip a hand inside my collar, feel the chill of my own fingers against the warmth there as I hook the chain and pull it out, let the ring dangle between us.
Jason blinks, blinks again. “Wha…” The ring looks tiny in his palm as he studies it, then unhooks his and holds the two together. They match perfectly, but one is smaller than the other. “Well, look at that.”
Moments pass before I can manage the words to tell Jason the rest of the story. “Aaron made mine. It never fit, so I just kept it on a chain. He made one for Micah, too, but he never got home with it.”
Jason’s fingers finally close in a fist over his ring and chain. Mine lands against the zipper on my coat, chiming like a tiny bell as Jason presses the fist to his lips, breathes over it as if someone has knocked the air from him. He slowly shakes his head. “How in the world…”
But, I know how. I know it with every scrap of my soul. Something remarkable has happened in my small, mixed-up, broken life. Something that will divide all the days before from the days to come after.
A miracle has taken place.
What else could explain the journey of this tiny bit of metal from a world away… from the desert to this shed by the sea, with this stranger, this brother-in-arms?
I look beyond Jason to the manger, where the infant Christ lies silent in his manger bed. His presence explains everything.
This is a night of miracles.
This is the night of hope reborn.
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