A Little Country Christmas

by Carolyn Brown

  Iris woke at four thirty, opting for a warm bath instead of her usual shower. As she played the sponge over her body, she couldn’t help wondering what it would feel like to have Collier’s hands following the same path. It was hard to imagine letting an utter stranger into her house, but he’d made certain she made it home safely and left without making a scene. Too bad he was only going to be in Charleston for the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday weekend.

  The transformation from seductress to working woman was complete when she pulled on a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved tee; she’d exchanged the stilettos for running shoes, and a rich moisturizer for her skin type and clear lip gloss replaced the dramatic nighttime makeup. Today, her hairstyle was more Peter Pan than Halle Berry. Nothing about her outward appearance bore any resemblance to the woman from the night before.

  Locking the door to her apartment, she walked down the staircase, opened the outer door, and stepped out into darkness. Sunrise was still more than an hour away. Streetlights revealed the Christmas decorations that had been put up along Main Street by the local chamber of commerce. Meanwhile, merchants had gotten a jump on the holiday season by decorating their doors and plate glass windows with colorful lights and decorative wreaths a week following Halloween. A few had placed pots of poinsettias on tables and countertops. The residents of the island were also into the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday spirit, with a steady stream of customers coming into and calling the Muffin Corner, placing orders for cakes, pies, and cookies.

  It’d taken a year, but Iris’s lifestyle had become the personification of simplicity since relocating from Baltimore, Maryland, to Cavanaugh Island, South Carolina. Instead of getting into her car and driving ten miles to work, she now walked three blocks from her apartment to the Muffin Corner. Here on the island there were no traffic lights, stop signs, or traffic jams. Her sound sleep wasn’t shattered by honking horns or an emergency vehicle’s wailing sirens. The streets and roads were safe enough to navigate regardless of the hour. After spending her childhood as an Army brat, moving from one base to another, she had finally put down roots in a place that actually felt like home to her.

  Forty-five minutes before she was scheduled to begin working, Iris opened the rear door to the bakeshop tucked into a row of stores off Moss Alley. An early start meant she could finish early and then return home to make her own desserts and prepare side dishes for Thanksgiving dinner. Light from the kitchen illuminated the floor in the storeroom, while cool jazz blared throughout the shop. She knew who’d come in early by the music choice. Mabel Kelly preferred jazz while her husband, Lester, favored new age.

  She took off her running shoes, pushing her sock-covered feet into a pair of white clogs, and then slipped on a white chef’s jacket with an embroidered muffin over the breast pocket. Covering her hair with a matching cotton cap and with several pairs of latex-free gloves filling the patch pockets of her jacket, Iris entered the industrial stainless steel kitchen.

  A smile parted her lips as she watched Mabel sway to the melodious sound of a soulful sax. Mabel stood barely five foot and claimed a pair of wide hips and slightly bowed legs. She flaunted her Gullah roots as a direct descendant of slaves brought to the island to cultivate rice when South Carolina was still a British colony. Mabel’s fifth-generation grandfather had been credited with developing a method for draining swamps and diverting the water to irrigate rice paddies.

  Although Mabel and Lester had been married for nearly twenty years, the couple didn’t have any children. Iris never asked, yet Mabel did feel comfortable to disclose she never wanted children because from the age of fourteen she had to help her father raise six younger siblings after her mother got hooked on drugs. Iris thought perhaps Mabel had opened up to her because she wanted Iris to reveal her own past, but she hadn’t. Once she’d closed the door on her marriage, she vowed never to open it again. Only Tracy knew what she’d gone through after a year of abuse from her ex-husband, and with no help from her mother-in-law, she finally found the strength to start life anew.

  “Good morning!” Iris shouted over the music.

  Mabel turned around, flashing a gap-toothed grin. “Mornin’! Let me turn down the radio so we don’t have to shout at each other.” Like Iris, she’d covered her braided hair with a white bouffant cap. She lowered the volume on the radio that rested on a table near the walk-in refrigerator/freezer.

  “It’s nice to see the Christmas decorations up on Main Street.”

  Mabel made a sucking sound with her tongue and teeth. “Folks belonging to the chamber cut the fool at the last meeting when they told the board they wanted Main Street decorated before, not after Thanksgiving. Personally, I feel that it puts everyone in a more festive mood when seeing the decorations.”

  Iris nodded in agreement. In some of the larger, more populous cities she’d noticed Christmas decorations going up in early November. “Where’s Lester?”

  “He’ll be along directly,” Mabel reported as she resumed cutting out piecrusts. “I told him he’ll have to handle the customers today while you and me fill pie orders. What do you plan as the cookie of the day?”

  “Butter pecan shortbread.”

  Closing her eyes, the older woman shook her head. “I love me some shortbread cookies.”

  “They’re also my favorite,” Iris confirmed. At least once a week she made up a large batch of basic shortbread and sugar cookie dough.

  When first hired, Iris was given the responsibility of assisting Lester in making pies and decorating theme cakes, while Mabel’s repertoire included muffins, doughnuts, scones, and quick breads. Now, Mabel’s muffin of the day and Iris’s cookie of the day were customer favorites. She glanced over at the bulletin board littered with order slips.

  “How many pie orders do we have?” she asked Mabel.

  “Eighteen.”

  Iris estimated it wouldn’t take more than four hours to make eighteen pies. The Kellys had devised a method of putting the ingredients for the crusts in an industrial mixer with a dough hook, then running the dough through a large machine resembling a pasta maker, turning the kneaded dough into thin, flaky, buttery sheets, which were placed on a flour-dusted butcher-block table and cut in circles to line nine-inch, deep-dish pie plates. Each sheet yielded six crusts. All of the fillings, made on the premises with fresh ingredients, were stored in the refrigerator in airtight, half-gallon glass jars.

  Iris removed the pushpins from nine of the orders and sorted through them. “I have two apple, two cherry, one peach cobbler, and four sweet potato.”

  “Don’t forget to make a few for yourself,” Mabel reminded Iris as she crimped the edges of a pie shell.

  Opening the refrigerator, Iris removed a plastic container labeled shortbread dough and another with finely chopped pecans. “I think I’m going to make a potato pie with a sweet pecan crust.”

  Mabel’s flour-covered fingers stilled. “Oh! That sounds decadent. Can you make one for me?”

  “Sure. If I have time, I’ll make some tartlets to put in the showcase. If they go over well, then we can add them to the pie choices.” Daily Muffin Corner favorites were muffins, doughnuts, and cookies. Pies and cakes were always special orders.

  “Remember, we’re closing at noon today,” Mabel reminded Iris. The bakeshop would open again Thanksgiving morning from seven to noon for customers to pick up their orders.

  “I want to leave before noon because I need to make desserts for my dinner, but if you don’t mind, I can make them here after we close.” Iris knew she had to leave by two, which would give her enough time to return home to shower and change her clothes before driving to Tracy’s house to meet the school bus before three thirty.

  Mabel sucked her teeth again. “Child, please. You know you don’t have to ask. Besides, I know one of these days you’re going to leave us to go into business for yourself, and mark my words, you’re going to do very well.”

  Iris went still. How did Mabel know? She’d heard about the Gullah super
stition that people born with a caul, or a membrane covering their faces, had the gift of discerning the future. She wondered if Mabel was clairvoyant—because Iris hadn’t uttered a word to anyone; not even her parents or brother knew she wanted to start up her own business.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “You remind me of Lester and me after we graduated from pastry school. For years we worked our butts off at a hotel chain baking for catered parties. I got tired of the frantic pace before Lester did. It took awhile, but I finally convinced him to move back here and open our own bakery. You’re much too talented to hide your gift under the proverbial bushel.”

  Slipping on a pair of gloves, Iris turned the cookie dough out onto a sheet of waxed paper, covered it with another sheet, and rolled it until it was approximately a quarter inch thick. She knew she would have to tell the owners of the Muffin Corner she planned to quit once she bought a house where she’d convert space to use as an industrial kitchen. Mabel had just given her the opening she needed to reveal her future plan.

  “You’re right. I have thought about it. Eventually I would like to design wedding cakes exclusively.”

  Mabel cut out another crust. “You can do that here in the Cove.”

  Iris met her eyes as she picked up a star-shaped cookie cutter. “But wouldn’t that compete with you and Lester?”

  “Not if we go into business together.”

  She gave her boss a skeptical look. “Are you talking about a partnership?”

  There came a pregnant pause, and then Mabel said, “Yes. Lester and I bought the vacant store next door, believing we were going to expand. We changed our minds when the recession hit everyone hard here on the island. Although we’ve tried renting it out, no one has come forward.”

  It was hard for Iris not to cut a dance step at that news. However, seconds later her newfound joy dissipated like a drop of cold water on hot coals. Something just didn’t add up. Why would the Kellys hire her, then a year later approve of her becoming a competitor?

  “I’m confused,” she told Mabel.

  “What about?”

  “Lester is known as the ultimate cake man. Do you think folks will patronize me if I open a shop next to yours selling cakes?”

  Mabel removed her gloves, tossing them into a nearby plastic-lined wastebasket. “I have a confession to make.”

  Iris listened, stunned, as her employer revealed why she’d hired her. Lester had been diagnosed with the onset of debilitating rheumatoid arthritis, and as it progressed, he wouldn’t be able to stand or sit for prolonged periods.

  “RA runs in his family,” Mabel continued. “His mama, daddy, and several of his cousins also have it; most of them started walking with canes before they were fifty. Dr. Monroe has prescribed anti-inflammatories for Lester, but he doesn’t like to take them because they upset his stomach. I can manage making cookies, doughnuts, and muffins, but there’s no way I can fulfill all of the pie and cake orders. Even now Lester’s not able to keep up. That’s why I hired you to help him. Eventually all of our special-order customers will be referred to you, and I’m willing to let you have the space rent-free for the first two years in return for thirty percent of your sales.”

  Iris paused, replaying what Mabel had just outlined in what sounded to her like a Shark Tank pitch. She knew she couldn’t give Mabel an answer until she weighed all of her options: operating out of a shop meant she could continue to rent her apartment; the money she would’ve spent to install an industrial kitchen in a house would be used in the shop; and if Mabel agreed, she could buy the store, using the property as a business tax deduction. Her mind worked overtime, contemplating a business arrangement that could prove conducive and advantageous to both her and the owners of the Muffin Corner.

  “Let me think about it over the weekend, and I’ll let you know sometime next week.”

  Iris took a break at nine thirty and left the shop through the rear door. Sitting on a wooden box, she pulled out her cell phone and called her brother, hoping to catch him before he and her niece got on the road to drive up from Florida to spend the holiday weekend with her. As a business owner himself—he taught veterinary surgery at the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, while also running a successful veterinary practice in Gainesville—she wanted his take on Mabel’s proposal.

  Much to her surprise, Evan actually answered. She listened intently as he outlined the pros and cons of entrepreneurship. “Thanks for the advice,” she told him. “You’ve given me a lot to think about.”

  “If you’re going to incorporate, then you’re going to have to come up with a name for your business. I have to go now because I’m scheduled to perform emergency surgery on a champion show dog.”

  “I thought you were driving up today.”

  “I was before I got the call to operate.”

  “What time should I expect you tomorrow?”

  “I plan to be on the road before sunrise. Allie likes eating breakfast at the Cracker Barrel, so we’ll make at least one stop before we get to Charleston.” Evan told Iris he and his daughter were excited about coming to Cavanaugh Island and spending the holiday weekend with her before he rang off.

  This year marked the first time Iris would host Thanksgiving on the island. Not only had she invited her family to come to celebrate the holiday with her, but also Tracy and Layla. She’d reserved connecting bedroom suites at the Cove Inn for her parents, brother, and niece during their stay.

  Last year she’d joined her family on a cruise to the Caribbean to celebrate her parents’ thirty-eighth wedding anniversary. US Army Col. James Nelson, a graduate of the US Military Academy at West Point, who’d served with distinction in the Gulf War and was promoted from the rank of lieutenant colonel to a full colonel, had announced his retirement effective the end of the year, shocking everyone with this disclosure. When seeing the expression on her mother’s face, Iris suspected that not even she knew what her husband had planned. Her father, who’d served his country for thirty years, had finally decided at the age of sixty-five he wanted to experience what it felt like to be a civilian again.

  Iris noted the time on the phone. She had only a few minutes to talk to Tracy before the teacher began her first class. “Did you meet someone?” Tracy asked before Iris had a chance to say anything.

  Pinpoints of heat stung Iris’s cheeks. “Yes,” she whispered into the mouthpiece.

  Tracy screamed. “You didn’t!”

  Stretching out her legs and crossing her feet at the ankles, Iris watched an elderly woman attempt to park a behemoth sedan with fins dating back to the 1970s between two pickup trucks. The parking lot appeared to be filled to capacity, which meant Christmas holiday shopping had begun in earnest.

  “Earth to Iris. Are you there?”

  “Yes, I did,” she confirmed for the second time.

  “You’re going to have to tell me all about it.”

  A knowing smile parted her lips. “There isn’t that much to tell.”

  “Are you going to see him again?”

  A slight frown furrowed Iris’s forehead “I doubt it. He’s only going to be here for the holiday. Enough about Mr. Last Night. I’m calling to ask your opinion about something.” She quickly told her about Mabel’s business offer.

  “If I were you, Iris, I’d go for it,” Tracy said, her voice filled with excitement. “We can talk more about it later. By the way, I put some oxtail stew in the slow cooker this morning, so all I’ll have to do is make the sides when I get home.”

  “Don’t bother about the sides. I’ll fix them once I get to your place.” Since becoming best friends, Iris had volunteered to meet Tracy’s daughter’s school bus and look after the seven-year-old until Tracy came home.

  “You don’t have to, Iris. You’ll have enough to do tomorrow putting together a Thanksgiving dinner.”

  “Stop stressing. I’ve got everything under control.” Her menu included roast and Cajun deep-fried turkey, corn bread–sausage s
tuffing, giblet gravy, collard greens, a sweet potato casserole with a praline topping, Parker House rolls, and the quintessential Southern Sunday dinner dessert: coconut layer cake.

  “Okay,” Tracy conceded. “Remember, I’m going to haunt you until you tell me about your Mr. Last Night.”

  “Bye, Tracy.”

  Tracy laughed. “Later.”

  Iris went back inside. She wanted to tell Tracy that she didn’t want to talk about Collier, who, despite her denial, she wanted to see again.

  Collier woke for a second time in less than four hours, flailing wildly and drenched in sweat. The nightmare was back, and he was drowning in an ocean stained with the blood of men staring up at the sky with sightless eyes. He’d managed to make it to the sand, where the stench of burning flesh threatened to make him lose the contents of his stomach. Rising to his feet, he started running, but arms like steel bands held him back until he broke free, stopping suddenly when flames erupted before him. He stood helplessly, watching and yelling at the top of his lungs while the firebomb consumed the Humvee.

  Collier opened his eyes, staring up at the ceiling in the hotel suite, chest rising and falling heavily, the back of his throat raw from screaming as the images depicting the horrors of his last deployment slowly faded. As Special Forces, he and his team were always called into the most dangerous operations. The nightmares were so vivid Collier could recount every day of the thirteen months he’d been in Afghanistan, the sights, sounds, and smells lingering with him like he was still there.