The 13th Day of Christmas Read online

  Miss Marva and Charlee spend time together after school every day, and it is a gift to us. She has always been an “old soul,” but I have not understood what that meant until now. She relates so well with adults. She always has. Maybe no one should be surprised that she is friends with a woman who is at least eighty years old.

  Sometimes I watch the two of them working slowly at Marva’s clothesline and I wish I were there too. One day maybe I’ll surprise them and walk over early before I call her home for dinner.

  I am very proud that Charlee has survived this change to our life and to our family so well. Better than Zach. Better than Thomas or me.

  Thomas . . . Thomas continues to work every job he can. Lately he’s been framing houses in a subdivision not far from here. I wish he would frame a home for us.

  But he’s better I think. As Thanksgiving and Christmas come closer, he seems to be getting happier. Tired but happier. We’re not the couple we were before we got caught up in all this. All the life and the fights. But we’re still here under the same roof every night, and I think that means something.

  It’s a good sign, I think, that Thomas is telling Charlee stories again and that he is rebuilding a 1967 VW Beetle with Zach that they got at the junkyard in exchange for fixing the roof on the owner’s home. They’re working on the ugly thing in the yard, even though Zach cannot drive until next summer.

  If he lives that long.

  Zach is still Zach. He still mopes like it’s a sport he’s lettering in. He’s doing better in school, we think; his grades are still not very good, but they’re better, and the phone hasn’t rung yet. I have even caught him doing homework a few times. He told me the other day it will be a miracle if he graduates high school and he might end up washing plastic trays at the food court forever. I told him that if he did the work honestly and lived up to his honor and started to love his family again, I would visit him at the food court every day. I love that kid.

  I am working at Walmart. It’s a twenty-minute drive, but the pay is better than at the mini-mart in Woodbrook, and I get to meet so many interesting people. I’ve made friends and working there feels like our old life in small ways. No one really knows our story, and no one cares. No one judges or grills me about my life. I can just work with some of the nicest people I’ve ever known. I guess it’s my escape from everything I see around me.

  If only one thing matters, I guess it would be this. If my family ever reads this, please understand that I’m trying. I think we’re all trying. We want to turn the corner and keep trying. And if we keep at it, I think we’ll be fine. Yes. We’ll be fine. Saying that makes me believe it more.

  If we can live through this, we can live through anything.

  9

  Rusty Apronisms

  Marva had never spent so much money at the grocery store. Not when John was alive, and not even when J.R. was in high school and eating everything not nailed down. But she didn’t mind; she knew the big tab meant a full house on Thanksgiving.

  A snarky young man at the store had helped stuff grocery bags into every inch of her toy-sized Miata. With every new bag, he guaranteed her it wouldn’t fit and that she’d be making two trips home and back again. But Marva simply smiled and thought that the bold youngster didn’t know her very well.

  By the time they finished their grocery Jenga, bags were arranged on the floor up front and puzzle-pieced into the trunk like clothes in a too-small suitcase. The turkey, a giant nineteen-pound bully, sat triple-bagged and buckled in the passenger’s seat. Marva said a prayer on the drive home that someone in the neighborhood would be out and about and willing to help her carry in the load.

  Marva drove slowly through 27 Homes but didn’t see a single person outside until she hit the bend in the fishing hook. She rolled down her window and greeted the porch wavers, but she knew they couldn’t help. She doubted they could carry a box of breadcrumbs if they had to.

  She rounded the corner, rolled down the short straightaway, and pulled into her driveway.

  “Thank you, God. I knew you were listening,” Marva said when she saw her friend Rusty Cleveland leaning against his pickup truck.

  “How’s my favorite columnist?” Marva said, climbing from the car.

  “I’m good. How are you?”

  “Better, because you’re here,” she said, hugging him. “Would you give me a hand with a few groceries?”

  Rusty reached for his back and feigned pain, but Marva threatened to sock him with a bag of frozen vegetables.

  He agreed to help on the condition Marva watch from the porch.

  She did not argue.

  After three trips and a bad joke about Marva’s turkey needing to hire a personal trainer, Rusty ran to his own vehicle and retrieved something for Marva. After helping put away the perishables, Rusty sat in the living room, and Marva sank into her chair.

  “You look good,” Rusty said.

  “There you go, just like the mainstream media to twist the truth.” She laughed at her own joke.

  “But you do—you look very good, in fact.”

  “My. Well, you’re a kind man, Rusty. A fibber, but a kind one, at least. I’m exhausted, and I haven’t even cooked anything yet.”

  “Guests for Thanksgiving?” Rusty asked.

  “Well, you didn’t think I was going to eat all that, did you?”

  Rusty smiled. “Who am I to judge?”

  Marva looked at him and smiled back. She’d missed her friend’s visits and took a minute to consider the last time he’d checked on her. “Yes,” she finally said after a lengthy pause, “I am having guests this year. Some neighbors, the ones right across the field. I’ve become quite close.”

  “That’s great.”

  “They’re a young family. Young to me, anyway. Two children. The little one is a girl I just adore. She calls me her BBF.”

  “BFF, maybe?”

  “That sounds right,” Marva said. “They’ve had a hard go of it lately, and I don’t guess they would have had much of a holiday.”

  “So here comes Miss Marva, just like always.”

  “Nothing anyone else wouldn’t do.”

  “We both know that’s not true, don’t we?” Rusty reached into a bag that read Sabrina’s Gifts and pulled out an apron.

  Marva giggled at the price tag that still hung from it.

  “You didn’t see that,” Rusty said.

  “See what?”

  Rusty stood and approached Marva’s chair. “Don’t get up. This is for you. I picked it up last month. No, back in September, I guess. It had your name on it.” He held it up for Marva to read. The front of it had a large peanut with a mouth.

  Marva read aloud. “You’re a nut. (But not the tasty kind—you’re more like the ones that make me swell up and require immediate medical attention.)”

  She began cackling before she’d even finished. “That’s one of my favorite apronisms ever.”

  “You like it?”

  “I love it.” Marva pushed herself up and hugged him. “Thank you for thinking of me. Even if I am a nut.”

  Marva escorted him to the porch with her arm looped through his, and they shared a few more minutes of small talk about laundry, some of Marva’s other new aprons, Woodbrook politics, Charlee, the newspaper, Marva’s volunteer schedule, and Rusty’s family.

  “Thank you for the visit,” Marva said. “It means so much. You know that, right?”

  “I do.”

  “So you’ll be back?”

  “I will.”

  10

  Thanksgiving Day

  Charlee woke with an upset stomach that choked her appetite for off-brand Cookie Crisp, but it did not slow her excitement for the holiday. It was going to be the Alexander family’s most exciting day since moving to Woodbrook two months earlier. Her dad was off for two days. Her mother had to work
Black Friday at Walmart, but at least she could spend Thanksgiving at home.

  Charlee sat at the chipped laminate kitchen table across from her mother and made a list on a free notepad from Woodbrook Credit Union.

  Take a shower

  Let Mom curl my hair

  Make place setting cards

  Leave for Miss Marva’s at 11 sharp

  Give a tour

  Help make dinner

  Eat dinner

  Eat dessert!

  Clean up

  Make Zach help

  Watch movie as a family!

  Walk home

  They hadn’t seen a movie together since long before arriving at 27 Homes, and Miss Marva had invited them to stay after the feast to watch something on the fancy television she hardly used. Zach wasn’t convinced, but Charlee was sure that by the time dinner was done, he would love Miss Marva just like she did, and he wouldn’t ever want to go home.

  “That’s quite a list,” Charlee’s mother said.

  “I know! There’s more probably, but these are the big things.”

  Emily pushed herself away from the table. “How about some toast and a glass of milk? Does that sound good?”

  But Charlee didn’t hear her; she was adding stars to her favorite items on the day’s to-do list.

  “How about an apple?” Emily asked, her head in the refrigerator. “It’s a little ripe, but it’s still good.”

  Charlee didn’t hear that, either. She was drawing a stick figure wearing an apron to the right of Miss Marva’s name. Of course, the apron was much bigger than her body, and Charlee added a heart in the middle of it.

  “How about my famous, hot and juicy, fish guts casserole, Charlee? I have one of those in the oven. Does that sound better?”

  But the suggestion didn’t reel Charlee in from her daydream about an afternoon with all the people she loved most all in one place.

  Emily soon placed two pieces of toast in front of Charlee and slid the notepad away from her to the other side of the table. “Eat something, please.”

  In the yard, Zach and his dad were already working on the dusty, rusty Beetle that was taking so long to come back to life; Charlee had suggested there would be flying cars before theirs ever ran again. Watching them through the window, she admitted to her mother that she worried her dad and Zach might spend the whole day covered in grease, listening to loud music, and forget to come to Miss Marva’s for Thanksgiving.

  Emily assured her daughter with a kiss on the head that the Alexander men would not miss the big day for anything. “They’ll be there.”

  After breakfast, Charlee showered and enjoyed having her hair blow-dried by her mother. It wasn’t as long as she wanted it yet, but it was long enough to curl, and Miss Marva had said that if her best friend would curl her hair, she’d curl hers, too.

  Dressed and ready to go long before anyone else, Charlee sat back at the kitchen table and made place cards for everyone using half sheets of cardstock and crayons. Each card had the first and last name of the guest. First names were in red; last names were in green. She even made one for Melvin and gave him the middle name Mason, just for fun.

  “Melvin Mason Alexander. It sounds like a president’s name,” she told the stuffed monkey with the big teeth.

  With the cards done and time left to kill, Charlee lay on the bottom bunk in the room she shared with Zach and rested her head on her hand, careful not to unfurl her shiny black curls. To keep her dress from wrinkling, she pulled the edges straight. It was the only nice dress she’d saved from the moving sale, and it was orange with oversized, white polka dots. When Charlee got tired at night, she thought the dots looked like the moon. A hazy, off-white band encircled each dot, and she counted them as she lay in bed.

  She could tell her hair smelled delicious, and she couldn’t resist the urge to pull a curl toward her nose and enjoy the scent of her mother’s shampoo. The aroma made her feel like a grown-up, and Charlee couldn’t wait to share the new smell and the new look with Miss Marva.

  She tried to read a book she got from the library, but the excitement of the day made it hard to focus. So she gave in and lay flat, gazing up at the bottom of Zach’s bed and wishing the clock wasn’t stuck on boring.

  Charlee looked at the sunflower clock on the wall. “It’s eleven!” she shouted at 10:58.

  “I’ll be right there,” her mother called from her bedroom at the rear of the trailer.

  “All right, I’ll walk slow,” Charlee said, stepping outside and beginning the journey. She stopped at the fallen fence that separated their yard from the communal field and turned back to see her mother whisper something in her father’s ear. Then she waited impatiently for her mother to catch up.

  Heavy rain and unseasonably warm temperatures had turned the grass in the field green and sent it high into the late-November air. Mother and daughter weaved through the field, giggling and pointing and sidestepping small puddles like unafraid soldiers in a foreign minefield.

  When they arrived at the stone pathway just before the clothesline, they found Miss Marva waiting on the porch. Her silver hair was lightly curled, and the style revealed how thin her hair was.

  “You did it! Your hair looks so nice!” Charlee said.

  Miss Marva smiled and fluffed it with both hands. “You’re kind, but yours looks truly beautiful. You look like a glamorous supermodel. But prettier.”

  Charlee looked up at her mother, and Emily winked in agreement.

  “So how do you like my apron?” Miss Marva asked. It was white and featured extra-thick gold stitching and a photo of a sweet potato. Above the picture appeared the question Thankful for You? Then below the image, it read Yes, I Yam.

  Miss Marva motioned for Emily to step closer. “All right, dear Emily, I do hate to hide that lovely blouse, but an apron is required to complete the outfit.” She held one up for her to admire. It was dark green and featured a large pumpkin pie divided into slices—with two pieces clearly missing. Above the pie, in white block print, it read Happy Thanksgiving! Take two and call me in the morning.

  Emily slipped it on and promised to eat at least two pieces of pie before the end of the day.

  Then Miss Marva pulled open Charlee’s apron so she could read it more easily. Charlee immediately noticed that the bottom had been trimmed; it was much shorter than the other aprons she’d seen before. It was cream-colored and the loopy, cursive text was dandelion yellow. It read Charlee Alexander.

  Charlee had both hands over her mouth as Miss Marva draped the custom-sized apron around her neck.

  “Why don’t you?” she said to Emily, and Miss Marva stepped aside so Charlee’s mother could tie the apron around her daughter’s waist.

  When it was tied in the perfect bow, Emily spun Charlee back around and said, “It’s beautiful,” but quickly corrected herself. “No, you’re beautiful.”

  Miss Marva walked toward her front door and, without looking back, raised her right arm and announced, “Let’s cook!”

  Charlee gave her mother the promised tour while Miss Marva finished preparing supplies and ingredients in the kitchen. Charlee pointed out every photo, every Christmas decoration, and every piece of interesting history. She described the wooden Advent calendar in great detail, as if her mother weren’t standing right next to her. Then she suggested her mother shouldn’t touch it. “It’s very delicate, Mom.”

  After the tour, Charlee asked permission to put the place cards on the dining room table, even though it wasn’t set yet, and she was thrilled that Miss Marva said she could decide who sat where. Charlee arranged the seats, then rearranged them, then asked her mother’s opinion, and switched them one more time. She’d run around the table so much she was dizzy when she finally settled on the assignments.

  The three chefs held what Miss Marva called a turkey talk session in the kitchen to p
lan the day. The turkey was already in the oven, but that was the easy part, Miss Marva said. And before Charlee knew the meeting was even over, the kitchen burst alive with breadcrumbs and flour flying, mixers mixing, and pie tins rattling. Charlee had never seen hands move so quickly through the air.

  She also hadn’t seen her mother smile and laugh so much since the move to Woodbrook.

  As the morning turned to afternoon, the three friends broke for a snack and to taste Miss Marva’s Thanksgiving cider. They sat in the living room and played a game to identify the scents that filled the house. Each time one of them closed her eyes and concentrated, she smelled something different.

  “There’s the stuffing,” Miss Marva said.

  Charlee went next. “I smell pecan pie.”

  “Mmm, cranberry sauce,” Emily said, her eyes still closed.

  The game continued until Charlee began naming things they hadn’t even prepared yet. The women laughed and soaked in the company until the afternoon demanded they get back to work. When Miss Marva and Emily returned to the kitchen, Charlee leaned back into the soft couch and put her hands behind her head. She looked up at a ceiling fan and dreamed about a life where days like today spun around and around, repeating themselves perfectly until someone turned off the switch for just a few minutes.

  The doorbell startled her, and when she sat up, she realized she’d napped for an hour and her father and brother were standing at the front door. She pulled it open and asked, “Want a tour?”

  Miss Marva stood at the head of the table at 5:00 p.m. and welcomed everyone to her home. Charlee found that odd since she and her mother had been there most of the day, but she smiled and said “Thank you” anyway.