The Christmas Promise (Christmas Hope)

by VanLiere, Donna

  I wrapped my arms around him and looked at Carla. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  Carla eyed Miriam and looked at the ground. Miriam took the hint and reached for Donovan’s hand, leading him inside.

  I stood with Carla in the driveway and searched her face. “Is he back?” Carla shook her head and wrapped the scarf tighter around her neck. “Are you lying?”

  Her eyes were dark. “No.”

  “I don’t believe you,” I said. Time after time I’d seen battered women lie about being abused, with black-and-blue marks clearly on their faces.

  Carla watched Donovan through the window and ran a finger under her nose. “He’s not back, Miss Glory,” she said. “I’m sick.”

  I turned Carla’s face so I could look at her. “What’s wrong? Do you need to go to the doctor?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “It’s the flu. You know. It works itself out.” She folded her arms and shivered in the wind. “Miss Glory, could you please watch him for a couple of days till I feel better?”

  I thought about it and Carla bit her lip, waiting. I felt uneasy, unsure of whether I believed her. “You’re sure Thomas isn’t there?”

  She nodded. “I’m sure, Miss Glory. I haven’t seen him.”

  “Will you go home and take care of yourself?” She nodded and I watched her slide behind the wheel and back out.

  Carla didn’t show up for work two nights in a row. Chaz asked Larry if she called him or anybody else on the janitorial team. “Haven’t heard from her,” Larry said. “She’s probably snowed in like half the town.” Twenty inches of snow had fallen in two days, and Mr. Wilson debated whether he should even open the store. Several employees couldn’t make it in due to the weather, and Carla was probably just one of them. Chaz waited an hour and then went to the security office and dialed her number. There wasn’t an answer. He tried again an hour later but she still didn’t answer. A half hour later he let the phone ring for several minutes.

  The store closed early due to snow, so Chaz finished his shift three hours earlier than usual. Larry drove him to his apartment. The streets were empty except for a plow that was trying to stay ahead of the snowfall, an impossible task by the looks of the snow that was piling on rooftops and cars. “Have a great Christmas,” Larry said.

  “You too.”

  “Do you work the day after?” he asked. Chaz nodded. “Better have somebody pick you up. You don’t want to be out in this stuff.”

  Chaz closed the car door and stood in the parking lot, looking at his apartment. He could go in and drink till he fell asleep like one of the mannequin people his father talked about, or he could walk to Carla’s to see if she was there. He ran up the stairs to his door and put the key in the lock. He’d never been good at interpreting that small voice inside; he never knew if it was just his mind thinking thoughts, or if there really was something in his soul nagging at him. The wind howled through the breezeway as he stood there, waiting, trying to figure it out. He reasoned that he could continue to call her apartment and rationalize later that he’d done all he could, or he could walk the three blocks to her place. “Damn it,” he said, yanking the key out of the lock.

  Carla’s apartment was on the first floor; he saw a light in the window and hurried to get out of the cold. He knocked but she didn’t answer; he knocked again and waited. The blinds were drawn on the window beside the door, so he peered through the cracks, looking for her or Donovan. Lights were on in the living room, and from what he could see it was a mess. He walked around the apartment and tried to see through the fence that surrounded the back patio. Snow had collected in between the slats of the wood, blocking his view; he jiggled the handle on the gate till the latch gave way.

  The patio had the same view of the living room, but the bedroom window was beside the patio doors. He leaned over, straining to see inside. In the half-light he saw Carla lying on her bed. He bent over the patio rail and tried to rap on the window. He couldn’t get his arm to reach that far, however, so he picked up a plastic baseball bat of Donovan’s and whacked on the window. She didn’t move and he thumped on the window again, harder this time. She still didn’t move and his heart rate jacked up. He rapped repeatedly on the window, yelling her name. She lay still and he felt his heart in his throat. He threw the small metal lawn chair into the patio window but it bounced back to him. The grill was small enough to handle so he heaved it into the glass as he screamed for help. His coat got in the way and he threw it off, then tried again. The glass gave way a little. He slammed the grill into the door two more times. He burst through the hole he’d created and ran into Carla’s room. A bottle of vodka sat beside an opened bottle of prescription pills on her bedside table. “What did you do?” he screamed, feeling for her pulse. “What did you do?”

  Paramedics loaded Carla into the back of the ambulance and one of them looked at Chaz, waiting. Chaz jumped in and the paramedic slammed the door. Chaz sat where the EMT pointed and watched as they worked on Carla. It felt like the wind had been knocked out of him, and he bent over and hugged his knees. He needed to throw up, but couldn’t. “Does she use?” The voice was loud in his ears. “Hey! Does she use?”

  Chaz looked up. “No. I don’t know.”

  At the hospital a flurry of people met the ambulance and chattered words to each other that Chaz couldn’t follow. They rushed Carla into a room and a woman grabbed Chaz’s arm, making him stay outside the door. After a few minutes—or an hour, for all he knew—a nurse with short brown hair and glasses on a chain around her neck flew through the door to his side. “You found her?” He nodded. “Are you a family member?”

  “No. We work together,” he said.

  “Did she ever indicate that she was being harmed by anyone?”

  “No. No, nothing like that.”

  “Her arm is broken,” the nurse said. “She has cracked ribs and several bruises.” She waited for him to say something. “Do you have any idea how those injuries happened?”

  “No, I don’t know anything about her personal life.”

  She went back inside the room and Chaz felt his hand start to shake. A middle-aged doctor with a high, round forehead and thin hair eventually came out and Chaz crossed his arms to stop the shaking.

  “Vicodin and vodka,” the doctor said. “Has she done that before?”

  “I don’t know,” Chaz said.

  The doctor nodded, looking him over. “Has she had any recent falls or been injured by anyone in a confrontation?”

  “I told the nurse. I just work with her and she never told me anything about herself,” Chaz said. “She didn’t show up for work yesterday or today, and I live close by, so…”

  “It’s a good thing for her that you do.”

  “Is she okay? Can I see her?”

  “She’s currently unresponsive and will be going to ICU for further evaluation and care. We’ll send someone for you before she goes.”

  He walked away and Chaz slunk into an orange, cafeteria-style chair down the hall. It felt like his body was oozing into the seat, and the shakes got worse. He leaned over onto his knees and heard footsteps in front of him, but it sounded like they were somewhere in the distance. Electricity was surging through his body, making it quake. He rocked back and forth, trying to ditch the nausea, but it was still lodged in his throat. He looked up and down the hall and walked toward some doors at the other end. There were restrooms on either side of the hall, along with a storage closet and an employee lounge.

  He ducked his head inside the lounge and saw that it was empty. His heart thumped in his ears but he opened one locker after another, looking for anything that would help. A noise outside the door sent him fleeing into the lounge’s bathroom. He locked the door and flipped on the fan, waiting as someone opened a locker and rummaged through it. Perspiration settled on his forehead and back, and the shakes worsened. A bottle of mouthwash sat on the bathroom sink, and he grabbed it and twisted it open. He poured it into his mouth and drank till it
was gone. The bottle fell to the floor and he leaned over the sink, dry-heaving. Sweat seeped through his hair and clung to his face, but after a few moments the shakes stopped.

  He looked in the mirror and the sight he saw repulsed him. A few moments earlier he had looked at people who had broken bones or were bleeding in the emergency room, and he was raiding lockers to get a fix.

  A knock at the door exploded in his ears.

  “You okay in there?”

  His heart raced faster at the sound of someone’s voice, and he flushed the toilet. “Yeah. Sure,” Chaz said. He turned on the water and splashed his face, then ran wet fingertips through his hair. He pulled out several paper towels and dried his face and hands, then opened the door. A man wearing a white jacket stood in the lounge. “I’m sorry. I was sick, but the stalls were full in the men’s bathroom.”

  “Not a problem,” the doctor said. “Do you need to see someone?”

  Chaz threw the paper towels away and headed for the door. “No. I brought in a friend, and the whole thing just made me…”

  “It happens.” Chaz’s back was to the doctor, but he felt him watching him. “Why don’t you sit for a second? Nobody’s in here but me.”

  “No, no,” Chaz said, turning toward him. “I’m really sorry I burst in here. I’ll get back down the hall.”

  The doctor touched his arm and looked at him. “Why don’t you sit down?” Chaz sat in a chair covered with pastel flowers. The doctor sat opposite him and took his pulse. “I’m Nathan Andrews. I work upstairs in Pediatrics, but I’m still qualified to take the pulse of an adult.” Nathan lifted one of Chaz’s eyelids and Chaz closed his mouth tight, holding his breath.

  Nathan crossed his arms and looked him over. “What happened to your friend?”

  Chaz rubbed his hands up and down his jeans; his palms were sweating. “They think somebody beat her up.”

  Nathan made a grunting sound and shook his head. “You found her?” Chaz nodded. “She’s fortunate that you did. You’re a good friend.” The words struck Chaz and he looked up at him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been a good friend to anybody. “Are you going home for Christmas?” Nathan asked.

  “No.”

  Nathan sat back, folding his arms. “Where is home?”

  “I don’t even know anymore.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Just alone, that’s all,” Chaz said. “My parents are deceased.”

  “My mother died when I was little,” Nathan said. “No matter how old I get, I still miss her at Christmas. I look at the parents of friends of mine and think, ‘My mom would be their age now.’”

  Chaz nodded, shifting in his chair. “I do the same thing.”

  “What kind of work do you do?” Nathan asked.

  “I, uh…nothing really,” Chaz said. “I’ve had a lot of jobs. Right now I work in security.”

  “Great.”

  “When I was a kid I wanted to be a doctor.”

  Nathan crossed an ankle over his knee and leaned on it. “What happened?”

  “I came down with a bad case of the stupids,” Chaz said.

  Nathan laughed and stood, walking to the door. “You’re still young, though.”

  Chaz shook his head. “Nah. Not cut out for it.”

  “That’s what I thought, too,” Nathan said. “But it’s never too late and you never know what’s around the bend.” He clapped Chaz on the back and made his way upstairs.

  Chaz walked down the hall and fell into the orange chair again. He leaned onto his knees and pressed his fists into his forehead. He jumped when the nurse called him.

  She let him sit beside Carla’s bed, and pulled the curtain between her and another patient, an older man who was hooked up to an IV. Carla opened her eyes when she heard him. “You look like hell,” she said.

  “So do you,” he said as he stepped close to the bed. “Carla, you don’t have to tell me anything, but…what were you doing?” A tear rolled down her face and she let it fall onto the sheets. “Were you trying to…”

  She rolled her head back and forth. “No. No,” she said. “I needed medicine to stop the pain, but it didn’t help, so I took a few more, but they didn’t work, so I kept on taking more.”

  “You should have called somebody,” he said, stepping closer.

  She shook her head, clenching the sheet in her hands. “No, I couldn’t. I couldn’t call anybody.”

  He sat down and looked at her. “There are people who care, Carla.” She looked up at the ceiling. She didn’t believe that any more than he would have; once you’ve convinced yourself it isn’t true it’s impossible to think anything else.

  “They say somebody beat you up,” Chaz said.

  Another tear fell onto the bed. “Thomas.” She lifted the sheet and wiped her face.

  “You could have died,” Chaz said. She nodded, and more tears spilled down her cheeks. “Donovan would have been alone just like that.”

  “He’s better off alone,” she said.

  He leaned close to her. “No. He’s not. Don’t ever believe that. Nobody’s better off alone.”

  A nurse ushered Chaz out of Carla’s room before he had a chance to ask her if Donovan was still with Miss Glory. He walked out the front doors of the hospital and the cold air stabbed his lungs. His coat was still at Carla’s but he pulled the hood of the sweatshirt over his head. He wandered through the hospital parking lot into the street and started to run. He stopped after two blocks and tried to catch his breath; it was too cold to run. He had to find Donovan; he needed to see him. Help me find him. Help me find Miss Glory’s home. He hadn’t prayed in years, and he felt foolish.

  The bartender from a few nights before saw Chaz as he was driving home and gave him a lift to Wilson’s. From there he ran through the town square over to Baxter, then behind the homes on that street to Maple.

  What was the address Donovan had rattled off? He thought hard but he couldn’t hear the number in his head. It was something 14. 214? 514? His hands ached and he shoved them deep inside the sweatshirt pockets, pressing them close to his stomach. The frozen asphalt seeped through his tennis shoes and he realized his toes were numb. What was he doing? He ran farther still and saw a porch light on in the distance. Snow sat on top of each mailbox like a frosty top hat, and he swiped it away from the top of one: 860. Snot drained out of his nose and onto his hand; he hadn’t even felt it. He wiped it away with his sleeve and his nose stung at the touch. He walked farther and knocked snow from another mailbox: 832. Was the house number 814? He thought it was, and tried to speed up but couldn’t. He put his head down in the direction of the snow and counted the steps he took. What if no one answered the door? What if they called the police? The air burned his lungs and he buried his nose in his sweatshirt. He flicked snow from another mailbox and held on to his side as he read the number: 820. It hurt to take deep breaths, so he took shallow ones instead, counting the number of houses down to 814. It was the one with the porch light on. He pulled his sweatshirt up over his nose again and headed toward it. The street was empty and all the lights were off inside the house. It was two o’clock in the morning. He stood at the bottom of the driveway and hated himself for coming all this way, but the image of Carla lying on her bed jumped into his mind and he had to know that Donovan was safe. Even though the doorbell was lit he chose to knock on the door instead, hoping not to wake everyone in the house. He knocked again and heard footsteps.

  “Who’s there?”

  “Miss Glory, I gave you the bags filled with hats and gloves at Wilson’s the other day,” he said, shivering.

  The dead bolt clicked and the face of the woman that he knew as Miss Glory appeared in the opening. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m really sorry,” he said. “Something’s happened to Carla and I just needed to know if Donovan was here.”

  “Yes he is, but…”

  “What’s wrong? Who is it?” Chaz heard another woman’s voice. She came and stood besi
de Miss Glory inside the darkened entry.

  The chain lock fell, the door widened, and the second woman screamed the loudest, most hair-raising scream he’d ever heard.

  Ten

  A mother’s yearning feels the presence of the cherished child even in the degraded man.

  —George Eliot

  His hands were shoved inside his pockets just as I remembered seeing him as a child waiting for the school bus. His face was thinner and masked with stubble, but his father’s brown eyes peered out beneath the hood of the sweatshirt. I reached for him, trembling as I pulled him inside. “Matthew, my Matthew,” I said over and over, holding his arms so my knees wouldn’t buckle. “It’s you. It’s you.”

  “Mom.” His voice was so small that I barely heard him. He cried as he held on to me and I wrapped my arms around him, weeping.

  “It’s you, it’s you, it’s you,” I said, burying my face in his. I cupped my hands on his face and searched his eyes. “You’re home,” I said, my voice failing me. “You’re home.” I led him to the sofa. “Miriam, bring blankets.” She ran from the darkened room in slow motion but was back in an instant, and wrapped blankets around his shoulders.

  Miriam flipped on a lamp beside Matthew; tears were on her face but she didn’t say anything. She helped take off his tennis shoes and socks, then wrapped his feet in a blanket. She draped blankets over his legs and then backed away and fell into a chair. I sat beside him, not fully comprehending what was happening, and touched Matt’s cheek to make sure he was real. “Every day I saw your face.” I choked on the words. “Every single day I prayed and prayed that you would come home.” My throat tightened and I squeaked out the words “my son, my baby.”

  I threw my arms around his neck and we sobbed as we held each other. There was nothing pretty about it. There are no words to describe how much I had missed my son and the sound of his voice. Words were lodged somewhere in my mind but I couldn’t form them in my mouth. I just kept saying “I love you” over and over again. After years of hiding, my child was finally home.