The Christmas Shoppe

by Melody Carlson

  He gave a half smile. “Okay, it was a little out of my way.”

  “Well, Tommy was in here a bit earlier,” she told him. “Let me try his cell phone.” As usual, his cell phone went straight to voice mail. Sometimes she wondered why he even bothered to carry it with him at all. He would always say the phone was for him to call others, not for others to call him, and then she would remind him that he was a newspaperman and was expected to be available when a big story broke. Of course, he would just laugh at that.

  “If you want to wait, I think I might be able to find him,” she told Garth.

  “Sure. That’s fine.”

  “Have a seat,” she said. “Or, if you want, feel free to look around.” She wanted to add, “Perhaps you’ll see just how lackluster and run-down this place is and decide you don’t want it,” but that didn’t seem very professional.

  “Really? You don’t mind if I wander a bit? Not worried I’ll make off with something valuable?”

  “Like I said, we’re a small town. We tend to trust people around here.” She cocked her head slightly to one side. “I’ll only be across the street, so don’t get any ideas.” She smiled sweetly and let herself out, then hurried across the street and knocked on the door. After a couple minutes, a pretty young girl answered. Her dark hair was tied back in a ponytail, and she had a small paintbrush in her hand.

  “Excuse me,” Helen said. “I’m looking for Tommy Thompson. I think I saw him come inside here awhile ago.”

  “Are you his mother?”

  Helen laughed. “Not exactly. But sometimes it feels like it.”

  “Tommy left.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Do you remember how long ago it was when Tommy left?”

  The mysterious gray-haired woman came over. Her hair was pulled back in a braid, and instead of her usual long dress, she had on overalls and a tie-dyed shirt and her feet were bare. She too had a paintbrush in hand. “Please come in,” she said.

  “You must be Matilda Honeycutt.” Helen smiled and held out her hand. “I’m Helen Fremont.”

  “Yes, I’m Matilda.” She looked down at her paint-smeared hand. “I don’t want to get paint on you.”

  “No, of course not.” Helen lowered her hand. “I work at the newspaper across the street, the Parrish Springs Spout.”

  “With Tommy,” the girl said.

  “Do you happen to know where Tommy went?” Helen asked. She was beginning to think this was a waste of time, but she was curious. This was her first encounter with the mystery woman. She glanced over to where a ladder was set up, trying to see what it was they were painting on the walls. It looked like letters or words.

  “I have no idea where Tommy is, but it’s a pleasure to meet you,” Matilda told her. “I do hope you’ll come back again when I officially open up my shop.”

  “What kind of shop will it be?” Helen asked.

  “It’s a secret,” the girl said quickly. “No one is supposed to know until opening day.”

  “I don’t expect you’ll be wanting to run an advertisement in the paper then,” Helen said.

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Tommy said he’s going to write an article about her,” the girl said. “That’s probably as good as an ad.”

  Helen smiled at her. “You’re right. May I ask who you are?”

  “I’m Megan Elton,” the girl told her. “My mom’s the new city manager.”

  “Aha.” Helen nodded. “I thought I’d seen her down here today too.”

  “What is going on here?” a small, wiry, dark-haired woman demanded. “I thought we were all supposed to be working.”

  “That’s my grandmother,” Megan said quietly. “She can be a little grouchy.”

  “We’re going back to work,” Matilda called out.

  “There’s still a lot to do if you want to open next week,” the other woman snapped.

  “I’ll get out of your hair,” Helen said as she backed toward the door.

  “Unless you want to scrub down the bathroom,” the woman called.

  Helen laughed. “No thank you.”

  Megan looked apologetic. “Nice to meet you,” she called out. “Hope you find Tommy. Tell him I said hi.”

  Helen waved. “Will do.”

  As she waited to cross the street, she tried to make sense of what she’d just seen. The girl was adorable, but that grandmother, well, she was a little scary. And Matilda was hard to read. Polite enough, but something seemed a little strange about her. And those bare feet. Who went shoeless this time of year? Very weird indeed. No wonder people were gossiping.

  As she opened the door to the newspaper office, she wondered what they had been painting on the walls. She suspected the letters would eventually comprise words, but they had made no sense to her. Perhaps a different language. For the life of her, Helen couldn’t begin to guess what kind of business that place was going to be, but she’d definitely gotten a weird feeling in there.

  As she returned to her desk, Helen remembered a friend she’d had in the sixties, a real hippie who had gone braless, smoked marijuana—the works. She wasn’t sure what had become of Sylvia, but she’d heard she and her man had joined a commune that eventually got in trouble for selling illegal drugs. Something about Matilda reminded Helen of Sylvia, and suddenly she wondered if Matilda planned to do some kind of illegal business in town. Surely the city manager wouldn’t allow her child to help out someone like that.

  “Did you have any luck?”

  Helen jumped, knocking a stack of files to the floor. “What?” She stared at the young man. “Oh my, I completely forgot about you.”

  “Sorry to startle you. I assume you didn’t find Tom then?”

  “No.” Helen shook her head. She couldn’t believe that she’d totally blanked out on the reason she’d gone across the street. At this stage of the game, she couldn’t blame it on a menopause moment. Maybe she was just losing it.

  “Well, I’ve got to be on my way. I’ll give Tom a call in the morning and then try to make it back here for the weekend.”

  Helen nodded. “That’s a good idea.”

  As he was leaving, she knew she should offer to make an appointment for him, or perhaps give him Tommy’s phone number or take his so that Tommy could call him. But the fact that he’d startled her like that, causing the files to fly all over the place, and then he didn’t even offer to help pick them up, seriously irked her. That was no gentleman!

  She had just gathered the files into her arms and was about to drop the mess into a cardboard box when Tommy walked in. “What’s going on in here?” he asked. “Was there a natural disaster while I was gone? Earthquake, tornado, tsunami?”

  “Very funny.” She stood and brushed the dust from her hands. “For all you’d know, there might’ve been.”

  He looked surprised. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means how can you call yourself a reporter and run around town with your phone turned off?”

  “That again?” He picked up a few of the folders she’d missed and handed them to her. “You know how I feel about cell phones. Especially in restaurants, which is where I happened to be, having a late lunch.”

  “How am I supposed to reach you if there’s a real emergency?”

  “If there were a fire or wreck or any life-threatening thing, you know I’d hear the sirens, Helen. And I’d call you for a heads-up. Besides that, Barry is always listening to his shortwave radio. You know he never misses a photo op, and if you don’t find me, he does.”

  “I know, I know.”

  “Really, Helen, what’s troubling you?” He frowned at the debris all over. “And why are you making such a mess?”

  She quickly explained her cleanup plan, then moved on to his unexpected guest, who was gone now but planned to come back on Saturday. “I felt a little blindsided, Tommy.” She held up her hands, which were looking pretty grimy from the files. “If you planned to sell this place, I’d think you’d have told me. Don’t I d
eserve to know?”

  He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. “That’s not how it was, Helen.”

  “How was it then?”

  “I’m sure I was just talking, saying how I was done with the newspaper business. You know how I can be. Sometimes I just need to blow off steam. To be honest, I don’t even remember the conversation.”

  “Well, Garth Price remembered.” She was actually surprised that she could recall his name. “He seemed quite interested.”

  Tommy rubbed his chin. “Hmmm.”

  “You really would consider selling the Spout?”

  “I don’t know . . . probably not.” He gave a mischievous grin that reminded her of when he was a little boy. “But it wouldn’t hurt to hear what old Garth’s got to say, would it?”

  Helen wanted to smack him on the back of the head. Instead she just said, “Humph!” and turned back to her cleanup project.

  “Want any help with this?” he asked.

  Her first response was to say, “No thank you” in a very frosty tone. On second thought, she wanted to make it home before dark tonight. So, acting like an angry army sergeant, she told him that she did in fact want some help. She barked orders at him, keeping him running back and forth from her desk to the dumpster. By the time they finished, just before six, she had forgiven him and was almost over her bad mood. Almost.

  Despite its slightly worn and faded Christmas decorations on the lampposts, the city of Parrish Springs looked bright and festive the week before Thanksgiving. Shop owners seemed to be pulling out all the stops in their efforts to loosen the purse strings of the previously frugal holiday shoppers this year. Garlands of lights were strung, windows were trimmed, Christmas music was playing. Stark’s Drugstore was already bragging that, following the Christmas parade, Santa would be spending his entire afternoon on their premises, taking photos with kiddies and handing out candy canes.

  Enthusiasm was high, and for the most part, this year was stacking up to be a profitable one for the local merchants. However, there was one small fly in the holiday eggnog. Or perhaps it was a big one. The Barton Building, which everyone had been anxiously watching, eagerly awaiting, and curiously speculating on, looked more dismal than ever. At least on the outside. To be fair, no one could see what was actually going on inside. Not since the big windows had been covered with a mishmash of newspaper, cardboard, and butcher paper. Thanks to those carelessly blocked-out windows, the building’s grimy exterior, the stained bricks, and the peeling white paint on the trim looked more derelict than ever.

  “It’s just a shame,” Helen told Tommy on the Friday before Thanksgiving as he was unlocking the door to the newspaper. “The Barton Building looked better unoccupied than it does now.”

  “Give her time,” he said as he opened the door for Helen. “Rome wasn’t—”

  “Yes, yes.” She pushed past him toward her desk. “Spare me your clichés.”

  Tommy knew Helen was still stewing over his recent conversations with Garth Price. She wouldn’t come out and say so, but Tommy knew she thought he was making a huge mistake to consider selling the place. “What’s the harm in just kicking the idea around?” he’d asked her on Monday morning, right after he’d admitted to spending a good part of Saturday with Garth. Helen’s response had been to simply roll her eyes, then busy herself with making coffee. The next few days had felt like a standoff. Now that it was Friday, he was hoping for some sort of truce.

  “Are you going to stay mad at me forever?” he asked as she tucked her handbag beneath her desk.

  She stood, straightened her jacket, and gave him her receptionist smile. “Of course not.”

  “Come on, Helen,” he urged her. “You’re the closest thing to family I have. I can’t stand having you acting like this.”

  “Really?” She peered intently at him. “You still consider me family?”

  “You know I do. You’re like a second mom to me.”

  “You planned to throw your second mom out on the streets?”

  He frowned. “Out on the streets?”

  “By selling the paper.” She folded her arms across her front.

  “Oh, Helen.” He held up his hands.

  “Don’t ‘oh, Helen’ me, Tommy Thompson. I’ve given you some of the best years of my life, and this is the thanks I get? You go selling the newspaper behind my back?”

  “I’m just talking to the man. I haven’t made any deals yet. Besides, he’d be a fool not to keep you on, Helen. The paper wouldn’t be the same without you.”

  “And without you?”

  He ran his fingers through his hair and moaned. “I don’t have time for this right now. We have a paper to get out.”

  “It’s Friday,” she reminded him.

  “Still, there’s work to be done.” He knew she could see right through him, but at the moment it was all he had. As much as he loved and appreciated Helen, he knew she didn’t understand him as well as she assumed she did. Her answer had always been to say, “Just roll up your sleeves, Tommy. Lose yourself in your work. Put out a good paper. You’ll feel better in the morning.”

  Helen had always adhered to the myth that time could heal a broken heart. For the most part, she was good at keeping up the appearance that time had healed hers. But sometimes, when she didn’t know he was looking, he could see the sadness in her eyes. Rich Fremont had hurt his wife deeply when he’d left her for a neighbor woman. Tommy suspected Helen would never be fully over it. But he had to give it to her, she was pretty good at hiding it. Much better than he was.

  To sell or not to sell . . . that was his question. Garth Price’s initial offer hadn’t even been worth considering. Tommy had expected him to lowball him, especially after the way Tommy had complained about the paper initially. But after Tommy took the time during the weekend to really show Garth some of the town’s charm, as well as the less obvious but positive aspects of the old newspaper, Garth’s interest as well as his budget had increased. By Sunday he’d made a firm and fair offer, and Tommy told him he’d need at least a week or two to fully consider it. Now the first week was drawing to an end and Tommy still wasn’t sure.

  He looked out his window and frowned. The same trappings and trimmings of Christmas that brought joy to many usually made him more depressed than ever. He was tempted to close his blinds, but it was such a gray day that the little bit of light coming in right now was welcome. He looked at the Barton Building and shook his head. What was that woman thinking? If she wanted to cover her windows, she could’ve at least done it a bit more attractively. Matilda Honeycutt was a strange one, he’d decided.

  Since Monday, he’d been trying to get together with her, but each time she had come up with an excuse. He could tell she was just trying to keep him at a distance, and at first he’d suspected it had to do with whatever sort of mystery business she planned to open up in there. But as the week had passed with even more resistance, he began to question if she really planned to open a business. Based on her evasiveness, he had his doubts.

  Most legitimate businesspeople were eager to partner with the newspaper. They appreciated getting whatever free publicity they could, and he tried to accommodate them, hoping that they in kind would purchase more advertising from him. That’s how it usually worked. But yesterday when he’d dropped by to see Matilda on his way to lunch, she’d almost treated him like an intruder. He’d actually planned on inviting her to lunch—his treat. If she’d been just a little friendlier, he would’ve done so. To be fair, it was possible that he was getting Matilda’s responses mixed up with that loose cannon Rose, who’d been helping her. For some unexplainable reason, Rose had taken a deep dislike to Tommy the first day he’d walked across her clean floors. He could almost understand that. No one liked having their work messed with.

  His second run-in with Rose made him suspect that her hostility toward him might be related to her daughter-in-law. Maybe he’d looked at the pretty city manager with a bit too much interest or appreciation. But w
as that any reason to treat him like vermin? Anyway, he did plan to get to the bottom of this whole thing—the question of who Matilda was and what she was up to, as well as why Rose had placed Tommy on her most-hated list. He figured that today’s interview with the new city manager would be key.

  He’d meant to do some research on Susanna yesterday, but thanks to Garth’s interest in the newspaper, Tommy ended up spending most of his “slow” day rounding up all the bookkeeping facts and figures for the business for the last five years. He’d spent the whole afternoon making copies of things like utility bills and tax records. He would’ve asked Helen’s assistance but knew exactly where that would get him—even deeper in the doghouse.

  He had mixed feelings about today’s interview. On one hand, he was eager to see Susanna again. He had put on his best khakis and a navy cashmere polo sweater that Helen had gotten him for Christmas last year. In fact, he was surprised Helen hadn’t mentioned it this morning. Well, except for the fact that he was number one on her bad list just now. Maybe she and the other women should start a club. Which brought him back to the other hand—he didn’t really want to see Susanna again.

  Tommy had no doubt that during this morning’s interview with Susanna, his question regarding her marital status—was she or was she not married—would be settled once and for all. Based on his experience with Susanna’s mother-in-law, he felt fairly certain she was. To his surprise, that disappointed him—a lot.

  Although he would never admit this to anyone, and as irrational as it sounded even to him, Tommy had decided that if indeed Susanna Elton was married, he would immediately sell the newspaper to Garth Price, but only for top dollar. He would apologize profusely to Helen, and then he would use the proceeds from the sale to travel the globe and perhaps get a job as a foreign correspondent—he was willing to work for pennies. Then for the rest of his life he could live as a vagabond in countries that never celebrated Christmas!

  He was still ruminating on these discouraging thoughts as he went to get his usual morning coffee. As he was stirring in a teaspoon of sugar, Helen accosted him. “Tommy,” she said urgently, “I was just looking into your new buddy Garth Price.”