The Noel Letters (The Noel Collection Book 4)

by Richard Paul Evans

  I turned on the kitchen light, then turned up the heat. I hadn’t had anything to eat since lunch, but I was too upset to eat or to make anything. I poured myself a glass of wine, then sat at the kitchen table and again took the letter out of the envelope, laying it out to read. The cuckoo chirped the half hour.

  In writing these letters anonymously, I suppose I too have come down the chimney in hopes that your lack of belief in me might not get in the way of what I wished to share.

  It was just as Grace had said; there are none so blind as those who will not see. I had been willingly walking blind for decades. What do you do when you realize that your life has been a lie? I read the letter again. And again.

  I looked at the date my father had scrawled at the top of the letter. October 28. It took me a moment to realize that the date couldn’t be right, as he’d died October 27, the day I’d arrived back in Utah. Maybe, in his state, he’d been confused about the date.

  As I examined the date more closely—and the numbers around it—I noticed something about my father’s handwriting. The date wasn’t October 28, it was actually October 18. I remembered Wendy complaining about my father’s handwriting—especially his numbers. She had said that his ones looked like twos.

  I went to my room and grabbed the paper on which he’d written the safe’s combination.

  23 R – 32 L – 52 R

  The first 2 looked different than the others. It looked just like the 1 on his letter. I’d been dialing the wrong number.

  I rewrote the combination.

  13 R – 32 L – 52 R

  I sat down at the safe and carefully turned the dial. This time it clicked at the last number. I felt as if I were opening a time capsule. I suppose I was. My heart pounded as I slowly opened the door.

  The first thing I saw was a small round ring dish. I had made it in school in the second grade as a Father’s Day gift. Our class had sculpted the pieces in clay, and our teacher had them fired and glazed so we could paint them.

  I held it up to examine it. I hadn’t seen it since I was a child, and it brought back a flood of memories. Written on the bottom were my words in a seven-year-old’s earnest script:

  Happy Father’s Day

  I thought parents just threw these things away. But here it was among his most precious possessions.

  Next to the dish were a pair of pink ballet slippers. My first dance shoes. They were tied together by their silk ribbons. I took them out. I remembered how special I felt wearing them. I set them down next to the dish.

  Under the shoes was a small square unsealed envelope. I extracted the contents. The message was scrawled in crayon in a child’s handwriting.

  Happy Burth day,

  I lov lov lov U.

  Yor DoTTer

  NOEL

  I smiled. I was only four when I wrote that. I especially loved that I felt the need to remind him that I was his “Dotter.” Next to the letter was a more formal piece of stationery, a crimson envelope. The outside had just two words written in soft, feminine handwriting:

  My Dearest

  I pulled back the flap and took out the letter. There were tear stains on the paper. Whether they were from the writer or the recipient, I don’t know. Maybe both. I began to read.

  My beloved Robert,

  How do you still hold to me? How do you continue to hope beyond hope?

  The bigger question on my heart is Why? Why do you still believe in me after all my failures? I want to believe I can be your butterfly, that this earthbound caterpillar can emerge from the cocoon of her shame and fly. I want to believe I can be that transcendent creature you believe I can be—the one only you can see.

  But I can’t, my love. It’s time we accept this. I can’t beat this, Robert. God knows I’ve tried. The only thing worse than losing you and my daughter would be to fail you both again. Please don’t let me. Please let me go. Please let me disappear like a stone dropped in the sea. Let me sink alone into the darkness. You must leave me, dearest. For your and our Noel’s sake. What life can she hope for as you cling to me? She deserves better than I can give her. You deserve better. You believe in me too much, my beloved. Not everyone is as strong as you. I beg you, please stop believing in me. Let me go. Let me sink.

  Your unworthy, Celeste

  Still clutching the letter, I wiped my eyes with my forearm. Two of my own tears fell onto the page, adding to the others.

  What Grace had said about my mother was true. I knew it when she said it, but here was evidence from my mother herself. How had my father dealt with such pain? I checked the date to see when the letter had been written. It was dated just two days before her death.

  I wiped my eyes again and looked deeper into the safe.

  Next to my mother’s letter was another envelope, only this one had my name on it, written in my father’s handwriting. There was something in the envelope as well. I tore it open. There was a letter and a pearl bracelet with a yellow-gold clasp. The pearls were iridescent cream and spherical. I took the letter from the envelope.

  My dear Noel,

  If you’re reading this letter, I am gone. I bought this bracelet for your wedding in the off chance you changed your mind and invited me to the ceremony. I hoped to give it to you the night before your wedding, to speak to you lovingly as a father speaks to his daughter at such a time. As heartbroken as I am, I honor your wish not to include me. But I was there, if not in person, then in the shadows of my heart. I’m sure your mother was there as well. I also purchased for you a Lladró figurine of a bride. I will keep it here until you someday claim it with all the rest.

  I saw pictures of you from your wedding posted online. You were as beautiful as any bride who has ever walked the earth. As beautiful even as your mother. I have written a small book about that day. It’s called The Dance, and it’s about us. I have kept the only copy of it in this safe. What you choose to do with it is up to you.

  I am sorry that I offended you in questioning your choice of partners. I was only trying to protect you. I should have been more sensitive. In all my life I have never hoped so much to be wrong. I hope I was wrong about him and that he loves you even as I do. This is my hope.

  Love, Dad

  I wiped my eyes again. “You weren’t wrong, Dad,” I said. “I should have listened. I was too prideful.” I put the bracelet on. It was beautiful. It would have perfectly accented my wedding dress. Part of me was glad it hadn’t been part of that day, to be downgraded with the rest of the memories of that failed relationship. I had already thrown away my dried bouquet and sold my dress.

  There was more to the letter.

  P.S. One can never be fully certain of the results of one’s choices, only one’s intention. I may have been wrong to send you away to that school in Tucson, but my intentions weren’t. The day I came home and found you drinking, I saw history repeating itself. I didn’t see you on the ground, Noel, I saw your mother, and I was there when they carried her body from the wreckage.

  If you don’t know by now, your mother was an alcoholic, as her mother too was an alcoholic, as was her grandfather. Some families seem to be wired that way. As her daughter, I knew you might carry the same wiring. I failed your mother by letting her out of the house that night. Others, innocent people, were hurt by my failure. I couldn’t take that chance with you. You might hate me for my decision, but I am grateful that you are alive to hate me. I take consolation in that.

  I looked inside the safe for the book my father had written about in his letter. It was thin and lay flat against the back of the safe. I brought it out. On the cover was the picture of a little girl dancing alone in a field of flowers. The title read:

  THE DANCE

  by Robert Book

  I took the book over to my father’s bed and lay down to read. I opened it to the dedication page.

  For Noel.

  Never stop dancing.

  I wiped a tear from my cheek, then began to read.

  A father once had a daughter
.

  She was a happy little girl who liked the things that little girls do—dress-ups and kittens and sometimes both together. But most of all she liked to dance.

  Nearly every day she would jump and spin in the thick, wild grass near the edge of the yard where the tall meadow flowers grew. Though she didn’t see him, her father watched.

  And he smiled.

  When the girl was old enough to go to school, she danced in the Thanksgiving play, dressed as an ear of corn. She could not see out of her costume very well and tripped over a boy dressed as a carrot. Though she could not see her father, he was watching.

  And he smiled.

  When the girl was a little older, she took dance lessons. She wore a pink tutu and soft leather ballet slippers. At her first recital she tried very hard to remember her steps. She did not see her father standing close to the stage.

  But he was smiling.

  A few years later the girl became a graceful ballerina. She wore pink satin toe shoes with long shiny ribbons. One year she danced a solo in The Nutcracker. Everyone clapped when she finished. The crowd was large, and the stage lights were bright so the girl could not see her father in the audience. But he clapped louder than everyone else.

  And he smiled wider than everyone else.

  The girl grew into a young woman. One spring night she put on a beautiful gown and high-heeled pumps and went to her first prom with a young man. When the young man brought her home, they did not see her father peeking out the window as they slow-danced on the front porch.

  (He wasn’t smiling.)

  The young woman fell in love with the young man and soon decided to marry. At the end of the wedding day she waltzed with her father. Then the father gave his girl’s hand to the young man and left the dance floor. As the young woman gazed into her new husband’s eyes, she did not see her father watching from the side of the room.

  Though the father’s eyes were moist, he smiled.

  The young woman and her new husband moved far away from the home with the thick grass and tall meadow flowers. Whenever he missed his daughter, the father would take out an old shoebox filled with photographs of her dancing. As he looked at the pictures, he remembered each dance.

  And he smiled.

  Many years passed.

  One day the father called his daughter on the telephone. “I am old now. I am cold and very tired,” he said. “Please come to me. I would like to see you dance just one more time.”

  The daughter came. She found her father in his bed. And she danced for him.

  But the father did not smile.

  “I cannot see you,” he said. “My eyes are not much good. Dance close to the bed so I can hear your feet.” The woman walked close to the bed, then she jumped and spun as she had as a little girl.

  The father smiled.

  Then the woman sat on her father’s bed. She lay her face against his, took his hand, and they swayed back and forth. In this way, they danced once more.

  “I have danced many times,” the woman whispered into her father’s ear, “in many places and for many people. But I have always danced for you. How can I ever dance again?” She buried her head in her father’s chest.

  But her father shook his head. “You must never stop dancing,” he said. “For though you will not see me, whenever you dance, I will be watching.”

  Then the father went to sleep.

  As the daughter sadly left his side, she stopped at the doorway and looked back once more at the father she loved. And then she danced. And though she could not see him, her father was watching.

  And he smiled.

  How could I have been so wrong? Not just about my father, but about everything? I had lived my life as a victim of false narratives demonizing those who loved me most, blaming them for my choices. There was nothing left to defend. My life was one big lie.

  All I could do was weep. It seemed that that was all I had done for most of the day, but there was something deeper about these tears, as if they had been squeezed from the very core of my being. I lay back in my father’s bed as wave after wave of sadness washed over me. All I could say was, “I’m so sorry, Daddy.” I fell asleep clutching the book to my chest.

  CHAPTER fifty–two

  Books have that strange quality, that being of the frailest and tenderest matter, they outlast brass, iron, and marble.

  —William Drummond

  THURSDAY, CHRISTMAS EVE

  I woke the next morning with the sun streaming through the blinds in my father’s room. I looked around, temporarily forgetting where I was. The closet was open, as was the safe. My father’s book lay on the floor. I was fully dressed.

  I looked down at my watch. It was five minutes after nine. I was late for work. At least Wendy’s there to open the store, I thought. Then I remembered that I’d fired her. I jumped out of bed and hurriedly got dressed, grabbing a brush to comb my hair on the way in to the bookstore.

  It was nearly nine thirty when I arrived. There was a line of almost twenty people standing out in the cold, two of whom were my Christmas employees Teddy, from the day before, and Marcia, whom I’d met only once.

  I parked in my spot. I had never gotten a key to the back door—I’d never needed one, since Wendy was always here first—so I had to walk around to the front, past the disgruntled crowd, apologizing the whole way. “I’m here, I’m so sorry. I’m here.”

  “There’s a line here,” a gruff voice shouted at me.

  “I own the place!” I shouted back.

  “Then why are you late?”

  “Bob was never late,” someone else said.

  “New management,” the gruff voice said sarcastically.

  “Where’s Wendy?” a woman asked as I fumbled through my keys. “She’s not answering her phone.”

  “She’s not coming in today,” I said as I unlocked the door, the crowd pressing in around me. “Back up, please.”

  “But I talked to her yesterday,” the woman said. “She said she’d be here.”

  “Well, she won’t. Something came up.”

  “Wendy’s not here?” another customer asked.

  This created a ripple effect in the line not unlike the telephone game. “Did she say Wendy’s not going to be here?” “Wendy quit?” “Wendy’s sick?” “What does she have?” “Is she in the hospital?”

  I walked into the store. It was dark and cold, not the usual ambience I’d grown accustomed to. I realized that I had never even turned on the lights before. It was an older building, and the switches weren’t where any normal human would expect them. As people began crowding into the dark store, I shouted, “Does anyone know how to turn on the lights?”

  “I’ll get them,” Teddy said, brushing by me, using his phone as a flashlight. He walked to the back.

  “I thought you were the owner,” someone behind me said.

  “She’s no Bob,” someone else said.

  No, I’m not, I said to myself.

  The lights went on. By that point I was ready to kick everyone out, but I think they probably would have just looted the store. Teddy walked out from the back. “The alarm wasn’t set last night.”

  “I know the alarm wasn’t set.”

  “No worries,” he said. “We weren’t robbed.”

  “Would you turn on some Christmas music, please?” I asked.

  “Will do, boss,” he said.

  A tall woman wearing a fur-lined, plaid trapper hat buttoned beneath her chin walked up to me. Her cheeks were red as though she’d spent too much time outdoors. “Wendy set aside some books for me.”

  I looked around the counter. I couldn’t see them. “I’ll find them. What’s your name?”

  “Maria.”

  “Maria what?”

  “Wendy knew.”

  “I’m not Wendy!” I shouted.

  She looked at me for a moment, then said, “Clearly.”

  Someone just shoot me.

  The next six hours passed by like an eternity. We had more than
a hundred customers, all rushing to grab last-minute gifts before heading to their gatherings. It seemed that everyone had somewhere to be except me.

  As the owner, I should have been happy about all the business, but I wasn’t. I felt disassociated from it all, with the holiday, the spirit, even the store. I was unworthy to stand in this place. Wendy was right—I killed everything I touched. I was misery personified.

  It was ten minutes after three. Teddy had locked the front door, and I was helping our last customer—a young, frantic woman who had run in just a few minutes before closing to pick up a couple of books. They were gifts for her children. Her credit card kept being declined. After several attempts I finally said, “I’m sorry. This card isn’t going through. Do you have another card? Or cash?”

  The woman looked flustered. “No. There should still be some money on there.”

  I tried the card again, only to have it be declined again. I could sense her embarrassment. I exhaled slowly. “Just take them.”

  “What?”

  “Just take the books. They’re on me. Merry Christmas.”

  She looked at me in disbelief. “Really?” To my surprise, tears welled up in her eyes. “I’ve been out of work for two months. You don’t know how much this helps. Thank you. God bless you.”

  “You’re welcome.” I let her out of the store, then relocked the door after her.

  Behind me someone said, “That was mighty decent.”

  I turned around. Teddy was standing there. “Her card wasn’t working.”

  “I saw what happened. You could tell she didn’t have the money and you helped her out. You’re a good person.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I felt like anything but a good person. “Thank you.”

  “Boss, if you don’t need anything else, I’m going to head out.”

  “You can go.”

  “Thanks. Wait, forgot something.” He ran out of the room, then came back wearing his pack. “Hey, I don’t know if I ask you or Wendy, but are you hiring after Christmas? I’d like to work here. I love its vibe, you know? It’s a cool place.”