A man from the set appeared at the edge of the pool. “Mrs. Rockwell, you’re needed on set.”
“I’ll be there in a minute,” she managed to choke out.
“I’m leaving, I’ll be gone by the time you and Holly get back,” he assured her.
Angela watched bitterly as Grant approached Holly and put his arms around her.
“Where are you going Daddy?” she asked with a timid voice.
“I’ve got to go Holly. Mommy will bring you home and help get the cookies for Santa,” he said sadly.
“But, I want to go with you, Daddy,” Holly begged, her tiny voice caused my heart to fall into my stomach. I could only imagine how those words pained her father too. Holly behind me had finally managed to stand up and look at her alter-ego.
“Be brave, Holly,” she whispered to herself. “You have a long road ahead of you, but you’ll do just fine.”
As Grant stood up and walked away, Angela knelt down in front of her daughter and kissed her forehead. “We’ll leave soon, sweetheart.”
“Why are you crying, Mommy?”
“We’ll talk about it later, sweetie. Be a good girl and give Mommy another half an hour.”
“But where’s Daddy going? Why is he leaving?” Holly asked curiously as tears began to fill her eyes.
Angela looked up and watched him disappear behind a palm tree. “He found someone younger and prettier to love,” she whispered wistfully, more to herself than to Holly. “Promise me you’ll stay young and pretty forever.”
Holly frowned. “Ok, Mommy,” she said, even though the little girl couldn’t possibly have understood what her mother was asking.
The pain in Angela’s voice stabbed at a little place in my heart – I couldn’t imagine what it was doing to Holly.
15
“We should go,” I whispered to Morgan. “We can’t stay and watch Holly like this.”
Holly looked pleadingly at Morgan too. “Please! I’m begging you. We have to go. I can’t stay here!”
Morgan watched as I put an arm around Holly’s shoulders, comforting her. Watching Holly, cringe in pain, Alba became incensed and hollered at Morgan. “Take us away! Now!” she hollered.
Morgan nodded and with a snap of her fingers, we watched the heartbreaking scene before us fall beneath our feet again as Holly whimpered on my shoulder. Air rushed around me as the world disappeared sending my hair cascading in currents around my shoulders. Into the dark abyss that scene went, as a busy cityscape sprang up around us. The streets were filled with cars, dodging from lane to lane and blaring their horns. The crowded sidewalks were filled with people doing their last minute Christmas shopping – their voices filled the bitter cold air around us and their breaths puffed out in front of them like white bursts of smoke.
Alba’s eyes lit up. “This is my neighborhood!” she said with more enthusiasm than she’d shown all day. She pointed towards a tall narrow brick building across the street. The brick-lined stairs were crumbling, and there was a pair of old, beat-up, tin chairs on the porch. “That’s my house.”
I looked down at Holly. Her head was still on my shoulder, but her tears had dried up. “Are you going to be ok, Holly? We’re at Alba’s house.”
She lifted her head slowly, dotting the corners of her eyes with the sleeve of her pajama shirt. “Is my makeup alright?” she asked me quietly.
“You look beautiful as always, Holl,” I assured her. “Are you ready to go in?”
She sniffed her nose but nodded. “Yeah.”
Morgan led the way across the street. Even though we were ghosts and not in danger of getting run over, out of habit, we all stopped for cars and then carefully dodged through the traffic in front of the building.
Climbing the steps, Alba paused at the doorway and took a deep breath. “I’m not sure if I want to go in.”
I moved right next to her. “You can do it. We’re all here for you.”
She nodded and tried the knob, forgetting that she would be unable to grasp it her hand went through. She gave it a half smile before floating through the door with the rest of us right behind her. We entered into a narrow entryway where a rather steep wooden staircase stood before us. Three winter coats hung on pegs to the right of the door with three sets of shoes underneath. The house was calm and seemingly quiet.
To our left, a small, sparsely decorated Christmas tree stood in the corner of the living room. The furniture was worn, with throw blankets covering the two sofas and the two easy chairs had doilies on the armrests. The small room was dark but surprisingly warm and homey.
We followed the light sound of music playing on the radio which led us from the living room to the dining area and into the kitchen. An older woman with her short grey hair in tight curls was rolling out a pie crust and quietly listening to Latin music. Her wide rear moved to the beat as she worked.
A small smile fell on Alba’s face. “That’s my Aunt Gloria,” she whispered.
“Why are you whispering?” I asked her. “She can’t hear you.”
Alba nodded. “Oh yeah,” she said – a little more loudly this time.
“Where’s the rest of your family?” Sweets asked her, looking around.
Alba shrugged and looked down a hallway. “Probably at work. They’re always at work.”
“You look like your aunt,” Holly pointed out.
“Thanks,” said Alba gruffly.
I wasn’t sure if that was a compliment – Aunt Gloria looked like she’d had a rough life. But Holly was right, she and Alba shared the same square shoulders, thick body, and tanned complexion. Alba shrugged it off.
“I wonder where Mom is. She should be home,” she said before walking down the hallway off the kitchen and poking her head inside two more doorways. “Mom!” she called out.
“She can’t hear you, Alba!” I reminded her with a little smile. It was hard remembering that we were ghosts.
“Alba! Where are you?” I heard a voice call from upstairs.
Alba’s head immediately turned towards the ceiling with a side smile on her face. “I’m down here, Ma!” she called back.
I looked at Morgan curiously. How had her mother heard her?
“Alba!” her mother called again.
“Just a minute, Ma!” called another voice from upstairs.
“Not just a minute, now!” her mother hollered back.
We followed the sound of the voices, back through the living room, up the stairs, and into the second-floor hallway until we heard footsteps coming right at us.
I turned to see a teenage, long-haired, Alba coming at us. She had on big round glasses, and her long hair hung limply down her shoulders. She wore an oversized athletic jacket over her baggy jeans, and she had a set of oversized gold hoop earrings in her ears.
I laughed into my hands with the sounds of the rest of the girls’ laughter behind me. “Alba! Is that you?”
“Shut it, Red,” she barked, looking at her former herself with embarrassment. “I looked cool back then.”
Holly put a hand on Alba’s shoulder. “I’m sorry to break it to you, Alba, but that look was never cool.”
Alba shoved Holly’s hand away. “Oh, whatever. We all had our awkward phases. This was mine,” she admitted gruffly.
Teenage Alba walked down the hall and knocked on a door. “What do you want, Ma?”
“Your brothers and father will be home soon for supper. Go see if your Aunt Gloria needs any help finishing supper.”
She pulled her head back and grimaced. “Aw, Ma. I don’t know anything about making supper.”
“Just set the table. Aunt Gloria has everything made; I just thought you’d help her get it on the table so we can eat when they get home. They might be going back out again,” she said through the door.
“But it’s Christmas Eve, Ma. Why can’t they just stay home?”
“You know your father is a workaholic. Just leave him be. Go help your aunt,” she instructed firmly.
Alba turned
around and grumbled as she headed down the stairs. We began to follow her when the front door was thrown open, and three big burly men barged inside wearing big winter coats, stocking caps, and work boots.
“Hey Pops,” Alba said as she rounded the corner at the bottom of the stairs. “How was work?”
“Work,” he grunted back. “Go tell your mother we’re home. We need to get this show on the road.”
“Are you going back to work after supper?” Alba asked with surprise.
“Of course I am. I’m not dead, am I?” he asked gruffly as he plopped down on the last step to pull off his work boots.
“Hey Vin, hey Jer,” Alba said, giving them a slight nod of the head.
“What are ya waitin’ down here for? You heard Pops. Go get Ma,” Jerry said just as gruffly as her father. “We’re starvin’.”
Alba turned around and raced back up the stairs, crossing through our ghostly bodies in the process. “Ma!” Alba hollered through the closed door. “Pops and the boys are home. He wants to eat. Hurry up and come downstairs.”
“Be right down,” she hollered back.
Alba raced back down the stairs, brushing through us again, causing us all to shiver from the breeze. “I’m gonna go help Aunt Gloria get the food on the table,” Alba said as she flew past the boys.
“Supper ain’t on the table yet? What the hell have you women been doing while we were gone? Playing?”
“Ma said it’s ready. I just need to get it on the table,” Alba hollered back at him. I could sense his grumpiness was quickly deteriorating Alba’s mood.
Alba’s father pulled off his second boot. “Damn women,” he growled.
“Don’t you damn women me, Abe Abernathy,” said the voice from the top of the stairs again. We turned around to find a clone of Aunt Gloria standing up there frowning at her husband below. “Supper’s ready. We were just waiting on you boys to take it out of the oven.”
“Alright, well, let’s get this thing going. Boys and I have work to do,” he grumbled at his wife as he pulled himself up. He had rolled his work jeans up at the calf and pulled his stocking cap off, leaving a disheveled mess atop his head.
“You three are a mess. You should all go wash up. We’ll get supper on the table,” Alba’s mother ordered.
He nodded at the boys. “You heard your mother. You have two minutes to be back in the kitchen.”
The taller of the two boys sprinted upstairs while the other one made a beeline for the kitchen. As we followed the stockier one towards the kitchen, Alba pointed at him. “That one is my brother Jerry. He’s just like my dad.”
“Grumpy?” Jax asked knowingly.
“No. A workaholic,” Alba said, looking at Jax with furrowed eyebrows.
“Oh,” she said, looking around with wide eyes.
Holly giggled into her hand.
We watched Alba and her mother scurry around to help Aunt Gloria cover the table with a delicious looking feast.
“Where’s your grandmother, Alba? I thought she lived with you too,” I asked, looking around the dining room.
Alba shook her head. “She doesn’t move in with us until my sophomore year. She’s living with my uncle right now.”
Alba’s father took a seat at the head of the table. One by one the rest of the family joined them until the table was full. They all folded their hands and said a quick prayer, and then they dug in.
“What I don’t understand is, who moves on Christmas Eve,” Alba’s mother asked after the prayer.
“Lots of people,” her husband replied gruffly.
“And you couldn’t have told them you were busy?” she pressed. “You have a family, you know.”
He stopped serving himself and looked across the table at his wife. “Are you kidding? It’s Christmas Eve. I can charge double what I usually charge. We got two people to move after supper.”
Her mother grimaced. “Everything isn’t always about money, Abe.”
He narrowed his brown eyes and stared down the long table at her. “How the hell do you think we keep food on the table woman? And the lights on?” he hollered.
Alba’s mother looked down at her food in silence as Vinnie and Jerry looked at their mother uncomfortably. I could tell it bothered them that their father spoke to their mother in such a way, but not enough that they thought of standing up to their father.
The rest of the meal moved forward in silence. Vinnie and Jerry couldn’t stuff the food into their mouths fast enough. Alba’s father also wasted little time with the formalities of conversation.
I looked at teenage Alba, sitting towards the end of the table across from her Aunt Gloria, eating her food quietly, absorbed in her own thoughts. She looked upset and lonely sitting there on Christmas Eve without the joyous laughter of a close-knit family.
“Your family isn’t very talkative,” I said to Alba as we awkwardly watched them eat.
“Pops isn’t much of a conversationalist,” she agreed.
“Pass the mashed potatoes,” he said from his end of the table. Jerry grabbed the bowl in front of him without looking and passed it down towards the head of the table.
Alba’s father took the bowl and looked down at the contents. “Are you a moron? I said pass the mashed potatoes, not the sweet potatoes.”
“Oh, sorry Pops,” Jerry said quietly looking down the table to see the mashed potatoes sitting right in front of Alba.
Without a word, she pointed her finger at the bowl, lifted it above the rest of the food with her powers, and moved it down the table to her father.
After serving himself, he looked down the table at her. “We could use another set of hands. Then we can take out two trucks tonight. You can come with me and we’ll do the Orloff’s, and the boys will take the second truck and do the Wariner’s. We’d get done with it twice as fast,” he said to Alba, leaning forward on his elbows.
“Ah, Pops. I don’t wanna spend Christmas Eve moving furniture,” Alba complained.
He looked at her for two long seconds and then down at his food angrily. “I wasn’t giving you the option. You’re coming. You’re old enough now, and you’re coming. You need to learn the business too. When I’m ready to retire from the business, it’s going to be for the three of you to run. The boys started with they were ten. You’re thirteen. You’re overdue.”
“But Pops – I – I don’t want to move furniture for the rest of my life!” Alba asserted.
“What else you gonna do with your abilities? You think someone is gonna pay you better to be a secretary in some dumb office?”
“I don’t know what I’d do, Pops. I’d think of something.”
He didn’t want to hear it. He shook his head angrily. “This isn’t a discussion. It’s the way it’s gonna be. Alba’s coming with me after supper. Jerry and Vinnie will go down to the garage and pick up the second truck.”
The Alba standing next to me let a chortle escape her lips. We all looked at her curiously. She tried to pretend that it didn’t bother her that her father was the way that he was and that she wasn’t embarrassed about the way he spoke to her family. She shrugged. “Pops had it figured out. And he was right. Tony and I do alright working for the business.”
“Alba, you and Tony still live at home,” Jax said, furrowing her eyebrows.
She smiled tightly. “Yeah, well, Pops isn’t retired yet. Things will be different when he retires. That’s why they sent me off to college. I’m going to be the one running the business end of things.”
“So they sent you to witch college?” Holly asked, raising one eyebrow curiously.
“I convinced Pops that there’d be more money utilizing my supernatural abilities than there would be if I just went to a tech school or a community college. I just couldn’t see myself at community college.”
Holly nodded, satisfied. “Makes sense.”
“Let’s go,” Alba said, looking back at Morgan. “I’ve seen enough. I know what my Pops is like. You didn’t need to show these guys.”
I shrugged. “I don’t know, Alba. I’m glad I got to meet your family.”
“You didn’t get to meet them, Red. You just got to see them.”
“But maybe now I get you a little bit better,” I said plainly.
Holly smiled softly as she patted Alba’s shoulder. “I’m with Mercy. I’m sorry your dad was so rough on you and your brothers.”
Alba shrugged Holly’s hand off of her shoulder. “That’s the thing. I don’t want anyone to feel sorry for me. My dad was a gruff guy, but he wasn’t abusive. I didn’t have a bad childhood. So if you want to feel sorry for someone – pick someone else.”
We grew quiet as Alba took several deep breaths to calm herself. “What are we waiting for?” she asked Morgan. “It’s time to hit the bricks.”
Morgan nodded solemnly. “We have one last stop to make.” She waved her hands in the air – and Alba’s family dinner was swept away in a flurry of snow. Behind it, a quaint house on a quiet street swept in. A gentle snow fell silently over the houses in the tidy neighborhood.
I let out a deep breath as I looked around and took in the familiar surroundings. A quiet peace seemed to fall upon me as I realized – I was home.
16
“This has to be your neighborhood, Mercy,” said Jax excitedly. “We’ve seen everyone else’s.”
“It’s mine,” I agreed. I’d lived here my entire life – until I’d moved to Aspen Falls for college, anyway. “That one, right there.” I pointed towards the pale yellow house on the corner with the chunky, old-fashioned Christmas bulbs lining the roof. A wooden Santa and Mrs. Claus stood in the middle of the yard. It was about as generic of a Christmas scene as you could find in any neighborhood in all of America this time of year.
Jax melted into my side. “Oh, it’s so adorable, Mercy! I just love it! Let’s go in. I can’t wait to see you as a little girl.”
“Let’s get this over with,” I said without hesitation as I moved forward. I was curious to see myself as a little girl, too.
A Very Mercy Christmas: A Witch Squad Holiday Special (A Witch Squad Cozy Mystery Book 5) Page 9
