Spreading Christmas Joy

by Tory Baker

  “Wouldn’t you like something for yourself?” I ask the little boy, trying to shake off all of the emotions that are assaulting me.

  “Mommy doesn’t smile anymore. She’s always worried about me. Can you bring her something to make her happy?”

  I clear my throat, but I manage to get through talking to the small boy and reassure him. As the nurse helps him down from my lap I feel wiped. When I agreed to this damn party, I didn’t know what I was agreeing to. I wasn’t prepared for the sadness that is filling me right now. As I watch the nurses gather the kids and take them back to their rooms and the sad looks on the parent’s face, I want to yell. How naïve are Margaret and Joy? How can this party help anyone? Margaret comes up and hands me a glass of punch.

  “I thought Santa might be thirsty,” Margaret says. I take it, pushing the fake beard down now that the kids are gone. I look around to find Joy and spot her in the corner of the room talking to some of the parents. I can hear her laughter from here.

  “There’s no way this party can help these kids, Margaret,” I growl, still feeling raw.

  “What? Of course it does. Did you not see the smiles on their faces today? It takes a lot to get these children to smile, Eb and you did that today.”

  “Not all of them,” I grumble, the last boy’s face still fresh in my mind.

  “Unfortunately no. You’re right, but you made a lot of them smile and that’s a small victory and the money will help to make the parents lives a little easier. That’s all we can do.”

  “More needs to be done,” I grumble.

  “Juniper is a small suburb. Our hospital has limited funds as it is. Most of these kids need advanced care, Eb. But, the sad fact is, a lot of the parents can’t afford to travel to the bigger facilities as often as would be necessary. We do the best to fill the gaps,” she says a little sadly.

  “Money. It all boils down to money,” I sigh.

  “It always does. But, you should take comfort in the fact that because of your time tonight, quite a few kids here had one of the best nights they’ve ever had,” she says like that’s a big thing. I frown as she walks away. There’s little solace in that, there has to be something more.

  Before I can think on it more, I see my agent, Loretta, walk in the room and she’s not happy. She’s not happy any time actually, but right now the anger she normally carries around like other women carries purses, radiates from her.

  Fuck. She must have gotten my email yesterday and drove straight here. I head to her in resignation.

  This day just keeps getting better and better.

  20

  Eb

  “Loretta what are you doing here?” I ask, trying to keep my tone civil. Really, she’s a great agent, but I don’t appreciate being hunted down. I sent her an email telling her that I had some issues and I wouldn’t be able to get the manuscript in by the deadline and to ask for an extension. It’s unusual for me, I’ll give her that, but still writers do it every single day. It doesn’t require a visit to be raked across hot coals. Which, from the look in her eye, is exactly what she has planned.

  “Get out of my way fat guy, I’m on a mission,” she grumbles and that’s just like her going a million miles a minute, full steam, and failing to recognize what’s right in front of her. Even if she didn’t recognize my voice, she should at the very least recognize my face now that I’ve had the beard pulled down.

  “Loretta, it’s me,” I explain, reaching up and snatching the hat and wig from my head.

  She stops. Her shrewd eyes appraise me and I barely resist the urge to shuffle my feet underneath the attention. Loretta would have made a good interrogator during times of war.

  “E. B.? What the fuck are you doing?” she growls, and calling me by my pen name. She refuses to use my real one. It’s never really bothered me, but for some reason her sharp voice and the way she uses it now… does.

  “What are you doing? I told you in my email I’d be in touch in a few days.”

  “And that’s why I’m here. What the fuck are you doing dressed as a pervert. Is this shit why you are late on your manuscript.”

  “It’s a Santa Claus suit,” I growl.

  “Same fucking thing. Who got it in their head one day and said: Gee, I’m going to dress up in a red velvet suit and look like some little girl’s grandpa and then ask her to sit and wiggle around in my lap and ask her what she wants me to give her for Christmas?”

  “Loretta,” I caution her, my voice full of warning.

  “A fucking pedophile. That’s who. What the hell are you doing here anyway? You hate this Christmas bullshit as much as I do, E.B. That’s always been one of the beautiful things about this relationship.”

  That’s when I look around the room in a panic. I don’t see Joy anywhere and hopefully that means she hasn’t heard Loretta, which is a miracle since she is being loud and annoying. I grab her hand and literally pull her with me. She jerks her hand away, but she follows.

  “Margaret, I need to use your office to meet with my agent,” I tell Margaret as we pass. She agrees, her face troubled, which means she probably heard Loretta. I notice she looks at Loretta with dislike and that would fit. Loretta has a tendency to make “friends” everywhere she goes.

  I get Loretta inside, turn on the light and close the door.

  “Now, what in the hell are you doing here?”

  Loretta walks to the desk and sits down, crossing her legs and taking off the black leather gloves she’s wearing. She pulls a cigarette out of a small purse she is packing and after taking a puff of it, looks at me.

  I hate the smell of cigarettes and I don’t bother to keep the distaste off my face. Loretta doesn’t care and makes that pretty clear when she flips me off. She really should have been born a man. She’s a bigger dick than most men I’ve met, she definitely has bigger balls.

  “How long have we known one another E.B.?”

  I shrug. “A while.”

  “Ten years. Ten fucking years and in that time, especially since I’ve became your agent, how many times have you been late on a manuscript.”

  I shrug again.

  “Not once. Not one damn time!”

  “Then, I was due.”

  “Bullshit. You weren’t even late the month you had to fly to Alaska to bury your dad. I think you wrote the entire time.”

  “My dad was an asshole.”

  “My point made. You hate people. You hate the world. You sit behind the typewriter and—”

  “We use these new machines these days. They’re called computers. You should try them Loretta.”

  “Fuck off. So who’s the skirt?”

  “What are you talking about?” I ask her stalling. I don’t want her to know about Joy. Joy is mine. I’m not ready to share her yet.

  “What piece of tail have you got your nose so far up that you aren’t working.”

  “You’re being stupid,” I growl.

  “Bullshit, again. I’ve been in this business for a long time. Enough to know men usually only fuck up their careers for one of two things. Dicks or Pussy. I would have figured you for one that likes pussy. But if you swing to the other side of the field, whatever. Who is it?”

  “Shit. I don’t do dick, Loretta. You know that.”

  “Then who is the skirt?” she asks and I walked into that pretty easily.

  Fuck.

  21

  Joy

  “Thank you so much for all your help, Joy. You went above and beyond,” Margaret says and I wave off her thanks.

  “It was my pleasure. Actually, next year I’d like to cater the event.”

  “That’s such a wonderful offer, but I have to warn you our budget is pretty tight. We only play the current caterer half his fee. He waives the rest of it”

  “No that’s fine. I wasn’t going to charge. I was going to do it for free.”

  “I can’t let you do that. It’s much too expensive.”

  “You’re not letting me, I want to. Besides I can al
ways write it off on my taxes,” I joke. I look around the room and it’s mostly empty now and the hospital staff that joined us, are all going back to work. “Have you seen Eb?” I ask Margaret when I don’t see him anywhere.

  “His agent showed up while you were in the restroom. He asked if he could use my office to meet with her.”

  “Oh. I hope everything is okay. He’s been having trouble concentrating on his current project.”

  “I’m sure it’s fine, although now that you mentioned it, she didn’t seem like a happy camper.”

  “I might go see if they’re done. I’d like to get home pretty soon. The judging committee will be out this evening to look at the decorations.”

  “I can’t believe it’s almost Christmas!”

  “Me either, seems like every year it just keeps sneaking up on me,” I laugh. “Thanks again for letting me help Margaret. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Bye Joy. You’re an angel,” Margaret calls back as I walk toward her office.

  I didn’t mention it to Joy, but I know Eb is behind and being here today probably didn’t help matters. I’m praying he isn’t in trouble with his agent, if he is then it’s more than likely my fault. I’m actually hoping she’s still around and I can apologize and play peacemaker between the two. Eb has many redeeming qualities but tact is not one of them.

  I start to go inside and introduce myself, but as I gently push the door open I stop when I hear his agent.

  “What piece of tail have you got your nose so far up that you aren’t working.”

  Wow.

  That doesn’t sound professional at all. I flush with embarrassment, but I also instantly feel guilty too, because I’m getting Eb in trouble. I should have insisted he worked more and instead I asked him to be Santa today.

  “You’re being stupid,” Eb growls, but I can hear the defensiveness in his voice. My hand tightens on the doorknob.

  I miss part of the conversation, because I’m feeling horrible. Does Eb regret the time we’ve been spending with each other? It has been a lot, maybe too much. Maybe I should stop staying over at his house, at least through the week.

  “It’s not what you think,” Eb growls.

  “So there is a woman?”

  “It’s nothing serious. I’m just scratching an itch,” Eb says and until this moment I never realized how much words could hurt. His simple words feel like a knife wound straight through my heart.

  “I’d almost believe that if you were the old E.B.”

  “What do you mean the old E.B.?”

  “The one I’ve been working with all these years. The one who can’t stand Christmas, who can’t stand parties and wouldn’t be caught dead dressed like you are right now.”

  “I was helping out at the hospital.”

  “And the E.B. I know and mildly tolerate would never do that. He hates people. He’d rather have his fingernails ripped out one at a time rather than socialize.”

  “Damn it, Loretta.”

  “So I’m asking one more time. I think I deserve to know—since you’re fucking up your career and ruining a hefty twenty percent that I get paid—who is the skirt?”

  I can see through the door as Eb rubs the back of his neck. He’s facing her, so I can’t see his face. I don’t really need to. I’ve heard enough. I start to back away, but I really don’t do it soon enough.

  “I’m still the same. I did all this to get in my neighbor’s pants.”

  “Has your game slipped so much that you have to dress up like a freak in red pajamas to get your dick played with?”

  “She likes Christmas. It gave me an in with her. I wasn’t thinking past that, figured it didn’t matter, because I’d be done with her by the time Christmas rolled around.”

  That wasn’t just a knife wound.

  That was a fatal blow.

  It hurts so deeply that my breath burns in my chest. My skin instantly breaks out in a cold sweat and I stagger under the weight of the pain. I can’t even stop a moan of pain from coming to my lips.

  That’s the one thing I wish I could take back, because the sound causes Eb to turn and face me.

  “Joy,” he says, his voice soft. He takes a step toward me and I take a step back. “Joy, honey,” he says and the endearment just twists the knife in my heart. It also wakes me up. I spin around and run away. I hear Eb calling my name, but that just makes me run harder. I don’t want to talk to him. I don’t want to see him.

  I never want to see him again.

  22

  Eb

  “Fuck!”

  “Let me guess. Comfort still isn’t taking your calls.”

  “Her name is Joy and no she’s not. Not that, that is any of your business. Why are you still here, Loretta?”

  “Morbid curiosity mostly. That and you still haven’t given me your completed manuscript.”

  “The manuscript can go to hell. I’ve got other things on my mind.”

  “I can see that. When’s the last time you showered?”

  “Why in the hell won’t she take my calls? We’re both fucking adults. Is it so much to ask that she talk about this sensibly?” I growl out, slamming my fist on my desk. That hurts like hell, but I welcome the pain. It gives me something to focus on besides the fact that it’s been over a week now since I’ve spoken to Joy.

  I’ve tried everything.

  She’s not been in her bakery. Her assistant Tina would barely speak to me too, but she said enough to let me know Joy is out of town.

  Of course I knew that, because I’ve tried to find her at her house too. She’s not been home. She never came home after the party, not even to pack clothes.

  “I’m not good at matters of the heart, but I’m going to venture to say if I ever gave a damn about a man and I heard him say he was only using me to fuck me, I’d never want to see him again too.”

  I don’t respond verbally to Loretta, though I do make a noise that I hope tells her to shut the fuck up.

  Apparently it doesn’t.

  “But, I’d never have that problem because I’m sane. The opposite sex only has one use in my life. It’s a philosophy I thought we shared.”

  “We did until Joy. If she had just stayed around,” I mutter, staring at the phone and wishing she would call me.

  “To hear you say worse things? I think she should be glad she left when she did.”

  “That’s just it! It wasn’t worse. I was trying to explain that even though that’s how it started…it’s different now.”

  “Different?”

  “Yeah. Joy’s different. Shit there were nights we didn’t do anything other than sleep.”

  “You don’t sleep.”

  “I did with Joy,” I grumble and I did. “When she was next to me, I was finally able to sleep. I wanted to sleep. I wanted nothing more than to close my eyes with her warm body wrapped around me and listen to her breathe. I wanted to make her laugh and listen to that sound for… Shit. A lot longer than I got the chance. Christ. She needs to know that she wasn’t just a body to use until I grew bored. Not anymore and if I’m truly honest with myself she wasn’t to begin with. Joy was different from the beginning. Joy was… is… everything.”

  “Shit,” Loretta says and I look up at her. Her face is full of shock. “Do you love her?”

  Her words sound foreign to me, but I let them settle inside of me and they feel right.

  They feel really right.

  “Yeah. I think I do.”

  “Holy fuck-balls. You’re in love with a Christmas freak,” Loretta says, still in disbelief.

  I don’t bother to respond to that. Joy isn’t a freak. She loved Christmas, but with her I was beginning to appreciate the season to.

  I walk over to my window overlooking the lawn that Joy had painstakingly decorated. The lights twinkle against the fresh falling snow and it makes my heart hurt. It’s beautiful. It’s the kind of scene Joy would love.

  It’s the kind of scene she belongs in. She was made to sparkle in these
lights with the snow coming down. As pretty as it is, it pales to how truly good and beautiful she is.

  “She’s an angel… a Christmas angel and I broke her,” I whisper to my window, forgetting Loretta is anywhere around.

  “Shit E.B. find your fucking balls. You want her, quit whining like some drunk poet singing prose and go get her,” Loretta responds.

  “I don’t know where she is!” I growl, the hopelessness of the situation almost overwhelming.

  “You said yourself you didn’t spend all your time fucking her. Surely she gave you a hint or a clue to where she would be this time of year, or where she would stay.”

  “Nothing. She was planning on being home—with me!”

  “Wha, wha, wha. Think with your head and not the one on your dick. Surely, you have an idea of where this chick would go to nurse a wound. What did she like? Maybe she tried to go find something that makes her happy.”

  “I don’t know. I’m not a woman!” I grumble, scratching the stubble on my face. I haven’t shaved since Joy left me. I’ve barely eaten. Mostly I’ve buried myself in a whiskey bottle.

  “Well don’t look at me, I’d go find another man with a bigger dick who made me forget you.”

  I let out an animalistic noise at the thought to Joy with any other man. Loretta holds up her hand and actually has the gall to laugh.

  “Don’t worry. I told you I’m not a normal woman. Start thinking of things she liked. Where would she go? Hell, it’s Christmas, she runs a bakery and caters. Maybe she has a party tonight.”

  “No…” I whisper, but I turn around to look at the lights. But it’s Christmas Eve… right?”

  “Yeah? You may have gone off the deep end, but I have to tell you there’s no pervert going to crawl down your chimney with Joy wrapped in a bow.”