One Week In December

by Holly Chamberlin

  “Hey, everyone, listen to this.”

  David began to read aloud an inspiring bit from the paper about local siblings, a brother and sister, who together had raised one thousand dollars for the care of one of their schoolmates who’d been stricken with cancer. Suddenly, the story brought to Becca’s mind a memory of a time when she was probably about seven and David a young teen. She remembered that she’d entered a Halloween poster contest at school. She didn’t quite remember why she’d entered the contest; she’d never been artistic. Probably she’d wanted the recognition of winning; that seemed a likely motive. Anyway, the night before the contest deadline, she’d sat facing an empty square of poster board, completely stumped, not one idea of what to do with the tubes of orange and silver glitter and black construction paper her mother had bought her at the craft store. And David had come to the rescue. She hadn’t won a prize, but at least she’d shown up with an entry, thanks to her brother’s skill with scissors, paste, and glitter.

  How close she and David had once been, in spite of the six-year age difference!

  Becca frowned down at her silly dog-cup of weak coffee. She knew she had to close her mind to the past, lest sentimentality weaken her resolve. Sentimentality wasn’t for people like her, people who had known fear and sacrifice so young. Sentimentality was as dangerous as its troublemaking cohort, nostalgia.

  There was a knock on the kitchen door, and a moment later a large man appeared by the table.

  “Good morning, Julie, Nora. Everyone.”

  Becca looked at the visitor without much interest. It was . . . She struggled for a moment to recall the man’s name. Yes. Alex. Alex . . . Mason. Becca realized she’d almost entirely forgotten about her parents’ nearest neighbor out here in the wilds.

  “Becca,” Julie was saying, “how long has it been since you’ve seen Alex?”

  She looked back to the bowl of cereal her mother had placed before her, unasked. It was probably some almost inedible “health” stuff that was actually packed with unnecessary calories. “I imagine it’s been since my last visit,” she said.

  “Yes. Of course.”

  “Alex stacked all of our wood this year,” Nora informed the family. “We have enough for fires all winter. Wasn’t that nice of him?”

  “Well, I don’t how nice it was of me,” the man replied. “I did have a motivation other than kindness. I stack the Rowans’ wood, and Nora and Julie feed me whenever I forget to cook for myself, which is just about every other day.”

  David laughed. “I’d say you got the better end of the deal.”

  “Oh, yeah. And speaking of which . . .” Alex turned to Nora. “There wouldn’t happen to be any of your famous cinnamon rolls left over from dinner, would there?”

  “Nope!” David crowed. “I’m proud to say I ate the last one.”

  “That’s what you think, David.” Nora walked to the cabinet over the toaster, reached deep inside, and pulled out a plastic bag containing two cinnamon rolls.

  “Grandma, you were holding out on me!”

  Becca thought her brother looked genuinely upset. If losing out on a few balls of sugary dough upset him, how was he going to feel about her announcement? Not good, that’s how.

  Alex kissed Nora’s cheek and accepted the bag. “Sorry, David. And thanks again, Nora. I’ll eat these on my way to Steve’s studio. See you all later. Becca, it was nice seeing you again.”

  Becca had heard her name. “Excuse me?” she said, looking up.

  Alex smiled. She noted that his eyes were very blue and piercing. “I just said good-bye.”

  “Oh,” she said, turning away from those eyes. “ ’Bye.”

  8

  “Did I tell you I’d already bought Cliff’s Christmas gift? It was a week before I found out—what he had done.”

  Nora didn’t look up from the dough she was mixing in a blue ceramic bowl that had belonged to her mother. “No,” she said. “You didn’t. I hope it was returnable.”

  Lily and Nora were alone in the kitchen, baking the second of what would no doubt be many, many batches of holiday cookies. Lily set down a measured amount of flour for her grandmother to add slowly to the mixture.

  “I got him a RiskRunner. It’s a handheld gambling machine, basically. You can play poker or the slot machines, pretty much everything they have in casinos. Roulette, too, I think. Cliff’s into gambling now.” Lily paused. “At least, he was when I last talked to him.”

  “This—contraption—sounds expensive.” And, Nora thought, the young man clearly hadn’t been worth the time, effort, or expenditure. He was into gambling? Did her granddaughter not find something problematic about that?

  “I know,” Lily admitted. “It was expensive, at least for me. I probably shouldn’t have spent so much money. But I thought he would really like it, so . . .”

  “I hope you’ve returned this thing.”

  “Well, not yet.”

  Had she taught her favorite grandchild nothing? Nora stopped stirring—her fingers were cramping a bit anyway— and put her free hand on her hip. “Lily, if I learn that you gave that boy the Lose Your Shirt on the Ponies or whatever it’s called in some ill-advised attempt to win him back, I’ll give you a talking-to the likes of which you’ve never heard from my mouth.”

  Lily smiled, but the thought of such a major reprimand scared her. Nora could be formidable. “I’ll return it first thing when I get back to Boston. I promise.”

  “And if you two do get back together, it’s that young man who will be buying you expensive presents for some time to come.”

  “Yes, Grandma.”

  Nora turned back to her work, but Lily’s thoughts were still fixed on her former boyfriend and how he was supposed to have spent the holiday with the Rowan family. From there her mind latched on to the fact—she thought it was a fact—that Becca had never brought anyone home for Christmas or for any other special occasion. Not even a girlfriend.

  Lily asked her grandmother to confirm this. She did.

  “In fact,” Nora said, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard Becca mention a close friend. Which, of course, do esn’t mean that she doesn’t have any friends. Becca’s been somewhat—private—since . . .” Nora glanced toward the door, then lowered her voice. “Since she was sixteen.”

  Lily watched Nora deftly, and with one hand, crack an egg into the blue ceramic bowl. Lily liked to eat baked goods, but she didn’t have her grandmother’s skill at making them. Maybe if she watched closely, her own skills would develop in time. Then again, maybe they wouldn’t. As long as there was someone around to bake cakes and cookies for her, Lily thought she’d be just fine. Cliff, she noted, was not a baker. Come to think of it, she wasn’t sure he had any culinary taste or talent whatsoever. His diet consisted mostly of soda and processed foods. He liked Sno Balls, those pink and white things that came two in a package. And, when visiting the Rowans’ house, Nora’s cinnamon rolls.

  “Will you hand me that wooden spoon?”

  Shaken out of her reverie, Lily handed Nora the spoon and asked, “Grandma, do you think Becca seems kind of weird this holiday?”

  The dough ready, Nora began to shape small balls of it and drop them onto a greased cookie sheet. “I’d prefer to use the term ‘troubled,’ ” she said. “But yes, something is going on with her. When she was a child she was never good at hiding anything, feelings, little lies. She was the proverbial open book. I haven’t seen that part of her—the transparency—in a very long time.”

  Michael and Malcolm charged into the kitchen, interrupting the women’s conversation. Lily wondered if they ever did anything at normal speed.

  “Are the cookies ready yet?” they chorused.

  Lily looked at the fraternal twins, Malcolm so like Naomi, blond and of medium height and build, Michael brown-haired and lanky like his father.

  “The first batch is over there. They’re still hot so don’t—”

  “Ow!”

  Lily smiled and wondered what
part of “don’t” little boys didn’t understand. Well, big boys, too. Cliff hadn’t understood the meaning of “don’t cheat on your girlfriend.”

  “I told you they were hot,” Nora said mildly. “Patience pays off, Michael.”

  “What?”

  “Never mind.” Nora used the spatula to slide a few cookies onto a plate and handed it to Malcolm. “Here, take these but wait a few minutes before you try to eat them.”

  With shouts of thanks the boys were off.

  “Grandma,” Lily asked then, watching her nephews go, “did you ever want more children? Maybe a daughter?”

  “Oh, yes. Your grandfather and I would have welcomed a large family, but it just wasn’t to be. Anyway, I’ve got all these grandchildren and great-grandchildren to care for. And to spoil, when I’m in the mood. My life certainly isn’t lacking in family.”

  “You know, Cliff and I talked about having children someday.”

  “Yes,” Nora said with feigned patience. “You mentioned that.”

  Lily sighed. “Everything reminds me of him, Grandma. I can’t listen to the radio because I might hear one of ‘our’ songs. I can’t walk past his dorm without imagining him in his room, with all the posters of those eighties bands he loves. I can’t even eat peanut butter anymore because Cliff loved it so much. Some days I don’t think I’ll ever get over him.”

  Nora felt slight annoyance with her granddaughter’s dramatic statements, but the annoyance was tempered with pity. Poor Lily really did believe that her romantic life was over forever. And Nora knew that it would do little if any good to tell Lily otherwise, to assure her that, yes, she would get over this heartbreak and probably a lot sooner than later. In Nora’s experience, the miserable didn’t like to be assured that their misery would come to an end. Misery was real and of the moment; what would come after that was intangible and of no immediate comfort.

  Nora turned at the sound of nails clacking on wood. It was Hank, coming for a nibble at his bowl.

  Lily sighed. “Cliff loves dogs. Did I tell you we talked about getting a dog after graduation? He’s never had a dog and he wasn’t thrilled about having to pick up the poop, but he really wanted one, anyway.”

  Nora rolled her eyes behind her granddaughter’s back and then remonstrated with herself. She had been young once, too. It was essential to remember that. It was essential to be kind. Too many people forgot that.

  There was a knock at the kitchen door. Hank, not much interested in guard duty, turned and clicked out of the room.

  It was Mr. Pollen. Nora thought he could be anywhere from sixty to eighty years old. He lived in what amounted to little more than a rude cabin off a minor back road and what he did for a living—or what he had done in his younger years—she didn’t know. Nobody did. Some in town said he survived entirely on the land and by his own wits, with a little help from a shotgun. Others said that back in the fifties, during the Cold War, he’d stockpiled enough canned goods to last him until the middle of the twenty-first century. Whatever the truth, Mr. Pollen was a bit of a local legend, the source of all kinds of rumors and strange stories. And whenever he was seen, which wasn’t often and always at random times, some new tale would emerge, full-blown from the head of a local with a creative brainstorm.

  “I’ve brought you a Christmas present,” Mr. Pollen said, handing Nora a brown—thing.

  His ill-fitting false teeth smacked loudly against his shriveled gums. Lily unconsciously took a step back, as if she were afraid the teeth would come flying out of his mouth and clamp on to her face.

  “How—nice,” Nora replied. “What is it, exactly? I’m afraid I don’t have my glasses handy. . . .”

  “It’s a nut bowl.” The man beamed. He was obviously proud of his creation.

  “A bowl for nuts,” Nora repeated. “And it’s made of pinecones. Well. How—original.”

  “Oh, you can do just about anything with pinecones!” Mr. Pollen said with great enthusiasm. “In fact, I’m building myself a whole chest of drawers made of pinecones!”

  “You don’t say? Did you hear that, Lily? A chest of drawers.”

  Lily could only nod. If she dared to open her mouth, she just knew she’d collapse with laughter.

  “Well,” Nora said, easing Mr. Pollen toward the kitchen door, “thank you for the lovely gift. And good luck with your project.”

  Mr. Pollen was almost out into the cold when he turned back. “I could make you a chest of drawers, too. Really, it would be no problem.”

  “Well, that’s a very kind offer, but I’m afraid we’re all set with our chests. Of drawers. Thank you, anyway.”

  Nora began to close the door on their guest, slowly but firmly.

  “All right, then,” he said, “I’ll be on my way. Merry Christmas to you all!”

  When he was gone, Nora sat the pinecone nut bowl on the table. She thought it looked like some massive growth, like something a doctor might remove from a diseased body and then send on to a top-secret lab for further intensive study. She couldn’t help but shudder and wipe her hands down her apron.

  Lily stood next to her grandmother.

  “Oh. My. God. What are we going to do with that thing? It’s disgusting!”

  “Yes, it is, isn’t it?”

  “I half expected him to pull out an axe and chop us both to bits!”

  Nora reached for a dishcloth and draped it over Mr. Pollen’s gift. “Oh, Mr. Pollen is harmless,” she said. “Crazy, but harmless. Now his wife, may she rest in peace, she was the one you had to watch out for.”

  Lily laughed. “Oh, tell me what she was like!”

  Nora, too, began to laugh. “Well, locals called her Flying Hammer Hattie. That should tell you all you need to know. When her temper was up, you’d do best to duck.”

  “What’s so funny?”

  Becca stood in the doorway to the kitchen, frowning.

  Lily wiped tears of laughter from her eyes and turned toward her sister. “Oh, hey, Becca.”

  “Hey.”

  Becca’s awkwardness was palpable. Nora had the feeling that Becca thought they had been laughing at her.

  “How about a cup of coffee?” she offered briskly. “Or one of these oatmeal raisin cookies. They’re fresh out of the oven. The twins seemed to like them. Then again, eight-year-old boys aren’t particularly fussy about cookies, are they?”

  Becca took a small step back. “No, thanks, Grandma. I’ve got to check in with my office.”

  How, Nora wondered, did drinking a cup of coffee or eating a cookie interfere with checking in with one’s office? Didn’t everyone these days multitask? Or had she missed some recent change in the social order?

  “But I thought nobody really does any work in the days before Christmas.” Lily took one of the cookies from the plate her grandmother offered.

  “I’m not nobody,” Becca snapped.

  There was a decidedly awkward silence, which Nora took it upon herself to break.

  “Of course not, dear. Nobody meant to imply any such thing.”

  “Yes. Well, I’d better go.”

  And she did.

  “Oh, yeah,” Lily said, reaching for another cookie. “Definitely something weird.”

  9

  Olivia and James arrived at the Rowan house at about four that afternoon. It was already quite dark and, being December in Maine, quite cold. Becca, in the front hall with the others, shivered when Julie opened the door, and stepped back farther into the house.

  Immediately, and in spite of being absorbed with her own emotionally fraught situation, Becca noted an air of tension between her sister and brother-in-law. And she figured if she could sense it, then pretty much everyone else could, too. Well, maybe not David. David was always all about David. You could fall down in front of him and he’d walk right over your body, his attention caught by something more important to him, like a cinnamon roll or someone dropping garbage in the recycling bin.

  James Moody was of middling height and build. Wh
ile he’d put on a few pounds over the years, and while his hair had gone prematurely silver, he was, most people thought, still a handsome man. Part of his attractiveness, Becca thought now, watching him greet his in-laws, was his seemingly complete lack of pretension or guile.

  Becca shifted her attention to her older sister, Olivia Rowan-Moody. At the moment, she was giving her mother a hug while simultaneously ordering James to do something with her bag. Olivia didn’t have the long and lean frame shared by Steve, Becca, Rain, and to a lesser extent, David. Like her mother and youngest sister, Olivia was of medium height and middling weight. Her hair was a light shade of brown; Becca couldn’t help but note that it was now streaked quite liberally with gray. Where Olivia had gotten her dark blue eyes was anyone’s guess. They weren’t the “Rowan eyes,” but neither were they the cow brown Julie and Lily shared. Becca tried to remember if her grandfather had had blue eyes, but she couldn’t summon a clear enough picture in her mind. That, she realized, was something she wouldn’t like to admit to her family. They already thought her self-centered enough.

  James came over to Becca now and they shared a brief hug. “You’re looking well, Becca,” he said.

  Becca smiled at him. “You, too, James,” she lied. In fact, she’d never seen him look so unhappy.

  Somehow, Olivia managed to avoid an official greeting with her younger sister. Becca wasn’t sure how she pulled it off but she had, and Becca didn’t feel in the least slighted.

  Julie ushered Olivia and James off to the Queen Anne’s Lace Room while Nora, with Lily’s and Naomi’s help, finished preparing dinner. Aware that she, too, should be helping in the kitchen, but not feeling overly guilty about her dereliction of duty, Becca chose instead to join Rain in the living room, where she was entertaining her brothers by gustily singing the theme song from SpongeBob SquarePants. Becca had caught the show once, by accident. She’d liked it but would never admit that to her family.