Christmas Once Again

by Jina Bacarr

  Not now. Not with my man’s hand around my waist.

  ‘How will you get to the mill?’ I don’t let go of his hand. Not yet.

  ‘I parked my roadster behind the ridge so I didn’t block the road. I’m going back to Wrightwood House first. I’m expecting an important call from the War Department about that new contract. Mr Clayborn met with the government representative yesterday.’

  ‘Really?’ I act surprised and pray my boss doesn’t give me away.

  He shakes his head. ‘I wish I could tell you more, Jelly Girl, but everything is top secret.’

  ‘I understand.’ Oh, do I.

  I don’t dare bring up how I almost lost that government contract. I want to tell him about my Miss Christmas Wrap idea, but I’ll surprise him instead. After all, that never happened back then so I have no idea how it will turn out.

  The seconds tick by. I run my gloved fingers over the rough fabric on the seat, toying with the design, while Jeff ties up the tree with a long, knotted rope, whistling a holiday tune, his sparkling eyes sneaking a glance at me through the back window of the truck.

  ‘Is the tree secure, Jeff?’ Mildred calls out the window. ‘Can we go?’

  ‘Not yet, Mildred.’ He comes around to my side and motions for me to roll down my window. ‘Don’t forget our date next week, Jelly Girl.’ His voice is dangerously smooth, which only ignites my need for him into a reckless state. He lifts my face like he wants to kiss me, but he stops. We’re not alone, his eyes say. I’m not worried about the reverend’s wife. She’ll understand a woman’s need to connect with her man, but I’m afraid to kiss him. Afraid it won’t be as wonderful as I want it to be.

  Or is it something else? Am I worried that I’ll break down and start sobbing like a baby? Afraid I won’t let go of him?

  It’s one thing to have my annual day of melancholy, to go through each moment with him during that last week with careful precision, enjoying the best parts, but relive it and lose him again? I can’t. I’ll break. Besides, I’m not satisfied with a sexy promise anymore. Not when I’ve come this far. I want the real thing.

  I want him.

  Before I think twice, I draw his head down to me, cupping my hands over his face so he can’t get away, and then brush my lips with his, teasing him, hoping he’ll forget everything but kissing me. I feel him stiffen, then a low growl from deep in his throat when I plant a big kiss on his mouth that deepens into something so hot, so passionate, he nearly loses control. My lips burn on his until I melt away his resolve and he kisses me back with a raw hunger, the same hunger seething inside me for endless nights. I didn’t mean for it to go this far, knowing Mildred is sitting in the driver’s seat, her brows raised, fingers tapping the steering wheel, but I don’t know when – or if – I’ll get the chance again to show him how I much I love him. I can’t quell my raging desire for him, nor do I want to. Long, beautiful moments go by and this lonely girl from Posey Creek shows her man exactly what a kiss can do.

  When we finally part, he lets out a low whistle, and then slicks back his hair like he doesn’t know what else to do. ‘You try a man’s soul, Kate.’

  That’s it. Nothing more. I look hard into his eyes. They smolder dark and rich like golden honey mixed with molasses heated to a boiling temperature and he can’t cool it down. Like he doesn’t believe it. Then he’s off. Taking long strides back behind the trees.

  What is fascinating to my time-traveling soul is I find new courage this morning. I let my passion ride a wave that takes me not only back to this wonderful time in my life, but makes me more convinced than ever I came here for a reason. I can’t fail to save Jeff. Not now. I’ll never regret it.

  Without a word, Mildred heads the truck down the dirt road toward the mill. I see a smile of approval curve over her lips. We don’t talk about what happened. Or that kiss. I have no doubt my cheeks blush a fever red. Every nerve in my body afire. My senses are so acute, I smell the unique citrus scent of the fir tree drifting through my open window. I fill my lungs with the smell of crushed oranges mixing with Mildred’s soft perfume. She glances at me sideways as she makes small talk, commenting on her husband’s latest letter about how his men helped him set up an altar in the middle of a jungle using a big box of ammo. Kind soul that she is, she’s affording me time to compose myself.

  What can I say to her? I love this man, but I’m going to lose him? I don’t have the heart to tell her the reverend comes home from the war a different man. It isn’t until after Mildred drops me off at the mill I remember I didn’t ask Jeff about getting a tree for the factory floor.

  After the way I kissed him, I doubt he’d remember anyway.

  15

  My career as a pinup girl begins and ends on the same day. Wednesday, five days before Jeff and I are set to elope. I bite my lip, eyes fixed on the day ahead and the task I set for myself on the trip into town. I feel confident our lives are on track, as much as they can be in this hectic time. I have to keep things following a normal fashion so no one suspects what we’re up to. That doesn’t make it any easier. I want to be with him every minute. Kiss him, hug him. God Almighty, I just want to look at him. Breathe him in. Love him.

  Basking in the memory of that kiss puts me at odds with myself. On one hand, I never saw a man smolder with so much desire or look at me with such fascination. His spine stiffened and the wheels in his brain turned in a different direction. Like he wasn’t sure what happened to his Jelly Girl. Yet in the back of my mind is the pivotal thought: when to tell him about the letter?

  If truth be told, I’m enjoying witnessing life through a different pair of eyes and also making my own history with today’s photoshoot. I’m determined to do my best to get this poster done. Besides, it keeps me busy so I don’t have to think about the fact I haven’t seen Jeff since yesterday morning. I imagine his face when he sees me posing on top of a giant Christmas box to help the paper shortage. Holding me close, whispering in my ear he likes my idea, tugging on my hair like he does when we’re alone.

  I’m feeling confident when I enter the DB Baker & Sons photography studio situated on a cozy, tree-lined corner of Main Street. The classical brick storefront boasts an oak door weathered with time. That’s comforting to me somehow. The studio is two doors down from Maisie’s hair salon and across the street from the post office. Downtown is busy with everyone shopping, mailing Christmas cards (if they have any left over from last year) and ladies getting fussed over with manicures. Rich ladies from the west end of town with the big Victorian homes mixing with girls from the mill. Women with foxtails sitting next to cheeky girls with ponytails. A breeding ground for gossip.

  There’ll be plenty of news to go around when word gets out one of their own is joining the movie star ranks. I won’t be surprised if my picture ends up splashed all over the local newspaper. I find the idea amusing. I can’t help but think what the townsfolk will say if I put an ad in the Locals section of the Posey Creek Courier (people announce who’s in town for the holiday or who’s home ill) that ‘Miss Kate Arden is visiting from the future to spend a week with family.’

  I snicker. Not likely, but I can use a spot of humor. Especially after my meeting earlier with Mr Neville. He kept repeating what a great idea it was to have a girl sitting on an unwrapped, big box decorated for Christmas. Already he’s had calls from the local press and the city council wanting copies.

  He insisted the factory setting isn’t right for the photoshoot, so we made the trek to the photography studio. He drove me into town in the company car, ranting on about if Mr Timothy starts running things, he’ll cut the marketing budget. Along with his job. No wonder he convinced Mr Clayborn if he wants this poster done right, we must go to the best.

  DB Baker has been the town’s photographer for forty years but his grandson is home on furlough and insists on doing the job.

  Flirty Freddie, we called him back in high school, because he liked making time with the girls before he got himself a gig as a photographer
with the Army.

  I’m impressed with the photos he shows us of his work. GIs going into battle, the fear as well as the courage reflected in every shot. He also caught them at their most vulnerable moments, like smoking a cigarette or writing a letter back home. He captured something in their eyes and on their faces in his photos that looks into the soul of each soldier and what they’re thinking: home and Mom and their best girl. That’s what they’re fighting for.

  Freddie is quick to add he’s seen action in Belgium and Italy. ‘Come Christmastime next year,’ he tells me with a wink of an eye, ‘who knows where I’ll be? London, Paris?’

  I put down the magazine and try to smile. I can’t. I know where he’ll be. In the Ardennes. At the Battle of the Bulge. It’s not easy knowing the history of everybody I meet. Freddie was there in the dense woods, holding his position on the frozen ground in the snow, recording the bloody action during that winter of 1944 to 1945 when he got caught in the crossfire and took a hit. He came home with a bum leg, but he never gave up taking pictures and for that I admire him.

  But that doesn’t give him the right to turn my poster idea into cheesecake. I’m not the shy kid I was back then. I’m a magazine food editor back in my time. I’ve sat in and supervised several author photo and cover shoots. Watched the art director pose the model in a dream sequence and turn on the wind machine, marveling at the invisible wires attached to a floating goddess advertising heavenly butter. I know about lighting and angles and what Madison Avenue gurus call, ‘Sell the sizzle, not the steak.’

  Freddie wants more sizzle than I’m willing to give. ‘Lift your skirt up higher, so we can see more leg.’

  ‘How about we trade places and you pose on top of this box?’ I pull down my skirt. I’m wearing my favorite blue sweater with the imitation pearl buttons and a dark skirt. I used leg makeup so I don’t get a run in my last pair of precious nylons. ‘It’s cold sitting up here.’

  Up here is a five foot high wooden box hastily constructed to look like a giant Christmas present. Mr Neville painted candy canes, holly, and a waving Santa along with cute elves on each side. The studio is cool so as not to waste fuel, but as soon as Freddie turns on the hot spotlights, a patina of sweat makes my face shine. Which brings the makeup girl out of the corner with her powder puff. A cute kid with braces and bobby sox, she dabs my nose and cheeks with loose powder that flies everywhere and makes me sneeze.

  ‘Please, Miss Arden, try to look like you’re enjoying yourself.’ Freddie pops a stick of gum into his mouth. ‘It’s Christmas, you’re supposed to be happy because you’re helping Uncle Sam, not look like you’re going to the dentist. Let’s try something else,’ he says, pacing up and down. Then he hits me with: ‘Undo the top button on your sweater.’

  ‘You don’t give up, do you?’ I slip the pearl button out of the slender opening not because he asked me, but because I see models do it to add sex appeal. Besides, anything to get this over with so I can go find Jeff.

  ‘Now turn your right shoulder toward me… a little more.’ He exhales, wipes his brow and spits out his gum. ‘Think of something wonderful… like ice cream or a thick, juicy steak… or kissing a handsome soldier.’

  By the smirk on his face, he means him, but my mind goes straight to Jeff. This time I don’t try to dissect what happened when we kissed in the woods. I let it happen. Fill me up and take me to dreamland. The lovely, quivery feeling in the pit of my stomach when my lips pressed against his and my whole world lit up inside me like fireworks. Popping, sparkling sensations.

  ‘Hold it. Don’t move. That’s perfect. Keep that smile coming… beautiful, baby, you’re a star.’ He snaps shot after shot, moving around me, standing on a ladder, shooting me from every angle and he never stops talking. ‘By the way, gorgeous, who’s taking you to the dance on Saturday night?’

  ‘Who says I’m going?’ I shoot back, wiggling my shoulders. I’m getting into this modeling thing. It’s fun being on this side of camera instead of watching on the sidelines.

  ‘Every girl in town will be there to meet and greet their favorite soldier. Which, if you’re lucky, will be me.’

  ‘Sorry, Freddie, I’m taking my sister, Lucy.’

  Jeff asked me, but I can’t tell him that. Hopefully we will get lost in the crowd and no one will notice the stardust in my eyes.

  ‘You won’t escape me. I’ll tag you for a dance and afterward we’ll go for a long walk in the moonlight—’

  I hear a loud cough from Mr Neville. I almost forgot he’s there. He clears his throat. ‘Did you get the shot you wanted, Sgt Baker? Miss Arden and I have work to do and must be getting back to the mill.’

  ‘Sure thing, Pops. Miss Arden is easy on the eyes and a heck of a model.’ He lifts me off the box and I swear he gives my waist an extra squeeze, making me flinch. I pretend not to notice. Freddie is a good-looking guy and fast with the compliments. I see why girls fall for his line. Every girl but me. Jeff is the only man I want. ‘Don’t forget, save me a dance.’ Then he winks at me.

  ‘With all the pretty girls in town, I doubt you’ll have time for me.’ I wink back.

  ‘Oh, yeah? You’re my type. The girl next door with class. We went to the same high school, right?’

  ‘You never noticed me.’

  ‘I am now, sister.’ He whistles at me.

  He takes a step back, giving me the onceover as if he can’t figure me out. ‘You’re different than you were back in high school. Not so much the quiet kid who spent more time with her nose in a book than teasing the boys.’ He looks me up and down. ‘Baby, do I like it.’

  ‘You, on the other hand, are the same Freddie Baker.’ I poke him in the ribs. ‘I don’t like it.’

  With that, I can’t wait to leave the studio with Mr Neville trailing at my heels, huffing and puffing like he can’t breathe. Neither can I.

  ‘I’ve never met such an impertinent young man.’ He wipes the sweat off his face and loosens his bowtie, something I never saw him do before.

  ‘I have. The publishing business is full of them.’ I don’t bother to explain. ‘He is good at his job.’ I smile at Mr Neville, remembering Freddie’s poignant and stirring photos of soldiers at war. I don’t want to be too hard on him, putting himself in danger to capture the war on film for generations to come so I say with a smile, ‘Don’t worry, Pops. He got the shot. I’d bet on it.’

  I’m counting the Christmas presents I bought for Ma and the family on this chilly December late Wednesday afternoon when I hear the telephone ring. It can’t be for me, not with the whole block on the same party line. Still, it takes me a minute to recollect whether or not it’s our specific ring. Two short rings. Two long.

  That’s ours. I’m curious, but Ma is the gatekeeper when it comes to the phone. Besides, Jeff wouldn’t call me here (Mrs Widget might be listening). My friend Helen isn’t allowed to use the phone in her mom’s shop except for business.

  Lost in my thoughts, I check over the presents my younger self put together. I line up the unwrapped gifts on my bed in a straight line like good soldiers.

  I start wrapping bows around the presents, but the phone won’t stop ringing.

  It rings five, six more times. Where’s Ma? Finally, the ringing stops. I breathe out. Good. She must have answered it.

  I want to spend every precious moment with Jeff this week until that fateful morning when he gets on that train. I can’t. He’s busy with the mill production, so I relive memories with him more vivid because I’m here. Like the time I was at Wrightwood House with Ma delivering sugar cookies she made for Christmas Eve. I saw a young Polish maid in the kitchen, sobbing. She wasn’t much older than I was. She didn’t speak much English, but I took her hand and together we sat in the kitchen and sang Christmas Carols and ate sugar cookies. Imagine my surprise when Jeff showed up and joined us. It was my best Christmas Eve ever, the three of us holding hands and singing. I lost that part of me over the years. That the true spirit of Christmas is giving, no matte
r how small or how simple. To think it took a trip through time for me to get it back. Why was I so stubborn? I shouldn’t have waited so long to go home for Christmas.

  Thinking only of myself every holiday and my pain. I hurt Lucy, too. I’m determined to make it up to her when I get back to my own time.

  Why am I so sure I’m going back? I rub my head, aching from the turmoil and confusion I experienced the past few days. My long rolls of hair come loose and keep falling in my eyes. I go back to what is a favorite ritual of mine during the holidays. Going through the presents I purchased, wrapping them up with pretty bows and anointing each one with a special prayer my family will use it well in the coming New Year. Gifts are hard to come by this season, but Pop and Junior are easy. My younger self traded two jars of cherry jam for Mr Evers’ best tobacco in the shop, and a factory worker at the mill donated a used baseball mitt to our barter exchange I got for Junior. I found a fluffy, blue bed jacket made from brushed rayon for Lucy, and I crocheted wool rosette earmuffs for Ma so her ears won’t freeze when she hangs up the laundry in the cold wind.

  I sit back on my heels, thinking. I hoped she’d love the muffs as I much as I do, but Ma never wears my girlish gift. I find it years later with the bow still on. That’s Ma, too practical for her own good. So I made a special trip to the drugstore and picked up a big glass jar of lavender scented hand cream. I have a feeling she’ll like that.

  The phone starts ringing again. More insistent this time. Whoever is on the other end isn’t giving up.

  ‘Ma, Ma!’ I call out, looking down the stairs. No one is about. Lucy isn’t home from school yet, Junior is at the community center playing ping pong, and Pop doesn’t get off work until six o’clock. I glance out the upstairs window in the hallway and see Ma hanging up sheets in the backyard.

  ‘I’m coming, I’m coming,’ I mutter, taking two steps at a time down the stairs. I grab the receiver. ‘Arden residence. This is Kate. Can I help you?’ I say, using my best office voice in case it’s for Pop.