The Christmas Boutique

by Jennifer Chiaverini

  He held her gaze for a moment, looked away, wiped the palms of his hands on his shorts. “It’s not that I don’t want to meet her,” he finally said. “It’s just that it isn’t possible.”

  “How so?” she asked. “If you’re concerned that Summer will be angry or resentful, don’t be. She’s a loving, forgiving child.”

  He shook his head, his mouth pressed in a tight frown.

  “Why don’t you start with a phone call?” Gwen persisted. “Get to know each other that way, and then we can talk about meeting in person. You could come visit us in Waterford, or we could come out to Santa Cruz—”

  “No,” he said vehemently, holding up a hand. “Whatever you do, don’t come to Santa Cruz. Never do that.”

  Gwen stared at him, astonished. “Why not?”

  “Because Susan and the kids don’t know about Summer.”

  Gwen’s heart plummeted, and then it began to burn. “You never told your family that you have another daughter?”

  He pressed his mouth closed again and shook his head, cheeks flushed.

  She kept her voice low, but her tone was cutting. “Don’t you think your wife deserves to know?”

  “How could I tell her now, when I’ve kept it secret so long?”

  “Throw yourself on her mercy and hope for the best. Eventually the truth will come out. Better Susan hears it from you than from—”

  “From you?”

  “I’m not going to tell her,” said Gwen, recoiling. “That’s on you.”

  “You don’t understand.” He shifted in his chair, glanced over his shoulder, and leaned forward to rest his arms on the table. “After you walked out on me, I fell apart. I didn’t know what had happened to you. I thought you’d been kidnapped, run over, worse. We looked for you. Did you know that?”

  She shook her head. How could she have known?

  “We backtracked all the way to Berkeley. We put up posters, passed out flyers. Then Katie thought of calling your parents.”

  Katie. Gwen searched her memory and drew forth the blurry image of a petite, copper-skinned girl with a reddish Afro and a gift for biting satirical poetry.

  “Katie called and asked for you, pretending she was calling from the UC Berkeley library about an overdue book. Your mother said you were out and asked Katie to send her the bill, she would pay it.”

  Gwen inhaled deeply. “I’m sorry I made you worry. I never thought of that.” Hadn’t he noticed her wedding band on the dashboard? That should have been enough to convey that she hadn’t gone missing, but had left him. Why make them both suffer through a maudlin parting speech?

  “So you were gone, and my child with you. I took it bad. I hit bottom. Some guy dragged me half starved and raging with fever into a mission. Susan worked there. She pulled me out of it. She must have seen something worth saving in me.” He clutched his hands together, rubbing the palm of his left with the thumb of his right. “So. Long story short. We married, started a family. I haven’t had so much as a beer in all that time. We go to church every Sunday. She says I’m a good man. What will she say if she finds out I’ve been lying to her all this time?”

  “She’ll probably be angry. She has good reason. But from the sound of it, she’ll forgive you.”

  “I can’t take that chance.” Suddenly he reached across the table and seized her hand. “Promise me you’ll never tell her.”

  “I already said I wouldn’t.” Gwen snatched her hand away. “Listen to me, Dennis. Summer is not your dirty little secret. Her right to know her father and siblings transcends your privilege to bury the truth.”

  “If I see her, or call her, or contact her in any way, my wife will find out.”

  “Then tell her the truth.”

  “I just told you, I can’t.”

  “No, you can. You just don’t want to.” Furious, Gwen signaled to the server to bring separate checks immediately. “Someday Summer will be old enough to seek you out on her own, and I won’t pretend I don’t know where you are, nor will I ask her to keep your secret. If she asks, I’m going to tell her about you and her half-siblings, as well as how to reach you. If she doesn’t ask, when she turns eighteen, I’ll tell her anyway. What she does with the information will be up to her.” The server hurried over with their checks. Gwen took hers, dug into her purse, and gave him enough cash for her meal plus a generous tip. “You have five years, Dennis. Make good use of the time.”

  She rose, yanked the strap of her tote bag over her shoulder, and strode away, tears of rage blurring her vision all the way back to the hotel.

  The conference ended that evening with a dinner and an open bar, but Gwen merely put in an appearance to speak with a few colleagues before retreating to her room. When she returned home the next day, and Summer greeted her excitedly with hugs and kisses and news from school, Gwen seethed with indignation that Dennis could ever believe that their daughter was something to be ashamed of, not a person, but a symbol of his youthful indiscretions.

  She really saw no reason why she should ever contact him again.

  Her parents stayed on a few days longer. On the second night when Summer was fast asleep, Gwen finally told them what had happened. Her father muttered euphemisms for curses and her mother grew pale with indignation. “He doesn’t deserve to know her,” she said, voice shaking, “and I hope he never does.”

  Gwen nodded, but in the end, that would be up to Summer.

  As snow fell softly upon the Elm Creek Valley and Christmas approached, Gwen and Summer put up a tree, decked the halls, wrapped gifts for the family, and worked on their Christmas Garland quilt. They took the segments with them when they drove down to Brown Deer on the morning of Christmas Eve, and in quiet moments when the house was not full of friends and neighbors cheerfully celebrating the festive season, they set out their cut pieces and took turns at Gwen’s mother’s sewing machine, attaching Nine-Patches to hexagons, triangles to Nine-Patches. To their delight, Gwen’s mother often joined in, sharing stories of Christmas joy from her childhood as she pressed seams flat, offering sage advice that improved their stitches or helped them avoid straining their wrists and fingers.

  Gwen and Summer finished the quilt top back home in Waterford in the second week of January. They layered and basted the top, batting, and backing, fit it snugly inside a lap hoop, and traded off quilting and reading aloud from their favorite classics—Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Anna Karenina. They had made quite good progress by the time Gwen’s parents drove up to the Elm Creek Valley so that Summer’s grandfather could escort her to the Eighth Grade Father-Daughter Dance. They had a wonderful time, but in the days that followed, Summer resumed her queries about her absent father, sometimes angrily, sometimes merely curious. Gwen always answered truthfully, but she volunteered no information beyond the boundaries of Summer’s questions.

  By the time they finished the quilt in early March, Summer’s inquiries had become far less frequent, and by her fourteenth birthday, they had ceased altogether.

  Four years later, Gwen brought out the photos of Summer’s half-siblings, told her about her encounter with Dennis in California, and gave her a small card with his contact information. “You can reach out to them if you like,” Gwen told her. “I can help you figure out how best to do it, especially since it’s possible your half-siblings don’t know they have another sister.”

  Summer fingered the card, studied each of the photos in turn, and set them down on the table. “Maybe someday,” she said, rising, leaving the artifacts behind. Gwen waited, but when Summer did not return, she put the photos and card in an envelope and left them on her daughter’s dresser.

  The next time Gwen passed through her room, the envelope was gone. She hoped Summer had put it away for safekeeping, but she did not ask.

  In all the years that had passed since then, Gwen had not heard from Dennis, and neither had Summer. She would have mentioned it if she had. Gwen was often tempted to ask her if she had thought about getting in touch with her half-
siblings, but she refrained. That was Summer’s path to follow, if she wished. Perhaps someday she would.

  In all those years too, Christmas Garland warmed them as they ate popcorn and watched holiday movies side by side on winter nights as snow fell softly outside their home, the cozy room fragrant with evergreen boughs and cinnamon, as the world turned and they awaited the return of the light.

  7

  Diane

  After seeing Tim off to work with a kiss at the door, Diane tidied up the breakfast dishes, put a chicken and some vegetables in the slow cooker for supper, and ironed the slacks, blouse, and jacket she planned to wear for her News at Noon interview with Nancy Reinhart later that day. It was just a three-minute segment on a local affiliate, but the program had a very large following of stay-at-home parents and retirees, an excellent target demographic for the Christmas Boutique.

  Once that interview was over, Diane’s publicity campaign would be essentially complete. She had sent out emails to every relevant campus group and community organization she could think of, had contacted all the local papers and radio stations, had put up flyers downtown and on campus, and had scored the one television news program that featured human interest stories from the Elm Creek Valley. As far as she could tell, she had exhausted every available form of publicity except for skywriting, which was impractical and cost-prohibitive. She would know soon enough how successful her efforts had been.

  Much work remained, however, if the vast throngs of eager shoppers she hoped to inspire to come to the manor that weekend would indeed find the wonderful Christmas Boutique she had promised. Leaving her freshly pressed, camera-ready outfit on hangers, she changed from her yoga pants and hoodie into business-casual slacks and a sweater, snatched up her purse and phone, and set out for Elm Creek Manor. The last she had heard, Anna and Jeremy had food services well in hand, while Gretchen and Agnes were nearly finished decorating the ballroom and banquet hall. That morning, volunteers from Good Shepherd Church were scheduled to bring over the handicrafts, preserves, and baked goods they had been collecting over the past few weeks. Stragglers who had not yet turned in their pledged items had been asked to drop them off at Elm Creek Manor at their convenience throughout the day. Sarah, Sylvia, Gretchen, and Gwen had offered to greet the volunteers, collect the remaining contributions, and help arrange the merchandise attractively in their market stalls. Diane assumed her friends would welcome an extra pair of hands, even though she would have to leave by late morning for the interview.

  Although the roads were clear of snow and ice, traffic was relatively heavy, the sidewalks bustling as people of all ages bundled in coats and scarves hurried off to work and school. The congestion eased as Diane left the downtown behind; she passed only a few cars on the rural highway, and none at all on the forest road leading to Elm Creek Manor. When she pulled into the rear lot, she spotted Gwen’s car and Andrew’s motor home, but to her surprise, Jeremy was emerging from the driver’s seat of the Elm Creek Quilts minivan instead of his own car, a few spaces away.

  She parked nearby, and by the time she approached, Jeremy had slid open the side door and was reaching inside for a wide, shallow carton decorated with illustrations of garden vegetables. “Do you need some help?” she asked.

  “Sure, thanks. Careful with those paper bags. They’re very full, and I doubt the handles will hold.”

  As he loaded another carton atop the stack in his arms, Diane reached for two paper bags overflowing with baguettes, sandwich rolls, and croissants, taking care to lift them from the bottom. “This is quite a haul,” she remarked, eyeing the many other bags and cartons still waiting to be unloaded.

  “Best of all, everything was donated,” Jeremy said as he led the way to the rear entrance of the manor. “I had to make a lot of stops, but it was worth it. The merchants didn’t give us their marked-down, past-expiration-date goods either. Anna will have everything she needs for a fantastic buffet this weekend.”

  “Anna could create a feast out of stale bread and a bag of frozen peas,” said Diane, pausing at the foot of the back stairs while Jeremy balanced his cartons on the railing and opened the door. Grinning in agreement, he held the door open and lifted his chin to indicate that she should precede him inside.

  The kitchen was warm and fragrant with savory aromas and spices. Anna bustled about in her white chef’s toque and apron, smiling and humming a Christmas carol. She greeted them eagerly, her eyes widening at the sight of the cartons and bags in their arms. “Would you leave all that on the table?” she asked, glancing through the window of the lower oven at whatever culinary masterpiece was baking inside. “I’ll help you unpack in just a moment.”

  They did as she asked, then headed back outside for another load. “It’s funny how much this reminds me of how Anna and I met,” Jeremy remarked, smiling.

  “I thought you met because your apartments are in the same building,” said Diane, quickening her pace to keep up with his bounding stride. “Don’t you live across the hall from each other?”

  “True, the first time we met was a few years ago when some of my mail ended up in Anna’s mailbox and she brought it over to me. But we didn’t really get to know each other until the Waterford College Key Club held a food drive.” He opened the side door to the minivan, but instead of unloading more boxes, he leaned against the frame and folded his arms across his chest, tucking his hands beneath his elbows for warmth. “They left a carton in the lobby of our apartment building near the mailboxes and posted a sign requesting nonperishable food items to make Thanksgiving baskets for needy families. They did the same at all the apartment buildings and fraternities near campus. The day before the drive ended, our carton held nothing but a box of pasta, a canister of raisins, and a package of granola bars. That was kind of pathetic, so I went around the building asking for donations.”

  “So you knocked on Anna’s door,” Diane interjected, “she gave you some gourmet delicacies, because what else would she have in her pantry, and the rest was history.”

  “More or less. She also told me that she had seen a guy from the first floor take a box of cereal and a gallon of apple juice from the box a few days before, which explained our neighbors’ ostensible lack of generosity.”

  “The nerve of some people.” Diane reached into the minivan for a paper bag full of winter squash. “It was a food drive, not his own personal pantry.”

  “Exactly. So after Anna donated, she offered to help me finish my rounds of the building. By the time we were through, we had filled a second carton.” Jeremy took two more boxes from the van and hefted a third on top. “After that, we went back to her apartment and she made us some whole-wheat chocolate cappuccino brownies to celebrate. They were amazing. We ate them right from the pan and watched A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.”

  “Sounds nice.” Diane studied him from the corner of her eye as they returned to the manor. “Sounds cozy.”

  “Best brownies I’d ever tasted.”

  “I bet they were,” she said archly, but she fell silent as they entered the kitchen, where Anna’s face lit up at the sight of them, or the donations they carried, or maybe just Jeremy.

  Something was up with those two.

  They needed three more trips to empty the minivan, but eventually the last carton was safely inside out of the cold. They hung their coats in the foyer closet and began unpacking the donations, storing perishables into the massive, stainless-steel refrigerator and setting the other items wherever Anna directed, in between checking on the oven and stirring the pot simmering on the stovetop. When they finished, Diane glanced at her watch and announced that she was overdue in the ballroom, for the volunteers and contributors could begin arriving at any moment.

  “I’ll come with you,” said Anna, wiping her hands on her apron. Making her way around the granite center island, she removed both apron and toque, set them on the seat of the farthest booth, and picked up two folded quilts from the adjacent table. “Jeremy, could you please listen for th
e oven timer and stir that pot every so often? I need to deliver my quilts to the decorating team.”

  “Sure.” Jeremy had just settled down in the booth by the window with a book, but he promptly closed it and stood. “Glad to help.”

  Diane felt a twinge of chagrin. “The deadline for quilts hasn’t passed yet, has it?”

  Anna smiled, a deep dimple appearing in her right cheek. “I think you still have the rest of the day. I won’t tell on you.”

  Diane almost joked that she wouldn’t tell on Anna either, but she held the words back just in time.

  When they entered the ballroom, they found Sarah, Sylvia, Gretchen, and Gwen already sorting merchandise into categories and arranging items artfully in the market booths. “Earlier this morning, Melanie and Nancy dropped off the donations they’ve collected at Good Shepherd,” Sylvia explained while they marveled at the vast array of items. “We might receive half again as much as this, if all the prospective donors meet their pledges.”

  “We should raise a tidy fortune for the food bank,” Gwen remarked, “as long as Diane didn’t get distracted by some other project and neglect her job.”

  Diane nudged her. “I defy you to find a better Christmas Boutique publicist in central Pennsylvania. I’ve checked off every item on my to-do list except for today’s News at Noon interview—live television, thousands of viewers. Did I forget to mention that part?”

  “You’ve mentioned it once or twice. Just don’t forget to show up.”

  “I’ve got this. You focus on partitions and tables, and whatever other minor, menial tasks you can be trusted with.”

  “I don’t have anything to sell at the market, but I do have two quilts for decorations,” Anna broke in, indicating the bundle in her arms. Diane and Gwen came forward to take the one on top, which they unfolded and held up for all to admire. A dazzling array of gold, six-pointed stars were scattered upon a rich blue background ranging from azure to indigo. “It belongs to Jeremy now, but he said we could borrow it.”