Stand Tall

by Joan Bauer

  Tree laughed and waved and shook all the hands of all the kids who came up to him. Down the hall they went with the ho-ho-hos booming. Kids in wheelchairs were following them. Tree handed out candy canes; King had a bag of toys over his shoulder. They turned the corner, saw three vets dressed like reindeer. Luger marched forward dressed like a toy drummer, beating a snare drum with his good hand.

  Rat tat tat.

  Rat tat tat.

  Rat a tat. Rat a tat.

  Tat tat.

  A doctor took them into the rooms of the children who were too sick to come out.

  One little girl had an IV in her arm and looked gray. Her mother was sitting in a chair by her bed. When Grandpa rolled in, that child lit up like a Christmas star.

  “Santa,” she whispered.

  “You’ve got it, kid.”

  “You’re in a wheelchair.”

  “Life isn’t perfect, is it?”

  King pulled a stuffed bear out of his bag, gave it to her. She hugged it, smiled at Tree.

  “Santa, would you tell me a story?”

  “Sure.”

  “Would you tell me ‘The Night Before Christmas’?”

  “Sure. Where’s the book?”

  She looked concerned. “Don’t you know it?”

  Grandpa looked at Tree and they both looked at the Trash King, who sniffed and said, “He knows it.”

  Grandpa desperately tried to remember the poem. The little girl hugged her bear and smiled.

  “Okay, here goes. . . . ‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.” He stopped dead.

  “The stockings,” the little girl said.

  “Were hung by the chimney with care,” said King.

  Grandpa grinned. “In hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there.”

  Silence.

  Tree whispered about the kerchief, the cap, and the nap.

  They got through it, helped by the little girl and her mother, and they had to call in two nurses to get the names of the eight reindeer right. King insisted the front reindeer were Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, and Nixon.

  “Vixen,” shouted the older nurse.

  “Jeez. They named a reindeer that?”

  They didn’t miss a room that night.

  Didn’t miss a child.

  Dozens of children lined up to see Santa. First in line, a boy in a big leg brace. He looked at Grandpa’s half leg. “What happened to you?”

  “I had an operation.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Mine hurts, too. I wouldn’t want anyone to sit on it.”

  So he stood next to the wheelchair and told Santa how he wanted a complete model train set, not like the one he got last year, like the one Billy Buckley got with the cool engine and the miles and miles of track.

  Grandpa motioned to King. “Take that down.”

  “I didn’t bring any paper.”

  “Elves,” said Santa, shaking his head.

  They had a party in the cafeteria for the kids who could get there; everyone sang Christmas songs. Only a few stalwart believers sat on Santa’s knee, and he managed. Then a little girl climbed up on Tree’s knee and told him that she wanted her lung to get better for Christmas.

  Tree didn’t know what to say.

  Then she whispered, “I know you can’t really give me that. I just wanted to tell you.”

  And she hugged him like he was the genuine article.

  It made Tree feel about a foot taller, which was really saying something.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Tree didn’t need much more of Christmas to happen after that.

  Except it would have been nice if Larry stopped yelling at Bradley, who, according to Larry, wasn’t moving fast enough to get out of his way.

  “Take it out on somebody your own size!” Tree shouted.

  “Like you?” Larry shouted back.

  Tree stood tough. “I’m bigger than you!”

  Larry’s face darkened. “Maybe I could do something about that!”

  But he never did. Larry was a screamer, not a fighter.

  Twice he’d come home at night really late. His voice sounded different, he swayed when he walked. Grandpa said he’d been drinking. Larry got grounded, but he snuck out again anyway. When Larry staggered into the house at 2:00 A.M. with beer on his breath, Grandpa said, “What you’re doing isn’t making the hurt go away.”

  Larry stood there, quiet.

  “Booze doesn’t help. Talking does. Time. And I’ll do whatever I can to—”

  Larry shouted at him to mind his own business.

  Grandpa said that anything that had to do with Larry was his business.

  Larry raced up the stairs, flopped onto his bed. A few minutes later, Bradley pushed the door open and stuck his old snout on Larry’s arm.

  “Get lost!”

  But Bradley wouldn’t. He just sat there with his big trusting eyes waiting to help. Finally Larry hugged Bradley around the neck, buried his head in that good, old fur, and cried his eyes out about his parents’ divorce.

  Right after that, he sank to his knees in front of the toilet and vomited up beer until his insides felt raw.

  Eight P.M., December 24.

  Tree, Curtis, Larry, and Grandpa looked at the half-bare living room.

  Tree hadn’t realized how important Christmas trees were until he didn’t have one.

  Larry said, “Some Christmas.”

  Curtis said, “Shut up.”

  They’d been at each other all day.

  Grandpa grabbed his walker, struggled up. “We’re going to change things here. We’re going to form a squad—tough and unified. And don’t tell me it can’t happen. I saw it happen in Nam. Saw different people with nothing in common work together to a common goal and become strong friends. So strong, you’d do just about anything to make sure your buddies stayed alive.”

  He rolled the walker to the middle of the living room. “That’s what it comes down to sometimes—forgetting how you feel; being brave in front of your friends.”

  Curtis, Larry, and Tree were quiet.

  Bradley, who understood about friendship, trotted in from the hall.

  “We need a Christmas tree,” Larry said finally.

  Grandpa nodded. “That would help.”

  “We could get one at the store,” Tree suggested.

  “The stores,” Curtis snapped, “are closed.”

  Grandpa grinned. “Guess we’ll have to steal one.”

  In the car.

  Curtis driving too fast, yelling at Tree to scrunch down in the backseat.

  “You try scrunching down back here!”

  Curtis screeched into the parking lot of Kramer’s Sports Mart. Dad was just about to close the store down. Curtis stopped fast. Tree’s head hit against the driver’s seat.

  Wheelchair out. Too many arms to help Grandpa.

  “Wait,” said Larry, “I lost my grip.”

  “Dear God . . .” said Grandpa, sliding butt to the door.

  Wheeling toward the store. Tree ran ahead, opened the doors.

  Their father at the cash register, trying to clear out for the holiday. He looked up, shocked.

  “This is a stickup,” Grandpa boomed cheerily. “Just hand over the tree and nobody gets hurt.”

  “What?”

  Grandpa pointed to the Christmas tree in the middle of the store, complete with lights and ornaments.

  “You’re closing. You don’t need the tree. We do.”

  “Pop, it’s not my tree. It’s the store’s tree.”

  “You’re the manager.” Grandpa motioned to the boys, who started unplugging the tree, arguing about the best way to get it out.

  “I need it back on the twenty-sixth when we open.”

  Grandpa looked around. “We’ll take that wreath and that fake holly.”

  Tree got the wreath. Larry got the holly.

  “Pop . . .”


  Grandpa wheeled himself toward the door.

  “It’s Christmas, Bucko, we’re going to start acting like it.”

  Tree lay across the seat with the tree placed over his body. Sports ornaments dangled in his face.

  “Drive carefully,” Grandpa ordered Curtis, “or he’ll be scarred for life.”

  Tree groaned all the way home to make the point.

  They got the tree up.

  It filled the empty spaces of the living room.

  Dinner cooking. Dad and Grandpa in the kitchen, getting in each other’s way.

  Huge steaks. A dozen fat tomatoes. Three loaves of bread. Four tins of pound cake. Frozen strawberries. Endless cans of whipped cream.

  Bradley looked longingly at the tree.

  “Don’t even think about it!” Curtis gave Bradley a push out the door.

  Then Dad remembered he left his presents for everyone at the store, and Tree remembered he left his presents for everyone at Mom’s house, and Curtis and Larry remembered that they should have gone shopping, but didn’t. And Grandpa said they didn’t need presents, they just needed to let Christmas come natural, like the first one.

  Bradley started barking at the front door. Tree let him in. Bradley headed right over to the Christmas tree, lifted his leg, and peed and peed.

  “See,” said Grandpa, “if we had presents under there, they’d be ruined.”

  And Bradley slept soundly in the hall.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  “Pommerantz!” shouted Mom. “Don’t eat that. Bad dog!”

  She ripped a celery curl with chutney cream cheese from Pommerantz’s tiny teeth.

  Aunt Carla, Mom’s sister, came over to defend him. She and her dog were visiting from Florida for the holidays.

  “He’s not a bad dog, Jan. He just doesn’t understand. Do you, Pommie?”

  This was almost more than Tree and his brothers could stand.

  Conan started barking. His territory had been invaded.

  You learn the flexibility of the human spirit when you have two different Christmas experiences in less than twenty-four hours.

  “How’s your . . . father?” Mom asked in that edgy way.

  “Okay,” Tree, Larry, and Curtis said together.

  “Grandpa?”

  Same response.

  She looked at the Serenity Fountain, a gift she had given to herself. Gentle, gurgling water cascaded over small, peaceful rocks. This is what her life would become. Someday.

  She was trying now to be conversational with her sons. “How was your Christmas Eve?”

  “Pretty good after we stole the tree,” Curtis offered.

  “What?”

  Tree hit Curtis in the arm, told her the story, tried to make it light. He left out how he had to lie underneath the tree in the car.

  “Your dad loves to do things last-minute.”

  She looked at her decorated kitchen with the little wreaths of basil over the sink, the Christmas music playing softly, the three kinds of vegetables, the perfect pies. Last night she had finished decorating the house with garlands, pinecones, and blue and white bows.

  She’d strung popcorn, for crying out loud.

  She’d pictured everyone smiling and happy, but instead her sons seemed distant and sad. “Let’s talk about our feelings.”

  “That’s a good idea,” Carla chirped.

  Three distinct male groans.

  Mom wiped away a tear. “We all know it’s different this Christmas. We’re still in the fresh pain of the divorce, the awkward parts of how to be with each other.” She looked at her sons. “Don’t you think?”

  Tree nodded.

  Curtis and Larry didn’t commit.

  “We can make this work if we talk. If we don’t talk, we’ll never know what’s going on.” She grabbed the supersize bottle of Motrin she kept by the sink, gobbled three pills, looked at the gurgling Serenity Fountain. “You can tell me anything, and I promise I will listen. I love you guys more than I know how to say. There is no wall between us, and there never will be. I want to know all that’s happening in your lives.”

  Three pairs of shuffling male feet. Larry looked up finally.

  “I’m kind of flunking two courses, Mom.”

  Apron flung off, gums back like Conan. “What are you saying to me?”

  “You wanted to know what was happening!”

  “You’ll lose your scholarship!”

  “I can’t concentrate. I don’t know.”

  “Flunking? Not even a D?”

  “Yeah! I get up every morning and say, ‘How can I really screw up today?’”

  Larry stormed out of the room.

  Carla said, “He’s acting out his feelings of frustration and anger, Jan.”

  Mom turned in fury to Tree and Curtis.

  Curtis had overdrawn his checking account again, but he was taking that news to his grave.

  Tree thought about mentioning how he’d taken apart the blender a couple of weeks ago and there were two parts missing and he wasn’t sure it worked, but his mother was standing in front of it now with a handful of walnut halves—she put them inside the blender and everything in Tree wanted to shout, Don’t.

  She flipped on CHOP.

  Nothing.

  She checked the plug, tried again. The blender made a sound like a sick duck. Dark fury came over her face. She turned to Tree.

  Tree was famous for doing this.

  He took the answering machine apart when his mother was looking for work.

  He took the remote control apart when his father’s commercial was running during the Army-Navy game.

  “You will never do this again.”

  Tree gulped. “I promise.”

  “I think a fire in that pretty new fireplace would be nice,” said Carla, running from the room.

  Mom furiously chopping the walnuts by hand.

  Then concern hit her face.

  “Was the flue up or down?”

  “I think we’ve got a problem here!” Carla’s voice was an octave higher.

  “No!” screamed Mom.

  They all ran into the newly painted living room and watched as billows of black smoke blew into the room while the logs crackled in the fireplace.

  “Guess it wasn’t open,” said Curtis.

  Tree grabbed a broom from the closet, knelt down by the fireplace, breathing smoke, coughing as his lungs filled with it. He shoved the broomstick up to where the flue should be. Shoved four times, finally felt it pop open.

  “Open the windows!” Mom screamed. “Open the door! Open everything!”

  Larry ran down the stairs. “What happened?”

  “Doom,” Curtis said solemnly.

  “Oh, God, Jan, I’m so sorry!” Carla was opening windows, batting smoke from the air.

  Pommerantz was barking pitifully in the kitchen.

  “Oh, poor Pommie. He must be so scared.”

  Pommerantz ran into the hall, stood shaking on the little yellow-and-white hooked rug, and puked up the celery stick with cream cheese.

  “Pommerantz,” screamed Mom, “sit on a tack!”

  “I think that’s excessive, Jan.”

  It was then that the smoke alarm in the kitchen went off.

  Mom stood on a stool by the freshly baked pies, trying to turn it off; the siren blared.

  She yanked it from the freshly painted ceiling.

  Ripped out the batteries.

  And finally, quiet came upon them.

  Except for the gurgling drips from the Serenity Fountain.

  Mom crumpled on the floor in a woeful heap. The aroma of perfect roast beef wafted from the oven.

  “Smoke alarm works,” said Curtis, who was known for having a firm grasp of the obvious.

  Tree, Curtis, and Larry half laughed from relief.

  She didn’t think that was funny.

  Tree scrunched down next to her, put his arm around her shoulder. “You’ve got to laugh, Mom. If you don’t, you’ll cry.”

&nbs
p; CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “My little sister is allergic to Fred.”

  Eli Slovik told Tree this on the phone. Fred was his parrot.

  “She’s got some feather allergy and Fred has to be out of the house until they test her and see if there’s medication. Can I bring him to your house? Just for a little bit?”

  Tree wasn’t sure how Bradley would handle a parrot.

  He wasn’t sure how anybody would.

  “He could keep your grandfather company, Tree. Just ask. Please?”

  “Back off, Buster.”

  Fred the parrot said it to Grandpa, who said, “Back off yourself. I’m going to teach you some manners.”

  Bradley looked at the parrot and barked loud.

  “I really appreciate this, Mr. Benton.” Eli was holding the big cage with Fred inside. “He gets kind of excited sometimes.”

  Grandpa stared at Fred, who stared back.

  “I’ve got to go, Mr. Benton. Thanks.” Eli looked in the cage. “You be good, Fred.”

  “Back off, Buster.”

  Eli looked pained. “My uncle taught him to say that.”

  Bradley backed out of the room.

  “You’re certainly looking handsome today, Leo.” Grandpa had his walker close to Fred’s cage. “Go ahead, bird, say it.”

  Fred looked back.

  They were getting used to each other.

  Grandpa tried again. “You’re certainly looking handsome today, Leo.”

  Nothing from the bird.

  “That’ll get you a whole lot farther in the world than ‘Back off, Buster.’”

  “Back off, Buster,” Fred announced.

  Grandpa sighed, headed back to the couch.

  The white oak stood like a skeleton covered with snow. It was hard to look at it and remember how full and lush it had been in the spring, how its leaves had turned to wine in the fall. That’s the thing about winter—it’s so easy to forget the other seasons—it never seems like it will end.

  Tree stood in front of the leafless white oak. He could see every branch, all the textures of the gray bark.

  Tree wanted it to be spring, but dealt with the reality.

  He picked up an acorn. It was so small, so compact—the seed of a new tree just waiting to be released in the earth.