Little Tree

As they sat down for dinner, she put popcorn in the microwave. After dinner, he produced the five bags of cherry candies he bought and a box of cordial cherries.

“How long should we make the string?” He asked.

“How tall you think that shrub is?”

“Let’s find out.” He almost ran outside, across the road and stood by the tree. It came to his chest.

“What do you think?”

“If we make it as tall as you with your arm stretched over your head it should be long enough to wrap around the tree several times?”

About that time, Chet pulled up. “What’re you kids doin’?”

“Being neotenous,” Oscar laughed. Chet wrinkled his brow.

“Come over, I’ll feed you.” Esther suggested.

“She made the best chicken and dumplins.”

Chet sat down to a piping hot bowl of chicken and dumplins and a piece of corn bread. “Bell is going to be so jealous.” He moaned as he took his first bite. “You weren’t kiddin’ man, these are great. So what does that word mean?”

“Exhibiting retention of juvenile characteristics in the adult,” Oscar smiled.

“Thanks, I’m glad you like them.” Esther blushed. “You can take Bell some if you’d like. I made more than we’ll eat.”

Chet’s mind was going in a hundred different directions as he ate his dinner. That black hole in Esther’s past bothered him. But Oscar looked happier than Chet had ever seen him; and if Esther could get him to eat, good for her. His biggest fear was that his friend was going to get hurt.

Esther put a big bowl of popcorn on the table as Oscar poured the candy cherries into another bowl. She placed a roll of fishing line and needles on the table as well.

He opened the box of cordial cherries, “dessert?”

“Don’t mind if I do?” She giggled as she ate a piece of the candy.

He looked at Chet and winked, causing his friend to smile. “We are going to make a garlan out of popcorn and candied cherries to go around that little shrub by the garage.”

Chet nodded, “I am understanding now.”

“Oh, I almost forgot.” Esther went over to the freezer. “Check these out.” In a baking sheet, she had put six cookie cutters, filled with water, ribbon was coming from under each one.

“What do we have here?” Oscar asked as she put them on the table.

“I am hoping ornaments for the tree.”

As they sat there, they told stories about Christmases past. And what got the garlan project started. Chet took a picture of them and sent it to Bell. Then took another picture of the dumplins and told her what he was bringin’ home for dinner. Chet read her reply out loud, ‘It’s a good thing you’re bringin’ me some of them home. I’d hate for you to get divorced over a dumplin’. He laughed.  

After the garlan was long enough (they hoped), they took it and the baking sheet outside. It was the right length. The ornaments turned out perfect and they had six decorative shapes to go on the tree. They posed by the tree for Chet. She took one of the two friends as well.

As Oscar was leaving for a meeting at school, he stood in his yard eyeing the tree as his SUV warmed up. It was a cute little tree. He was amazed at how much fun it was. He took a picture of it in the morning light, just in case the sunlight got hot enough to melt the ornaments away. He had to admit that was the most fun he had ever had decorating a tree. There were no fond memories of Christmas. Well, now he had one.

This time the word neotenous didn’t bother him. Was it just a matter of getting used to saying it?

Oscar was eating at his leftover dumplin’s when his phone vibrated. Chet had sent him the pictures from the night before. He had a great time and it showed on his face. Bell had also sent Esther a message that the dumplins were amazing. Oscar made the picture of him and Esther his Christmas screen on his phone. Then sent the pictures and the message on to Esther, with a message of his own.

‘I knew that I enjoyed last night. But I never knew how much until Chet sent me the pictures. Thank you so much. I feel like it’s a start in the right direction in helping me get Christmas back. It was so much fun.’

She replied, ‘I love you too’.

Basement boogers

Esther stretched waking up from an amazing sleep. The lingering smell of Old Spice hung in the air. She smiled to herself burying her face in the pillow he had slept on. The flush of the commode caused her to jump followed by running water, she realized he was still there. He leaned up against the bathroom doorframe. “If you will go with me, I will look in the basement to see what we can find.”

“I would be delighted.”

“I’ll go change, just come over when you get ready.”

She smiled, “you got it.”

They went through the den down to the basement. He turned on the light and opened a couple small windows to let a little air into the space. He just stood in the middle of the room, “My uncle liked to tinker with models and he would let me help him.” Esther didn’t say a word. She just let him reminisce. He cleared his throat, “my aunt was a stickler for details. I’m sure the container would be labeled Christmas.” They didn’t find one box of Christmas things, they found ten.

“Wow!” Esther sneezed, “either this is a life time of stuff or she loved Christmas.”

“I don’t remember her loving Christmas per say. She had a tree but that’s all the decorations I remember.”

One box was every bit as tall as Oscar. “How much you wanna bet, that’s a tree?” Esther smiled.

“I’d say you’re right.” And indeed it was. It was a very old tree. “This tree is a good thirty years old.”

“Your hearts not in this is it?”

He sat on the steps. “No.” Rubbing his face with his hands, he continued. “It just seems like something I should do.”

She knelt in front of him, “I have a thought.” When he looked up, she was smiling. “Let’s forgo this idea for now. When I moved in with my grandparents, we started our own Christmas tradition. She always told me that she did it with her children when they were little. And the tree between the front door and your garage is perfect.”

“For?”

“Let’s string up some popcorn and candied cherries since cranberries are to expensive now; and make garlan for that tree?”

“I’ve watched people do that in movies.”

She smiled again, “it was great fun. Then again, I was a little kid.” She sneezed.

“Tomorrow, I’ll stop by the store and get the candy.”

She sneezed again. “I’ll have the popcorn ready.”

He smiled, “it’s a date.” She sneezed. “Are you okay?”

“It’s time for me to go. If we come back down here, remind me to wear a mask.”

The next evening when he got home from work, she had attempted to make chicken and dumplins .

“It smells great in here.” Oscar knocked as he walked in.

“If these aren’t any good, I have a pizza as a backup plan.” She smiled, “a white pizza.” She removed the cornbread from the oven. “Oh, before I forget.” She handed him back his key.

“No, keep it.” She was in shock and he noticed. “Please.” He smiled.

“Okay.” She flopped the cornbread on a plate.

He sniffed at the pot, “oh my.” She giggled. He took a spoon from the drawer and tasted.

She pouted, “and?”

He turned her face toward him then kissed her, “delicious, just like you.”

She blushed, “well you know.”

Truth or dare

Silent tears rolled down his face. She loved him too. Dear God was it true? They had known each other less than a month. Was it too soon to be spewing the L word? Out of loneliness, he had jumped too quickly before.

Should he tell her the truth? Should he tell her what really happened 10 years ago? He gave up. That’s what happened. He gave up. The beating they were dishing out became too much. He just wanted to die. ‘God, take me home.’ He pleaded night after night. But morning after morning, he woke up. Still feeling lost, alone, hurting (mentally and physically). He was too big of a coward to commit suicide. Didn’t want to pull someone else into a world of misery by stepping out in front of a train. From his friendship with Chet, he knew how finding a dead body made Chet feel. He couldn’t do that to another person.

God had a plan for him. Right? There was a reason he was still getting up every morning? There had to be. The last 50 years of his life wasn’t the pinnacle of his existence?

This was his cross to bear. His lot in life. How do you fight your parent? He was beat down with ‘honor thy parents so your days on this earth will be longer’. Don’t talk back to your elders. Don’t correct your elders, even if you know they are wrong. His mom had back handed him across the face off the porch one day. His Granny was telling one of the smaller grandchildren that God was the reason the sky was blue. While Oscar agreed with her, he started telling them about what his 6th grade science teacher had told the class that week in school about distance and light. Why the sky appears blue. He landed in the yard. In the mud. The adults didn’t even look at him. They just kept on talking. From that point on, he kept his head down and rarely spoke.

Esther hadn’t discovered the scar on his leg. He had gotten cut working with his dad. Probably should have gotten stitches. When he took the bandages off to check it, his mom punched him in the mouth for wasting good bandages. ‘You’re not even bleeding!’

His breathing increased as his stomach seized again. He jerked alerting Esther that he was not okay.

His family was jealous? Maybe Esther was right. Did it not dawn on them how much piss and fecal matter he had cleaned up over the course of his life? He wasn’t complaining. His uncle, aunt and in the end his dad; he couldn’t imagine them being alone in a home. But his aunt giving him the house. That was her choice. She could have sold it to him. She even told him, ‘my boy you earned this’.

“O,” she whispered.

He rolled over, burying his face in her shoulder sobbing.