Runyon went into the bedroom. The silver-framed photo of Colleen, the best of the batch taken by a commercial photographer a few years ago, was on the night-stand. He brought it out to the living room, put it on the table next to the couch. Then he flipped on the TV, did some channel surfing until he found an old movie — always old movies on cable-system TV, even on Christmas Eve. This one was Christmas in Connecticut, with Barbara Stanwyck and Sydney Greenstreet, just starting. He watched it all the way through, not even bothering to mute the commercials. The party below was over by then; even the rain had stopped and the wind was quiet outside. Silent night.
He watched another film, something from the thirties with Bette Davis. When that was over he darkened the set. In the kitchen he took down the bottle of Wild Turkey, poured a thimbleful, carried the glass back to the couch. The table lamp illuminated Colleen’s smiling image, oddly as if the glow were coming from within. He looked at it for a long time, holding the glass of whiskey, remembering Christmases with her in their Seattle home, one up in Calgary, another at a ski lodge. Presents they’d given each other, trees they’d trimmed, food and drink and special moments they’d shared.
He raised the glass. Aloud he said, “Always,” and drank.
In the silence he sat there looking through more good memories, as if he were turning the pages of an album. Dwelling in the past so he wouldn’t have to think of tomorrow.
Bill
The best thing about Christmas morning was the look on Emily’s face.
She’d been happy the night before, all smiles after she finished reprising the three pageant carols in her sweet voice and Kerry and I gave her a literal standing ovation. But today, standing in front of the lighted tree in her robe and slippers with Shameless cradled in her arms, peering down at the array of presents we’d set out while she was asleep, she seemed radiant. Almost angelic in the shaft of pale sunlight, the first sunlight we’d seen in ten days, that slanted in through a part in the drapes.
“Some pile of loot, huh?” I said.
“Wow. Santa was good to us this year.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in Santa.”
“I do now,” she said.
I was basking in her glow when the cat did his perverse feline thing, jumping out of her arms and launching himself onto my lap from ten feet away. I wasn’t ready for it and didn’t get my hand out of the way in time; one paw smacked into my bandaged finger and sent shooting pains up my arm.
“Merry Christmas to you too, cat.”
The lingering throb put Tuesday afternoon back into my thoughts. I shoved it out again, but not before I remembered Tamara looking at the smashed chandelier and saying, “Place’ll never be the same again.” She was right, and not just because of the chandelier. We’d counted five bullet holes in the walls and ceiling, and there was what would likely be a permanent bloodstain on the floor where Thomas Valjean’s broken nose had leaked. There was also a leftover aura of violation and violence. It wouldn’t be easy to work there now. Not for Tamara and me, anyway.
Well, why should we have to? We’d outgrown the place as it was, with the addition of Jake Runyon; a larger space, a better address with more modern, upscale trappings would be beneficial for business and morale both. We could afford it, we were on a monthly rental basis rather than a lease, and it was almost the end of another year. New year, new start. Tamara would be all for it, and Runyon wouldn’t care, so why not?
Kerry came in with a breakfast tray. Hot chocolate for Emily, coffee for us, croissants, Christmas cookies she’d baked herself. When she set the tray down she saw me rubbing my knuckle, but she didn’t say anything. She hadn’t said much about Tuesday, other than “Thank God none of you were hurt” and “You manage to get yourself into the damnedest situations even when you’re not working at it.” Runyon and Tamara and I had downplayed the incident to the media; I’d downplayed it to Kerry and really downplayed it to Emily. Nobody but the three survivors knew just how close we’d come to dying that day. Maybe Kerry suspected it and maybe she didn’t. In any case she had the good loving grace to keep her thoughts to herself and let me do the same with mine.
We dug into the food and drinks. Then we dug into the pile of presents. Emily squealed when she unveiled her state of the art, AT&T model 3360 cell phone with the Vesuvius red faceplate; ran over and kissed me and kissed Kerry. I got another kiss when Kerry opened her package of French perfume.
As the family patriarch, or maybe as its oldest and only male member, I got to open my two presents last. Emily’s was a ceramic sculpture she’d made in her crafts class at school; she said it was an egret and I took her at her word, but I would’ve loved it if it had been a cockroach. And Kerry’s was—
A cell phone.
Emily let out a little whoop. “It’s a Nokia, just like mine. Only basic black.”
“His and hers,” I said. “Now we can both be noisy in public.”
“Cool! That is so cool.”
I looked at Kerry. She shrugged and said, “Well, you must be the hardest man in the world to buy for. Besides, now you won’t have to hang out in parking garages.”
She moved closer, and I put my arm around her. Emily came over and snuggled on my other side. Pretty soon she said, “This is the best. The best Christmas ever.”
Best Christmas ever for me, too. One to cherish, to be thankful for. A special Christmas for a very lucky man.