A Shiloh Christmas (24 page)

Hands start moving again, and there's chatter here and there. But at some point in the meal, just when I think maybe folks took Dad's words to heart, I hear the preacher say, “Rachel, you've got cranberry sauce on your new sweater.”

I see the color rise in Rachel's cheeks, just like they did that first day of school on the bus. She stares down at her sweater, not knowing quite what to do. The spot is about the size of a pea. Ma fumbles around for a napkin, and then Becky leans forward and tells the preacher, “But the whole
rest
of her sweater is clean!”

Now we really are speechless, 'cause not a one of us could have thought of saying anything that perfect.

The preacher studies Becky a moment, then turns back to Rachel and says, “That's right. It's only a tiny spot. And Rachel, you and your sister look lovely in your new sweaters.”

The girls are so shocked they stare at their father, and Ma adds, “Indeed they do! Now if everyone is through, you can pass your plates down to me and we'll think about dessert.”

We pass our plates to the end of the table, where Mrs. Dawes is helping Ma scrape them off. Ma has mince and pumpkin pies to go along with her cookies and the fudge from the Daweses. I take a huge slab of fudge first, and boy is it good, but my mind's on the big sled Aunt Hettie brought us. I see that stack of dishes on the counter, though, and know that none of us are going sledding till those are clean and put away.

Then the grown-ups get to talking again, which tells me it's going to be a long time before that kitchen's cleaned up. I look around the table and notice that the preacher's got such a wistful look on his face, I turn to see where he's staring. I find that Becky has slid down from her chair and climbed up on Dad's lap, the way she'll do sometimes when she's tired of eating but don't want to miss out on grown-ups' conversation. She's snuggled down in the crook of his arm, twisting a lock of hair with one finger. Dad's eating his mince pie with his other hand and having a conversation with Judd about the little trailer he's got coming in January.

I look back at the preacher and see that his eyes are wet. Those are tears for sure—just enough to make his eyes watery. So I turn away and don't look back. It's a moment so personal he gets it all to himself.

With twelve people helping, those dishes are washed and dried and put away like nobody's business. The turkey's cut up and divided in little packets to go home with everybody for sandwiches the next day, and the minute the last cupboard door is closed, Dara Lynn sings out, “Sled time!”

I see the preacher look at his watch and can tell he wants to go home. We've had another inch or two of snow during dinner, but then it tapered off, and the roads shouldn't be too bad. I expect he'll say something about how he's got a sick person he's got to visit, but since he'd already set the day aside to take his family to their grandma's, he can't hardly expect anyone to take that seriously.

Since the Daweses hadn't known we were going sledding, though, the next five minutes is spent fishing more boots out of the closet, more caps and scarves and mittens. And when us five kids look like we're headed for Alaska and Dad's got on his work boots, we find a rope to put on the new sled and go out to the long hill behind the house.

Rachel and Ruthie hold back, wanting us to go first, see how it's done, so Dad tramps up the hill, Dara Lynn and Becky and me following behind. I want to go down all alone, so I volunteer to push them off. Dad sits down at the back of the sled, Dara Lynn in front of him, Becky
in front of her, and then Dad stretches his long legs out so his feet are on the steering bar in front.

“Ready?” he asks. The girls lean back, Dara Lynn against Dad, Becky against her. I give them the hardest push I can manage, and the sled whizzes down that hill, the girls screamin' their heads off.

Dad knows where the stump of the old locust tree is buried in the snow, and he steers away from it, but the minute he gets to the bottom, he turns too quick to stop the sled and they all fall off, laughing and hooting.

I'm next. Take a running start to do a belly flop. Don't do much better than Dad when I get to the bottom, but man, that sled goes fast. Shiloh's running up and down the hill, following every sled trip to the bottom and back up again.

Now Ruthie's dancing up and down, pulling at Rachel's hand. “C'mon,” I say. “Sled holds four,” so Dara Lynn goes up with us. This time I'm the one in back with my feet on the steering bar, Rachel against me, Dara Lynn against her, and Ruthie in front. Dara Lynn and Ruthie are already screaming, and we haven't even took off yet.

I dig my fists in the snow to tip us forward, and then we shoot off. Got my hands holding tight to the sled on
both sides, the girls holding on to each other, and I got to say, I make a perfect half circle when we get to the bottom.

Then Aunt Hettie says she's got to start back to Clarksburg pretty soon before the snow gets any deeper on the roads, but she's not going till she gets a chance on that sled herself. We all of us cheer as she lies down on her stomach and I give her a push. Gets halfway down—don't know what she hits—but she falls off the sled and it goes on without her, and she is lying there on her back in the snow, laughing like a kid. Shiloh goes over and licks her face, and she laughs some more.

“Hettie, you sound just like you did at thirteen,” Dad says, going up the hill and helping her to her feet.

“Wanted to do that ever since I can remember,” she said. “You boys always hogged our sled for yourselves, and it's about time I got a turn!”

“Well, take another,” Dad says, and she does. Then we're all of us telling Judd to try it out.

So he climbs to the top of our hill, and we figure he'll take the same path the rest of us have taken. But he must have decided to carve out his own sled tracks there on the hill, 'cause he weaves first to one side, then the other, and even though Dad shouts a warning, he's heading
right for where we know that tree stump is buried.

And suddenly Judd Norman Travers is airborne, that sled going up the slant side of the stump, and in that split second I see a look on his face that must have been his look when he was just a kid. And then he is down on the slope again, still holding on, and he gives this loud “Ye-haw!” that makes us laugh and clap, and when he gets off at the bottom, he's grinning wider than I can ever remember.

“Judd, I should've warned you about that stump,” says Dad.

He shakes his head. “Best ride I ever had,” he says. “Next time I try it, I'll have my dog with me,” and we laugh some more.

Becky wants another ride, and then there's just a girls' ride, and I decide that my extra Christmas gift to Dara Lynn will be to hand the sled over to her each time she wants a ride. Finally the Daweses say it's time to go home.

“One more!” Ruthie pleads, and grabs for Dad's hand. “Take us up one more time!” she begs.

It's embarrassing there for a moment, her grabbing Dad's hand. He don't want it to look like Ruthie chooses him over her own dad, but don't know how to turn her down, neither.

And then we hear Jacob say, “I'll take you girls, but I need a pair of boots.”

The girls can't believe it.
I
can't believe it. Can't take our eyes off their dad, and finally Ruthie's face breaks into the widest smile. I hear Dad say, “I got an old pair of galoshes, Jacob. I don't know your size, but they'd probably fit over most anybody's shoes.”

And before you know it, the preacher's on his way up the hill, the galoshes making a gloppy sound on his feet. He's got one of Dad's caps on his head, one of Dad's scarves around his neck, and I go along to give them a push. He sits down at the back of the sled, and for a minute, I don't think Rachel's going to sit in front of him. But finally she does, then Ruthie.

“Ready?” I say. I see the preacher lean forward to grasp the sides of the sled, his chin next to Rachel's shoulder. She leans back against him just a little, Ruthie against her, and I give 'em a push, then follow them down the hill on my feet, Shiloh leaping along beside them through the snow.

I tell you, I can even hear the preacher give a shout, and when they turn at the bottom, Rachel snuggled back against her dad, their cheeks are apple red and they're all three of them smiling. When Ruthie begs to do it again,
her father tells her, “Okay, one more time, and then we need to go.”

I know that a single afternoon don't change a lifetime of preaching against sin. It don't change a lifetime of looking for faults instead of goodness, feeling fear instead of love. And it don't make Judd the kind of man you can trust 100 percent. But like Dad says, it could be a start.

Everyone goes home by four o'clock. Aunt Hettie's already on her way back to Clarksburg. We say Merry Christmas to the Daweses and Doc Murphy, and Judd heads down to his friend in Middlebourne to see his dog, take him some of that leftover turkey.

Then our family has the sled to ourselves. Even Ma bundles up and takes a few rides. We're on that hill a half hour more, but when the wind picks up, turning colder and raw, we pack it in for the night and go inside to warm up by the stove.

As we're taking off our boots, I hear Ma say to Dad, “Judith told me something interesting as we were watching the kids play. First she said she'd like to go to that parenting class with me, and then she said that Doc Murphy had suggested a counselor in Sistersville that he thought would be good for her and Jacob.”

“Really!” says Dad.

“And she also said she's made an appointment, and she's going whether he goes or not,” Ma tells him.

“Well, that's a step in the right direction,” says Dad. “I don't know . . . Somehow, I think he might go along.”

I don't say a word. Can't stop smiling.

When Judd comes back around eight, though, he discovers a big old branch has blown down on the tent, and new snow has got his sleeping bag wet.

Wind is fierce now, and after Dad takes a look at the situation, he says, “Judd, it's Christmas, and you're not sleeping out there tonight. We'll get to that tomorrow. Come on in here where it's warm.”

And for once Judd agrees. Ma makes turkey sandwiches and a salad, and after supper we sit around the living room—turn out all the lights except the ones on the tree. Dara Lynn shows off how she's learned to play “Jingle Bells”—her version of it, anyway—on the harmonica Santa left in her stocking. If you ask me, Santa should've had better sense, but she loses interest in it as soon as she sees Becky trying to find something of Judd's to look at under her microscope. He offers a thread from his jeans or a hair, but she's already seen some of those.

“Tell you what,” he says. “I got a callus on my hand
from chopping wood. You can have a piece of that.” He pulls out his pocketknife, and Becky's fascinated as he peels off a thin piece of the thick skin.

“Gross!” says Dara Lynn, but she puts it between two glass slides and hands it to her sister. Becky slips the slide in place and turns on the little light. Then she bends low over the microscope and fixes her eye in the right place.

“Wow!” she cries. And moves over to give Dara Lynn a look.

Dara Lynn takes her place at the microscope.

Judd starts to grin. “What'd you find? No bugs, I hope.”

“You're made up of all these teeny tiny pieces,” says Dara Lynn.

“Yeah, I get to dancing too hard, I'm like to fall apart,” Judd tells her. And when Becky don't smile, he says, “Just joking, sweetheart.”

When it's time for bed, and the girls have gone off to put on their pajamas, I tell Judd he can have the couch tonight, but he says he can sleep just as well in a recliner. So while Ma brings out the pillows and blankets, I put the leash on Shiloh and take him out to do his business before we settle down for the night.

Don't have my boots on, so I stay on the bottom step
and let Shiloh nose around in the snow. Air is crisp as a cracker, sky so bright I can see stars I never knowed was up there before. Feel like I'm standing by a fairy-tale house, those icicle lights behind me. Dad says we get to keep them up till New Year's Day. Neighbors like 'em too.