Blessings of the Season (5 page)

“Well, it's not an actual family, but say hello to our
counterparts.” He came to her side, plopped his arm around her shoulder and turned her toward the box he had just opened.

There stood a life-sized photographic cardboard cutout of a mom, dad, kid and dog frozen in time circa 1959. The father wore a green sweater over a white shirt and rust-colored tie. The mother had her requisite high heels and pearls, naturally, but she also had a perfect figure and wore a holiday hostess apron over her perfectly fitting dress.

“The little boy could be Jesse,” Nate observed. “Or Opie from
The Andy Griffith Show
.”

“No, definitely Jesse,” Addie said as the image tugged at her heartstrings. She was finding it hard to catch her breath standing there and with Nate's arm around her staring at the family she and Nate were expected to portray. “We aren't really the spitting images of the couple, though, huh?”

“It's not exactly like looking in a mirror.” He laughed, then let go of her. “Or like looking at any family Christmas I have ever been a part of.”

“We always had a big celebration at Christmas,” she said. “Even the year my dad was dying.”

He stopped midreach in his efforts to get the sign free and looked at her. “I'm sorry. I didn't know.”

“It's okay. I was young, but my mom and dad handled it so well. I was sad, and I miss him to this day, but I also got a chance to see real faith in action.” Her eyes grew moist, but she did not cry.

He listened intently.

“Dad was so brave, right up until the end. Since then
my mom has always…” Addie stopped to think of her mom and their discussion this morning. She could practically hear the hum of all the lights and motors from their front-lawn display as she fought back a wave of embarrassment at how hard she had always been about her mother's Christmas antics and said, “She always made a point to celebrate big at Christmas after that.”

“So you doing this promo is probably making her very happy?”

In that moment she felt at least a little comforted about her years of trying to distance herself from her mom's displays. “Yes, I guess, it—”

“Addie McCoy, phone call on line one.” The voice of the lady from the customer-service counter echoed through the building.

“I better take that. It might be the
Star City Satellite
.” She excused herself and hurried to the phone attached to a column behind an empty sales counter.

Moments later she found herself listening to the editor of the
Satellite
telling her he didn't see any value in doing a story on Goodwin's Christmas promotion. “It's just not newsworthy. If they want to pay for an ad, I'd be happy to talk.”

Addie stiffened. Everything she had worked so hard to achieve these last few days came down to this. Goodwin's needed publicity. She was in charge of marketing, and if this editor hung up now, she would have failed to get any advance word out. She wasn't sure what to do. Her gaze fell on the cardboard cutout, then on Nate. She thought of what he had said about Jesse and his school, then about her mom loving all this. She
recalled what she had learned about the Web cam, the contest and how to give people what they wanted.

There was also the idea that something could compel Nate to perhaps want to stay in Star City, but not if he left because the promotion got cancelled.

“All right, you want newsworthy?” She took a deep breath and gripped the phone receiver tightly. “How about this? In a matter of days, Goodwin's Department Store is going to go back in time and around the world. We are going to give people something to feel sentimental about, something to cheer for and something to help them show their commitment to Christmas and help children in the process. If that's newsworthy enough for you, show up here Thursday morning and bring your camera.”

I
f anyone at the temp agency would have warned him when he took this assignment that there was even the slightest chance that twelve days before Christmas he'd be still in Star City, dressed like a dad straight out of a 1950s family sitcom, Nate would have turned the job down cold.

But if he hadn't taken the job caring for Jesse Goodwin, he'd have missed out on so much. First and foremost, of course, getting to know a great kid and being able to make a difference in his life, however fleeting. Next, he'd have missed meeting all the great people of Star City, from the Goodwins to the parents and teachers at Jesse's school to Addie McCoy.

He stood back and folded his arms over his gray suit jacket, courtesy of the costume department of the Star City Community Theater, to watch his counterpart at work. Somehow in the last five days she had managed to take the Christmas promotion in hand and spin it off
in a whole new direction. With Web cams streaming live directly from inside Goodwin's on a Web site set to go live in a matter of minutes, she'd already garnered attention from all over. It helped that she had found a way to connect the whole stunt to a worthy cause—raising money for Jesse's school—and to get people engaged by turning the whole thing into a competition.

He took a leisurely stroll the length of the windows. At the far ends of each, Addie had hung signs that read His and Hers. Each side had been furnished with the trappings people associated with the life and times of a husband or wife circa 1959. “His” featured a desk and office furnishings. “Hers” had a kitchen complete with a sink, stove, fridge—a set also courtesy of the community theater—and a chrome-and-Formica table she'd brought from her own home. In a stroke of what he considered genius on Addie's part, she had also arranged a sofa, an old television, a faux fireplace and a spot to set up a Christmas tree in the entryway just inside the store. It was a place that could be viewed from the door or, if you craned your neck just so, from the windows but was best seen by coming into Goodwin's.

And that's just what people were doing. Sales were up, though not breaking any records, but Maimie reported that foot traffic had almost doubled, and now that the promotion was going into full swing they expected that to grow considerably. Anyone looking at the goings-on today would think that the Goodwins themselves were responsible for all this. They were the ones front and center, and Maimie was going to be the one presenting everything at the launch and in any subsequent media contacts.

All of this made Nate smile. In part because he had believed Addie capable of all of this from the moment she rallied her nerve and kissed him that morning under the mistletoe. But he also couldn't keep from celebrating privately because he knew that Addie had gotten what she wanted: success for Goodwin's and a meaningful job behind the scenes and as part of a team.

He turned away from the small but energetic crowd gathering outside the still-closed doors of the old department store in time to see Addie walking toward him.

“Well, if it isn't the little woman,” he said, smiling so big his cheeks hurt as she walked up to him in those simple heels she'd worn the day they met and one of the dresses she had found at a vintage-clothing store over in Gatlinburg. “I have to say, it looks good on you.”

“This old thing?” She swished the full, gathered skirt one way then another, giving a half turn, then dipping her chin and batting her eyes just like a starlet straight out of the 1950s.

“Not the outfit,” he said, coming to her side so that they could present a united front when the store doors opened. “All of this.” He extended his arm to indicate everything surrounding them. “The enthusiasm of the public, the appreciation of the Goodwins, the cooperation of the press. Success.
Success
looks good on you, Addie.”

“Thank you, Nate.” She practically beamed like a lighted angel on the top of a Christmas tree, but one quick look at him top to toes and it was like somebody pulled the plug. “You don't really look all that different.”

“I tucked my hair behind my ears,” he protested,
though not convincingly because she hadn't told him anything he hadn't already thought himself.

“Oh, it's okay. Don't worry about it.” She gave his arm a pat. “It will give me an instant edge in the voting for who is making the transition to life in the fifties better.”

He hadn't thought of that. Even though all the money collected would end up benefiting Jesse's school, Nate had just enough of a competitive nature to want plenty of that money to have come from his supporters. If he had to go old school—literally—to accomplish that? He opened his mouth to tell her not to get too comfy in that assumption, but just then Maimie and Doc stepped up to the front door.

Addie fluffed her hair, smoothed down her skirt, squared her shoulders, wet her lips and through a perfect smile said, “Showtime!”

“Ladies and gentlemen.” Maimie raised her hands, commanding all eyes outside and in. “Welcome to Goodwin's Department Store. Home for the next twelve days, excluding Sundays, of course, of Nathan and Adelaide Goodlife.”

As the small group applauded politely, Nate turned to his counterpart and whispered, “You know I've been so involved in taking care of Jesse and pitching in around here when I can, I never thought about the actual event. What are we going to do all day long?”

Outside Maimie raised her hands again, and the group, which had drifted from applause to foot-shuffling and mumbling, quieted.

Addie froze. “I've been so focused on the Web stuff and getting the word out that when Maimie said she'd take care of all of that, I left it to her.”

Nate's stomach lurched as if it had actually taken a dive from the height of his admiration for Addie to the depths of his good-natured frustration in dealing with the formidable Mrs. Goodwin.

“The Goodlifes will be going through these next few days demonstrating life as we knew it way back when Goodwin's first opened its doors, fifty years ago.”

He adjusted his tie, which suddenly felt much tighter around his throat than before, and muttered, “I have a bad feeling about this.”

A
ddie stared at the sign posted front and center in her side of the twin plate-glass windows. Because the whole stunt had morphed into a challenge for charity, she and Nate had agreed to longer than normal hours six days a week. In return they got time off to enjoy hot lunches brought in by local eateries, to take breaks to roam the store and talk with customers, even run errands around town as long as they stayed in character and costume. Though they never got to leave the windows at the same time.

In accordance with Maimie's agenda, Addie gave three cooking demos a day, though since the oven wasn't functional she didn't actually cook so much as combine
ingredients, put them in the oven and then take a break to “wash up,” run to the breakroom and pick up a premade clone of what she had made. Sometimes it worked all right, but for the most part Mrs. Goodlife came off looking like a pretty lame homemaker. The crafts projects went better, to some degree, but because she had to stick with ideas gathered from women's magazines of the day, they tended to be heavy in the glitter and spray-painted macaroni department.

She sank into the unforgiving stiffness of the kitchen chair.

“How's life on the home front, Mrs. Goodlife?” Nate called out from his side of the dual display.

“Boring,” she called back, unafraid to speak frankly in the midafternoon lull with no customers around to hear her.

“What do you expect? It's 1959. Fun hasn't been invented yet,” he teased.

She laughed, then sighed. “I had no idea it would be this tedious.”

“Tedious? You want to talk tedious? Try sitting at a desk all day pretending to shuffle paperwork when what you're really doing is monitoring the Web site, posting blog updates and reading through the comments, a third of which wouldn't make sense even if they were spelled right.”

“You find that tedious?” She slapped her palms flat on the tabletop then pushed back her chair and stood. She walked toward the side of her window nearest to him, stretching up on tiptoe as if that might help carry her voice as she called out, “Are you
kidding? I'd love that. I'm stuck over here in the kitchen all day doing demos every ninety minutes. In a day and a half I've done more cooking and crafting here than I did the whole year and a half since I graduated from college.”

“Year and a half, huh? So that makes you…”

“Twenty-four. I'm twenty-four years old, still live at home and this was supposed to be my first real grown-up job that has anything to do with my marketing major. Only for this job I'd have done better with a home ec major.” She blurted out the whole frustrating truth.

“…three years younger than me,” Nate concluded. “I was going to say you're three years younger than me, but the rest of that was interesting, too. Thanks for sharing.”

“I'm sorry. I'm just a little jumpy, I guess.” She slumped her shoulders forward and laughed at that. “I blame all this glitter and gelatin.”

She walked to the faux cabinets and picked up a box with the brand name hidden behind a phony label. Since they were live streaming over the Web, the Goodwin's attorney had felt more comfortable if they kept all references to products not sold in the store obscured and referred to them only by generic terms.

“At least you have some human contact,” Nate grumbled—if you could call something as loud as that a grumble, she thought.

She looked up at the large clock above the stairway at the back of the store and realized she needed to get ready for her next demo. As she began gathering things on the countertop, she reminded Nate, “At least at three o'clock
you
get to put up a sign saying you're in a
business meeting and dash out and pick up Jesse from school every afternoon.”

Darin Goodwin had been home from his honeymoon for days now, but beyond giving Jesse a place to sleep at night he had done nothing to try to bond with the child. Maimie and Doc fussed and fretted about that, making excuses for their son's behavior and assuring everyone who asked about the situation that it would all work out, probably after Christmas.

Addie looked at the cardboard cutout of the happy family complete with the little boy who looked a little like Jesse and then at the makings for a Popsicle-stick manger craft project in her hands. Picking up the cutout of the star she would later cover in macaroni and spray paint gold, she walked slowly past the living-room set, past the front door of the store and leaned one shoulder against the wall of Nate's set. “What do you think will happen to Jesse when you leave?”

He looked up at her and gave a sort of sad smile, then shook his head as he said softly, “You're not supposed to be over here during office hours, Mrs. Goodlife.”

“Maybe I had to come, Mr. Goodlife. Maybe you forgot something when you hurried out the door for work this morning.”

“What?” He pushed up from the office chair where he spent so much of his day pretending to do paperwork and came her way. “My goodbye kiss, I hope.”

“No!” Heat rose from her roll-collar neckline to her cheeks, and she tipped her head down, hoping that he wouldn't see her blush. “I, uh, I…” She slipped her
hand into her apron pocket, found the box of gelatin and pulled it free. “I brought you lunch.”

He leaned in close.

Her stomach fluttered. She watched him move closer, thinking she should tell him that some kids from the school would be by any minute on a field trip and the last thing they wanted was to get caught kissing. She pressed her lips together.

His face came so close to hers she could see his cheek twitch with amusement as he snatched the box from her hand and said, “Yum-yum.”

He pulled away, and she let her breath out in a long stream. Then she came to her senses, reached out and nabbed the box back again. “Sorry. I need that for a demo later.”

With that she turned on her high heel to start back to her kitchen set. Outside, the sound of an engine drew her attention as a big yellow school bus pulled to the curb. “Time to get back to work, Mr. Goodlife.”

“Why do I suddenly have great empathy for zoo animals?” he muttered as he made a quick pass—straightening his tie and jacket and making sure his too-shaggy-for-the-time-period hair was tucked behind his ears.

“You just have to look good. I have ten minutes to construct a manger, then show them how to make a gelatin fruit salad in a mold.” She held up the star and the box on either side of her head as though doing an advertisement for them both. “I just hope I don't get my gelatin and my glitter mixed up!”

She scooted across the way, still a bit breathless over the near-miss chance for a kiss. As she passed the door,
it flung open and in came a class of kids that looked a year or so older than Jesse. With teachers and moms keeping them in line, they came inside single file, but as soon as they saw Nate and Addie they scattered. Even though they had all joked about the archaic roles of men and women, Addie couldn't help noting that the boys rushed over to check out Nate's area while the girls clustered in the cozy little kitchen setting.

“Hey, who are you supposed to be, mister?” one of the boys who wriggled his way to the front of the group demanded loudly of Nate.

“I'm Mr. Goodlife.”

Silence and befuddled expressions answered that.

He tried again. “The…dad?”

“Oh, I get it,” another boy called out. “You and that mom are divorced, so you have to live over here and the mom lives over there.”

The matter-of-factness with which the boy spouted that conclusion tugged at Addie's heart. She held her hand up to ask the gaggle of girls around the table to wait a moment, and she started to go over to Nate's side to see if she could help out.

Of course Nate, with his master's in child development and a matter of weeks as a manny under his belt, didn't need help.

“I'm supposed to be at the office,” he confided, trying to look quite businesslike.

The boys looked at each other.

“Work,” he clarified.

“You sure do dress funny for work,” another boy observed, shaking his head in a show of obvious disbelief.

“This is how they dressed for work back then. This is how they dressed for church and for going out to eat and even, sometimes, for doing everyday things like going to a movie or ball game.”

“No way!” They stared at him, their mouths gaping. “Every day?”

“Yep. Every day.” He moved from the office toward the living-room set in the middle ground between the two windows. The boys followed, and seeing the action, the girls moved forward to get a good look. “And when a man came home from work, he would take off his jacket and tie and put on a sweater or a more casual jacket. They tried to look nice even if they were just watching TV.”

Nate sat on the couch, looking every bit the man of that era as king of his castle.

“Dads even dressed up when they came home?” One of the girls ventured forward. “What about when they ran the vacuum or helped their kids do stuff? Kids were still messy back then, right?”

He laughed. “I'm sure they were, but the way I understand it, most dads didn't do housework back then or help raising the kids.”

“What
did
they do?” The first boy who spoke up wanted to know.

Nate looked at Addie for help.

She folded her arms to let him know he was on his own.

“Well, they had some household chores, sure. But after a hard day as family breadwinner they usually came home and read the newspaper, maybe watched TV until their dinner was ready.”

“Wow. No wonder the mommy makes you live in your office!” a small but feisty girl standing by Addie exclaimed. “You don't do nothin'!”

The adults laughed.

Nate looked a bit sheepish.

Addie stepped up to chime in, “You know that we're just playing roles here. In the real world, Nate is actually a professional child-care provider and all-around great husband.” Addie's cheeks blazed red the second she realized what she had called him.

“Guy,” she corrected hastily. “All-around great guy.”

Their eyes met. He smiled but did not have anything to add. Not that she would have heard it with her now-slowing heartbeat thudding in her ears.

“He still doesn't look like that guy.” The first boy to raise the issue went to the cardboard cutout and pointed to the perpetually cheerful father figure towering over the family portrait.

“You know, you're right!” Maimie Goodwin with her hands folded in front of her strolled elegantly into the fray. She stopped beside the sign and gave it a good looking over before she tipped her nose up and studied Nate. “He doesn't quite look the part, does he?”

“Oh, no, Maimie.” Nate put his hand up. A lesser man might have retreated a step or two from the formidable older woman, but Nate held his ground. “Don't get any ideas in your head.”

“I assure you,
Mr. Goodlife
—” she emphasized the name with her imperious tone and threw in an arched eyebrow for good measure just to make sure he and anyone else who might be drawing a paycheck with her
signature on it got the message loud and clear “—I always have ideas. Goodwin's Department Store opened in 1959 and is still here today because I got some ideas in my head.”

“Let me guess, you're getting a new idea right now?” He folded his arms and cocked his head in an “if you can't beat 'em, join 'em” kind of conspiratory way. “One that involves me and the missus?”

“Actually, it just involved you, Mr. Goodlife, but now that you mention it…” She turned her smile to Addie. It was a gentle smile, but the set of her cheeks and the narrowing of her eyes made it clear she wasn't joking when she said, “I seem to recall that
some
women found being a housewife in 1959 could be quite…What was the word I heard bandied about?”

She fixed that arched eyebrow on Addie.

“Tedious?” Addie offered in a whisper, knowing she'd been caught.

Maimie's smile warmed considerably, and she looked down at the children staring up at her and the sign showing the perfect Goodwin's family as she told them, “Tomorrow being Saturday, children, tell your parents to come down to Goodwin's first thing. There are going to be some exciting changes taking place, and I have an
idea
you are all going to love them.”