Merry's Christmas: A Love Story (7 page)

Joan piled fresh-washed cherries in a
bowl on the counter. It wasn’t often that her grandchildren asked her opinion,
so she enjoyed the fact that Tara had as she mulled over her first impressions.
“I like her. Just something about her.”

Tara opened the cupboard door. “Yeah. Too
bad Dad’s so into that Catherine person,” she sighed, finding only empty
shelves in front of her. “So, where are all the plates?”

“Try the dishwasher, dear,” Joan
answered.

Suddenly, Ollie’s triumphant voice rang
out from the backyard. “Smithereens!”

Joan recognized the distinct crash of
breaking china that followed. In a flash, Joan was out the back door, just in
time to see Ollie raise an ornate china platter high above his head, as if to
acknowledge the cheers of an imaginary throng. He whirled it around like a
discus thrower. “Ho, ho—”

Recognizing the platter, Joan shouted in
horror. “No! Ollie, don’t!”

“—ho!” Ollie cried as he released the
platter and sent it soaring into the brick fireplace, dashing it to pieces.

Tara emerged, agape at the sight. “You
are so getting coal for Christmas.”

Joan hurried down the stairs. “Ollie,
what are you doing?! That’s the good family china!”

Ollie turned, grinning to beat the band.
“It’s okay, Gramma. Merry said so,” he exuded. “I’m making memories. For
Christmas!”

five

T
ara and
Hayden cleared the Bell’s dinner table as Merry sat guiltily with Ollie on the
living room sofa. Tara lingered, a look of concern on her face, as her father
silently paced in front of the culprits.

Merry kicked herself. The thrill ride of
her first day had come to a screeching halt. Her mind whirled. Why hadn’t she
been clearer with Ollie? Though she feared it would get her fired, Merry knew
what she had to say. Her heart pounding, she prodded herself to open her mouth
and speak. Finally, the fearsome words that she knew could end it all came out.
“It was all my fault. Really, Mr. Bell.”

Daniel studied Merry, and then turned to
his young son. “Ollie, did you not know that was the good family china?”

“She said it was okay!” Ollie protested.

“I did, Sir. In a way,” Merry admitted.

“Please, do not call me
Sir
,”
Daniel blustered. “And I assume you have an explanation why you’re encouraging
my son to engage in vandalism?”

“It was a mix up,” Merry explained. “I’d
bought these thrift store dishes. I got them to break and make ornaments from
the pieces. Then, I went up to talk to the girls and—”

Daniel cut her off. “Yes. So they tell
me,” he said. He turned to his son. “Ollie, would you go do your homework?”

Ollie glanced at Merry, his brow knit
with worry. “But what’s going to happen to—”

Daniel quickly gestured to the stairway.
“Now, Oliver. I’ll be up in a bit.” Ollie obediently headed up the steps. Next,
Daniel pivoted to address his eavesdropping daughters. “Girls, I believe your
grandmother could use your help in the kitchen.”

As the twins reluctantly disappeared,
Merry stood, imploring, “Please. Take the price of the china out of my pay.”

“And just how do I dock you for the
sentimental value of it?” Daniel countered. “That platter was an heirloom. From
their mother’s side. Let alone worth a small fortune.”

“And can I tell you how completely awful
I feel about that?” Merry rued.

Daniel kept pacing, then abruptly he
stopped. He turned back to Merry, weary and forlorned. “You promised me the
perfect Christmas.”

“I did,” Merry replied. “But Mr.
Bell...perfect doesn’t mean everything goes exactly right. That kind of
perfect, it’s pretty much forgettable, I think. But when something goes
wrong—well, that really is the kind of thing you hang your memories on.”

The tiniest flicker of a change on
Daniel’s face told Merry that somehow, she was starting to get through to him.
She knew that she was still a long way from out of the woods, but it encouraged
her to continue. “Years from now, think of it,” she said. “Ollie will be
putting those ornaments on his own tree. Can’t you just hear him laughing,
telling your grandkids the story?”

Daniel crinkled his lips, softening ever
so slightly. “I suppose you could spin it that way. But what’s this with these
lists? The girls don’t want to do it. At least, Hayden doesn’t.”

“You said you wanted a family Christmas,”
Merry reminded.

“Which I expected you to handle.”

Merry braved stepping closer to Daniel.
She kept her voice calm and quiet enough so as not to be overheard by the twins
she presumed might be listening in, just past the kitchen door. “That’s why I’m
trying to get them to be part of it. If I just think it up, buy it up, put it
up, and wrap it up myself, how special would that be?”

Daniel sat tiredly, his tone changing. He
scratched the back of his head. “You sound like Amanda. Next thing, you’ll tell
me I work too much.”

Merry sat back down beside him. “Do you?”

“Maybe,” Daniel replied. “It’s not like
it’s been easy. Raising them alone. Trying to get them past what I—maybe not
get them past it. That’s not the right word. It’s not like I want them to
forget, but... Why am I telling you this?”

Merry smiled softly, understanding.
“Maybe you sense that I care to hear it. Because I do. Care.”

Daniel studied Merry. “You do. Really?”

“Yeah,” she answered. A moment of silence
passed between them, before Merry finally broke it. “Can I...ask you
something?”

“Sure,” Daniel agreed.

Merry looked Daniel straight in the eyes.
It was a gaze that said she wasn’t going to let this go. “What do you want this
Christmas?”

Daniel didn’t answer at first. It was a
loaded question for him, Merry realized.
I’m his employee
, she thought.
He was under no obligation to answer her, she knew, yet something in the moment
had seemed to disarm him completely.

“I want...” Daniel started. “It’s not
much really, but then again, it’s...” Daniel paused again. “I want to see my
family happy again. I’d like to go back to church together. We haven’t been
much since Amanda’s memorial—my fault really—and I don’t know. Maybe Christmas
morning would be a good start. I do want to make some new memories...not to
replace the old ones, but to somehow...”

“...take the broken pieces and make
something beautiful with them?”

Daniel took awhile to consider Merry’s
response. He looked at her, what almost seemed to be through her, for the
longest of times. Finally, he spoke. “You’re easily underestimated, aren’t
you?”

Merry nodded self-deprecatingly. “I’ve
been told I make a better second impression. That is, if I get a chance to make
a second impression?”

Time stood still. At least it seemed to
as Daniel studied Merry. Clearly, she thought, he had fully intended to fire
her on the spot, but thank heaven, something was making him hesitate.

“Let’s see what the week brings,” he
concluded.

♥    ♥    ♥

When Daniel
ambled in to check on him, Ollie was sprawled on his stomach on his bedroom
floor, doing his math homework. “There’s always that desk I got you.”

Ollie hardly looked up at his dad. “I can
work stuff out better here.”

It wasn’t often that Daniel Bell sat
cross-legged on the floor, but on this particular night, that’s exactly what he
decided to do. As soon as he got down to his son’s level, he was glad he’d gone
to the trouble. He noticed Ollie’s quivering lip, but decided not to make
anything of it. “So... What do you have going there?”

“Long division,” Ollie muttered gloomily.
“Mrs. Finkelston says it’s useful in every day life.”

Daniel leaned back quizzically. “You have
Mrs. Finkelston? I had her. What, is she ninety?”

Ollie pushed his math aside and sat up.
Crocodile tears rolled down his cheeks, streaking through the dirt of his
ill-fated, heirloom-breaking deed.

Daniel opened his arms and drew his son
close for a very welcomed embrace. “I’m sorry I broke your family china,” Ollie
blubbered.

“It’s okay,” Daniel assured. “And it’s
not really my family china. It was ours. Just something your mom’s family has
passed down for the past few hundred years.” Daniel broke the embrace. He
checked around, then signaled Ollie closer and whispered conspiratorially.
“Want to know a secret?”

Ollie wiped his nose on his sleeve,
clearly intrigued.

Daniel leaned toward him. “I always kind
of hated that platter.”

Ollie’s eyes widened. “You did?”

Daniel sat back. “Yeah. I always thought
it was kind of snooty and girlie. Not a guy’s kind of plate, you know? Guys
like us, we don’t go for that stuff. Your mom wasn’t so crazy about it, either.
But we were stuck with it—it being in the family that long—so actually, you
kind of did me a favor.”

A crooked little smirk returned to
Ollie’s lips. “I did?”

“Did yourself one, too. Because guess who
would have gotten it next.” Daniel circled a finger toward Ollie.

Ollie exhaled dramatically. “That was a
close one.”

“Yeah, scary close,” Daniel agreed. “You
know, Merry. She seems to think we should make these lists, so... What do you
really want for Christmas?”

Ollie didn’t miss a beat. “A worm farm,”
he repeated.

Daniel eyed his son, amused. “Still with
the worm farm, huh?”

Ollie nodded decisively.

“Worms, they don’t do much, you know,”
Daniel went on. “Not so big on thrills and chills. Can’t race ‘em or goof with
‘em. Just kind of hang out there under the dirt.”
 

Ollie’s shoulders went up in a little
shrug. “Marty Ruppick has one,” he pointed out. “Marty grows lots and lots of
worms. Then his dad takes him fishing.”

There it was.

It was so simple that Daniel wondered why
he hadn’t put it together before. It wasn’t so much the worms Ollie wanted,
Daniel realized. What Ollie wanted most for Christmas was his time.

Long after his children had gone to bed,
Daniel sat in his study, deep in thought. Nothing about this roller coaster
ride of a day had gone like he had supposed. He finished off a short note and
slipped it into the Christmas drawer, knowing Merry would find it in the
morning.

♥    ♥    ♥

Even after
finishing up the late shift at the Downtown Diner, there was a spring in
Merry’s step as she walked with Kiki toward the stop where they would catch the
El to their respective homes. Despite the disastrous heirloom platter incident,
Merry was quietly exuberant. For Arthur’s sake, Merry hadn’t said much about
her job with the Bells. She’d only spoken about it in the most general of
terms. Still, Merry felt Kiki studying her, the way Kiki did whenever she’d
figured out that something intriguing was afoot.

“So, gimme the real skinny on this
Christmas gig,” Kiki probed.

Merry did her best to feign nonchalance.
“You heard what I told Arthur.”

“Yeah, I heard you dancing ‘round the
doo-doo for him, but this is me. Kiki. So, let’s have it straight now.”

Merry cocked her head with a smile. She
lit up from inside. “Almost got fired today.”

“So, why you glowing like a Tiki torch?”

Though Merry did her best to downplay her
excitement, it still kept bubbling through. Still, she did her best not to say
too much. “No, it was just...he has this cute way of being all boss-man, but
underneath, I get these little glimmers that he’s... It was good, that’s all.”

Kiki clasped her hands and raised them
toward the heavens. “Precious Lord, help us!” Then turning back to Merry, she
nailed what even Merry hadn’t realized.
 
“You jazzin’ on that man!”