The Christmas Promise (Christmas Hope) (9 page)

“Where are my green wellies?” Miriam said, running into the living room.

“Where are your what?” I asked, helping Erin into her boots.

“My wellies! My green wellies!” She was spinning, looking around her.

“Would you just talk like a normal person?” I screamed.

“My rubber boots,” Miriam said. She hiked up her robe and pulled on the green rubber boots. “How could she be having the baby?” she said wild-eyed. “It’s early.”

“We’ve already been through all that,” I said, putting Erin’s coat on her.

“I can’t go out in public like this,” Miriam said. “It’s not Halloween.”

I held Erin’s arm and ushered her through the front door. “Shut up, Miriam!”

“What did you say?”

“She said shut up,” Erin said, taking the steps with her legs wide apart. Miriam cinched her robe tight and ran beside us. I opened the passenger-side door and Erin dipped down to get inside.

“Don’t put her in the front,” Miriam said, lifting Erin’s arm.

“She’s the one having the baby,” I said, pushing her back down. “She deserves to be in front!” Erin sat and lifted her legs inside.

“What about the air bags?” Miriam said, waving her arms as if being struck in an accident.

I pulled Erin’s arm. “Get in the back.” We helped Erin into the backseat and I searched around for my keys. “Where are the keys?” Miriam twisted in all directions, searching the driveway. “Where’d they go? I just had them!”

Miriam turned and shrieked, “They’re in your hand!”

I screamed when I saw them. “Oh, you idiot, Gloria!” I was clearly no good in a crisis.

Miriam ran to the passenger side. “Turn
left
out of the driveway, because Baxter is closed.” I turned right and Miriam jumped. “What are you doing? I just told you to turn left.”

“You never told me to turn left!” I spun the car around and Miriam toppled into me.

“I most certainly did,” Miriam shouted. “Didn’t I, Erin?”

Erin groaned and threw her head back against the seat. “I don’t care! Drive faster!”

I pushed the pedal while groping for my seat belt. “Everybody buckle up!” I turned to look at Erin. “You need a seat belt.”

“I can’t,” she said.

“Miriam! Buckle her seat belt.”

Miriam unsnapped her belt and it whizzed back into place. She crawled over the back of the seat and reached for Erin’s. “My robe is caught,” she said. She yanked on her robe, trying to free it. I felt through the folds of fabric and Miriam smacked my hand away. “Are you some sort of masher?!”

“It’s in the door!” I said, turning onto Post Avenue.

Miriam opened her door ajar, tugged on the robe, then closed the door again. She crawled over the back of the seat and wrapped Erin’s seat belt around her, snapping it in. She locked her own belt into place and looked up in time to scream as I raced in front of a delivery truck when I turned onto Grand.

Miriam held her stomach. “I think I’m going to throw up.”

“Be quiet, Miriam,” I said, bearing down on the wheel. She crossed her arms in a huff.

I swung into the front entrance of the hospital and threw the car into park. We lifted Erin from the backseat and threw an arm over each of our shoulders, running for the door. “We’re having a baby!” we shouted.

“She’s having the baby,” I said as a woman in scrubs ran toward us with a wheelchair.

The woman helped Erin into the chair. “And you’re the grandmothers! Will you be joining her in Delivery?”

Our answer rang throughout the hall as the nurse wheeled Erin to the elevator. “No!”

“Yes!” Erin shouted over them as the doors closed in front of her.

I rummaged through my purse, pulling out the contents in massive handfuls. “What are you doing?” Miriam asked. I was annoyed, and continued to dig to the bottom, retrieving several battered cough drops, nasal spray, and some tattered coupons. “Is there a reason for such behavior?” Surely, I hadn’t left what I was looking for at home. I would be so angry with myself if I’d done something so stupid. In desperation I emptied the entire purse onto the floor and poked through the pile.

“Ah ha!” I said, holding a piece of paper in the air.

At twelve thirty Chaz found Carla cleaning up around Santa’s workshop. She looked worse than she had the previous night. “He’s sleeping,” Chaz said over the vacuum. She nodded but wouldn’t turn off the vacuum. Whatever was bothering her, she planned to keep it to herself, so he walked away.

“Could Donovan go home with you tonight?”

He turned to look at her. “Why?”

“Because I’m sick,” she said.

“What’s wrong?”

She held up her hands in a stopping motion. “I’m too sick to care for him right now. I just need someone to watch him tonight. That’s it.” She waved him off and clicked the vacuum back on.

He grabbed her arm, turning off the vacuum. “Wait a second!” he said. “Do I just keep him all day tomorrow, or do you come and—”

“I’ll pick him up tomorrow. I just need to keep him out of the apartment tonight.” She seemed panicked, but her voice grew calm. “I don’t want him to get sick. If I’m not feeling better tomorrow, I’ll take him to Miss Glory’s.”

Chaz agreed to let Donovan stay, but couldn’t imagine what he’d agreed to; he’d never even taken care of a cat before.

At the end of his shift, Chaz carried Donovan into his apartment and laid him down on the futon. He rubbed his eyes in the glow of the Christmas lights from across the street, and Chaz tried to turn his face away from the window. “Am I at your house?” Donovan asked.

“Yes,” Chaz said, whispering.

“You don’t have any furniture.”

“I know.” Chaz closed Donovan’s eyes and Donovan flung an arm over his leg. Chaz tried to get up; he needed to get to the refrigerator.

“Lie down,” Donovan said, half asleep.

Chaz moved Donovan’s hand and pulled off his shoes. “I’ll be right back.”

“It’s time for everybody to be asleep,” Donovan said. “Even I know that.” Chaz sat down on the futon, hoping Donovan would drift off again. Donovan put his hand in Chaz’s and pulled it toward him. “Lie down and go to sleep.” Chaz lay down next to Donovan and waited for him to fall asleep. Donovan put his hand on top of Chaz’s chest and patted it. “I love you, Spaz.”

Chaz didn’t respond; he couldn’t. When he was confident that Donovan was asleep he moved his hand and slid off the futon, onto the floor, and buried his head in his hands. Tears fell into his palms, and he rubbed his coat sleeve over his face. He’d once heard his mother tell a friend that the drought was always worst right before the rain. He’d been living in droughtlike conditions for years because his life had dried up ages ago; there wasn’t anything life-giving in him. He’d had so many plans and visions when he was a child, but they were gone now. When he’d dreamed as a boy, he never envisioned himself eking out a living and either losing or drinking away what money he made. He stopped planning and dreaming a long time ago because all he could see was the gaping wound of his life, which hit him square in the face day after day. Maybe that’s what the truth does, it beats the living hell out of us until we do something about it. For years he shoved the truth aside, choosing to deal with the pain any way that he could, but he couldn’t deal with it any longer.

Let it rain,
he said into his hands.
Please let it rain.

Carla knocked on Miss Glory’s door but no one was home. She waited in the driveway with Donovan, but after an hour she pulled away and drove to her apartment. Thomas’s car was still there, so she backed away before he could see her. “What are you doing?” Donovan asked.

“Going back to wait at Miss Glory’s,” she said. “You need to stay with her today.”

“Why? I liked staying with Spaz.”

She turned to him and her eyes blazed. “Don’t fight with me today.”

Miriam and I pressed our noses to the nursery window and smiled. Erin’s mother, Lois, arrived an hour after I called. She was there for the birth of her first grandson and held Erin’s hand throughout the delivery. Miriam and I bowed out of the room when Lois arrived and paced in the waiting room together, sipping bad coffee and watching horrible TV. When the doctor told us the news at eight o’clock that morning we cheered and hugged his neck as any grandmother would do, and fought to be the first to hold little Gabriel when we saw him with Erin. I won.

Donovan ran for the car when I pulled into the driveway. “Señorita Cuckoo!”

I wrapped my arms around him and looked at Carla. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

Carla eyed Miriam and looked at the ground. Miriam took the hint and reached for Donovan’s hand, leading him inside.

I stood with Carla in the driveway and searched her face. “Is he back?” Carla shook her head and wrapped the scarf tighter around her neck. “Are you lying?”

Her eyes were dark. “No.”

“I don’t believe you,” I said. Time after time I’d seen battered women lie about being abused, with black-and-blue marks clearly on their faces.

Carla watched Donovan through the window and ran a finger under her nose. “He’s not back, Miss Glory,” she said. “I’m sick.”

I turned Carla’s face so I could look at her. “What’s wrong? Do you need to go to the doctor?”

“I don’t think so,” she said. “It’s the flu. You know. It works itself out.” She folded her arms and shivered in the wind. “Miss Glory, could you please watch him for a couple of days till I feel better?”

I thought about it and Carla bit her lip, waiting. I felt uneasy, unsure of whether I believed her. “You’re sure Thomas isn’t there?”

She nodded. “I’m sure, Miss Glory. I haven’t seen him.”

“Will you go home and take care of yourself?” She nodded and I watched her slide behind the wheel and back out.

Carla didn’t show up for work two nights in a row. Chaz asked Larry if she called him or anybody else on the janitorial team. “Haven’t heard from her,” Larry said. “She’s probably snowed in like half the town.” Twenty inches of snow had fallen in two days, and Mr. Wilson debated whether he should even open the store. Several employees couldn’t make it in due to the weather, and Carla was probably just one of them. Chaz waited an hour and then went to the security office and dialed her number. There wasn’t an answer. He tried again an hour later but she still didn’t answer. A half hour later he let the phone ring for several minutes.

The store closed early due to snow, so Chaz finished his shift three hours earlier than usual. Larry drove him to his apartment. The streets were empty except for a plow that was trying to stay ahead of the snowfall, an impossible task by the looks of the snow that was piling on rooftops and cars. “Have a great Christmas,” Larry said.

“You too.”

“Do you work the day after?” he asked. Chaz nodded. “Better have somebody pick you up. You don’t want to be out in this stuff.”

Chaz closed the car door and stood in the parking lot, looking at his apartment. He could go in and drink till he fell asleep like one of the mannequin people his father talked about, or he could walk to Carla’s to see if she was there. He ran up the stairs to his door and put the key in the lock. He’d never been good at interpreting that small voice inside; he never knew if it was just his mind thinking thoughts, or if there really was something in his soul nagging at him. The wind howled through the breezeway as he stood there, waiting, trying to figure it out. He reasoned that he could continue to call her apartment and rationalize later that he’d done all he could, or he could walk the three blocks to her place. “Damn it,” he said, yanking the key out of the lock.

Carla’s apartment was on the first floor; he saw a light in the window and hurried to get out of the cold. He knocked but she didn’t answer; he knocked again and waited. The blinds were drawn on the window beside the door, so he peered through the cracks, looking for her or Donovan. Lights were on in the living room, and from what he could see it was a mess. He walked around the apartment and tried to see through the fence that surrounded the back patio. Snow had collected in between the slats of the wood, blocking his view; he jiggled the handle on the gate till the latch gave way.

The patio had the same view of the living room, but the bedroom window was beside the patio doors. He leaned over, straining to see inside. In the half-light he saw Carla lying on her bed. He bent over the patio rail and tried to rap on the window. He couldn’t get his arm to reach that far, however, so he picked up a plastic baseball bat of Donovan’s and whacked on the window. She didn’t move and he thumped on the window again, harder this time. She still didn’t move and his heart rate jacked up. He rapped repeatedly on the window, yelling her name. She lay still and he felt his heart in his throat. He threw the small metal lawn chair into the patio window but it bounced back to him. The grill was small enough to handle so he heaved it into the glass as he screamed for help. His coat got in the way and he threw it off, then tried again. The glass gave way a little. He slammed the grill into the door two more times. He burst through the hole he’d created and ran into Carla’s room. A bottle of vodka sat beside an opened bottle of prescription pills on her bedside table. “What did you do?” he screamed, feeling for her pulse. “What did you do?”

Paramedics loaded Carla into the back of the ambulance and one of them looked at Chaz, waiting. Chaz jumped in and the paramedic slammed the door. Chaz sat where the EMT pointed and watched as they worked on Carla. It felt like the wind had been knocked out of him, and he bent over and hugged his knees. He needed to throw up, but couldn’t. “Does she use?” The voice was loud in his ears. “Hey! Does she use?”

Chaz looked up. “No. I don’t know.”

At the hospital a flurry of people met the ambulance and chattered words to each other that Chaz couldn’t follow. They rushed Carla into a room and a woman grabbed Chaz’s arm, making him stay outside the door. After a few minutes—or an hour, for all he knew—a nurse with short brown hair and glasses on a chain around her neck flew through the door to his side. “You found her?” He nodded. “Are you a family member?”

“No. We work together,” he said.

“Did she ever indicate that she was being harmed by anyone?”

“No. No, nothing like that.”

“Her arm is broken,” the nurse said. “She has cracked ribs and several bruises.” She waited for him to say something. “Do you have any idea how those injuries happened?”

“No, I don’t know anything about her personal life.”

She went back inside the room and Chaz felt his hand start to shake. A middle-aged doctor with a high, round forehead and thin hair eventually came out and Chaz crossed his arms to stop the shaking.

“Vicodin and vodka,” the doctor said. “Has she done that before?”

“I don’t know,” Chaz said.

The doctor nodded, looking him over. “Has she had any recent falls or been injured by anyone in a confrontation?”

“I told the nurse. I just work with her and she never told me anything about herself,” Chaz said. “She didn’t show up for work yesterday or today, and I live close by, so…”

“It’s a good thing for her that you do.”

“Is she okay? Can I see her?”

“She’s currently unresponsive and will be going to ICU for further evaluation and care. We’ll send someone for you before she goes.”

He walked away and Chaz slunk into an orange, cafeteria-style chair down the hall. It felt like his body was oozing into the seat, and the shakes got worse. He leaned over onto his knees and heard footsteps in front of him, but it sounded like they were somewhere in the distance. Electricity was surging through his body, making it quake. He rocked back and forth, trying to ditch the nausea, but it was still lodged in his throat. He looked up and down the hall and walked toward some doors at the other end. There were restrooms on either side of the hall, along with a storage closet and an employee lounge.

He ducked his head inside the lounge and saw that it was empty. His heart thumped in his ears but he opened one locker after another, looking for anything that would help. A noise outside the door sent him fleeing into the lounge’s bathroom. He locked the door and flipped on the fan, waiting as someone opened a locker and rummaged through it. Perspiration settled on his forehead and back, and the shakes worsened. A bottle of mouthwash sat on the bathroom sink, and he grabbed it and twisted it open. He poured it into his mouth and drank till it was gone. The bottle fell to the floor and he leaned over the sink, dry-heaving. Sweat seeped through his hair and clung to his face, but after a few moments the shakes stopped.

He looked in the mirror and the sight he saw repulsed him. A few moments earlier he had looked at people who had broken bones or were bleeding in the emergency room, and he was raiding lockers to get a fix.

A knock at the door exploded in his ears.

“You okay in there?”

His heart raced faster at the sound of someone’s voice, and he flushed the toilet. “Yeah. Sure,” Chaz said. He turned on the water and splashed his face, then ran wet fingertips through his hair. He pulled out several paper towels and dried his face and hands, then opened the door. A man wearing a white jacket stood in the lounge. “I’m sorry. I was sick, but the stalls were full in the men’s bathroom.”

“Not a problem,” the doctor said. “Do you need to see someone?”

Chaz threw the paper towels away and headed for the door. “No. I brought in a friend, and the whole thing just made me…”

“It happens.” Chaz’s back was to the doctor, but he felt him watching him. “Why don’t you sit for a second? Nobody’s in here but me.”

“No, no,” Chaz said, turning toward him. “I’m really sorry I burst in here. I’ll get back down the hall.”

The doctor touched his arm and looked at him. “Why don’t you sit down?” Chaz sat in a chair covered with pastel flowers. The doctor sat opposite him and took his pulse. “I’m Nathan Andrews. I work upstairs in Pediatrics, but I’m still qualified to take the pulse of an adult.” Nathan lifted one of Chaz’s eyelids and Chaz closed his mouth tight, holding his breath.

Nathan crossed his arms and looked him over. “What happened to your friend?”

Chaz rubbed his hands up and down his jeans; his palms were sweating. “They think somebody beat her up.”

Nathan made a grunting sound and shook his head. “You found her?” Chaz nodded. “She’s fortunate that you did. You’re a good friend.” The words struck Chaz and he looked up at him. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been a good friend to anybody. “Are you going home for Christmas?” Nathan asked.

“No.”

Nathan sat back, folding his arms. “Where is home?”

“I don’t even know anymore.”

“Why is that?”

“Just alone, that’s all,” Chaz said. “My parents are deceased.”

“My mother died when I was little,” Nathan said. “No matter how old I get, I still miss her at Christmas. I look at the parents of friends of mine and think, ‘My mom would be their age now.’”

Chaz nodded, shifting in his chair. “I do the same thing.”

“What kind of work do you do?” Nathan asked.

“I, uh…nothing really,” Chaz said. “I’ve had a lot of jobs. Right now I work in security.”

“Great.”

“When I was a kid I wanted to be a doctor.”

Nathan crossed an ankle over his knee and leaned on it. “What happened?”

“I came down with a bad case of the stupids,” Chaz said.

Nathan laughed and stood, walking to the door. “You’re still young, though.”

Chaz shook his head. “Nah. Not cut out for it.”

“That’s what I thought, too,” Nathan said. “But it’s never too late and you never know what’s around the bend.” He clapped Chaz on the back and made his way upstairs.

Chaz walked down the hall and fell into the orange chair again. He leaned onto his knees and pressed his fists into his forehead. He jumped when the nurse called him.

She let him sit beside Carla’s bed, and pulled the curtain between her and another patient, an older man who was hooked up to an IV. Carla opened her eyes when she heard him. “You look like hell,” she said.

“So do you,” he said as he stepped close to the bed. “Carla, you don’t have to tell me anything, but…what were you doing?” A tear rolled down her face and she let it fall onto the sheets. “Were you trying to…”

She rolled her head back and forth. “No. No,” she said. “I needed medicine to stop the pain, but it didn’t help, so I took a few more, but they didn’t work, so I kept on taking more.”

“You should have called somebody,” he said, stepping closer.