Chapter 29
CHAPTER 29
Christmas Eve, 1969
Bernie
I remember some chilly Christmases growing up, but I’m hard pushed to remember a colder Christmas Eve ever. Our small flat feels as nippy as the meat fridges in Dan’s shop below us. The girls wear their new coats indoors and I keep Alice wrapped in blankets, which, much to my frustration, she seems determined to kick off. Our breath dances like small clouds in the air every time we speak. Thankfully, the girls find it wonderfully entertaining as they puff out over and over. They’re lying on their backs on the living area floor staring up at the ceiling, to which Dan has secured many multicolored decorations with thumbtacks. There’s a yellow crepe paper bell, a silver paper star, and plenty of shiny foil garlands looping from one side of the room to the other. Every so often the girls jump up and try to touch one.
“Santy is coming tonight,” Marie tells her sisters. “And he’s bringing dresses for our dollies. He said so, didn’t he?”
“I like Santy,” Elizabeth says.
The children’s excitement is electric and it should excite me too, but a weight sits in my chest. I look at the Christmas tree in the corner. It’s tall, with a gold star on top and red, blue, and yellow fairy lights twinkling brightly. It’s wrapped in chunky red tinsel, and every time the girls touch the tickly tinsel they squeal with joy. Under the tree an empty floor sits waiting for Santy’s arrival. Empty. Waiting.
“What are we going to do?” I whisper when I pull Dan into the kitchen and out of earshot of the girls. “Maura promised she’d have dresses ready for the girls’ dolls in time. But she’s fallen off the face of the earth.”
My girls and I have walked to Maura’s house three times this week. We knock on the door as usual, but there is never an answer. Marie and Elizabeth have called out to her, but still, there is nothing. The curtains are open and hang perfect and gleaming. The grass is cut and the full milk bottles are brought in and empty ones are left out on the porch for collection. The house is the epitome of a blissful suburban life, just like all the other houses on the street. But behind closed doors, I fear it is a very different story indeed.
“I’m worried about her,” I say. “Dr. Davenport has a temper.”
“Bernie!” Dan says, shocked. “You can’t say something like that.”
“I can. And I just did. Because he has.”
“Temper or not, he’s a doctor. Folks don’t appreciate talk like that about a doctor. He’s a local hero, for God’s sake.”
“Hero, my foot.”
“You’ll think differently when he places a healthy baby in your arms.”
I roll my eyes, but Dan is right. An end to this pregnancy and a healthy baby is the only gift I want this Christmas.
“Didn’t Maura teach you how to crochet?” Dan says, pulling me toward more urgent worries. “Could you make something for our girls?”
“Not in time,” I say, my heart aching as I imagine their disappointed faces as they stand under an empty tree in the morning. “And besides, I’ve no yarn.”
“I could dash out. Pick some up. What colors?”
I shake my head. “I’m not good enough or fast enough.”
“Mrs. Stitch,” he says, and it’s obvious he’s grasping at straws. It unravels me even more.
I’ve tried hard not to think about Mrs. Stitch and the goings-on behind her closed doors. But I do know her little shop is not somewhere I want to visit ever again.
“Mrs. Stitch doesn’t open before noon on a good day. I doubt she opens on Christmas Eve.”
“Oh, Bernie, love, don’t let this upset you. We’ll think of something.”
Dan gathers me into his arms and kisses me. I kiss him back, but my stomach is full of worry.
“I’ll go out. I’ll buy coloring pencils and paper; you know how Marie loves to draw.”
He’s right. She does.
“And, a pram, I’ll buy Elizabeth a pram for her dolly. She’ll be just like you. She’d like that, wouldn’t she?”
Elizabeth would love that. But toy prams are expensive. We don’t have that kind of money to spare.
“Dan—”
He kisses me again. Hard this time, and I can feel how determined he is to fix this. When he pulls away from me and looks into my eyes, I nod.
Dan will fix this. Even if we have to eat beans on toast until the summer. Dan will fix this. And I will be so grateful that he did.
“I love you,” I say.
“I love you too.”
“Now go. Quick. Before the shops close.”