Chapter 10
Archer
The annual mistletoe raising and tree lighting was a generations-old tradition, and every year, the entire town of Winterbury showed up. In recent years, people from neighboring towns turned up too because the magic of the mistletoe—as my mother liked to put it—drew people in.
The way they all acted, I often wondered if the very fate of Christmas hinged on that parasitic twig dotted with white berries that would soon dangle from the entrance of the large Victorian-style gazebo in the middle of town square.
And yes, mistletoe could have red or white berries. It depended on the kind. Our oak had the white kind. If I were to point out that the red would be more Christmasy, I’d probably get thrown in jail. My own mother wouldn’t even bail me out.
Snowflakes flurried from the sky, adding to the few new inches of fresh white that had fallen last night.
The air was frosty enough to burn your lungs if you breathed too deeply, but the kids darting around in brightly colored scarves acted like they didn’t notice.
String lights lined all of Main Street, giant candy canes and mistletoe adorned the lamp posts, and all the shops glowed from within.
My boots crunched over the salt and snow, hands shoved into the pockets of my red coat.
I didn’t even try to avoid this night anymore.
I’d long since learned it was entirely useless.
My mother was relentless, and until he’d died, so was my father.
Living in Winterbury meant being part of the town and its traditions.
Especially when you owned the biggest farm.
It was one of those things I’d learned to grin and bear. No point in ruining it for other folks just because I thought it was stupid.
As I walked, rich cocoa warmed the air, the line for Bab’s already spilling onto the sidewalk. The windows had white awnings over them, and the sugar-dusted glass promised sweet rewards inside.
Tucking my chin, I crossed the street and kept going toward town square. The oversized gazebo was generations old and draped in icicle lights and evergreen garland fresh from the farm. A large red bow adorned the cupola on top, a crown atop the crown already there.
People milled around the octagon-shaped building with cups of hot chocolate and other holiday delights gripped in their mitten-wrapped hands.
Some made their way up the steps to the twelve-foot tree, also from my farm, which stood proudly in the center.
It was already covered with ornaments, but people continued to add more.
The fir wasn’t lit up yet, though. That moment was coming, and then once it was shining bright, the true star of the show—the mistletoe—would be raised.
When the tree was lit and the mistletoe hung, the town would celebrate by browsing the pop-up booths and shops on the street, filling up on too many sweets, and also making a lap around the gazebo where the brightly lit tree illuminated all the items for the auction the town sponsored every year.
Did I mention this town went overboard at Christmas?
If the tree lighting, mistletoe raising, and yuletide bonfire weren’t enough of a clue…
Winterbury also hosted a charity auction every year.
Businesses and people donated items, and after a one-week bidding term, the lots would be delivered to the highest bidders.
This year’s selected charity was a nonprofit LGBTQIA+ outreach program called Find Home that focused on health care, counseling, suicide prevention, and advocacy.
It made me proud that our town chose an LGBT program to sponsor because, to me, it really represented what the raising of the mistletoe was about: unity and acceptance.
And yeah, maybe it hit a little close to my heart.
Not that anyone knew that but me. Didn’t make it any less true, though.
As I drew closer, I watched one of the auction items being loaded into the gazebo onto a large empty table angled against the railing. Curious, I climbed the steps and went around to get a closer look.
It was a gingerbread house, and I knew just by looking at it that Bab had made it. The attention to detail and white snowy roof could not have been accomplished by anyone else. Not to mention the sheer size, which took two people to carry and one to direct.
It wasn’t an ordinary house, though. You know, the kind with a slanted roof and four walls.
There were no gumdrops on the roof (pretty sure I still had some of those stuck in my teeth from when I was a kid) or marshmallow snowmen in the yard.
This was a gingerbread gazebo, a replica of the one it was currently sitting in.
The cupola on the roof was covered in white and dusted with sugar and had some kind of light inside to make it glow.
Garland draped the roof, red bows adorned each arch, and there was a tree in the center. The stairs leading up to the entrance were flanked with nutcrackers, and I didn’t even try to guess what she’d made those out of.
The entire creation sparkled and glowed, and as others gathered around to ooh and ahh, it became clear this would likely be the high-ticket item of this year’s auction.
As I stood there admiring the gingerbread creation, people were already filling out the bid sheet on a clipboard beside it. Not even fifteen minutes on display, and it was already up to one hundred and fifty dollars.
“There you are,” a familiar voice called out. I turned to see Mom approaching the gazebo with two paper cups in her hands.
I met her at the bottom of the stairs as she looked me over and shook her head. “Where’s your hot cocoa?” she asked even as she pushed one of the cups into my palm. “I knew you wouldn’t have any.”
“Then why’d you ask where it was?” I wondered.
“Such a bah humbug,” she uttered, gesturing for me to take a drink.
I did as any dutiful son would and smiled as I swallowed. “Happy now?” I asked while all I could think about was ten years ago when I’d had hot chocolate on the night of the mistletoe raising.
“I’ll be happy when you hang our ornament on the tree,” she said, pulling a pair of hammered gold bells tied together with a piece of jute rope and one of her homemade red velvet bows on top.
“You haven’t already hung it?” I asked, mildly surprised.
Usually, she was down here first thing.
“That’s your job,” she said, gesturing for me to take the bells.
“I cut the tree down, drove it over here, and set it up.” I reminded her. And I did it all for free.
“Don’t sass your mother,” she rebuked. “You’re taller than me. All the low spots are already taken.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I muttered, taking the bells.
Leaning up, she patted my cheek. “While you do that, I’ll go look at all the auction items and get my bids in.”
“You aren’t going to help me?”
Pursing her lips, she glanced toward the gazebo and then shook her head once. “Not this year,” she confirmed and went up the stairs, pausing long enough to say, “Drink your cocoa before it’s cold. I stood in line a long time for that.”
“I didn’t ask you to,” I muttered.
“I heard that!”
Of course she did. She couldn’t hang an ornament, but she had the ears of a bat. After a fortifying sip of the rich chocolate, I spun and went back up the stairs to the tree to find a place for the bells.
I had no idea what the town did with the ornaments people left on the tree each year, and it made me wonder if there were boxes upon boxes of them in the basement of the town hall.
Hopefully, they got donated or something.
Maybe people bought them back at the yard sale the town sponsored every summer.
I never shopped then. We had our own booth with maple syrup and maple candy, so I wasn’t sure what everyone else sold.
I did a lap around the impressive Douglas fir—nothing wrong with admiring the fruits of my labor—and then scanned the branches for a place to hang the ornament.
Mom was right. The entire lower half of the tree was already jam-packed.
Probably because most people let their kids hang the ornaments, and kids were, well, short.
I paused in front of a handmade Santa ornament, his beard made of wool and his red hat of plaid flannel.
The fur around the hat and at the end was soft and slightly aged-looking, wire-rim glasses sat perched on his nose, and his cheeks were pink.
I usually didn’t pay much attention to all the ornaments or decorations.
I mean, to be honest, they were the same every year.
Tradition was tradition, after all. Plus, the older I got, the less magic Christmas seemed to hold.
It felt more like going through the motions, keeping up appearances, and doing my job as a Christmas tree farmer.
So it was very rare when something like an ornament made me pause.
But there was something about it. Something nostalgic, something warm… magic.
And for a moment, I remembered. The ache of it was bittersweet, something that hummed in the center of my chest. How it felt to believe and hope.
The crackle of a fire and the soft weight of a blanket while snow hushed the night.
The excitement of finding gifts beneath a tree, watching people you love open them and smile.
It almost made me homesick, but for what, I wasn’t sure because I was home.
I never left. The yearning was there, though.
A quiet bruise I didn’t know was there until I touched it.
Even as it ached, I didn’t shy away because the feeling was sentimental and reminiscent of love.
Without thinking, I reached out to finger the ornament that somehow captured everything I’d forgotten. The wool was soft but dense as my thumb stroked it.
The clearing of a throat brought the world around me back into focus, but I clung to that feeling for just another moment, reluctant to let it slip away. Feels like meeting with a long-lost friend again.
“Do you like that?” a voice behind me asked.