Chapter 13 - Jabali
I didn’t think I’d be decorating a Christmas tree in the Grindley mansion like some six-foot-three elf, but here we were. The tree looked even bigger standing in the foyer than it had at the lot. Aziza and Zoriah circled it like it was a dragon Jabali the Tree Slayer had brought down.
“Uncle Jay, it’s huge,” Zoriah said.
I shrugged. “That’s what happens when your cousin says she wants a big one.”
Mr. Benton stood off to the side with a broom and the patience of Job. We all stared at the tree for a minute.
“It’s leaning,” Kyleigh pointed out.
“Girl, it’s got character,” I argued.
She rolled her eyes. “If it falls and crushes my child, I’m suing you.”
I lifted a shoulder. “I don’t own anything in my name you can take,” I lied. “Talk to my lawyer.”
“Your lawyer is your sister.”
“Exactly.”
That earned me a real laugh, soft and surprised. I held on to that.
“May I begin sweeping the needles, ma’am?” Mr. Benton asked
“Yes, please, before I pass out from the mess,” Kyleigh said.
Aziza and Zoriah dropped to sit on the floor where we’d laid out boxes from Bellarose’s. Ornaments, hooks, lights, ribbon. Glitter was already trying to take over the marble.
“Okay, listen up. Game plan. We doing lights first, top to bottom. Then garland and ribbon. Then ornaments. No one touches the star until I say,” I instructed.
“Who died and made you Tree King?” Kyleigh asked.
“Military training. And the fact that this is taller than both of us. Y’all want it to look nice or like a crime scene?” I challenged.
“Nice,” the girls said together.
“Crime scene,” she said under her breath.
I ignored her. I started stringing lights, moving in wide circles, stepping on and off a low ladder Mr. Benton brought out of nowhere. The girls tried to hand me things and almost tripped me twice. Max yipped a warning. I looked down at them and sighed.
“Back up some, little mamas. I like y’all lives.”
They scooted back and sat crisscross applesauce, separating hooks and arguing over which ornaments were “iconic.”
“This donut is iconic,” Aziza said.
“This dinosaur is,” Zoriah countered. “He holy.”
Kyleigh sighed. “He is not holy. He is ridiculous.”
“He’s both. Like Uncle Jay,” Zoriah insisted.
I would’ve been offended if I hadn’t heard the admiration in her voice. I finished the last loop of lights and stepped back. Warm white wrapped the tree, making the room glow soft and gold.
“That’s… actually beautiful,” Kyleigh admitted.
I smirked. “You sound surprised.”
“I am.”
“You gon’ keep wounding me in front of my child?”
Aziza smirked. “You doing a good job, Daddy.”
I froze. Daddy. My eyes flitted to Kyleigh’s. They were warm, understanding. It was the first time Aziza had called me that, and she did it so casually.
“Thank you, baby,” I managed to get out.
We hit the ornaments next. Kyleigh and I both went for the same box of glass balls and our fingers brushed. Heat shot up my arm way out of proportion to the contact. Her eyes jumped to mine. For a second we were seventeen again, sneaking kisses behind Mrs. Amanda’s tree.
She snatched her hand back like I was hot. Maybe I was.
“These go up high. Far away from little hands,” she directed, trying to sound all cool and brisk.
I nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
I put the glass ones higher as she handed them to me.
She was beautiful as she concentrated. She’d taken a moment to change into some kind of casual dress that hugged every curve on her body.
I was what my Uncle Brady used to call “jealous than a muhfucka” of that material.
We let the girls go wild on the lower branches with donuts, dinosaurs, reindeer, glittery music notes, and one highly unnecessary flamingo in a Santa hat that Ola Kate shoved in the basket just to start mess.
Max was their faithful assistant, damp nose in everything, whole body wagging along with his tail.
“Why is there a flamingo?” I asked.
“Because he festive,” Zoriah said, like that answered everything.
Aziza nodded. “He from Florida.”
“Y’all don’t know a damn thing about geography,” I said, hanging him anyway.
“I know enough. I know Emancipation is in Louisiana and the hill is dramatic,” Aziza argued.
Kyleigh sputtered. “Who told you my hill is dramatic?”
“Serena.”
“Traitor,” Kyleigh proclaimed.
The more we worked, the louder it got. The girls started singing off-key to whatever Christmas song came on the speaker. Kyleigh fussed about ornament distribution, then gave up halfway through with a resigned “Fine, cluster them. Apparently, chaos is our aesthetic.”
“You gon’ admit it’s pretty when we done,” I warned.
“We’ll see,” she said.
When we finally stepped back, the tree glowed. Glass, glitter, ornaments that should never be near each other in theory somehow worked in practice. Big green giant standing there like it had always belonged in that foyer.
Aziza went quiet. So did Zoriah. They just stared, faces lit up.
“It’s… ours,” Aziza said softly.
Something in my chest pulled tight. Kyleigh looked at her, eyes shining in a way I knew she’d deny later.
“Yeah, baby. It’s ours,” she said.
I cleared my throat. “One thing left,” I said. “The star.”
I handed it to Aziza. She cradled it like it was fragile. “I can’t reach.”
I crouched. “That’s why you got a daddy.”
Her eyes widened. She was still getting used to that. So was I.
“Okay,” she whispered.
I lifted her slowly, her weight solid and real in my hands as she giggled. She stretched, set the star straight, tongue poked out in concentration like Kyleigh’s used to do when she lined up her eyeliner.
“Got it!” she yelled.
The star lit. The girls shrieked. Zoriah did a little victory dance. Kyleigh clapped before she caught herself and tried to turn it into a hair adjustment.
“Kyleigh. Tell the truth. It’s beautiful,” I said, looking over Aziza’s head as I set her down.
She hesitated, then exhaled. “It is,” she said quietly.
I didn’t say I told you so. I let the moment sit.
Mr. Benton cleared his throat. “Hot cocoa is ready in the kitchen, if anyone is interested,” he announced.
“Me!” both girls shouted.
They took off, Max included, claws clicking on marble. Kyleigh shook her head.
“Walk, please,” she yelled halfheartedly.
They ignored her.
“You want some?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Yeah. I guess decorating counts as labor.”
“You did good,” I said.
“I did not yell,” she agreed. “That’s growth.”
We were almost to the archway when Mr. Benton’s phone buzzed. He glanced at the screen, then at me.
“Sir, the gate camera just notified me. There’s a vehicle stopped outside. Same truck that’s been circling the last few days. They appear to be filming,” he informed us.
Kyleigh froze. My jaw clenched.
“Let me see,” I ordered.
We went to the small security monitor off the hall. Sure enough, a lifted pickup sat just outside the gate at the bottom of the hill. A couple of young dudes in the bed held up their phones, panning up toward the house. Someone in the front seat honked twice, long and obnoxious.
The microphones picked it up faint.
“Look up here, y’all! Grinch Hill finally got a tree!” one of them yelled.
Another voice joined in. “Hey, Ms. Grindley! Is it free to the public or do we gotta buy tickets?” Laughter followed.
I felt heat snake through me, slow and dangerous. My vision narrowed a little.
Kyleigh’s hand tightened on the back of a chair. “See?” she said, voice soft. “This is why I stayed up here. They act like I shot Santa.”
The honk came again, longer. Whoever was in the driver’s seat revved the engine like this was cute.
I slid a look at her. “Stay inside. I got it,” I told her.
“Jabali—” she started.
“I said, stay inside,” I repeated, softer but no less firm. “You did the hard part. You let them put up a tree. Let me handle the rest.”
She stared at me, weighing it. Then she nodded once. I looked at Mr. Benton. My research had shown there was more to Mr. Benton than met the eye.
“You coming?”
“Yes, sir,” he said without hesitation.
We hopped in my truck. The drive down the hill was short, just long enough for my anger to get more focused.
I parked on our side of the gate, got out, and walked up slow.
The boys on the other side went quiet when they saw me.
I recognized two of them from around town, the kind who always had opinions and nothing else.
“You lost?” I asked through the bars.
“Nah, we good,” the one in front said. “We just out here documenting history. Folks need to know she finally caved.”
I smiled. It was not nice. “Caved how?”
“To the people. We been saying for weeks it’s bigger than her. Christmas belong to—”
“Stop. Don’t finish that sentence.”
He looked confused.
“You feel some type of way about the trees, you go talk to the mayor. Or go buy your own land and put lights on it. What you not gon’ do is sit outside this woman’s house and treat it like a zoo exhibit. Y’all can cut that shit out today.”
One of them scoffed. “Man, you really caping for her like she ain’t the one—”
“Like she ain’t the one who what?” I stepped closer. “Who own this hill? Who pay them property taxes? Who gon’ have to deal with shit if somebody gets hurt or dies on her property?”
“Damn, we just playing,” he muttered.
“I’m not. Understand something. That gate is not here for you.
It’s here for her peace. It’s here for my daughter’s safety.
If you got jokes, keep them where she can’t hear you.
You pull up here again to entertain your followers, you gon’ deal with my sister and some paperwork. And then you gon’ deal with me.”
“I find that I would be rather happy to take part in such activity, also,” Mr. Benton said, looking calm but sinister.
One of the boys in the back shifted. “You threatening us?” he asked.
I shook my head. “Nah. I’m informing you. There’s a difference.”
We stared at each other for a beat. Engines hummed. A bird called somewhere in the trees. Mr. Benton stood just behind my shoulder, and I could feel his disapproval like backup.
“Come on, man. This not worth it,” the driver muttered finally.
“Told ‘em they were wild for riding up to somebody house anyway. My mama would beat my ass,” the quiet one in the back added.
“Your mama smart,” I said.
Their truck backed up. One of them made a face but didn’t say anything else. They drove off, engines echoing up the road. I watched until they turned the corner.
“Thank you, sir,” Mr. Benton said.
“You don’t gotta ‘sir’ me. But you’re welcome,” I told him.
Back inside, I found Kyleigh in the kitchen. She stood at the stove stirring more cocoa, jaw tight, eyes far away. Aziza and Zoriah were at the table drawing ornaments on scrap paper, oblivious.
“Well?” she asked without turning.
“They left,” I said. “Won’t be back. Not like that.”
She slumped against the counter. “I hate feeling like… like I’m some villain,” she admitted quietly.
“You not a villain. You just somebody they don’t understand. That’s not your problem.”
“It feels like my problem,” she mumbled.
I stepped closer, not touching her, but close enough that she could if she wanted. “You got lights in your foyer now. Your baby got a tree. You walked through a Christmas village and lived. You came ornament shopping. You doing more than they know.”
She let out a slow breath.
“You feel like finishing this?” I asked.
She glanced toward the foyer, where the tree’s glow bounced off the walls. Aziza laughed at something Zoriah said, bright and free.
“I… think so,” she said.
“That’s enough for me.”
She looked up at me. “What you do?”
I shrugged. “I kept it PG-13.”
“I don’t know what that is but thank you.”
“Anytime,” I said. “Now pour me some of that cocoa before the kids drink all of it. Just greedy.”
She scoffed. “You sound like my granddaddy.”
“He had good sense.”
A few minutes later we were all back in the foyer, mugs in hand, lights low except for the tree. The girls lay on their stomachs under the branches, already arguing about who got which side for their presents.
Kyleigh stood next to me, shoulder almost touching mine. “You realize this counts as one of your Christmas things.”
I glanced down at her. “I know. And I’m still getting one more.”
“We’ll see,” she answered.
I smiled and watched the reflection of the star my baby and I had placed in the glass.