7. Like Christmas Morning
seven
Like Christmas Morning
“ C ould I have fruit instead of home fries with my egg white omelet, please?”
“Already had the fruit cup down.” Our waitress winks at Helen.
“Thanks, Dawnie.” Helen’s smile stretches across her tiny angular face. She chirps effervescently like a bird when she speaks and apparently eats like one too. I puff air into my cheeks in total recall of the sheer volume of breakfast fare I just ordered.
“So, you’re sticking with the eggs benedict, extra hollandaise, a side of hash browns, and the gingerbread waffle with extra whipped cream?” The waitress also reminds me.
I nod as I zero in on her name tag. Dawnie. She seems nice enough. Nothing wrong with a sense of humor, and everyone in this town seems to have one. Her maroon apron spins away from our table and toward the onlooking breakfast goers.
I’m guessing that football coach wasn’t far off. I’m still the talk of the town. My eyes graze across the town’s faces. I assume it’s the entire town. The diner is full, and the population in Blitzen is not that large.
“Ignore them. You’re fresh meat. At least this is only a quarter of them, and the tame quarter at that.
We’ve dodged the church goers. The real vultures won’t be let out again until noon.
” Helen waves at what looks like three generations coming through the door as an older man and his son follow what must be the grandson to his favorite booth. The family resemblance is uncanny.
“They’re sweet.” I nod at the three ball caps staring our way as they settle into their booth.
“Don’t stare back too long. This is a small town in Kentucky. Ever seen Deliverance ?”
“Helen!”
“I’m joking. They’ve all been looking forward to you coming and now that you’re here they—well, they’re staring. That’s all there is to it. I don’t have a valid excuse or an antidote, other than you’ll get used to it.”
“It’s fine. Aunt Josie’s a tough act to follow. I’m sure they’re wondering where my top hat is or when I’m going to leap out of our booth and ask the line cook to dance to the first song that comes on the juke box.”
“Speaking of songs on the juke box… anything new with your mysterious tape?”
“Nope. It didn’t play for me this morning on my way here. I hope that’s not all she’s got. But hey, it’s inspired me already, so let’s just skip the jokes about how Aunt Josie’s place currently looks like the North Pole after a few too many, and that I literally just caught you—”
Several large plates are dropped in front of us, and Helen squints at me above the egg white omelet.
“You have to work for it, you little devil. No one over the age of twenty-three has a metabolism that produces a statue in heels such as yourself, and you my little pixie, bird-like, Vogue model attorney friend, don’t either.”
“F— you, Erika with a K. I happen to love egg whites and fresh fruit cups.”
“Fish sticks. You can say ‘fish sticks’ when you have the urge to say—”
“Do you mean, fiddle sticks ?”
“Never mind. So. I’ve made a chart.” Brushing my hair behind both ears, I fan my hands out in excitement.
Our table is full of piping hot holiday deliciousness, but I’m suddenly not hungry anymore as I lean down toward my large red velvet tote with the braided white handle.
It has an applique of a ice skate on the front of it.
A fun find from Josie’s attic. It’s vintage and I’m obsessed.
With my extended three-ring binder in hand I scan the plates below looking for more room, only to find a massive bite torn from my waffle. Helen blinks fake interest my way, trying to divert me from her full cheeks as she chews with her mouth closed.
“Really?”
“It’s gingerbread and it’s December. It would be a crime not to taste it while it’s hot.”
“Okay, fine. Your lack of any real restraint when it comes to holiday breakfast items suggest we actually may become good friends. Now, swallow that, and tell me about Walter Miller and his trees.”
Helen takes a large gulp of her coffee and tilts her head feigning confusion. “Well. Mr. Miller used to have a tree lot, but he hasn’t in years. Not since Kourt and I were kids, and not since I came back into town. Who told you about him?”
Opening my notebook to the first page, I check off the box by tree lot. “So, it was a bona fide tree lot? And he still produces trees? He just doesn’t sell them anymore?”
“I mean there’s talk of the demented old buzzard still out there every two weeks with garden sheers or whatever you shape Douglas Firs with, but no, he doesn’t run a tree farm anymore. And he never sold them. That was the main issue.”
“What do you mean he didn’t sell them?”
“When we were kids, he had just retired. His wife passed long before that, and they had planted those initial trees together for something fun to do in our Christmas-themed town after retirement.” She eyes my gingerbread waffle.
“No. Not until you finish. Keep going.”
“Anyway, he didn’t have the heart to charge the people of Blitzen, so in honor of his wife, he opened the lot and let each household come pick out and chop down their own Christmas tree.”
“That may be the most endearing thing I’ve ever heard.”
“Wait for it. People are picky, especially in a town named after an iconic Christmas character. Every year more people came to the lot and every year more trees were wasted. The boyfriend would chop one down and girlfriend thought it wasn’t full enough after all, so they tossed it aside.
Mom would point and dad would run over with the ax, then when mom got there with the kids, she’d say, ‘No! It was the taller one two rows over.’ And so on.
You get the point. Each year, until Kourt and I turned about thirteen, it was a Christmas tree massacre.
At one point surrounding towns were coming over and taking advantage of the free hayride Mr. Miller offered—”
“Hayride?”
“Yes. You need transportation through the acreage of evergreens. How else would you pick out your tree and cart it back?”
“Okay. The fact that you know this, and don’t insist it keeps happening every Christmas, is stunning to me. That, and does this story get better?”
“Unfortunately, no. Mr. Miller created the Christmas chain saw massacre of Blitzen in the mid 2000’s. Fed up with wasted trees and greedy towns folk, he locked the gate.”
I look at her, appalled at her hometown’s behavior. “I don’t blame him.”
“Well—he blamed us. Still does. Mr. Miller became a recluse, showing up for the town meetings only to taunt us with his scowl and never vote for or against anything, and he makes Dawnie here deliver his Salisbury steak every Thursday night after her dinner shift.”
Dawnie rolls her eyes toward me as she refills my coffee. “Yup. He refuses to come in and associate with the likes of us anymore. But he’ll eat our food. Lord knows we can’t let the salty bastard go hungry.”
“This is the worst story I’ve ever heard.”
“Not really. Who else you got in that notebook of yours to ask about? I’m here all day.” Helen reaches for more of my gingerbread waffle, and I’m too dumbstruck to spat her hand.
“Okay. But not all day. I actually have a two o’ clock.” She speaks blatantly with her mouth full.
“On a Sunday?”
I can’t imagine what in this tiny town has her working on the weekends.
“Don’t ask. Don’t tell.”
“Gross.” I look up at Dawnie for confirmation, but she’s already walked away laughing.
“Hey, how do you know I’m not getting right with our maker. It is Sunday after all.” Helen throws her crumpled napkin in her half-eaten plate of egg whites as she dives into my cold benedict.
“Oh, don’t worry. I’ve got your number. Let’s just say you remind me very much of someone else I know.”
I try to smile, but I can’t. All the holiday banter aside, my heart is broken over Mr. Miller.
“Speaking of someone you know. Who the heck told you about Mr. Miller and—” Helen’s pristine red nails trace down the names of townspeople in my color-coated notebook. “And everybody else— Dang . Am I on there?”
Helen’s pointer finger pauses by Bob and the hardware store. Her tiny red nail taps on my scribbled in excerpt by his name as her face slowly changes and tilts to mine. “Kourt. Kourt told you about all of these people.” Her face is strange.
“Wow. You’re good. See, I went to the hardware store, like you said, and I bumped into your friend.”
“Kourt.”
“Would you stop saying his name like that?”
“Could you start saying it? I mean, you clearly know him now.” Helen makes a face I don’t recognize. It’s a knowing look that suggests she knows something I don’t.
“Anyway. Go back to the hardware store where you bumped into my best friend.”
“Okay. Bob was out of everything I needed and your—” Fine. I’ll play. “ Kourt needed clips for Bob’s wife’s Christmas lights. Something about hanging them on the outside of the house under the gutters. And Bob was out of those too. He suggested we go to Fisher’s to get everything we needed.”
“Who suggested? Bob? Or Kourt?”
“Bob. Bob recommended Fisher’s.”
“Ah. Now we’re getting somewhere.” Helen’s demeanor completely relaxes, and she goes in for another bite off one of my neglected plates. “I’m sorry, I just had to understand how the contents of that three-ring binder came about. There is no way Kourt volunteered all that information.”
“He didn’t. In fairness to him, I ask a lot of questions. Actually, that may have been unfair to him, seeing as how I developed his answers into a complete town overhaul of a Christmas agenda over lunch.”
“Wait a minute—You two had lunch together?” Helen’s red stained lips paint a wide smile, and she waves Dawnie over to refill her coffee and probably eavesdrop. “Do tell.”