Chapter 7 - The Wreath Stays In The Box
Two days before Christmas, someone knocked on my front door just after four, when the light was already going thin. I knew the cars by sound on our street, and this one wasn't familiar. It idled, then cut off.
It was Jenna, the younger one, my brother's daughter with the dark hair. She wore the same light top she'd worn at that lunch, now under an unzipped puffer. Her hands were shoved in the pockets. She didn't smile right away, just looked at my porch like she wasn't sure she should be on it.
"Hi," she said. "Can I come in for a minute?"
I stepped back and let her in. The living room was warm. I'd pulled three plastic bins in from the garage that morning to go through them, not to decorate, just to check for dead batteries and broken bulbs. The lids were off. Tissue paper and green garland spilled over the edges. The whole room smelled faintly like pine and dust.
She stopped when she saw them. "Oh," she said. "So you do have it all."
"Have what?"
"The stuff. For Karen's house. She said you might lend it. Since her place looks... she hasn't done anything yet."
I sat down on the arm of the couch. I was still in my gray cardigan from the morning. My hands were cold, so I tucked them into the sleeves. "What did she say exactly?"
Jenna swallowed. "That you had extra. The wreath from your window, and the photo ornaments. From the big tree. She wants something on the mantel for pictures."
I didn't answer right away. I reached into the first bin and lifted out the wreath. It wasn't fancy. Just fake pine, a little flattened on one side from storage, with a red ribbon I'd re-tied every year for almost ten years. I'd hung it on my shuttered window every December, the same one visible behind us in all those lunch photos.
"This hung in my dining room," I said. "I bought it at a craft fair when you were in middle school. Remember? You helped me pick the ribbon."
She nodded, her eyes on it. "I remember your house always smelled good. Like oranges."
"That was the second bin." I pulled out a small cardboard box, opened the flaps. Inside, wrapped in paper towels, were the photo ornaments — little wooden frames I'd printed and glued myself. Jenna at eight missing a tooth. My brother holding a ham. Karen holding a baby. My mom before she got sick. "I made one every year. I hung them low so the kids could find themselves."
Jenna picked one up carefully. It was her high school graduation, her hair pulled back. She stared at it a long time. "She just wants to borrow them," she said quietly. "For Christmas Eve."
"I know what she wants."
There was a silence. The furnace clicked on. Outside, a car went by slow, tires hissing on wet pavement.
She set the ornament back down like it was heavier than it looked. "At that lunch," she said, "when they put you at the little table — I knew it was wrong. I watched you fold that napkin over and over in your lap. And I didn't say anything."
I looked at her. Not hard. Just steady.
"I was scared," she said. "Dad gets that voice, and Karen jumps in, and I just... I ate my vegetables. I kept eating like nothing was happening. I'm sorry."
Part of me wanted to make it easy for her. That's what I'd done for years — smooth it over, say it's fine, pour more wine. I didn't.
"It hurt," I said. "Sitting there with my plate on a card table while everyone else was at the wood table, listening to you all decide I shouldn't come for Christmas. And no one at that table said my name."
Her eyes filled. She wiped at them fast with her sleeve. "I know."
I stood and went to the kitchen and put the kettle on because my hands needed something to do. When I came back, I carried two mugs. Tea, peppermint, from last year. I handed her one and sat across from her, with the bins between us.
"I'm not lending the wreath," I said. "Or the ornaments. Not yet. Not to fill in a background for someone else's party."
She nodded, holding the mug with both hands. The steam rose up into her face. "Okay."
"But you can stay for a while," I said. "If you want to talk."
May you like
And she did. She told me Karen's house felt empty and tense, boxes of new lights still unopened on the floor, her dad checking prices on his phone and going quiet. She told me she'd offered to help and Karen had snapped at her. She asked how I used to get it all done, the food and the tree and the music and the parking, and I told her the truth — lists in November, money set aside from each paycheck, three days of cooking while everyone else just showed up.
By the time she finished her tea, the light outside was gone. She hadn't touched her phone once. The wreath stayed in the box.
