'Tis the Season Read online

  “Santa needed a map?” Ruby asked.

  Mae nodded. “I drew a map and I gave it to Daddy, but Daddy lost it, and Santa couldn’t find our house.”

  Now Flora glanced at Nikki, who mouthed, “I’ll tell you later.”

  “But this year,” Mae went on, “I’ll give the map to Mommy. She won’t lose it. And I’ll send my list with the map. I haven’t made the list yet, but I’m going to do it soon.”

  The older girls listened indulgently as Mae chattered on.

  “Here’s what I’m going to ask Santa for.” Mae screwed up her face in concentration. “A doll with clothes. Like party clothes. And a stuffed dog that’s as big as Paw-Paw. And a bead kit so I can make necklaces and earrings for Mommy. And a new box of crayons. And a little piano. Oh, and that Twister game. I think I know right and left now,” she said, looking dubiously at her hands. “Santa probably can’t fit all those things in his pack, but it would be really nice if he could.”

  The girls had reached Mae’s first-grade room, and Nikki shooed her inside. “See you this afternoon,” she said.

  “Wow,” exclaimed Ruby, “Mae sure is excited about Christmas.”

  “So am I,” said Nikki. “Our first Christmas without Dad. The only thing is … I hope Mae will be satisfied with just the crayons and maybe the game. There’s no way Mom can afford all that other stuff.”

  “Well,” said Flora, “you know what Min would say. ‘Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it.’”

  Nikki nodded.

  “Bye, you guys,” said Ruby as she opened the door to her fourth-grade room. “I’ll see you later.”

  Nikki, Olivia, and Flora then stood hesitantly outside the door to their own classroom.

  “Here goes,” said Olivia, sounding as if she were getting ready to jump into a freezing cold swimming pool.

  But none of the girls moved.

  “It’s only Mr. Donaldson,” said Flora finally, and although she was the shyest of the three girls, she reached out and opened the door.

  “Good morning,” said Mr. Donaldson heartily. He was standing behind his desk, wearing a necktie with brilliant goldfish on it.

  How bad could a teacher with a fish tie be? thought Nikki. And the day began. It felt, Nikki realized, almost like the first day of school again, and in a way it was, since it was the first day with their new teacher.

  “Let’s talk about the three hundred and fiftieth birthday celebration,” Mr. Donaldson said after he had taken care of all the morning chores, such as attendance and announcements. “Mrs. Mandel told me that there will be a lot of special activities to commemorate Camden Falls’s big birthday, and that you’re going to be part of them.”

  Olivia shot her hand in the air, making her pigtails quiver. “Mr. Donaldson,” she said, “there are SO many things going on! Our school is putting on a play about the Camden Falls witch trials, and Flora’s sister is going to be the star of the play. That’s Flora over there,” said Olivia, pointing, “and her sister is Ruby. She’s in fourth grade. And also, there are going to be all these exhibits in town that anyone can go see, with prizes for the best entries. I’m taking pictures of Camden Falls wildlife for the photography exhibit.”

  “So,” said Mr. Donaldson, “the exhibits are for work by both adults and kids?”

  Olivia nodded, wondering why their new teacher didn’t know this, and Mary Louise Detwiler said, “Mr. Donaldson, don’t you live in Camden Falls?”

  “I just moved here,” he replied.

  Their teacher had a lot to learn. That was clear.

  “Well, there are going to be all kinds of exhibits,” spoke up Randall Tyler. “Photos, art, history. Plus fun stuff. A parade and a fair.”

  Flora raised her hand nervously, and when Mr. Donaldson nodded to her, she said, “There’s going to be an exhibit of antique clothes and quilts. My grandmother and Olivia’s grandmother are organizing that. They own Needle and Thread, the sewing store. They’re going to have a float in the parade, too.”

  “Will you be helping with the float?” asked Mr. Donaldson.

  Flora shook her head. “No. I mean, yes. But I’m — I’m —”

  “Mr. Donaldson,” said Olivia, “Flora is really shy. She’s working on a history project, but she won’t talk much about it yet. That’s just how she is. She’s always private about her works in progress.”

  “I see,” said Mr. Donaldson.

  Nikki saw something else. She saw Randall hide a smirk when Olivia mentioned “works in progress,” a term that probably only Olivia and Mr. Donaldson understood completely. Nikki wished she were sitting close enough to Randall to give him a good poke in the ribs. Olivia couldn’t help being smart any more than Flora could help being shy.

  “I have an idea,” said Mr. Donaldson. “Why don’t we go around the room, and each of you can tell me what you’re working on for the celebration. Make sure you say your name first.”

  One by one, the kids in Nikki’s class told Mr. Donaldson their plans. Nikki’s heart began to pound. If someone had asked her just the week before what her plans were, she would have replied, “I don’t have any.” This was because her father had forbidden her to participate in the celebration. “Us Shermans,” he had said, “don’t need to call any attention to ourselves.” (Any more attention, Nikki had thought.) But now a wonderful, exciting idea was taking shape in Nikki’s mind. Maybe, just maybe, she could enter some of her drawings in the art exhibit. Her father couldn’t do anything about that if he was out of town, could he? There was nothing Nikki liked better than drawing (she planned to become a wildlife artist one day), and maybe she could work on some drawings of Camden Falls. Flora and Ruby and Olivia had been encouraging her to enter one of the shows. And now, maybe, she could. Maybe. When had her father said he might come back? In the spring, Nikki remembered. If he bothered to come back at all.

  “Next,” Mr. Donaldson said, and Nikki realized it was her turn.

  She swallowed. “My name is Nikki Sherman,” she said, “and I — I might work on some drawings for the art exhibit.”

  There. She had said it. In front of her teacher and her entire class.

  When the last bell of the day rang, Flora grabbed Nikki by the arm and said, “Stay after school with Olivia and me. There’s a play rehearsal and I told Ruby we’d come.”

  “Okay,” Nikki replied. “Let me just tell Mae and call my mom.”

  Later, sitting in the back of the auditorium, only half listening to Ruby and the others on the stage (Ruby was easy to hear; she had the loudest voice of anyone in the room), Olivia whispered, “Nikki, you have to enter the show! You have to. I know your drawings would be the best there.”

  “It’s just that my dad — I don’t know when he’s going to be back. What if I started working on the drawings and he came home?”

  “Well, he wouldn’t know what you planned to do with the drawings,” Flora pointed out. “Anyway, he won’t be back for a while, will he? You could get a head start on them, just in case.”

  “And if he shows up unexpectedly,” added Olivia, “you could move your drawings here to school. Mr. Donaldson wouldn’t care. And then if you change your mind about entering, well, it won’t matter. But if you don’t, you’ll be all ready.”

  “I guess …” said Nikki.

  “Come on. You know you want to do this,” said Flora.

  “Besides, what’s your father so worried about?” asked Olivia. “If you got a prize, you could show Camden Falls,” (Olivia paused, searching for the right words) “you could show Camden Falls the other side of the Shermans.”

  Nikki grinned. “Okay. I’m going to do it.”

  “High five!” said Olivia.

  If you were to visit Camden Falls, Massachusetts, in the month of December, you would find a very busy town. Walk down Main Street at the end of the day and you’ll see that as darkness gathers and the streetlights blink on, the store windows glow golden. Shoppers are still hurrying along with their packages. In the
windows are gingerbread men and chocolate Yule logs, waving Santas, smiling angels, and electric trains winding around miniature villages. There’s Mrs. Grindle wearily closing up Stuff ’n’ Nonsense after a long day. There’s a line of people stretching all the way out the door of the post office, even though closing time is just five minutes away.

  Now leave Main Street and walk to Aiken Avenue. The windows of the eight Row Houses glow as cheerfully as the windows in town. If you turn onto Aiken from the direction of Needle and Thread, you’ll come first to the house at the left end of the row. That’s the Morrises’. They’re home from the trip they took over Thanksgiving, and the four Morris kids are already back into their school routine. “And,” says Lacey, who’s eight, “there are only three weeks until our next vacation. Then it’s Christmas!”

  Next door to the Morrises, old Mr. and Mrs. Willet are sitting down to supper in the kitchen. Mr. Willet is wondering if he should bother getting a Christmas tree this year. He realizes that his wife won’t miss one, and that if they do get one, it might confuse her. But this is to be her last Christmas in the home they have shared for so many years — she’ll be moving to Three Oaks in January, to the wing for people with Alzheimer’s. How can they have their last Christmas together without a tree? Maybe, he thinks, he’ll ask his friends Min Read and Rudy Pennington for their advice.

  In the third house, Dr. Malone, the dentist, and his daughters, Margaret and Lydia, have, like the Morrises, returned from their Thanksgiving vacation. Dr. Malone is wondering when he should haul their Christmas decorations out of the attic. Every year he puts together a Christmas for his daughters that he hopes is as lovely as the ones the family shared before his wife died. He wonders, too, if he will always miss his wife as acutely at the holidays as he still does, nearly six years after her death.

  Now pass by the next few houses, and walk to the one at the other end of the row. The house here belongs to the Fongs. Their home is buzzing with excitement, and it’s all about the baby, as they begin work on the nursery. On this cozy evening, Mr. Fong is seated at a sewing machine, stitching boldly patterned curtains, and Mrs. Fong is painting an underwater mural on one wall of the baby’s room.

  Next door live the Edwardses, seventeen-year-old Robby and his parents. Tonight Robby is seated at the kitchen table, a pack of crayons and a stack of construction paper before him. “Mom! Mom!” he says. “This year I am going to make all my own cards. Christmas cards and Hanukkah cards. I want to make one for every family here at the Row Houses, and one for every kid in my class. Oh, and for Mrs. Fulton. Can you please write Christmas on one piece of paper and Hanukkah on another piece so I can keep them right here and always know how to spell those long words?” Robby is grinning, and so is his mother as she sets to work making his spelling cards.

  To the left of Robby’s house is Mr. Pennington’s. Mr. Pennington is nearly eighty-three, and he is spending a quiet evening with his old dog, Jacques. This is Mr. Pennington’s favorite time of day, that hour just before dinner when the world winds down. He sits on the couch and strokes Jacques’s silky ears.

  Olivia and her family live on the other side of Mr. Pennington, and Olivia has always been glad about that. She considers Mr. Pennington her third grandfather. On this evening, Olivia is seated at the desk in her bedroom. She is supposed to be doing her homework, but her mind keeps wandering to Mae Sherman and the map she plans to make for Santa Claus. What will Mae think when she doesn’t get the presents she asks Santa for? Every time Olivia imagines Christmas morning at the Shermans’, a funny feeling comes over her, an uncomfortable feeling. Olivia brings the cordless phone into her room and dials Flora’s number. She presses her ear to the wall; sometimes she can hear the phone ringing on the other side.

  Presently, Ruby answers. “Read and Northrop Summer Home,” she says. “Some are home, some are not.”

  Olivia giggles. “Hi, it’s me, Olivia. Can you ask Flora to get on the phone, too?”

  When Flora has picked up the extension, Olivia says, “I can’t stop thinking about Mae and Santa Claus, and I have this idea. Maybe we could surprise Mae with a visit from Santa. If we all worked together, and if we talked to some of the grown-ups, I bet we could get most of the things on Mae’s list and then they could be delivered to her by a Santa Claus on Christmas Eve.”

  Next door, Flora finds this idea so exciting that, after she has hung up the phone, she can no longer concentrate on her homework. So she closes her door and pulls out the secret projects she’s working on — presents for Min and Ruby and Olivia and Nikki and all her other new friends, and even Daisy Dear and King Comma.

  Flora is wondering what to make for a dog when the phone rings again. This time Min answers it.

  “Hi, Mom,” says the voice at the other end.

  “Allie!” cries Min. “How good to hear from you.”

  “Did you get my card?”

  “Yes, and we’re delighted that you’ll be coming for Christmas. This will be the girls’ first Christmas without their parents, you know, and I wasn’t sure about bringing them to New York. I think they’ll be happier staying put. But won’t you miss Christmas in the city?”

  “Not so much,” says Allie. “What about you?”

  “I guess not so much, either. I’ve celebrated with you in New York for years, but it will be nice to be here in Camden Falls. Actually, I’m looking forward to it.”

  “Good.”

  Allie tells Min that she plans to arrive a few days before Christmas and to stay through New Year’s, and Min begins making plans and lists in her head even before she hangs up the phone.

  Leave Aiken Avenue now and stroll back to Main Street. Turn a corner at the other end of town, turn another corner, and you’ll find yourself on a lane lined with shabby houses. Here’s one with two steps leading to the front door, but at the back is a door with no steps at all, and through that window you can see Sonny Sutphin moving around his two-room apartment in his wheelchair. Someone at the little market in the next lane gave him three cans of soup and a package of bologna this afternoon, and Sonny is fixing himself a fine supper of tomato soup and fried bologna.

  Leave town behind you now and take a chilly walk along country roads to the Shermans’ house. The four people inside are smiling, and look, there’s Paw-Paw. Nikki and Mae have fixed a warm shelter for him on the front stoop. Tomorrow he will go to the vet for the first time in his life.

  “Paw-Paw must wonder what we’re doing,” says Nikki. “I bet he’s never seen Christmas up close before.”

  Mrs. Sherman, Tobias, Nikki, and Mae have brought out their box of decorations. They are nothing like the ones that are stored in the attics of most of the Row Houses. What the Shermans have are some paper chains made by Mae in preschool, a wooden angel that Mrs. Sherman has kept since she was a little girl, a Santa doll that’s missing its nose, and a pillow with NOEL stitched across the front. There’s another box full of ornaments for the tree, but that’s all. The Shermans love their decorations, though, and they are pleased with them, so they admire them for a few moments, and then Mae turns her attention to the map and the letter to Santa.

  “Letter first,” she says, and diligently writes out the list of toys she wants. When she’s done, she draws the map, including an enormous arrow pointing to a box with a triangle on top labeled MY HOUS. She gives both pieces of paper to her mother and says, “I know you won’t lose these.”

  Mrs. Sherman glances at Tobias, who can’t look at either his mother or his little sister. But he doesn’t want to ruin the evening, so he says, “Let’s think about which tree we’re going to cut down this year.”

  Mae is happy about that, and their preparations continue.

  One night just before Ruby climbed into her bed, she stood at the window that looked out over the front yard and thought how very dark Aiken Avenue seemed. At the corner of Dodds Lane a street lamp shone, but there was no moonlight and there were no stars in the sky, either. She raised her window a bit, then s
hut it quickly.

  “Brr,” she said aloud. “Too cold for open windows.”

  She crawled beneath the blankets and a few minutes later felt King Comma leap lightly onto her bed. Ruby held up the covers for him and he slid under and curled into a purring ball behind her knees.

  They slept that way the entire night. When Ruby’s alarm clock went off the next morning, the first thing she noticed was the odd gray light in her room, seeping around the edges of her window shade. Ruby sat up slowly, then peeked around the shade. She gasped and let the shade fly all the way up.

  “Snow!” she cried. “Snow, King Comma! Snow, everybody!”

  It was not just a little snow but quite a lot. In the dim light, Ruby could see that the cars on the street had become rounded mounds, like igloos. Snow lay piled against tree trunks. Ruby guessed that the fluffy tower on Mr. Pennington’s birdbath, which she could just barely see, was a good foot high. And more snow was falling. It was being flung from the sky, whirling and circling and sometimes appearing to whoosh upward instead of down.

  Ruby flew barefoot from her bedroom and into Flora’s, not bothering to knock on the door.

  “Flora, it’s snowing! It’s snowing hard! I bet we won’t have school today.”

  Flora, whose alarm clock had gone off and who was lying in bed, thinking (and worrying just a little bit about a lot of things), sprang to life. “Really?” she said, hurrying to look out her own window.

  “Let’s go downstairs and turn on the TV,” said Ruby.

  “We don’t know which channel has the school closings,” said Flora.

  “Is Min up yet?” Ruby asked as she and Flora ran down the stairs.

  Min was up — she was making coffee in the kitchen with Daisy Dear hovering hungrily around her knees. She didn’t know which channel listed the school closings, either.

  “Is it too early to call Olivia?” asked Flora.

  But just then the phone rang. Ruby grabbed it and heard Olivia’s voice on the other end. “It’s a huge snowstorm!” she exclaimed. “Almost blizzard conditions! And there’s no school today. Turn on channel eight if you want to see for yourselves.”