Read Online Sweet Memories by Lavyrle Spencer - Free Book Online Page B

the hall and paused in the living-room doorway. Brian stood before the piano, one thumb hooked in the back pocket of his pants while he lackadaisically pressed the keys with a single forefinger. He looked up. She crossed her arms. The piano strings vibrated into silence. She noticed things about him that she liked—the shape of his eyebrows, the way his expression said  smile  when there really was none there, his easy unhurried way of speaking, moving, shifting his eyes, that put her much more at ease the longer she was with him.
    “I enjoyed the concert.”
    “I’m glad.”
    “My first live orchestra.”
    “It’s nothing compared to the Minneapolis Orchestra. You should hear them.”
    “Maybe I will sometime. Do they play Chopin?”
    “Oh, they play everything! And Orchestra Hall is positively sensational. The acoustics are world acclaimed. The ceiling is made of big white cubes of all sizes that look like they’ve been thrown up there and stuck at odd angles. The notes come bouncing off the cubes and—” She had looked up, as if expecting the living-room ceiling to be composed of the same cubes she described, not realizing that she looked very girlish and appealing in her animation, or that she had thrown her arms wide.
    When her eyes drifted down, she found Brian grinning in amusement.
    The kitchen door burst open and the noise began again.
    __________
     
    WHEN THE BRUBAKER FAMILY  decorated their Christmas tree, the scene was like a three-ring circus, with Margaret its ringmaster. She doled out commands about everything: which side of the tree should face front, who should pick up the trail of needles left scattered across the carpet, who should fill the tree stand with water. Poor Willard had trouble with the tree lights, all right, but his biggest trouble was his wife. “Willard, I want you to move that red light so it’s underneath that branch instead of on top of it. There’s a big hole here.”
    Jeff caught his mother by the waist, swung her around playfully and circled her arms so she couldn’t move, then plopped a silencing kiss on her mouth. “Yes, his little turtledove. Shut up, his little turtledove,” Margaret’s tall son teased, gaining a smile in return.
    “You’re not too big to spank yet, Jeffrey. Talking to your mother like that.” But her grin was as wide as a watermelon slice. “Patricia, get this boy off my back.” Patricia made a lunge at Jeff and the two ended up in a heap on the sofa, teasing and tickling.
    Margaret had turned on the living-room stereo, but while it played Christmas music, Amy’s bedroom was thumping with rock, and though the door was closed, the sound came through to confuse the issue. Jeff sang with one or the other in his deep, gravelly voice, and before they got to the tinsel, the phone had rung no less than four times—all for Amy.
    Brian might have felt out of place but for Patricia’s being an outsider, too. When it was time to distribute the tinsel, she was given a handful, just as he was, and protesting that it was  their  tree would have sounded ungracious, so he found himself beside Theresa, hanging shimmering silver icicles on the high branches while she worked on the lower ones. Jeff and Patricia had taken over the other half of the tree while the two elder Brubakers sat back and watched this part of the decorations, and Amy talked on the phone, interrupting herself to offer some sage bit of direction now and then.
    They ended the evening with hot apple cider and cinnamon rolls around the kitchen table. By the time they finished, it was nearing eleven o’clock. Margaret stood up and began stacking the dirty cups and saucers.
    “Well, I guess it’s time I get Patricia back home,” Jeff announced. “Do you two want to ride along?”
    Brian and Theresa both looked up and spoke simultaneously.
    “No, I’ll stay here and clean up the mess.”
    “I don’t feel like going out in the cold again.” Theresa took over the task her mother