Read Online The 13th Gift by Joanne Huist Smith - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Joanne Huist Smith
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only be seen if you’re seven feet tall?”
After a weekend of scrubbing floors, cleaning toilets, de-cobwebbing light fixtures, washing down walls, and polishing every wooden surface in the house, Rick labeled me “Christmas crazy.” In future years to avoid participation in the cleanup, he would plan some vital home repair—like replacing the plastic vent on the dryer or changing the batteries on our seven smoke alarms—that simply had to be completed over the holidays. That was fine with me as long as he stayed out of my way. I’d flip on the radio and sing along to Christmas songs while the housework tinted my hands and knees the color of pink poinsettias
.
The real Christmas fun began after the cleaning. That’s when I’d drag out the decorations. A Santa figurine dressed in Pilgrim apparel standing next to a turkey, a gift from my sister Carol, was always the first holiday dressing to be displayed. For us, and then later for the kids, his appearance was a sign that a month of holiday fun was about to begin. Thanksgiving was a blur this year, and the little fellow never made it out of the cupboard
.
I’m nearly to the bottom of the laundry pile—I can actually see the floor for the first time in weeks—when I unearth a cache of Rick’s clothing: socks, underwear, the gray-striped shirt he wore the day before he died. The sleeves are still rolled up to the elbows, a necessity because his long arms usually stuck out of his sleeves. I gather the shirt and hold it to my nose, breathing deeply.
Mildew.
The shirt has been sitting on the laundry room floor under wet towels and dirty gym clothes. Any trace of my Rick is gone.
I dump extra laundry detergent into the washer as it fills with hot water and then collect Rick’s clothing. Before I toss in the shirt, a note slips out of pocket. The paper is damp, but a list written in Rick’s perfect block penmanship is legible: “Christmas gifts to buy before surgery—bike for Nick, seat covers for Ben’s car, a Bellbrook warm-up suit for Meg. Nerf guns for everybody.”
Under my name, he has written “This Christmas is going to be special.”
I trace each letter on the page wondering when he wrote the list, and where. The empty washing machine runs through the wash cycle while I read the short missive over and over, committing it to memory. I’d like to think it’s a sign from Rick that he is somehow still with us, but I know it’s just another piece of his unfinished life.
I refold the note and put it back in the shirt pocket, then restart the washing machine. I stuff Rick’s socks, his underwear, and the shirt into the washer, and I watch, mesmerized, as the hot water begins to rotate. I regret my action almost immediately, but not soon enough to save the note. It is in pieces, like our lives.
Vapor rising from the hot water makes me feel like I’m in a steam room, so I flip the lid closed, but it doesn’t help. I am sweating, and my heart jumps and leaps like it wants out of my chest. I wonder if this is how Rick felt, and I panic. My legs buckle, and I slip to the floor.
“Breathe. Stay calm. Help me, Rick.”
I fall asleep sitting there on the concrete floor, leaning against the washer.
When I wake, the house is quiet, and my heart beats normally. Only the fear remains. The house feels unwelcoming, and I don’t want to be here alone. I run upstairs, slip on my snow boots, grab my car keys and coat. I have to get away.
I drive for three hours, to Cincinnati and back, without getting out of the car.
Nick opens the front door for me when I arrive home just after five o’clock. He has been home for more than an hour, but he doesn’t ask me where I’ve been. A CD with a collection of my favorite songs is playing on the stereo. Megan, he informs me, needs a ride home from basketball practice at seven thirty; Ben is chopping firewood with a friend, and he’s going to get paid.
Nick pulls off my coat by the cuffs, folds it over his right arm
After a weekend of scrubbing floors, cleaning toilets, de-cobwebbing light fixtures, washing down walls, and polishing every wooden surface in the house, Rick labeled me “Christmas crazy.” In future years to avoid participation in the cleanup, he would plan some vital home repair—like replacing the plastic vent on the dryer or changing the batteries on our seven smoke alarms—that simply had to be completed over the holidays. That was fine with me as long as he stayed out of my way. I’d flip on the radio and sing along to Christmas songs while the housework tinted my hands and knees the color of pink poinsettias
.
The real Christmas fun began after the cleaning. That’s when I’d drag out the decorations. A Santa figurine dressed in Pilgrim apparel standing next to a turkey, a gift from my sister Carol, was always the first holiday dressing to be displayed. For us, and then later for the kids, his appearance was a sign that a month of holiday fun was about to begin. Thanksgiving was a blur this year, and the little fellow never made it out of the cupboard
.
I’m nearly to the bottom of the laundry pile—I can actually see the floor for the first time in weeks—when I unearth a cache of Rick’s clothing: socks, underwear, the gray-striped shirt he wore the day before he died. The sleeves are still rolled up to the elbows, a necessity because his long arms usually stuck out of his sleeves. I gather the shirt and hold it to my nose, breathing deeply.
Mildew.
The shirt has been sitting on the laundry room floor under wet towels and dirty gym clothes. Any trace of my Rick is gone.
I dump extra laundry detergent into the washer as it fills with hot water and then collect Rick’s clothing. Before I toss in the shirt, a note slips out of pocket. The paper is damp, but a list written in Rick’s perfect block penmanship is legible: “Christmas gifts to buy before surgery—bike for Nick, seat covers for Ben’s car, a Bellbrook warm-up suit for Meg. Nerf guns for everybody.”
Under my name, he has written “This Christmas is going to be special.”
I trace each letter on the page wondering when he wrote the list, and where. The empty washing machine runs through the wash cycle while I read the short missive over and over, committing it to memory. I’d like to think it’s a sign from Rick that he is somehow still with us, but I know it’s just another piece of his unfinished life.
I refold the note and put it back in the shirt pocket, then restart the washing machine. I stuff Rick’s socks, his underwear, and the shirt into the washer, and I watch, mesmerized, as the hot water begins to rotate. I regret my action almost immediately, but not soon enough to save the note. It is in pieces, like our lives.
Vapor rising from the hot water makes me feel like I’m in a steam room, so I flip the lid closed, but it doesn’t help. I am sweating, and my heart jumps and leaps like it wants out of my chest. I wonder if this is how Rick felt, and I panic. My legs buckle, and I slip to the floor.
“Breathe. Stay calm. Help me, Rick.”
I fall asleep sitting there on the concrete floor, leaning against the washer.
When I wake, the house is quiet, and my heart beats normally. Only the fear remains. The house feels unwelcoming, and I don’t want to be here alone. I run upstairs, slip on my snow boots, grab my car keys and coat. I have to get away.
I drive for three hours, to Cincinnati and back, without getting out of the car.
Nick opens the front door for me when I arrive home just after five o’clock. He has been home for more than an hour, but he doesn’t ask me where I’ve been. A CD with a collection of my favorite songs is playing on the stereo. Megan, he informs me, needs a ride home from basketball practice at seven thirty; Ben is chopping firewood with a friend, and he’s going to get paid.
Nick pulls off my coat by the cuffs, folds it over his right arm
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