Looking for Miracles. Lynn Bulock
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it in one, Mom. She does promise to do the heavy cleaning. In fact if it was up to her, I think Lori would be doing the heavy cleaning before the first of the year.”
Gloria’s artfully tinted brown curls bounced as she shook her head. “Not that soon. I’m glad you did it, Mike. It will be good to have children around. Especially since I seem destined to be without grandchildren until I am too old and feeble to hold them.”
Mike scowled. “Okay, it’s Christmas Eve. We are not going to get into that tonight. You going to open your present before supper or after?”
“After.” Gloria laughed. “It’s not even dark yet. I don’t open presents before dark on Christmas Eve. And you need a shower before dinner anyway. Go wash up and come back presentable.”
“Okay, but no decorating Dogg while I’m gone. He’s had enough of that today.”
“Not even one plaid bow?”
Mike sighed. “If he’ll let you put it on, you can do that. And of course you can brush him. But no jingle bells or pine roping or anything.”
His mother gave a very unladylike snort behind him. “Pine roping. Who does he think I am?” Even though he was headed out of the room, Mike already knew that Dogg’s big head was in her small hands. They both loved the attention. “You’d eat pine roping. And mistletoe is poisonous, so we can’t have you wearing that, either. Let’s go find that plaid ribbon, the one with the gold edges, shall we?” Mike heard the sound of Dogg’s nails ticking down the hardwood hallway as they both went their separate ways to prepare for Christmas Eve.
An hour later they were all in the dining portion of the big country kitchen. Mike tried to disguise his exhaustion with aftershave and a bright red sweater. It might work, depending on how close Mom was paying attention.
There were candles everywhere there was flat space in the kitchen. It did seem kind of quiet, just two people and one dog, even if he took up more floor space than one of the people. Maybe his mom was right about the lack of grandchildren. A few rug rats would definitely spice up the holidays. Of course he’d have to meet the right woman first. One that would pass muster with his mother, as well as being able to put up with all his foibles. And it wouldn’t hurt if she were soft and small and easy on the eyes, too. That would take another couple of decades at least.
As a special treat, Dogg got a little veal stew on top of his kibble. He inhaled his food and stretched out on the rug with a sigh. Mike ate in silence for a while, then pushed back from his place. “I’m probably going back to the hospital tomorrow to get Lori. She and the baby are both healthy, and I expect they’ll be ready to discharge her by noon. She doesn’t have much in the way of insurance and there’s nobody she can stay with.”
“She’ll need people around. Don’t take her straight to that empty house. Bring her here and I’ll stretch out Christmas dinner.”
Jumping up from the table and hugging his mom felt like a good idea right now. But that would not be Gloria’s idea of good dinner decorum. Better to stay seated. “Great. I can’t thank you enough for being understanding about this. I know I don’t usually bring fire-and-rescue home with me, but this time something was different.”
“I’m glad you’re reacting this way. I can honestly say I’ve been where this young woman is, and it’s not a pretty place to be.” Gloria looked down at her plate. As usual she’d stirred around a small portion of dinner, hardly seeming to eat.
“At least you had money to fall back on. I don’t think there’s any there.” Mike looked at his mother. Did he dare ask a question he’d wondered about for years? Hey, it was Christmas. Why not? “And you just had me. Did you ever regret that I was an only child?”
Gloria’s smile was crooked. “All the time. Except maybe that year your dad died. Then I was thankful I didn’t have any littler ones to deal with. You were a little old man by then, so serious. I couldn’t imagine having a baby or a toddler in that situation.”
“Well, try a five-year-old, a baby, one junker car that I could see out there in the middle of nowhere and only the possessions that fill a very small mobile home that ceased to be mobile during the Nixon administration.”
Gloria actually grimaced. “Definitely bring her here. I wonder if there was any Christmas for the little boy.”
“No idea. I pretty much doubt it.” Sitting there contemplating the Harpers’ Christmas made his head hurt. “Could we have coffee and some of those Christmas cookies I know are on that tray on the countertop? I feel like I’ve been run over by a truck all of a sudden.”
Gloria got up briskly and cleared the plates before Mike could move. Putting them next to the sink, she flipped the switch on the coffeepot, which hummed to life. “I had it all set up. I figured the day would catch up to you sooner or later.” She walked over to him at the table and massaged his shoulders. Her hands were so fine boned. “Think you’ll still be awake when the carolers come?”
“Only if they make it in the next half hour. Otherwise I’m joining Dogg under the tree so we can look up at the pretty blinking lights.”
Gloria looked at the bubbling pot. “I should have brewed more coffee.” Even as tired as he was, Mike had to laugh. His mother was ever the hostess. Even with just the two of them there on Christmas Eve.
“Hey, for your sake I’ll try to stay awake until at least nine. And then we’ll open gifts. Can Dogg unwrap his this year?”
Gloria made a face. “Only if you feel like vacuuming before you go to bed.” His mother loved him. But she was definitely still the mother he’d grown up with. Somehow that gave Mike more comfort than if she would have said yes to his goofy request.
“C’mon, Dogg, let’s go plug in those tree lights.” The big beast’s ears perked up and he padded behind Mike into the living room, where they could both take an after-dinner nap.
Gloria liked her bracelet. Of course, she would have professed to like anything Mike gave her if he’d picked it out himself. But Mike could tell once she’d seen the delicate serpentine gold chain with its Victorian slide charms that she approved. It went on immediately with several exclamations.
Dogg helped unwrap his present after all. He could smell the basted rawhide bones through the package, and nosed his way into Mike’s lap to help with the paper. “Take that into the kitchen,” Gloria cautioned him. Mike didn’t bother answering because he knew she was speaking directly to the dog. And he listened, too. One prized bone in his mouth, it never touched the carpet in his trek to the right spot on the woven rag rug in front of the sink.
“Aren’t you going to open yours?”
“Sure.” Mike eyed the box. “Bet I can guess what it is anyway.”
Gloria shook her head. “I bet you can’t.”
It was on the tip of Mike’s tongue to describe in detail the baseball jacket he expected. Surely it was there in red splendor, complete with the number 25 of his favorite St. Louis Cardinals player.
But something held him back. That was his fantasy. His mom was not likely to know that’s what he’d been looking at in store windows, nor believe the kind of money to be spent on such foolishness, at least in her eyes. One look back at Dogg decked out in gold-edged plaid told Mike he was going to be vastly disappointed if he expected that jacket.
So while he unfastened the neatly taped edges of the paper, he rearranged his expectations. It was easier than asking to exchange a present from Gloria. When he opened the bulky box, there was a jacket inside. A beautiful salt-and-pepper herringbone tweed in soft wool. He didn’t even have to look inside to know that it was the 46 long he wore. “All right.” He held up the garment, trying to inject as much enthusiasm as he could into the statement. “This is some jacket.”
“You’d been hinting about needing a new one. If it doesn’t fit, you’ll have to go into St. Louis to exchange it, because nobody around here had