Xmas Spirit (6 page)

Christmas Past

Holidays are so powerful for us because more than anything they recall other holidays of the past. Christmas makes you feel like a child again, but not always in a good way. No matter what is happening in your life at that moment, that week, that year, how much progress or growth has been made or ground lost in your journey, you can easily find yourself thrust into your own personal time machine, where it can be difficult for your heart, mind, or spirit to tell exactly what time it actually is.

“Who says you can’t go home again.”
Charlotte sighed deeply. Her house wasn’t far but was a world away from the other side of town. The side where Petula, Scarlet, Damen, The Wendys, and most of the other kids at Hawthorne lived. The simple wood-sided Cape Cod house was pleasant enough, if in need of a renovation. It was designated a group home, which she never understood, since she was the only kid living there, along with Gladys, her foster mom.

The neighborhood was run-down and had been for years. It sat inconspicuously behind a strip mall, the smell of the Dumpsters from the few shops that remained open wafting through the neighborhood and making it a must to avoid. Even the few Christmas decorations that hung sparsely from the neighbors’ roofs and doors brought little cheer to the grim environment. Most were just kept up all year long anyway, forgotten and faded. A string of Christmas lights ran along the gutters of her house too, but they remained unlit, having burned out long before she ever arrived there all those years ago.

Charlotte approached the door, admired the colorless wreath, and stopped to read a note taped to the door before entering.

“You are late. Kitchen is closed.”

“No dinner,” Charlotte murmured. Of all the great things about being alive, one downside definitely was hunger. She hadn’t been hungry in ages, but all that walking and returning to life had left her famished. There was always cereal, she hoped.

Charlotte pulled at the doorknob only to find it locked. No surprise. Gladys never cared enough to hide a just-in-case key, so Charlotte eyed the tree next to the side of the house and walked toward it, as she had many times before.

“How are you, old friend?”

She leaned her tired head against it, patted the trunk, and hoisted herself up onto it by the leafless, icy branches jutting from it. It looked as if it were encased in glass, making it nearly impossible to climb. She slipped and slid her way up, grabbing on for dear life, and finally stepped onto the first-floor roof. She cautiously crawled across the cedar shingles, loosening a few as she scampered to her window.

Charlotte looked behind, noted the steep pitch of the gabled roof, and thought about all the times she’d made this risky climb and how she could have fallen and broken her
neck any one of them. By comparison, death by gummy bear seemed both more embarrassing and cruel. But then, she was a choker in life, not a risk taker. That and, well, she wasn’t dead anymore, was she. She had triumphed. The fructose bear had not won after all. She considered standing up, arms raised in victory for the full Rocky, but the shingles wouldn’t permit it. She lifted her unlatched bedroom window and stepped inside.

She reached instinctively for the wall switch and flicked it, the harsh burst of light from the dusty ceiling bulb instantly flooding the sparely furnished room.

“Holy crap,” Charlotte said out loud, scanning her surroundings.

There they were, all over the walls, the floor, her desk, and her bed, plastered everywhere, nearly floor to ceiling—pictures of her own personal idols: Petula, The Wendys, Damen.

A lot of people get nostalgic for their past, Charlotte thought, but she had the novel experience of feeling nostalgic for her present.

“I was—I mean, I
am
obsessed.”

Coming back was so disorienting, surreal, and yet so natural. The truth was everything was the same; nothing had changed except her. She was totally different. Filled with insight and wisdom. At least this was what she kept telling herself. Being thrust back into her former life was bringing back all her old insecurities, old feelings of rejection and of longing, most of all. She could feel them growing inside of her, crowding out her rationality. She was aware of it yet helpless somehow, finding those feelings harder and harder to shake off, like a determined spider about to bite.

“What is happening to me?”

Charlotte turned off the light and made her way back to her bed from memory. She lay down and spread herself out over the pictures, sprinkled some over herself to form a semigloss comforter, and tried to rest her body if not her mind. In the darkness, she heard a voice, echoing all around her, call her name.

“Charlotte.”

She got up to check her window, hoping to block out the voice with the draft, but it was shut tight. She heard it again.

“Charlotte.”

It was a sweet voice, one she recognized but couldn’t quite place. Small, faint, and soft, it surely wasn’t Gladys. In all the time Charlotte had lived there, Gladys had never gotten closer
to her room than the bottom of the staircase. She heard the call a third time, this time closer, almost in her ear.

“Charlotte.”

Charlotte looked over at her desk and a bright glimmer of light appeared, shattering the darkness.

Right there in front of her a flurry of glistening snow swirled from the floor to the ceiling. Like a supernatural snow globe. And as it settled, nothing was left but a beautiful, delicate figure. A tiny spectral form with the voice of an angel.

“Yes, Virginia?”

Virginia stood there in a floor-length, simple, pure white dress. Her flowing blond locks reached almost to her ankles. Crowning her head was a wreath of white roses and deep greens peppered with tiny lit candles.

“We’ve been worried about you,” Virginia whispered, her angelic face basking in the warm glow radiating from her head. She was so close but seemed so far away.

“What is going on?” Charlotte asked.

“Don’t be afraid, Charlotte. It’s only me,” Virginia said, reaching her hands out to her.

“Who has been worried about me?”

“All your friends.”

“Well, I’m fine. I’m home; there is no need to worry.”

“This isn’t home, Charlotte. Hawthorne isn’t your home. Not anymore.”

“Is this a dream?”

“No,” Virginia said. “Well, I don’t know. Not unless we’re all having the same one.”

“How did I get here?”

“You made a wish. Sometimes wishes come true. Especially at Christmas.”

“Did Pam send you?”

“Nobody sent me. I wanted to talk to you. To show you. Come.”

“Where are we going?”

“Downstairs,” Virginia said, pointing her finger toward the staircase. She led Charlotte down the set of rickety steps and stopped at the bottom, facing the living room.

“No offense, but I could’ve walked down the steps on my own.”

“Not these you couldn’t,” Virginia replied. “What do you see?”

Charlotte tried to focus her eyes. She was both tired and
out of practice.

“I see a little girl staring at a Christmas tree,” Charlotte said quietly, eyeing the child waiting expectantly and alone for Santa to arrive. “Me.”

“What’s under the tree?”

“Take me back upstairs!” Charlotte demanded.

“Not yet,” Virginia insisted. “What’s under the tree?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing for you, that is.”

Sadness welled up in Charlotte just as it had on every Christmas past, and just as she had on every Christmas past, she sought to put the best face on it. To ignore it, to excuse it away.

“Gladys is always so busy,” Charlotte explained. “She barely has time to shop for her
real
family.”

“Is that right?”

Virginia pointed at the kitchen and there was Gladys, whistling a merry tune, wrapping gift after gift. Charlotte stared at the cheerful scene and felt she was looking at a total stranger, a woman with whom she shared a roof and a refrigerator but hardly knew.

“It wasn’t always like that,” Charlotte said unconvincingly. “She cared—I mean, cares about me.”

“Really?” the little spirit queried. “How was dinner tonight?”

Charlotte turned her back to Virginia and hung her head ever so slightly, wrestling with her tear ducts, keeping the tears pinned down, like the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dike. It hurt Virginia to treat her friend this way; she wanted to hold her, to comfort her as Charlotte had done for her so many times before, but Virginia stayed focused. There was too much at stake for her, and for Charlotte, to soften.

“Don’t blame me for the way things were,” Virginia said stoically. “Come, see for yourself.”

“Where to now?” Charlotte said, a note of panic in her voice.

Before Charlotte got a more detailed answer, they’d already arrived.

“The Kensingtons’,” Virginia said.

“This place sure could use some remodeling,” Charlotte said, thrown by the outdated look of the space. “You sure that’s where we are?”

“I’m sure,” Virginia answered, calling Charlotte’s attention to the scene before them.

Two little girls, sisters, were getting their coats on to go somewhere, while their mother stayed behind to wrap gifts.

“Is that . . .” Charlotte began, wide-eyed.

“Petula and Scarlet,” Virginia said, helping her along.

Petula wore a white fur coat with matching hat, containing her blond locks, and a muff to tuck her delicate hands into. Scarlet, her younger sister, was wearing a black coat with oversized black buttons. Her hair was long and straight, and her bangs got caught in her eyes with almost every blink.

“What’s going on?”

“Listen,” Virginia whispered.

A negotiation was apparently under way.

“I paid for mom’s present last year, and now it’s your turn to pay this year.”

“But I don’t have any money,” the young Scarlet said.

“Well, what do you have?” Petula asked knowingly.

Scarlet shrugged her shoulders, clinging desperately to the stuffed black cat in her arms, the same cat that Petula was eyeing like a homeless person would a steak.

“You have Poe?” Petula asked.

Scarlet clenched her beloved cat even tighter in her arms.

“That is what you have, and so that is what you can contribute,” Petula said. “Don’t be a baby, Scarlet.”

“But she
is
a baby,” Charlotte said to Virginia.

“Shhh,” Virginia said.

Meanwhile, Virginia pointed to the room where their mother, KiKi, was busy wrapping presents for the girls, more gifts for just two people than she’d ever seen.

“Wow,” Charlotte said. “Now that’s Christmas!”

“Look,” Virginia said. “What do you see?”

“Lots of pink. Lots of dolls. Frilly outfits,” Charlotte said. “Petula stuff.”

“That’s right. It’s all Petula stuff.”

“Looks like Petula will get everything she wants this year, and so will Scarlet.”

“Why is Scarlet getting what
Petula
wants?” Charlotte observed.

“Because that’s the way it is. KiKi doesn’t understand Scarlet or what she wants, so she just makes it easy for herself. You can’t blame her. It happens all the time.”

Charlotte was overtaken by anger. “Well, it shouldn’t!”

“Come on, let’s go.”

“Are we going back?” Charlotte asked desperately.

“We’re going shopping,” Virginia said.

With another swirl of snow and light, they materialized in a gritty, Grinchy pawnshop. Degenerates with half-empty liquor bottles begging for change out front, shady teenagers looking to make a deal for merchandise that clearly had just fallen off the truck. Somebody else’s truck. It was an environment not fit for even a mouse and certainly not for two little girls. Yet there they were at the counter, Petula and Scarlet. Scarlet was gripping her stuffed cat as if her life depended on it.

“So, what can you give us for the cat?”

“That thing?” the pawnbroker asked.

“Don’t play with us. That cat is an original piece of folk art,” Petula said, hustling like a pro.

“I can give you twenty bucks,” the guy said, looking at Scarlet’s sad face. “Only because I like cats. But that one, it’s a dime a dozen. Very little value.”

“Not to me,” Scarlet whimpered.

“Twenty-five bucks and you got yourself a deal,” Petula said.

“Don’t do it,” Charlotte moaned, empathizing with her friend. “Can’t you do something?”

“It was what it was,” Virginia said.

“You really know how to get what you want, don’t you?” the pawnbroker remarked, mulling her offer. “Okay, done!”

Petula pried the black cat out of Scarlet’s hands.

“Hey, kid,” the guy whispered to Scarlet as Petula walked to a display counter to look for something for her mother and herself. “You can come back for it when you get the money. Or better yet, wouldn’t it be something if someone knew you so well that they bought it for you and surprised you? Now that would be fate, or some crap like that, right?”

Scarlet just looked at him, wide-eyed, before collapsing into a heap of tears.

“Get up,” Virginia said to Charlotte, who collapsed right along with her.

“I am cold and tired . . .” Charlotte began.

“And heartbroken?” Virginia added.

“
And
I want to go home,” Charlotte finished. “Now!”

“Not yet,” Virginia said, just as adamantly.

It was a familiar place. Charlotte recognized the hallways, the lockers, the kids, and the numbers on the doors. Her mood brightened considerably.

“Grade school!” she yelped.

Virginia nodded and pushed open a classroom door, revealing a room full of boisterous kids tugging at a sack full of presents.

“Secret Santa!” Charlotte squealed. “The only Christmas gifts I ever got.”

Virginia remained silent and let Charlotte’s own words sink in, but she was undaunted, buoyed by the joyful celebration unfolding before her.

“There’s Petula and The Wendys,” she chirped. “And they still have braces.”

Charlotte ran her fingers along the ridge of her own teeth, recalling how desperately she wanted braces too then, not just to straighten her smile but to be like them. The memory of not having braces hurt Charlotte more than actually having them ever would have.