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Chapter Five - Christmas Tree


Lauren had rearranged the living room when I went downstairs. I almost tripped over the ottoman for the big easy chair Dick Van Dyke style as I walked into the room. I stood there, looking around at all the furniture in new places and cringed. I hate when things change and this change was a big change. “Shit,” I muttered, scratching my arm with anxiety. “Lauren?” I called out.

In reply, Nacho came running down the hallway and a moment later he was followed by Igby and then Lauren, carrying a big box marked Christmas, which was all dusty. “Hey!” she sing-songed over the box, “Good morning, sleepy head.”

“Morning,” I said. I watched as she carried the box expertly around the newly placed furniture, like it’d been there like that for eons, and put it down on the coffee table.

“What’cha think?” she asked, looking around the living room, “I thought it’d be nice for Christmas.” She grinned. “Look, we can put the tree over by the window and the fireplace has a big open space now for… you know… nice evenings together…” Lauren winked.

I liked the sound of that. Maybe this whole rearranged living room thing could work. “Yeah, it looks good,” I agreed. But I was still scratching my arm. Probably would be for a bit. Nacho jumped up on the arm of the couch and stretched, trying to reach me. I picked him up. “You did all this this morning?”

“Yes,” she sang out, “Sure did.” A big grin was on her face.

“What time did you get up?”

She shrugged, “A few hours ago.”

Lauren opened the box of Christmas stuff and started rooting around in it, pulling out the garland that went on the stairs banister and the Elf on the Shelf and the plastic light up star that went on top of the tree, putting everything down on the couch around Igby, who’d curled up and fallen asleep on the end pillow. “I was thinking, if you want to go get the tree this morning, we could decorate it tonight after it settles and maybe we could get the outside of the house done this afternoon…”

“Okay,” I nodded.

She grinned. “Are you hungry? I can make you breakfast before you go.”

I was, but she was elbow deep in the box and the living room was still making me anxious. “Nawh,” I answered. “I’ll go get the tree first. Maybe I’ll get like Starbucks while I’m out. You want anything?”

“Yeah, I haven’t had a coffee in ages,” she replied. “Since we started trying.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. It’s true. She hadn’t. She’d read somewhere on the internet that women shouldn’t drink coffee when they’re trying to get pregnant. “A’ight, coffee and a Christmas tree. I got this.”

“Thank you,” she said.

“I’m gonna take Nacho with me,” I said, since I was still holding him. “You wanna go for a ride, Nacho?” He wiggled excitedly.

“Have fun, Na Na,” she said to Nacho, who wiggled even more. “Bye sweetie.” She turned back to the box of decorations.

I carried Nacho out to the foyer, discovering along the way that she’d rearranged the dining room, too, and the placement of stuff on the table in the foyer. I put Nacho’s leash on and carefully put the stuff back where it belonged on the table, glancing down the hallway like switching places of a lamp and a keybowl was a horribly rebellious thing. I grabbed my jacket out of the closet and shrugged it on. “C’mon Nacho, we better get outta here before she rearranges us,” I muttered and we headed out to the Jeep.

“You doing okay through this whole rearranging the house bit, Nacho?” I asked him as he peed on a bush on the way to the Jeep in the driveway. He didn’t respond, of course, but sometimes it was peaceful talking to him. “I hate changes, you know? I know she’s only rearranging ‘cos, like, that’s what she does when she’s frustrated… You remember how many times she rearranged when Lori was buggin’ about the prenup and I was trying to get a wedding date?” I asked. I shook my head at the memory. I’d ended up fighting for a date just out of the pure anxiety that all of the rearranging had given me.

When he’d finished doing his business, I loaded Nacho into the Jeep and we started on our big Christmas tree adventure. Nacho bounced excitedly around in the back as I drove north to downtown. I’d seen a Christmas tree lot the night before on Franklin Road north of the town on the way home from Cool Springs and I figured that was as good a place as any to get the tree. It was brisk and a little rainy outside, and the traffic was light on the backroads for a Black Friday. I figured they were probably all still down at the Galleria or up in the city crammed into one of the other malls and super centers.

At the lot, they’d constructed a makeshift fence, like one of them things that come in a big bundle that you just unroll, and hung Christmas lights off it. There was a big tent and a blow up Santa Claus on top that looked like he should’ve had a V8 that morning. “You wait here,” I said to Nacho. We’d be in there forever and all the trees would be covered with doggy whiz if he’d gone inside. A whole tent full of trees was basically Nacho’s every dream. The dog loved to pee. He bounced around, slobbering on the windows, watching as I walked across the lot from the car, my hands buried in my jacket pockets.

Inside the tent there were trees everywhere. I wandered through them, looking at the different types of branches and heights and fullness.

“Can I help you?” A man with a big round head that reminded me of Mr. Spacely on the Jetson’s came up. He had a Santa cap on.

“Yeah, I’m in the market of buying a Christmas tree,” I said.

He smiled, “Awesome because I’m in the market of selling one.” He held out his hand, “Name’s Carver, nice to meet you.”

“Nick,” I said, shaking his hand, and thinking that all I wanted was a Christmas tree, not a friggin’ new best friend. I wondered if I shouldn’t have just gone with a nice plastic one from the K-Mart.

“You got a particular kind and height in mind?” he asked.

“Green. Maybe seven or eight feet?”

“I got just the tree.” He led me through a maze of them, like I’d described a very particular tree and none of the others between where we’d started and where he led me had been it. Fact was, we passed about twenty seven or eight foot green trees, but that’s okay. When we reached the tree he meant, he waved his arms at it with bravado. I mean it was just another tree, but he’d dragged me halfway to Kingdom Come for it so I felt like it had to have some sort of special feature, so I walked around it, inspecting it, trying to figure out what exactly had been worth the walk across the entire tent. I mean the branches were really full and stuff, but there’d been other really full trees. “She’s a beaut, ain’t she?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I replied. I still didn’t see anything particularly special about it, but whatever. It was a good tree, and Lauren would be happy ‘cos it didn’t have any gaps or anything so it’d be good, especially if we were apparently putting it in the window. “How much?”

“Thirty a foot,” he replied.

I did the math. Thirty a foot times...looked to be about eight and a half high… Fuckin’ $250 for a tree that was gonna end up dead on the curb in a month. The plastic tree was sounding better and better. But I’d made such a big deal about getting a real tree the day before I didn’t wanna take it back, so I pulled out my wallet, “You take American Express?” I asked.

“I got a Square on the iPad,” he replied, “I’ll take anything.” He grinned. “Let me go get the iPad and we’ll get you loaded up…. Ethan!” he called the name out, “Ethan, can you wrap this tree while I get the iPad?” He disappeared between the trees, leaving me there waiting for Ethan.

Then around the corner, carrying a web of netting and some rope, came the Sbarro kid from the night before.

“Hey. It’s you,” I said when I saw him.

He stopped short, looking surprised to see me. “Yeah,” he said.

“You work here?” I asked.

He shrugged. Then he cleared his throat and threw the netting down onto the ground, stealing glances at me as he shuffled the tree onto the netting and pulling it up toward the top, tipping the tree onto it’s side as he did, the branches pulling against the trunk under the netting, which he pulled closed and tied a piece of rope around.

Carver came back a moment later with an iPad and one of them little square things plugged into it, grinning, “I love this new technology, ain’t it somethin’?” he held the iPad out, “Just swipe your card there and it does all the work. Even emails you a ticket.” He grinned.

Ethan the Sbarro Thief was dragging the tree out of the tent.

“What car’s it going on?” Carver asked.

“The, uh, the Jeep.” Mine was the only car out there, but that’s okay.

“Goes on the Jeep, Ethan,” Carver called.

“No kidding,” Ethan muttered as he disappeared into the lot.

I swiped my card and all that on Carver’s iPad. “So, is he your son?” I asked.

Carver shook his head, “Some kid. Showed up the other day asking if I needed some help, if I’d pay in cash. Figured he seemed like he’d be okay lifting some trees onto the roof of some cars for a couple bucks a day, you know? My back’s been killing me the last few years doin’ the lifting, so it was a blessing.”

I nodded, “Sounds it.” I handed back his iPad, “Well. Thank you. Merry Christmas.”

“You enjoy that tree now, y’hear?” he said, grinning and he waved, tapping the iPad as I headed out to the Jeep.

Ethan had the tree on top and was tying it to the rack. Nacho was bouncing off the window, barking as Ethan balanced on the runners by the back door. “Sorry about Nacho, he’s crazy.”

“It’s all good,” Ethan answered as he knotted the rope a couple times, tight, and cut the rest off with a pocket knife.

I pulled my wallet out and pressed a ten dollar bill into his hand. “Thanks for getting it loaded up,” I said as I gave him the tip.

“No problem,” he answered. He hesitated as he watched me walk around the Jeep to the driver’s side door. Then, “And thanks. For the pizza.”

“You’re welcome,” I answered, surprised he was thanking me.

He hesitated again. “I don’t usually steal.”

“That’s good,” I replied.

He nodded. “Well, anyway. Merry Christmas.” He turned and headed back into the tent quickly, leaving me there by the Jeep. I stared after him, then I sighed and got into the Jeep.

Nacho practically flew over the seats to the front, leaping onto my lap and lapping my face, like he was making sure I was okay. I rubbed the scruff around his neck, and started up the Jeep, headed home.

At the Starbucks, I got our coffees and the barista handed out a doggie biscuit for Nacho, who ate it like it was going out of style, scarfing it and all the crumbs he’d dropped on the seat with a few loud snorts before we’d even pulled away from the drive thru window, which made the barista laugh and call a couple co-workers over, and Nacho got a couple extra biscuits for the road. The dog knew how to do it.

When we got home, Lauren had put a wreath on the door already and on the patio furniture was a big ball of outdoor lights that we’d be putting up on the trim of the house that afternoon, I guessed, judging by the staple gun that was sitting on the table. I carried the coffees in first, then went back out to get the Christmas tree from the roof of the Jeep as Nacho ran off to bury the one remaining biscuit that he had from the Starbucks.

Lauren was sipping her coffee as she watched me fit the tree into the stand she’d put by the window. “God I missed coffee,” she commented as she took a long sip, holding the cup in her palms with excitement, breathing in the coffee steam.

“It missed you too,” I joked.

Lauren laughed. She always laughed at my lame ass jokes. I smiled.

Once the tree was in the stand, I cut the netting Ethan had put on it free and the branches dropped, needles going everywhere, but it started settling nicely and I took a couple steps back and sat down next to Laur on the couch. We stared at the tree. “It looks beautiful,” she said. “You picked a good one.”

I didn’t tell her Carver had picked it for me.

“Nacho, get outta there,” I called as he went over to inspect the tree, a particular interest on his mind. “We’re gonna have to keep him out of there somehow,” I said.

Lauren snuggled into me as a response, so I wrapped my arms around her and we sat there drinking our coffee, staring at the tree, Igby laying at our feet, and Nacho back off, running around with the leftover biscuit in his mouth, digging at the carpet to hide it in plain view in the corner. I leaned my cheek against Lauren’s hair.

“So… you wanna hear somethin’ weird?” I asked.

“What’s that?”

“Remember I told you about the kid that stole the Sbarro at the galleria?”

She nodded.

“Well he’s workin’ for the tree guy. His name is Ethan. He’s the one that put it up on the roof of the Jeep and stuff.”

“Huh,” Lauren said. “Well. It’s a small world. Did he say anything about the stolen pizza?”

“He thanked me.”

“That’s good,” she said.

I nodded, “Yeah. It is.” We fell silent for a moment, then I said, “He said he doesn’t usually steal.”

“That’s good,” Lauren repeated.

“Yeah,” I agreed, “It is.” Again, we fell silent.

“What do you want for Christmas?” she asked.

I shrugged, “I dunno.” I know we’d agreed to stop trying, but what I really wanted was still for her to get pregnant and for me to find out my pipes weren’t broken. I wanted to know the universe didn’t think I’d be a bad father, that it trusted me with a kid. I wanted to be a dad. But I didn’t wanna say all that. So I left it at that and asked, “What do you want?”

In the same tone I’d said it in, Lauren answered, “I dunno.”