~ The Best Of The Worst Times ~

by

Kowanda Stroud

“Can I have a ride?”

Janiece faced Linda, and frowned at the seventh grader that had caused her so many problems.

“Don’t you know it’s rude to invite yourself? Aw, get in, it’s too cold for anyone to be walking, even a pain in the rear like you!”

Both Linda’s and Jessie’s homes had pretty Christmas trees in their front windows, and Janiece bragged on them when she let them out.

The lights from the windows in her house weren’t twinkling blue and red, but the light shining through her living room let her know someone was there waiting for her. When she opened the front door, smells of their evening meal greeted her.

She didn’t know why she felt like crying but she did, and she wanted to hug someone. Her mother stepped into the living room, drying her hands on the apron fastened around her waist.

Janiece hugged her mother. “Oh, Mama I just love you so much,” Janiece told her with her eyes closed, and she heard her mother’s soft chuckle.

“Now what have you done?” Her mother asked, kissing the top of Janiece’s head.

“Nothing,” she answered going to her bedroom. She pitched her coat across the chair and sat on the edge of the bed, and looked at the wall of her room covered with pictures of her teen idols.

She’d been mad at her mother ever since the night of the “big fight,” and she’d wondered who her “real” daddy was. Other times, like last week when her mother had berated a girl in school for “having to get married,” she wanted to shout, and tell her she wasn’t any better after what she’d done. But, she didn’t know for sure what her mother had done, and she was afraid to ask. Now that anger was gone and she felt relieved.

She’d been angry with her father because he wasn’t her father. It hurt her feelings when he told her mother to take her when she ran off with that man, but he wanted Donna to stay there with him. She’d always felt her father was partial to Donna and Nickie, and now she knew why. He didn’t love her as much because she reminded him of the man her mother ran away with, and she wasn’t his daughter. But now, she didn’t feel angry with him. Of course a man wouldn’t want someone else’s little girl.

But she wasn’t a little girl any longer. She was nearly grown and he had let her stay. Soon she would be old enough to marry and leave his house forever. She looked in the mirror over her dresser, and wondered if she looked like her “real” father.

“Janiece! Come help me!”

She jumped when she heard her brother’s voice followed by a crash from the living room. When she rushed into the living room, she couldn’t believe her eyes. Standing in the doorway was Nickie with a Christmas tree. The tree was wedged between the small rocker by the door and the blonde drum table in front of the double windows facing the street. The trees limbs knocked off some of their mother’s whatnots from the table but, thankfully, only one was broken.

She rushed across the room and met him at the door just as their mother entered from the kitchen side. “What have you done?” Janiece asked looking at him in amazement.

“What in the hell is this?” Faye shouted at them. “I don’t feel like messing with a stupid tree! You know I’m sick. Why did you bring that sticky thing in here?”

His eyes pleaded Janiece to help him pull it into the room.

Janiece stared at him. “Oh, you’re going to be in so much trouble.” She took the top part of the tree in both hands and tugged while he pushed on the trunk. Suddenly the tree lunged forward it nearly knocked her over.

“What in the bloody hell?” Their father’s voice came from behind the branches. “Who brought this damn thing in here?”

“I did. We don’t ever get to have a tree.” He looked towards his father. “George Gaskins gave me this durn tree, and it didn’t cost me a dime.” Then, he gave his mother a defiant look. “I’ll take care of it and I’ll clean it up. You just don’t worry. It won’t hurt us to have a tree one year in our life.”

Janiece felt her heart drop to around her knees because she feared the worst for her little brother.

“And how did you plan on making it stand up?” Faye asked. She frowned at the large tree. She pushed the little rocker to the other side of the room where the piano used to set before Janiece quit taking lessons and she sold it.

He looked at Janiece. “Go get me some tea towels from the kitchen, and we’ll tie the branches to the curtains.”

“Oh, no you won’t!” Faye said. She moved the drum table closer to the door so the tree could be directly in front of the double windows. “You’re not messing up those curtains that took me an hour to iron just yesterday.”

She looked at Nick sitting in his recliner watching them. “Well? What do you have to say about it? Can you make a stand for this tree?”

He looked at her incredulously. “You’re actually going to let them put up that tree?”

“Well, since it’s here and all I guess I might as well. That is if you can make that stand. I think I threw the old one out a long time ago.”

Janiece wondered when there had ever been an old one because she couldn’t remember ever having a tree. She stayed quiet because she didn’t want to ruin their chances of keeping this tree.

“Yeah, I can make a stand,” he said disgustedly and left the house.

Their mother motioned to the place in front of the double windows. “Just lay that tree down real easy on the floor, and I’ll be right back.”

When she left the room Janiece whispered to him. “You’re the luckiest human in the world. If I’d brought home a tree they would have killed me.”

“I knew they’d let me keep it once I got it here. They just don’t want to do anything different. It is a pretty tree isn’t it?”

“Well, yeah, what I can see of it anyway.”

Faye set a big cardboard box on the couch. Strands of gold garland were on top, and Janiece could see various ornaments inside the box.

“Where did this come from? I’ve never seen this box before.” Janiece tried not to sound angry.

“You just never looked in the right spot before, Miss Smartie.”

Nick brought a stand made of wood strips he’d nailed together. He wedged the tree trunk between the slats of the stand, and drove a nail through the wood up the center of the tree. Then he stood back and smiled.

“Well, Pater I’m proud of you! I didn’t know you knew how to make stuff.” Janiece grinned impishly. She knew he wouldn’t like her calling him Pater.

He turned and stared at her with his icy blue eyes. “There’s a lot you don’t know about your daddy.”

Janiece wondered if he meant she didn’t know he wasn’t her real daddy.

“But,” he continued with a smile, “one thing you should know is your daddy is a really handy fella to have around. Right, Faye?”

“Oh, yes definitely! He is handy to have around.”

“But,” he said sounding grim, “I’ll damn sure be glad when you quit calling me that ignorant Pater word. Can’t you just call me ‘daddy’ like you used to?”

“Sure, Pater, I mean Daddy. I just thought it was funny, and I was kinda wanting to tease you, but if it makes you mad, then of course I’ll go back to calling you daddy.”

“Good.” He stepped back from the tree and turned it a little one way and then the other. “What do you think, Shurff? You think that’s in the right place?”

“Speaking of calling people by names they don’t like,” Faye said with an irritated tone to her voice. “If you don’t mind, please do not call me ‘Shurff’ again!” She gave her husband a dirty look.

“Why, honey I thought you liked that little pet name I have for you.”

“No you didn’t! I know why you call me ‘Shurff’ and it isn’t very nice,” Faye said stiffly. She took a strand of garland out of the box, and nodded for Janiece to take the other end. “You just do that because my daddy worked for the sheriff department in Lawton during the week. Everybody knows just preaching on Sunday didn’t even buy their groceries.”

“Tell me about it,” Nick said. He knew who’d been giving them money for their groceries. He placed a gold star on top of the tree, and pulled the electric cord straight so they could plug it into the extension cord with the other lights. “I wouldn’t make fun of him, in fact, I thought he looked kinda cute in that deputy uniform he wore. Kinda reminded me of that Howdy Doody guy.”

“Well,” Faye said in a haughty tone wrapping the branches with the gold garland, “it isn’t nice and it hurts my feelings.”

Janiece walked to the couch and watched. After her mother draped the branches with strands of lights and silver icicles, her father plugged in the lights, and they stood back to admire their work.

“Where was all this stuff?” she asked, looking at the tree in wonder.

Nick patted Faye with his crippled hand. “I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, and I won’t call you ‘Shurff’ again,”

“That’s okay,” Faye said quietly. She smiled at her husband with the twinkling lights reflecting in her eyes, and slipped her arm around his waist.

“Where did all this stuff come from?” Janiece persisted.

“But,” Nick told Faye, “if I forget sometime, and I do call you ‘Shurff’, you just say ‘Christmas present’, and then I’ll remember my promise, and I won’t do it again.”

He smiled lovingly at her. She looked so pretty to him, just like she did the first time they put up a Christmas tree many years ago.

“Until the next time you forget on purpose,” she said smiling back at her handsome husband.

“Where did all this stuff come from?” Janiece said in a loud and irritated voice.

Faye gave her a hard look. “Oh, for goodness sake, Janiece! It’s just some stuff we had left over from when we used to put up a tree. Why didn’t you help us decorate?”

“Mama, I am in a state of shock. First, Nickie carries in a tree as big as our living room. Second, Daddy was able to make a stand for it. Third, you appeared with a box full of ornaments, and THEN, you both had fun decorating. I’m in a state of shock I tell you!” She clutched at her chest indicating she might be having a heart attack.

Nickie stood in the middle of the room, with his hands on his hips, staring at the tree as if mesmerized. His face was red and sweaty from all his pulling and tugging. “This is the bestest damn Christmas tree we ever had!” He proclaimed with a smile.

“Course,” Janiece couldn’t help from adding, “it is the only damn Christmas tree we ever had!”