I'll Be Home for Christmas Read Online Free PDF Page A

school when it happened. All you do is plug them in.”
    â€œI appreciate that. I won’t charge you for Hannah, then.”
    â€œOkay, that’s fair.” He wasn’t about to tell her each detector cost eighty-nine dollars. She would need at least four of them for the sprawling house and kennel.
    â€œWant some bacon on your sandwich? Ketchup?”
    â€œSure.”
    â€œI made a pie today. Want a piece?”
    Peter nodded. “Your house smells like the house I grew up in. It always smelled like apples and cinnamon. At Christmastime you could get drunk on the smell. Speaking of Christmas, I give a party once a year, would you like to come? I think you’ll like my grandmother. It’s next Thursday.”
    â€œI don’t know…I hate to leave the animals. I haven’t been to a party in so long, I don’t think I’ll remember how to act. Thank you for asking, though.”
    â€œDon’t you have a pair of pearls?” he asked, a stupid look on his face.
    â€œWhat do pearls have to do with it?”
    â€œYour mother’s pearls.” Jesus, he must have missed something when Sadie was explaining party attire. She was staring at him so intently he felt compelled to explain. “You know, pearls to go with the dress. Your mother’s pearls. If you have that, you don’t have to worry about anything else. Right? Can I use your bathroom?”
    â€œUpstairs, third door on the right. Don’t step on the carpet at the bottom of the steps. Annabelle lies there all the time. She pees on it and I didn’t have time to wash it. She chewed all the fringe off the corners. She’s getting old, so I can’t scold her too much.”
    Peter bolted from the room. Andi stared after him with puzzled eyes. She scurried into the pantry area where a mirror hung on the back of the door. She winced at her appearance. She didn’t look one damn bit better than she had looked earlier. “What you see is what you get,” she muttered.
    Andi was sliding the sandwiches onto plates when Peter entered the room. “This must have been a nice house at one time.”
    Andi nodded. “It was a comfortable old house. It fit us. My mother never worried too much about new furniture or keeping up with the neighbors. It was clean and comfortable. Homey. Some houses are just houses. People make homes. Did you know that?”
    â€œBelieve it or not, I just realized that same fact today. Every so often I trip down memory lane.”
    â€œI don’t do that anymore. It’s too sad. I don’t know how I’m going to walk away from this place. My mother always said home was where your stuff was. Part of me believes it. What’s your opinion? By the way, where do you live?”
    â€œIn Clark. It’s a new, modern house. Decorated by a professional. Color-coordinated, all that stuff. I don’t think you’d like it. My grandmother hates it. I don’t even like it myself. I try throwing things around, but it still looks the same.”
    â€œMaybe some green plants. Green plants perk up a room. You probably need some junk. Junk helps. I’ll be throwing a lot away, so you can help yourself.”
    â€œYeah? What kind of junk? My plants die.”
    â€œYou need to water plants. Get silk ones. All you have to do is go over them with a blow dryer every so often. Junk is junk. Everybody has junk. You pick it up here and there, at a flea market or wherever. When you get tired of it you throw it away and buy new junk.”
    Peter threw his head back and laughed until his eyes watered. “That’s something my grandmother would say. Why are you looking at me like that?”
    â€œI’m sorry. You should laugh more often. You take yourself pretty seriously, don’t you?”
    â€œFor the most part, I guess I do. What about you?” He leaned across the table as though her answer was the most important thing in the world.