The Christmas Note Read Online Free PDF Page A

said that he found your mother…”
    Stand still. Don’t react. Ramona did this to herself. It doesn’t involve you.
    “She died in her apartment, and he said he’d like you to clean out her place or else he will.”
    I nod. “Thanks.”
    She catches the door before I can close it. “I’m sorry about your mother.”
    “I’m not,” I say, leaving her in the cold.
    I walk back to the sofa and sit down, staring at the TV screen. What am I watching? Today’s Friday. When did she say Ramona died? The landlord came yesterday morning. When did she die? Wasn’t it just two days ago that I talked to her? She asked for money and called me a worthless pig. That’s how sixty years ended. She yelled, she took, she misused, she swore, she badgered, she abused, and then her eyes closed and her mouth shut. I’m glad it’s over. That sliver of me that always wanted something, anything from Ramona, will have to find something else to covet now. I turn off the TV and sit in the dark, waiting for morning.

 
     
    Four
     
We make our friends; we make our enemies; but God makes our next-door neighbor.
    — G . K . C HESTERTON
     
    GRETCHEN
     
    Ethan’s chatter wakes me up way too early. His voice has always had a way of drilling through hardwoods and mortar. It took me half the night to fall asleep. I tossed and turned, thinking about the look on Melissa’s face when I told her her mother was dead. Shouldn’t there have been something—a short, quick gasp, a sigh, a twitch, even a nervous laugh? Who doesn’t have some sort of emotion when a parent dies? I replay her closing the door on my face as I make pancakes for the kids and feel the irritation burrowing beneath my skin. But what’s irritating me? The fact that she doesn’t care that her mother died or that I took so long to tell her? Kyle was right. I overthink things. While the kids are playing, I check my e-mail and find myself getting teary-eyed reading them. There are several from Kyle’s parents, Tom and Alice, who attach several pictures of Kyle to each e-mail with a detailed description of when the photo was taken. I dry my eyes before the kids can see me and send an e-mail, attaching a few photos of our new home and the kids before making breakfast.
    Ethan is eating his pancakes before I have time to put syrup on them. “Are we going to that lady’s funeral?” he asks.
    “What lady?” I realize who he means as the question crosses the air between us. “Oh. No, we’re not.”
    “Why not?”
    I pour syrup over each of their pancakes and then my own. “Because we never knew her.”
    “We got lots of cards and flowers and stuff from people we don’t know,” Emma says.
    “I know but…”
    “That’s what we should do, Mom,” Ethan says, his mouth too full to talk. “We should make her a card and send her flowers.”
    I take a bite and realize that my kids are better people than I am. “You’re right. That’s what we need to do.” I don’t want to; I envision Melissa crushing the flowers in her hand like a cookie and torching the card by breathing on it.
    They dig out a piece of blue construction paper and work on the card together after breakfast, and by the time I have cleaned the kitchen, the paper is covered in flowers with bloated, misshaped petals and a rainbow dripping glittery glue streaks. “We’ll let it dry and a little later we’ll go out for some flowers.”
    “Let’s go now, and by the time we get back, the card will be dry,” Emma says.
    I don’t want to go now. “Why don’t we get some things done and then we’ll make a trip out?”
    “What’s left to do?” Ethan asks. “We already unpacked everything.”
    “Yes, we did, didn’t we ?” I say. It’s no use. They’ll just keep asking and wear me down. “Get your clothes on and let’s go.”
    As we back out of the driveway I’m already planning what to say to Melissa this time. Maybe when she opens the door she’ll sock me in the eye or twist my arm behind