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“Just over here,” Isla said, slightly out of breath. “This one? Oh . . .” She looked at the tree that had seemed perfect from the top of the hill. She sized it up: trunk not quite straight, a few gaps in the boughs. “Do you think it will do?”
“Oh yeah, it’s a beauty.” Sometimes Isla would talk a cousin into helping cut down their Christmas tree, a task she’d taken over from Dad a decade or so ago; this year she asked Dave. If they were to stay friends, there needed to be some fun, not just scolding.
It sounds like a fairy-tale scene, choosing the perfect tree, snow lightly falling. In reality, it is often a soggy or slippery endeavor and always a splintery one. Dave came prepared with work gloves and now he pulled them on.
“Princess!” Isla teased.
Dave smiled. “You want some? I have another pair.”
“Can’t be bothered . . . oh damn.”
“Sliver?” Dave was already pulling a manicure kit out of his backpack for tweezers, but Isla waved her hand at him.
“I’m good. Let’s get on with it.” So they hoisted the freshly cut tree, Isla with all the soggy wet branches and Dave with the trunk in his gloved hands. It wasn’t a good time for talking, but Isla grunted out, “What are you doing for Christmas? Going back to Mass?”
“Maybe. I think Kim and Phil would invite me, but they’re going to her folks’ house.”
“Yeah, they go there every year. Well, you’re welcome to join us.”
“You won’t mind? What about your folks?”
“We have an open-door policy. I’ll ask, but it’s a formality.” Isla smiled.
“Would they mind if my dad comes? Maybe I’ll pick him up and he could spend a couple of days up here, if he can get time off.”
“Like I said, open door.”
“I’d love to come. Sure. Let me know what time and what I can bring.”
Isla smiled and then turned her attention to helping Dave heave the tree over the stone wall. She leaned against the wall on the far side to catch her breath.
“I don’t know why we don’t just buy one! I mean, I like a real tree, but I’m not sure about this cutting down part. I’m not much of a lumberjill. I kinda liked it when it used to just appear in the living room.” Dave laughed and Isla brightened and stood up. “Hey, that’s a business idea! Christmas-tree delivery! Maybe I should start that!”
Now Dave laughed for real. “But you just said you didn’t like wrestling the trees.”
“Eh, it’s different if you’re getting paid for it.” Dave fished in his pocket and handed her a quarter. Isla rolled her eyes.
Another half hour or so of wrangling got the tree in the stand with a drink of water for its troubles and a cup of coffee for Isla’s. Dave produced a tea bag from his pocket, dandelion or some other weed, and waited for the teakettle to whistle while Isla and Mum unpacked boxes of ornaments.
“Better let those branches dry before you hang the snowflakes or the houses,” Dad advised from his chair, feet up, referring to piles of snowflakes they had made over the years from printer paper and some antique glittered cardstock houses from Germany.
Isla nodded dismissively. She held up a clothespin doll in a peach satin ballgown and showed it to Dave. “I rescued her from an eviction after Grammie passed.”
Dave looked sideways at the doll. “Looks like she’s come on hard times,” he said. The skirt of her ballgown was loosening and slipping off her straight “hips.”
“Well, I’ve always loved her. I think she’s beautiful. Maybe I should fix her up a bit, though.” Isla laid her aside and held up a Snoopy snow globe. Most of it was a yellowed white, with a window in the front to show Snoopy and Woodstock skating. “This is another favorite. I’m not sure why, exactly. I guess because we’ve always had it. It’s an old friend.” Dave smiled.
A similar hodgepodge went up—ornaments made from milkweed pods and coffee lids, cast-off CDs and Happy Meal prizes. Soon, they were sitting back admiring it and talking about watching a Christmas movie. Isla sighed and Dave looked at her questioningly.
“Andrea from the office doesn’t like this kind of tree. She likes white lights with all matching ornaments. She told us all about it at our winter decorating meeting after Thanksgiving. She just wants to pretend she’s something she’s not.” Isla grimaced.
“Like what?” Dave questioned.
“Like . . . the First Lady or someone in a magazine.”
“Different people like different things.”
“It’s pretension. I think she thinks this is a poor person’s tree.” Isla’s parents and Dave looked awkwardly around the room or into their mugs. “But this tree, now,” Isla leaned back to take it all in, “is a story. It’s the story of my life. No Andrea from the office is going to tell me my life isn’t good enough.” Isla gazed up at it in satisfaction.
No one knew what to say, so they didn’t say anything, until finally Dad cleared his throat and said cheerfully, “How about White Christmas? Will you stay, Dave?”
Isla drove Dave home after the movie since his rattling old beater was in pieces in Phil’s driveway again, awaiting repair. There was dramatic rustling of wrapping paper on the dining room table when Mum heard her come in. “Isla! I didn’t expect you back so soon!” She stood blocking the doorway.
“Aren’t I welcome?” Isla laughed.
“Always,” Mum said distractedly, looking over her shoulder. “Why don’t you go see Dad?”
Isla smiled at her lack of subtlety and sat down on the couch in the living room. Dad turned off The Rockford Files.
“Nice to have Dave here tonight. You two getting close?”
“Don’t make it awkward, Dad, please. Anyway . . . I think he has a girlfriend. So don’t worry your sweet, suspicious little heart about him.”
“Really! Have you met her?”
“You could say that.”
“Where’d he meet her?”
“At the . . . well, at the studio, I guess. It’s hard to explain.” Isla needed to get that story out of Dave or Kim sometime.
“And he’s dating this girl?”
“I don’t know, I guess. He acts like it, kinda. He says he’s not. It’s weird.”
“Well,” Dad picked up the remote, “good for Dave.”
“Oh, I invited him and his dad to Christmas.”
“The more the merrier.”
There were piles of cousins and aunts and uncles all over the place when Dave arrived on Christmas Day. Pots filled the counter and platters covered the table. Isla answered his knock, calling jokingly over her shoulder, “Hey! Here’s our charity case!” only to glance back and see Lacey standing behind Dave’s dad looking a little embarrassed. “Oh!” said Isla, flummoxed, “I didn’t realize, I . . . hi! Nice to see you here!” She stood awkwardly aside to let them pass, hoping Dave would explain that she really, really hadn’t meant to be saying anything about Lacey at all. He found Isla a few minutes later in a far corner.
“I didn’t mean to!” she said in dismay.
“I know, I know. Don’t worry! Just make sure she feels welcome and it will all be fine.”
“You could have told me!”
“You said there’s an open-door policy.”
“Well, there is, but . . .”
“Anyway, it’s hard to know with Lacey . . . she thought she might go home, but at the last minute she decided not to.”
Isla wondered what would keep her from going home but didn’t ask. “It’s ok, don’t worry about it.”
“Hey!” Isla’s dad called, seeing them pass through on their way back to the kitchen. “Nice to see you brought your lady friend, Dave! I think Isla has some mistletoe!” Dave looked around nervously.
“No, I don’t, Dad. It’s toxic, you know? Too many babies around.”
Most of the guests were in the living room around a huge pile of gifts. Even though the adults didn’t exchange them anymore, there were enough kids to make for a mountain of colored paper. Isla squeezed into a tiny spot on the floor like always. When she was a kid, she’d supposed that when she was in her mid-thirties she’d have a cushy couch spot, but somehow it hadn’t happened. She carefully avoided crushing Aunt Dot’s arthritic feet in their support stockings and the handmade slippers she always brought with her.
Dave, Lacey, and Dave’s dad were on the couch, his dad nursing a big mug of coffee and looking deeply content. When Mum came by and asked if he needed a refill, he popped his hand over the top and said in his gentle tenor voice, “No, no, deah, I’ve got everything I need.”
Aunt Dot suddenly lunged across the gap between her chair and the couch to grab Lacey’s hand. “Do you know? I knew your Gram.”
“What?” Both Isla and Lacey were startled.
Aunt Dot laughed hoarsely. “Yes, that’s right. It gets worse, I was her babysitter! Course in hindsight I wasn’t that much older—5, 10, 15 years. I’m not sure.”
“But how do you know who I am?” Lacey said, wide-eyed.
“Small town, haha, small town. Couldn’t place you at first, but then it clicked. I knew I knew that face. In fact . . . I babysat you a few times when you were a tyke, you and your sisters. You’re Lacey? Or Maddie?”
“Lacey!” She looked at Dave, surprised and pleased.
Aunt Dot turned to Dave and said, “Of course, of course. Maddie’d be much older. You’re a lucky young man. Lucky young man. Take good care of this one.” Isla cleared her throat awkwardly and Dave and Lacey moved apart an extra inch. Before any more could be said, Uncle Rick was standing with his cup in the air and proposing that they all keep Austin in their thoughts and prayers this Christmas while he earned his place among the few and the brave.
“The proud!” Uncle Mike corrected.
“And the proud!” Uncle Rick amended while Mike just shook his head.
A small cheer went up.
“Wish he coulda been heah,” Dottie said softly, shaking her head.
“Don’t worry about ole Austin,” Uncle Mike said. “He’s getting an M16 for Christmas.”
“I’d rather have Mum’s penuche,” Isla said. “Pass me the tin, wouldja?”
“Take some for the girls,” Aunt Dottie commanded Mike. Lilly was home with a flu and Aunt Pam was nursing her.
“Yes, ma’am!”
“And don’t eat it all on the way home.”
“No, ma’am!”
The day whirled on in chaos and color. It was already dark in the late afternoon when Dave and his dad came to say good-bye, having gotten their coats off the bed in Mum and Dad’s cold, dark bedroom.
“Where’s Lacey?” Isla asked.
“Gone. She was texting for a while and then somebody came and picked her up.” Dave looked sad and Isla regretted asking.
“Maybe she went home after all.”
“Maybe,” Dave said, worried.
Not knowing what else to say, Isla turned to Dave’s dad and shook his hand. “So glad you could join us.”
“Me too, deah, it was so nice to be included in your family time. Thank you so much. Dave and I have had a lot of quiet Christmases, this made a nice change, didn’t it?” Dave agreed.
“Take some leftovers.”
Dave held up a Tupperware. “Dottie’s already covered that.”
“Good, good. Take care!” Isla gave the door a good yank—it always seemed to stick in recent years—and the cold dark pushed into the kitchen.
“Merry Christmas!”
Next chapter arrives May 2, 2026!
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Copyright 2025 Jennie Robertson