Marcia Talley - Occasion of Revenge

After this unfortunate evening I hoped Daddy would see what a terrible person Darlene was, that he’d escort her down the drive to her car and we’d never see her again.

Wrong. Wrong. And wrong again.

One thing’s for sure. Ruth is her father’schild. While she maintained an off-again-on-again relationship with a local real estate agent and occasionally dragged me along on halfhearted house-hunting expeditions to look at South River Colony condos or Eastport fixer-uppers, Daddy apparently bought a spare can of shaving cream and a second toothbrush and was blowing hot and cold about moving in permanently with Darlene.

As often as not, Daddy would be home for dinner and Ruth, though exhausted from a day behind the counter at Mother Earth would, more often than not, be home to cook it for him.

We rarely saw Darlene.

Ruth counted every dinner served at home a major victory in her silent tug of war with the widow Darlene over our father. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to see him happy, even remarried-someday. It was his choice of a running mate that was giving her fits. If Daddy had put an ad in the paper for someone the exact opposite of our mother, she said, and if Darlene had applied, she’d have been the perfect candidate. We couldn’t imagine what he saw in the woman.

“Isn’t that obvious?” Paul said one evening two weeks before Christmas. He stood on a ladder, carefully positioning a crystal star on top of our Christmas tree, a plump, nine-foot spruce that graced the corner of the living room nearest the fireplace.

I hung a favorite blue glass horse on an upper branch where Chloe, who was playing at my feet with a strand of tinsel, couldn’t reach it. “It’s a guy thing, isn’t it?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Other than that, I mean.” I retrieved the tinsel which appeared to be heading for Chloe’s mouth and substituted her Tinky Winky doll.

Paul backed down the ladder, cocked his head to one side, and squinted up at the star. Satisfied, he turned to me and put his hands on my shoulders, his gray eyes unnaturally bright in the reflected candlelight. “Hannah, your father went straight from his mother-who cooked and cleaned and washed his clothes-to the Naval Academy-which told him when to go to bed and when to get up, even what to wear and what to think-to the Navy itself and marriage to your mother. Poor guy’s never sown any wild oats. Maybe it’s time.”

“I just don’t want him taken advantage of.”

“You don’t think he can look after himself?”

“No, I don’t. He’s not thinking with his head, Paul. Mr. Happy’s in control here.”

Paul laughed and pinched my cheek. “He usually is.”

“You’re impossible!” I thought he was going to hug me, but I was holding a gilded angel with wings of delicate filigree and I was afraid he’d crush it. “Here,” I said, handing him the angel. “See if you can’t hang this out of harm’s way.”

Balancing on the ladder, Paul placed the angel on an upper branch, carefully facing her into the room. We’d bought her together for our first Christmas in Ohio more than twenty-five years ago. The only other decorations we could afford for that teeny, tiny tree had been a garland of popcorn, strung together with a needle and thread during an episode of Star Trek , and a box of colorful glass balls from the five-and-ten. We still had the glass balls, nestled in an egg carton, waiting to be hung.

I was reaching for a striped ball when Emily appeared in the doorway between the living and dining rooms, drying her hands on her jeans. “How’s my girl?”

Chloe’s face radiated joy at the appearance of her mother. She held out Tinky Winky, dripping with drool, for Emily’s inspection. “Dah dah dah.”

“Little ingrate,” Emily said cheerfully. She swung Chloe into her arms and, using the tail of her linen shirt, wiped the baby’s chin dry. “Bear her, feed her, change her diapers, and read her stories and the first word out of her mouth is dah. ” Emily boosted her daughter over her shoulder and with a firm grip on her ankles, slid Chloe down her back like Santa’s sack. Emily jiggled her gently up and down until the little girl was convulsed with giggles. “Bath and beddie-bye and Goodnight Moon for you, sweetie pie!” She turned to smile at me. “I’ll be back to help with the tree in a bit, OK?” Emily gazed wistfully at the boxes of decorations and sighed. “Speaking of Dah… ” She swiveled her head around and spoke directly to Chloe’s laughing pink face. “I wish your father could be here to help with the decorating.”

Paul laid another log on the fire. “I realize the rich and famous need to be pummeled into shape for the holidays, but doesn’t Dante get time off for Christmas?”

“Like, sure. Three whole days.” Emily stiffened her back and thrust out her chin. “Zoh, ven I tell you ve haf mudge respect for zee family here at New Life, you vill zoh vant to verk vith us.” She giggled. “But it will be great once we find a place of our own, won’t it, Chloe? Then Daddy will come home to us at night.”

Studying my daughter’s face, roundly cherubic in the candlelight, I found myself softening toward my son-in-law. Clearly he cherished Emily and adored his daughter. He was also turning out to be a good provider. While he toiled on a Virginia mountaintop, working his fingers to blunted nubs, I worked to overcome my prejudices and get over the fact that Dante’s degree came from the Rolf Institute in Boulder, Colorado, and not from Haverford.

Paul adjusted the damper in the fireplace. In the gentle draft the ornaments on the tree twinkled. With tears pricking the corners of my eyes I watched a sleigh I had made for my father out of Popsicle sticks revolve into view. I had been only eight when I painted it fire-engine red and stenciled Daddy on the slats in white. That treasure should have hung on the tree at my parents’ house, but Daddy had declared that he didn’t want a tree this year-it was too painful a reminder of Mother-so he’d hauled the decorations out of the attic and begged us to take the boxes away.

Ruth’s box had ended up at my house. Any minute she’d be showing up to help decorate. I prayed she wouldn’t complain about where we’d put the tree. If I knew Ruth, she’d point out that there was better feng shui between the two front windows. Alas, the ancient Chinese hadn’t been around in 1856 to advise our builders of that fact, or instruct them to install an electrical outlet on the wall there, so if I had anything to say about it, our tree was staying put.

I watched Emily skip upstairs with Chloe’s head bobbing joyfully over her shoulder. Two minutes later I heard the bath water running. While Paul put the kettle on to boil for tea, I slipped a selection of Christmas CD’s into the changer and happily unwrapped and hung our collection of ceramic angels while singing the alto part to “Silent Night” and “Angels We Have Heard on High.” In the middle of a particularly fine glo-o-o-ria , Ruth materialized in a multilayered swirl of scarves, sweaters, and cold air. She froze when she saw the tree, her eyes glistening.

“You OK?” I asked. “You’re not crying, are you?”

Ruth shook her head, then ran a mittened finger under each eye. “Just the cold.”

I didn’t believe her.

Ruth took off her mittens, stuffed them into the pocket of her sweater, and walked slowly around the tree, touching familiar ornaments. “Hannah, it’s gorgeous.” She knelt to inspect the Brio train that circled the tree stand on a lumpy green-and-white felt skirt. With a long index finger, she pushed the engine forward a foot. “I wish Daddy were here tonight.”