The Gift

written in first person POV, but not biographical, so please rate and review as a piece of fiction
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The heaving crowds, the blinding, blinking lights, the lurid colors, the raucous music – all of the wonders of the mall at Christmas time were nearly enough to undo me.

“Okay.” I let out a long sigh. “Everyone has a present!”

I waved my list triumphantly in front of my husband’s nose.

He lowered his coffee cup and raised an eyebrow at me.

“What about Alan?”

I scowled.

“What about Alan?” I said. Even to myself I sounded like a petulant child, but I didn’t particularly care.

“Well, it might be a little awkward on Christmas morning when he doesn’t have anything to open.”

“Maybe he shouldn’t come, then.”

“Erin…” Dan shook his head.

I shrugged and looked away. “What?”

“Erin, like it or not, Alan is your mom’s friend and he’s coming.”

I swallowed against the angry lump in my throat.

Dan continued in a calm, reasonable, completely maddening tone of voice. “You know, I think the problem isn’t that Alan’s coming to stay for Christmas. The problem is that your mom has a male friend.”

“She’s allowed to have friends.” I broke off a bite of muffin but set it down again; I couldn’t have swallowed it to save my life.

“A boyfriend, then.”

“She’s allowed to go out. She just doesn’t have to flaunt it in front of everyone.”

“Honey, your dad died ten years ago. Your mom is sixty. That’s still pretty young these days. She’s probably still got…you know…needs.”

“Dan!”

“What? I don’t know about this stuff. At the very least she needs companionship, doesn’t she?”

“That’s what she has her book club and her missionary meetings for.”

Dan raised an eyebrow. “Are you saying that if I died, you’d be satisfied to live the rest of your days going to book clubs and missionary meetings with a bunch of other widows and divorcees?”

“Well, I wouldn’t, no. But this is my mom.”

“Sorry, babe, but your mom is still a woman.”

“Who died and made you Oprah?”

“A nice looking woman, too. For her age.”

I snorted and took a sip of coffee.

Dan picked up my list and looked it over. “So, Alan.”

“What exactly does one buy for the man who wants to get hot and heavy with one’s mother?” I asked sweetly.

“Here, we’ll stop by Sears on the way to the car. I’ll help you pick out a generic man gift. Okay?” He stood and picked up the shopping bags.

“Fine.” I pressed my lips together in a frown, but then added a grudging, “Thanks.”


“You don’t like him.”

We were cleaning up from Christmas Eve dinner. Mom was washing and I was drying, a comfortable, familiar tradition which was about to become distinctly uncomfortable.

“Who?” I asked, stalling for time like a coward.

She looked at me.

“He’s fine, Mom. Everyone seems to like him.”

“Except you.” Her voice was carefully neutral. I expected the tone she used when I was out after curfew without calling or sassed back. I did not expect this tone - not accusing, not hurt, just matter-of-fact.

“Erin,” she continued, “you know that I loved your father very much. We were happy together for twenty-eight years. But he is gone and I’m alone. I’m alone and I’m lonely. Alan makes me laugh; he takes care of me; he worries over me. Do you know how long it’s been since someone took care of me?”

“Mom, I take care of you, don’t I?”

“Hon, you’ve got your own family, your own life.” I started to interrupt, but she put up a hand. “And you should. But I should have my own life, too. I need him, Erin.” She took a keep breath. “He’s asked me to marry him.”

I rubbed faster and clattered the dishes in an effort to stop her words.

She put a hand on my towel.

“I need to know that you can let me do this, Erin. Please.”

It all felt horribly wrong. Isn’t it parents who are supposed to let go? Shouldn’t I be the one pleading for permission to follow my heart? Marry my true love? What would she do if I didn’t agree? Run away from home? Commit double suicide? It was ridiculous. And yet it was not at all laughable.

“I’m trying, Mom,” I whispered, as tears stung my eyes.

Mom carefully dried her hands as I fought back the tears that came anyway. She turned and put her arms around me.

“It’s okay, Erin. Let him go. He wouldn’t want either one of us to live only on memories. He loved us and would want us to be happy, even without him.”

“What…?” I knew but I didn’t want to admit.

“Daddy.”

I felt suspended in that moment - no thoughts, no feelings, no memories, no desires. But it couldn’t last. My mind tumbled open to what I most wanted to keep out.

How did she know? How did she know that it was Dad I couldn’t let go of, not her?

He was gone. Really gone. No matter how much I expected to see him walk into a room or hear his voice on the other end of the phone, he was not there. And he wouldn’t be there. While I was frantically hanging on, he had slipped free of my desperate clutch.

Gradually, I felt the hard coil of grief and anger in my chest loosen and slip and begin to dissolve.

I don’t know how long we stood in the kitchen, holding each other and crying. Even when the tears subsided, we stood and comforted each other, the first real comfort I had felt in ten years.

Finally, Mom pulled away and smoothed the hair away from my face.

“It’s okay, honey.”

“I know, Mom. It really is. You should marry Alan.”

“May I tell him yes?” She looked so beautiful and so hopeful.

I nodded and smiled a thin, unsteady smile.

“I’m going to wait and tell him in the morning. It’ll be his Christmas present.”


Later, as I tucked in my four-year-old daughter, Jennie, she whispered,

“Mommy, I like Grandpa Alan. Can I make a picture for him?”

No one had taught her to call him that – somehow she had come up with that on her own.

I smoothed the blond curls away from her face. “Yes, Jennie,” I whispered back, “I think that would be very nice.”


Everyone was there for our traditional Christmas breakfast, including Alan. I was surprised that the usual pang of hurt and resentment was gone.
Perhaps, in time, I could adjust to having him there. Yes, for my mom’s sake, I would adjust.

Suddenly, Jennie wriggled down from her seat and took off for her bedroom. In a moment, she returned with a paper covered in a riotous mass of color.

She made a bee-line for Alan.

“Here, Grandpa Alan,” she said. “This is for you.”

I was surprised to see a mist of tears in his eyes as Alan accepted the offering.

“Thank you, Jennie,” he said, with a quiet smile. “That’s just about the best Christmas gift I’ve ever gotten.”

Then, he turned to my mom and squeezed her hand.

“Except one.”