A Merry Little Christmas (Songs of the Season) Page 13

  “So this is it, huh? Not bad. Even the roof is still there.”

  “Did you and your brother ever build a tree house?”

  “No, my father didn’t want anything to mar his trees.” Charlie shrugged and chuckled.

  Franny sighed. “I wonder if your dad ever had a tree house when he was a boy.”

  “I have no idea. He doesn’t talk about his childhood very much.” Charlie placed his foot on one of the lower limbs of the tree. “Come on. Let’s have a look at your house.”

  “But I haven’t been up there in years. The wood is probably rotten.”

  “I’ll be careful, Mommy.” Charlie dangled from a limb and grinned.

  She watched him as he hoisted himself up to the tree house. Franny shivered, but she wasn’t sure if it was from the chilly temperatures or the concern that he might fall.

  Charlie opened the latch on the makeshift door, stooped down in the little entranceway, and then disappeared inside. The floor groaned with his weight, but no boards gave way. He opened the crudely constructed windows, stuck his head through one of the openings, and looked down at her with a smile. “It appears to be sound. You built a sturdy little house. Come on up.”

  Franny grabbed the first big limb, and then, remembering her old routine, she pulled herself up on the tree’s nooks and crannies, which had always been her footholds to the loft. When she got to the tiny portico, Charlie drew her inside.

  She glanced around the wooden structure and remembered how grand it had all been in her youthful imagination. The kitchen and dining hall to the right. The living quarters to the left. Even a skylight, which was little more than a hole left behind from an overly zealous hailstorm. Franny laughed at the memories as she wiped away the cobwebs and an old wasp’s nest.

  She flung open the back doors, which led to the veranda—that term being used in the loosest sense. “It’s so strange being up here after all these years.” She looked out the tiny doorway. “Charlie, would you like to sit a spell on my porch?” She motioned toward the precarious boards and railing just beyond the tiny doors.

  “I’d be happy to.” He eased himself down on the wooden extension and held onto the railing as he let his legs dangle over the edge. “Nice view.”

  Franny sat next to him and rested her arms on the railing. Just as the moment took on a sweet glow of rightness, the memory of Mr. Landau glaring at her from the shadows morphed her glow into a sickly garish hue. Her mother always said that fretting was the pastimes of pagans, so perhaps she should put Mr. Landau out of her mind. For now. “In the summertime, the fireflies would come out. Daddy would play his harmonica on the open porch, and Momma would sing along.” She took in a deep breath. Memories of her youth wafted around her like a sweet breeze. “As a kid, I thought this view was paradise.”

  “And now?”

  “Still paradise.” Without thinking, she started to hum “White Christmas.” She chuckled. “Sorry…habit of mine. Do you hum too?”

  “No, but I’ve been caught whistling from time to time. Some women don’t like it. They think its juvenile or old-fashioned or something. So I don’t do it much anymore.”

  Well, I don’t think it’s juvenile or old-fashioned. “The farm is a great place to whistle.” The breeze hurried through the elm tree, making the last of the brown leaves rattle. Franny looked above her. “The leaves are very chatty today.”

  “What do you think they’re saying?”

  “I guess all the things people are too afraid to say.” Franny reached up and touched one of the leaves, but it crumbled into pieces and blew away in a puff of wind.

  “I’m curious about something. When you were little, did you always color inside the lines? Wait a minute, let me guess. You didn’t. You told the teacher that lines were for people who had no imagination. So, am I right?”

  “You’re pretty close. When the teacher asked me why I didn’t color inside the lines, I said that the people who made the coloring book put the lines in the wrong places.”

  Charlie chuckled.

  “And did you?”

  “Color outside the lines? No. But my brother never even used coloring books. He liked to color on everything, including painting swirling stars on the bedroom wall.”

  “I bet your nanny was thrilled.”

  “Not as thrilled as Willie. At five he thought he was van Gogh. Then when he got a little older, he wasn’t content with a small paint set. He always said that God had made so many more colors than what he saw in his little tray. And he wanted to paint with them all. So, he went outside and started mashing up leaves and dirt and whatever he could find in nature to mix with his paints. Didn’t work very well, but he was so passionate about it. I’ve always loved that about him.”

  “I’m sure I’ll love it too.”

  “But not too much I hope.”

  “No.” Franny smiled. “Not too much.”

  Charlie went quiet and seemed to study her. “So, did you ever invite anyone up here to your tree house?”

  “No one but God.”

  He grinned. “Then I feel honored, although I invited myself.”

  “I’m glad you’re here.”

  “I still can’t figure out how you did all this by yourself. I don’t mean the tree house—I mean everything. Weren’t you ever lonely? It seems like a forlorn way to live…that is, without a companion all these years.”

  I didn’t know how forlorn I was until you came along, Charlie. She wanted to say the words, but the timing didn’t feel right. “Some days were easier than others. I would open my window at night, and I could hear all kinds of things…the coyotes howling or a distant train or the bugs humming their little hearts out. And on Sundays I might sit out on the porch and listen to the rain pattering on our tin roof. Sometimes these sounds were music to me, and then at other times they made life almost unbearable. It might have made me stronger, but I feel more breakable. But that doesn’t make a lick of sense. Kind of like that silly idea I had to go to the city and—”

  “Now, Franny, I wish you wouldn’t keep tormenting yourself for having a dream.”

  “Honestly, my head was so stuck in the clouds, I couldn’t see my own nose. It embarrasses me.”

  “I have plenty of humiliating stories to tell that make me look ridiculous. Would it make you feel better if I told you some of them?”

  “It might.” Franny grinned, wondering how many men would allow themselves to look foolish just to put someone else at ease. If Charlie only knew what he’d done to her heart. She was in danger of losing it altogether. “Do you ever play the ‘What if’ game?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, like, what if my daddy and momma hadn’t gone up to latch that cellar door? What if your father had encouraged you as a musician?” And what if you hadn’t come to dance with me? “You know, that sort of thing.”

  “The ‘What if’ game can get pretty scary. And what good can it do anyway? It only keeps us bound in the past.” Charlie sputtered out some air in a chuckle. “Listen to me talk. I’m the worst—”

  Thunder rolled over them and turned into a deep, throaty growl. Franny looked toward the north; the sheet of sky behind them had darkened as if it had been dipped into a bottle of bluing. “We’d better get inside.”

  Charlie helped her up.

  “I have to warn you—when it comes to storms, I have as much backbone as a filleted catfish.” She maneuvered through the tree house and then down the staircase of limbs and branches even faster than she had as a child.

  When Charlie made the final step down with a jump, she looked at the churning storm and said, “This doesn’t look good.” She pointed toward the north. “The clouds over there…they seem to be spinning. We’d be safe in the cellar, but I haven’t been down there since my parents died. It’s not fair to ask you to use the hall closet when there’s a cellar, though.” Fear engulfed her.

  “It’s all right, Franny. I’ll be with you.” The wind suddenly lashed at their cloth
es. A spray of red dust whirled at them, and a tumbleweed bounced though the yard as if it were a rubber ball. “Those clouds mean business.” He grabbed her hand. “Let’s go.” Lightning—red as blood and as sharp as a devil’s claw—made its presence known with an assault so fearsome that it shook Franny to her bones.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Drafts of frigid air curled around them like wraithlike fingers. The gusts hit them with a blistering force, imploding with fury.

  Hand in hand they ran toward the house, the wind battering against them all the way. Once they were inside, within the safety of the enclosed porch, an object slammed into the side of the house. Franny gasped but couldn’t move.

  Charlie took hold of her shoulders. “We need to be belowground.” He looked toward the far end of the long, narrow porch, toward the cellar door.

  Franny’s face went numb, and her whole world swirled along with the storm. “I can’t go down there. You should go, you and Henry, and yet I’m scared for you. I don’t know what we should do, Charlie.”

  “Look, if the wind is bad enough to knock a piece of wood against the house, then it’s too dangerous to stay up here. There might be a funnel cloud right above us.”

  Henry whimpered by the kitchen door.

  Charlie slapped his leg. “Henry, come, boy.”

  The dog scurried toward them. Henry stopped at Franny’s side, nudging at her.

  Leaving her for a moment, Charlie opened the cellar door and flipped a switch. “Go on, boy.”

  Henry trotted down the stairs into the cellar.

  Franny mumbled something, but she could barely decipher her own words.

  Charlie turned her head to meet his gaze. “Stay with me, Franny.”

  Dizziness seized her, and her foot faltered.

  He grabbed her hand. “Do you hear me?”

  Her air felt cut off. Where was all the oxygen?

  “Franny?”

  She tried to concentrate on Charlie’s voice. “Yes. I’m here.”

  “One step. Just one. All right?”

  “I can’t. I just can’t. I’m sorry.”

  Charlie descended a couple of steps on the concrete stairs and turned back to face her. “I need you to do something. I want my guitar.”

  “What?”

  He pointed toward the open closet next to the mouth of the cellar. “My guitar is right there in the closet. I want you to reach over and grab it.”

  Franny moaned in exasperation, but she moved slowly toward it and clasped the instrument by the neck. “Now what?”

  He took hold of her free hand. “I’m going to teach you to play.”

  “Right now?” Franny twisted her hand in his, trying to squirm free.

  “That’s right.” Charlie took a step down into the cellar and gave Franny a tug.

  “But there’s not enough light. We can’t.” Instead of going down the step she just leaned over.

  “We’ll use candlelight. And Henry and I are going to tell you stories.”

  Unable to break free from Charlie’s grasp, Franny took one step downward and then another. “Stories? This isn’t a good time for stories.”

  After a few seconds Franny’s head cleared enough for her to understand what Charlie was doing. While she clutched the neck of the guitar and fumed over his goofy comments, he was ever so slowly leading her down the cellar stairs.

  “Look at this,” Charlie said. “You’re getting there.”

  Franny stopped on the stairs, unable to move. “This is where they died. Right here.” Oh, God in heaven, is their blood still on the stairs after all these years? Had the neighbors cleaned everything as they had promised? Or was it still visible? She glanced downward but saw nothing. The stairs were covered with dust but no more. The neighbors had respected her wishes. They had honored her parents.

  “You’ve got to come the rest of the way down. I’m going to carry you down if I have to. Franny?”

  “Yes?”

  Something crashed at the other end of the porch—what sounded like shattering glass.

  She jumped. “Oh, God, no, please. It’s happening again.”

  “Now, Franny.” He gave her a firm tug. “Move!”

  She hurried down the rest of the way while Charlie lowered the door and then joined her in the bowels of the cellar.

  “You did it, Franny.” Charlie took the guitar from her and rested it against the cement wall.

  Franny clutched at her heart. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.” Charlie wrapped his arms around her, pulling her into the warmth of his embrace. “I’m not going anywhere even if you throw up all over me.”

  Franny released a nervous chuckle. “I just might.”

  Charlie held her even more tightly. “I’m right here.”

  After a moment or two Franny’s heartbeat slowed into a natural rhythm. When she felt she might be able to sit on her own, she moved to a wooden bench in the corner.

  “You all right now?”

  “Better.” She nodded.

  “Sorry I yelled at you.”

  “You’re forgiven.” Henry came over to her and curled up by her side. “Good boy.” She gave him a scratch behind the ear and a gentle pat.

  “It’s kind of dark on this side of the cellar.” Charlie took some matches out of a canning jar and lit the candles on the wooden table.

  Franny dabbed at the perspiration on her forehead with her sleeve. “We used to sleep down here when things got bad.” She pointed to one of the bunks. “Until that night.”

  Charlie sat across from her on one of the mattresses. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “I think I told you most of the story. It really was the worst storm I’d ever seen. Some of the porch windows right above the cellar were shattered by flying debris, so the cellar door got the full force of the winds. That’s what made it bang up and down. Anyway, Momma and Daddy both went up to try to secure it. But the door was too much for them. And I guess before they could head back down the stairs, an elm tree fell. And that was it. The force of the blow was enough to kill them. I witnessed all of it. Those last moments are impossible to forget. The only blessing was that their suffering didn’t last long, otherwise…”

  Charlie took her hands in his. “I cannot even imagine such a thing. How hard that must have been.”

  “I will never forget the looks on their faces. The very people I’d loved most in the world…watching the life drain out of them.”

  Charlie squeezed her hands but didn’t say anymore, waiting for her to go on.

  “I knew this was the safest place for you and Henry to be. I knew it was the safest place for me, and yet…” Franny crossed her arms over her middle. “It’s strange about irrational thoughts. There’s no accounting for them. They cause us to toss all common sense out the window. You convince yourself that the tragedy could happen all over again. I thought of this cellar as a place of doom, not a refuge.”

  “It’s all right, Franny. I’ve never met anyone yet who didn’t have some secret place in his or her heart that wasn’t hurting. And everyone is afraid of something.”

  The glow of the candlelight flickered against Charlie’s face. Such a fine face. With Charlie there she didn’t mind the dank, musty smells of the cellar or the way the small space closed in around them.

  Franny glanced down at Henry, who appeared to be sleeping in spite of the storm.

  They both reached down at the same time to give him a stroke, and their hands touched in midair.

  “Your friend has become my friend,” Charlie said.

  She smiled and hummed a few bars of any song that came to mind, trying to blot out the sounds of the storm that raged above them, raged against the elms, the house, and her spirit like some dark entity. Then, other anxieties took their turns gnawing at her.

  Franny got up from the bench and settled in next to Charlie. He draped his arm around her, and she snuggled close to him. What if Charlie were taken from her�
��either by storm or by some other means? Even with the best scenario, Charlie was only meant to be a farmer for a time, just to prove to his father that he could succeed as a businessman. And then he would be gone to run his father’s enterprises. Would he offer to sell the farm back to her? What did she dread losing the most? What was it she desperately needed—more than the farm, more than the music? With every passing hour it was becoming easier and easier to answer.

  Charlie.

  She was falling in love with Charlie. But did she really believe he would propose? He needed her, but why? Was it only to run the farm, or did he feel that same rush of love?

  A silence drifted between them, and she wondered about his thoughts. “I hope we won’t have too much damage from the storm.”

  “Well, at least I’m covered. I might have more than one claim to file with the insurance people now.”

  She looked up at him. “You promised me a story, something embarrassing.”

  “I did indeed, Franny girl.”

  “But I want the worst one.”

  “You are so cruel.” Charlie grinned. “I will do my best. This is one of the most pinheaded, ungentlemanly things I’ve ever done.” He cleared his throat. And then coughed.

  “You’re stalling.”

  “Of course I am. Are you sure you want to hear this?”

  “Yes! More than ever now.”

  He paused as if he might change his mind. “All right. When I turned eighteen, I had a bet going with my brother.”

  “Hmm. What kind of bet?”

  “I had a bet going…that I could kiss one hundred girls before I turned twenty-one.”

  You did what? Franny had to admit that just for a moment, she wasn’t paying much attention to the turbulent weather above her head.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Charlie regretted telling Franny his revelation the second it came out of his mouth.

  She pulled away and looked at him. “And who won the bet?”

  “I did.” He groaned. “Man, I wish I hadn’t told you. It turned out to be more embarrassing than I thought it would be. Shows how self-serving and phony young guys can get about affection.”