The Fir Tree of the Right

This work of short fiction was written in response to a debate I had with someone last fall. I told myself I would soften the ending when (if?) I calmed down. I’m still waiting for the spirit to move me.

The holidays were coming. It was her favorite time of the year. She thought about this as she walked around the mall, newly glittering with the season’s decorations. Fake fir trees stood proudly, displaying evenly placed globes and lights. The one in the center courtyard was particularly grand and comforting in its symmetry.

Carol wasn’t there to shop; it was too early for that. The mall was just her preferred place to get a head start on her daily step count. She got to 10,000 every day. She was just that good. She checked the ring status on her Apple Watch and saw in it the assurance that she would live a long, healthy and happy life.

The holidays were now her favorite. They hadn’t always been. When she was a kid, sure. But as a young adult, she had been too poor to enjoy winter. There had been seasons when she would come to a mall like this one and stroke the coats, wondering if she could get away with stealing one. She’d       never go through with it. But she couldn’t help but long for somebody to give her one. Just one. There were so many on the racks and she was so cold.

And then there were those winters, many years later, when her kids’ dad was so mean to her. Giving her a holiday budget, berating her for over-spending, eventually just taking an immediate cut from her November paychecks to make sure the family bills would be paid. As if she couldn’t do the math herself.

But she had freed herself, hadn’t she. First from poverty. And then from him. And she had done it all by herself.

In a mirrored wall between stores, she caught her reflection – an average-sized woman with shiny hair and a nice coat. She was now a successful businesswoman and it showed, in her dress and her posture. Successful in the sense that she got promoted every few years and was given a slight salary increase after every annual review. But considering where she had come from, whew! She remembered being excited to have been hired at all, to work in the mail room, sorting the company’ enormous volume of mail for the “bigwigs” who worked upstairs. She had put her chin up and worked hard among the surly, hung over, or actively high. She had surprised everyone – herself included – by becoming one of those “big wigs” herself, with only the help of company-sponsored education.

And her children had turned out amazing. Well, they were nearly adults now, if you could call twenty-somethings adults, but they would always be her babies. She knew everyone who praised them was really thinking about her, wowed by her parenting skills, because her kids really were something. Attractive, polite, hardworking like her. They never asked for anything.

She tried to think what her kids would like for Christmas. They always squealed when they got chocolate. They love those chocolate Santas, don’t they. The hollow ones or the ones with marshmallow inside? Maybe she would come back and shop after the stores opened.

Outside, the weather was balmy for December. She was really enjoying the earth’s naturally warmer cycle right now, although she remembered the white Christmases of her youth fondly. As she turned on her car, her favorite radio channel chirped from the dashboard. Christmas music filled the car.

Carol smiled as she pulled out of the parking lot onto the road. Her house wasn’t far; she could have walked, but she loved her car. Why shouldn’t she have this moment of joy, listening to music, driving her own car?

The racket of a jack hammer ricocheted against “Silent Night” as she pulled up to the intersection. Why were they always working on something? And what gave them the right to make so much noise this early? Didn’t citizens deserve the freedom to sleep in? To have moments of peace? To listen to music in their car without interruption?

The light changed. She carefully drove around the small pothole on her own street before pulling into her driveway. She didn’t get out until the song ended. It settled her.

Inside, she dropped her keys into their little bowl and went directly to the basement, to recover the old fake Christmas tree and the box of ornaments she had collected over the decades. One or two were from her own mother’s tree. Most were ones her children had made or picked out when they were younger– a complete hodgepodge of their interests and heartfelt attempts at artistic expression. Whatever had appealed to them in the store at that age or whatever design the art teacher had come up with that year. There were reindeer drawn out of thumbprints, angels with tin foil halos and popsicle stick trees with sequins for ornaments. Tiny frames with “I love you Mom” printed along the border. The two “Baby’s First Christmas” ornaments that she herself had bought.  A tangle of colorful lights.

It was all old, dusty, tattered. I am better than this, she thought, standing suddenly. The symmetrical and dazzling holiday trees at the mall danced in her mind.

She went to the sink and stooped to open the cabinet. She pulled out a heavy-duty trash bag and carefully tipped the entire contents of the ornament crate into the black plastic. From the bottom of the box, clunked a snow globe. She rescued that alone. She had bought it out of spite that winter he was being terrifically mean. The cost had felt like a small fortune at the time. She marveled how little the amount seemed now.

After a moment of hesitation, she stuffed the faux tree back into its box and added it to the trash bag. It didn’t quite fit but she tied the bag and carried the whole thing to the curb.

As she walked back from the driveway, the catharsis was amazing. She was done with all that. She was free. Free to do whatever she liked. Free to celebrate Christmas her way. She was a self-made woman.

On her way back to the mall, her son called. He wasn’t going to be able to come home for Christmas, he said. The facility for elderly adults, where he worked, was short-staffed and he just couldn’t let his colleagues or his residents down.

“They can’t be on their own, for even a couple days?” she asked.

“No.”

“Why not?” These people were spoiling her Christmas, stealing her son. If they had just taken care of themselves better…

“Because they can’t,” he said.

She felt the emphasis on the word “they.” As in, because she could take care of herself, she would have to do without. Why should she be punished, just because she had worked hard and taken care of herself? Her anger shifted from the residents to her son. How dare he act like they were more important than his own mother? She gave him his life!

“I am going to get a new Christmas tree,” she said quickly, to mask her anger. “It is going to be gorgeous. A completely fresh start. Nothing from the past, nothing from the time when your dad was living with us. It will be a celebration of my freedom, and my success.”

“Good for you, Mom,” he said.

She went on, describing her cathartic morning. “And you are going to miss the new one!” she ended accusingly.

“I guess so.”

He sounded tired and grumpy, suddenly. He should really come home, where he belongs, she thought as she got back into her car.

The shop attendants were much more cheerful. They praised her every decision and even brought out more ribbons and baubles to show her from the back. They seemed to really enjoy helping her; they understood this was a meaningful moment in her life, worth the extra effort and extra expense. Holiday music played over the mall speakers, soothing and encouraging at once.

The check-out counter offered the usual sticker shock. As she looked down the receipt, she noticed the significant sales tax. The government stealing her money again. And for what? To drill up roads and ruin the peace of her morning? To give medical care to illegal immigrants? The rage she had seen on TV news welled momentarily inside her. She would take this anger out in the voting booth. But for now, she took refuge in the smiles of the shop attendants. They were so happy for her. She thanked them.

It was hard work getting everything into the car and then out of the car and set up in her house. Especially the new faux tree, much larger and lusher than the old one. But she was capable of hard work. And when it was done, it was spectacular. Gilded purple ribbons looped from branch to branch, and identical large gold globes were perfectly spaced from top to bottom. A set of smaller, more ornate ornaments – also purple with gold etching to echo the ribbon – were set a bit further back, giving texture for the eyes. Soft-white lighting glowed from within.

With water from the sink, which had just been fixed yesterday (for a whole afternoon she had had no running water, the one and only time that had ever happened in her life), she made herself a cup of peppermint tea with honey and sat down on the couch to admire her new tree. She called her daughter. There was a baby screaming in the background when her daughter picked up. Her daughter had recently had her second child. The children were so cute, but the older one messed with her stuff and the new one was very loud, so she didn’t see them often, despite living nearby. She didn’t understand why the kids weren’t better disciplined. Her daughter tried but that husband of hers really needed to step up to the plate. She had never liked him. His parents didn’t even speak proper English.

“Hi, Mom, everything ok?”

“Oh yes, honey, you will be so proud of me. I have had the most amazing day.” She launched into a description, starting with the catharsis that a large black plastic bag can provide. It wasn’t until she got to the end, the bit about how the government had stolen some of her money as usual and how the ribbon actually has wire in it, so it can be placed just so, that she realized she could no longer hear the background noise; her daughter must be on mute. “I would love for you to come see it, darling.”

Her daughter’s voice suddenly came through, along with the whining of her two-year-old grandson. She was whispering. “Of course, I’d love to see it, Mom.”

“Why are you talking so quietly?”

“I am just talking with Grandma and then I will read,” her daughter said to her son.

Carol waited patiently. She had been better at this phase of parenting than her daughter. She managed to restrain herself from commenting most of the time, only offering advice when truly necessary.

“Sorry, Mom. I just managed to get the baby to sleep and she’s here on my lap. Justin wants a story. He has been such a good boy, waiting so patiently, I should probably go.”

“Okay, but I wanted to know when to expect you on Christmas. And I forgot to get the chocolate Santas you like but I will go back and get them.”

“Oh, we are going to have Christmas at our house this year. Would you like to come? Pablo’s family is coming.”

“Why aren’t you coming home?”

“Mom, we have been over this. If I come over on Christmas, I would need to bring my kids and Pablo like I did last year. We are a unit on Christmas, especially on Christmas Day. And until Abby stops breastfeeding, it is hard to go anywhere without her at all, so I can’t even come by myself another time that week.”

“Oh, well then bring her. She is so sweet and sometimes quiet.”

“I would need to bring Justin, too.”

“Well, if he can just leave my cabinets and bookshelves alone… I mean, I have a right to have things the way I like them.”

“I gotta go, Mom. We can talk about this later.”

Her daughter hung up quickly. Had she been disappointed about the chocolate? She still had time to get the little Santas – and she would, she really would.

Carol looked at her Christmas tree and finished her tea, thinking over her conversations. She tried to understand how she had raised children who were so incredibly selfish. It must be their father’s fault. Yes, of course. He was selfish, too.

She turned the TV on; it opened directly onto Fox News as it always did. She nestled into the arm of the couch and began to doze.

She had worked hard this morning, just like those newscasters did. She deserved a rest. She had earned it. If only everyone worked as hard as she did. Then her son would be free to come home, and her daughter would be able to afford a nanny.

The steady light of the new tree and the flashing lights of the TV set layered colored light over her face, as the early start to the morning caught up with her. Her breathing slowed, and her mouth and forehead relaxed into a deep scowl. Her heart hiccupped and then succumbed to the lack of use, to the practiced silencing of its instincts. The channel barreled on, while her internal organs settled into a permanent stillness. They had worked hard and deserved a rest. It had been a good day. It had been her favorite time of year.