Chapter 16

A few more months passed, snow started to fly. People hit each other in icy intersections and the shop got lots of business. Olivia started to shiver constantly, and curse whenever she hears Christmas music, regardless of who was around to hear it. Which is only part of the reason I am at the mall alone today. The other half of the reason is that I am determined to find her a present today. I swear I’ve been to every store and kiosk in this damn mall. I swear I’ve been here for hours, and it feels like months. When I asked her what she wanted she just shrugged. She hates jewelry, I think, as I pass the glittering display cases for the fifteenth time. She doesn’t read. I have sniffed every candle and lotion in Bath and Body Works, but there’s nothing special about lotion. I’ve always been terrible at giving gifts. In the past I’ve always settled, though. I walk around the store for a half hour, pick something, and leave. This is different, though. I have one hundred dollars in my wallet, and I refuse to leave until I have spent it on a gift for Olivia that is as amazing as she is. Suddenly my tired eyes settle on a sweater on a rack on the other side of the aisle. I cut a diagonal line between two mannequins towards it. It is warm, creamy white like mashed potatoes, thick and soft, soft, soft. A red tag dangling from its sleeve tells me it is cashmere, size small, $60. I cary it reverently to the register and nod when I’m asked if it should be put in a box. At home I make a mess of wrapping it, but Christmas morning she is all smiles and bed head as she unwraps it. My heart skips a beat as her eyes touch it for the first time, she lifts it from its place among the tissue paper and tells me she loves it. I have earned the gentle kiss on the apple of my cheek and the admiring gaze she gives herself in the mirror after she has put it on. 

On Sunday afternoon she wears it to my parents’ house and my mother tells her it’s gorgeous. 

“Thanks,” She smiles, seems genuinely pleased, “Jimmy bought it for me for Christmas.”

“Really?” She raises her eyebrows at me. 

It is the least s****y holiday I have ever spent with my family. After a dinner entirely devoid of questions like “how were your grades this semester?” and “are you seeing anyone?” or “still working at that liquor store?”, my parents, David, Maria and baby Katherine went to the basement to watch Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I had noticed Olivia shivering during dinner and stayed behind in the kitchen to make her some cocoa. She stood, with her back to me, staring fixedly at the Christmas tree in the living room while I stirred lumps out of the sweet liquid. When I came to her side and put the mug in her icy hands, I warned her that it was hot. She got up onto her tiptoes and pressed a kiss on my cheek. “Thanks, Jimmy.” I put my arm around her. I showed her an ornament I made when I was in first grade, “I think it was supposed to look like a reindeer. . .” but there was so much excess glue and one of its eyes was missing. “That is terrifying, wow. Santa should have had this one put down.” I hung it back on the tree, closer to the bottom. 

She giggled. “I was trying to remember the last time I stood in front of a Christmas tree like this.” 

There was a moment of silence as we both regarded the tree, it stood a monument to some kind of invisible spirit of the holiday. With its glittering lights and expertly draped tinsel, mix of traditional and handmade ornaments, it managed to look cozy and familiar but still somehow celestial and miraculous in its beauty.

Olivia set her head on my shoulder, “I love you. You take such good care of me, and if you weren’t here, I would be so lonely.” She murmured these words and they made my soul stir. 

I close my eyes for a moment, not long enough as it turned out, because, stirred to action by her perfection, I next proceeded to ruin this beautiful moment. 

I fell to one knee on the hardwood floor I had been scolded for scuffing so many times over the years. She looks down at me, alarmed. 

I laugh at myself, “Olivia, will you. . . Will you marry me?”

In the next six seconds, a number of things happened all at once. Olivia backpedaled suddenly and, keeping her eyes on me, tried to set her mug of cocoa on the countertop behind her. The butt of the mug caught the edge of the counter, causing her to drop it. The mug connected with the floor, shattering into pieces and splattering me with scalding hot chocolate. Olivia turned immediately in search of paper towels. The crash and my subsequent cursing brought my mother up from the basement, she cleaned up the floor while Olivia blotted the stain on the front of my shirt and apologized over and over. When the mess was taken care of the three of us went downstairs, laughing like it was some kind of cute blunder we could tell grandchildren about some day. I sat through fifty-five excruciating minutes of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, then David, Maria and Katherine, and Olivia and I were loaded down with leftovers, hugged, kissed and sent on our ways. 

When the doors of the car were closed, with me behind the wheel and Olivia shivering in the passenger seat, tense silence ballooned around us. When we reached home, I shut off the engine, but neither of us moved. My mind had been in constant motion the entire drive. Regrets of every size and shape rose and fell before my eyes in a whirling vortex of questions. Suddenly all I wanted was for her to say something, anything. 

I managed to choke out a single syllable in my desperation, “So,”

“So indeed.”

“About earlier. . .”

“Yea.”

After a moment, I continued, “Are, are you gonna’ answer my question?”

“No, I was kind of hoping you would take the first degree burns as a satisfactory reply.” She looked at me sheepishly. “I’m really sorry, are you okay?”

I nod, “I’m fine. . . You were gonna’ say no, weren’t you?”

She sighed heavily. “Jimmy, I like you a lot, I really do, but,” There’s always a but. “You can’t look at everything with leukemia vision, you know? We’ve only known each other for seven months. I don’t think I’ve even committed to one brand of toothpaste for more than seven months.”

There’s a moment of silence. “I can’t believe it’s only been seven months.”  

“I know right,” Olivia raises a cigarette to her lips.

“You shouldn’t smoke, it’s bad for you.” I say, absentmindedly. 

She looks at me, eyebrows raised expectantly. 

“Sorry. Ugh, why do you even hang out with me?” 

She grins around the cigarette, lighting it, inhaling, then holding it away from herself for a moment to kiss me on the cheek. “Cuz you’re cute.” 

I followed her inside, and found myself quite content with the way things are.