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Smiling, he nodded hard. “Just like this.” He looked at his sons. “That’s part of the reason I asked you boys to come up here. So we could have that together, right here in Big Falls. My adopted hometown. That’s how I’ve thought of it ever since I left it behind.”
“I think that’s a beautiful idea,” Vidalia said. “And I’d be real pleased if we could have that together, Bobby. You and your boys are welcome to share your holidays with us.”
“I was hoping you’d say that.” He lifted a glass. “To family.”
“To family,” Vidalia agreed, and they all lifted their glasses in agreement. Even the children picked up their glasses of juice and tinked them together.
Bobby met Vidalia’s eyes across the table and held them as their families all started talking at once and food was passed around and compliments were paid. And he couldn’t help thinking that this should’ve beentheirfamily. His and hers. They should’ve been spendingeveryholiday season all gathered around together, all talking at once with kids making a mess of their food and dreaming of ponies and babies and Santa Claus.
When the meal ended, he left their offspring to clean up the mess, and took Vidalia with him into the main part of the saloon. The eighteen-foot tree stood bare and waiting. “We’re gonna deck these halls tonight. Then, dessert by the fireplace. Will you stay?”
“You couldn’t get me out of here if you tried, Bobby Joe.”
He smiled at her, and he knew he was going to have to tell her the truth pretty soon. But maybe it could wait just a few more nights. Just a few. He wanted a Christmas without heartache. One so chock full of joy and sappy holiday magic that his sons would never forget it. He wanted that, just once, before he died.
* * *
They all stood around the eighteen-foot beauty of a tree, and Bobby Joe said, “I bought decorations, but I don’t think there’s gonna be anywhere near enough.”
“Don’t worry about that,” Selene said, walking right up beside him and resting her hand on his shoulder. “Mom had us bring a small portion of the horde of holiday decor she had stashed at home in the attic.”
“I think we have enough for ten trees,” Vidalia said. “Plus two.” She gazed at the boxes, smiling in self-deprecation. “Some of these haven’t seen daylight in several years. I can’t wait to go through them. Shall we?”
“Lights first,” Caleb called. “We have to string the lights first. That’s how we always do it.”
“I’m with you on that Caleb,” Jason said.
“Fine, you young men handle the lights,” Vidalia told him. “Robert, can you find us a couple of stepladders around here?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Robert said. And if Bobby Joe didn’t know better, he would think Rob was starting to enjoy himself a bit. His sadness seemed distant, and he was even smiling now and then.
Melusine cranked up the music. Caleb and Rob strung the lights, while Vidalia gave constant direction. The others girls vanished into the kitchen. But in short order, they were back, handing cups of hot cocoa around. Jimmy, Kara’s husband, turned up the music a little louder, and when Randy Travis started singing Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer, the children all sang along.
They were are all picking through boxes of ornaments, re-attaching hooks or strings, and passing them around to be placed on the tree. And it seemed to Bobby Joe that every single piece in Vidalia’s old dusty boxes from the attic had a story attached to it. Her girls didn’t mind one bit telling them as each one was added to the tree.
He heard all about the Christmas when they’d all made homemade gifts for each other because money was low, but how somehow, they’d still found Cabbage Patch dolls under the tree, one for each of those girls, from Santa.
“You never told us how you did it, Mama,” Maya said softly.
“I got up at two a.m. on Black Friday to be first in line at the Kmart, where they had a five doll limit. I pawned my wedding ring to pay for them.” She rolled her eyes. “Oh your father was furious when he came home and saw my ring finger bare. Course, by then it was February, and I’d saved up enough to buy it back.”
Selene pulled out an ornament, a picture frame shaped like Santa’s sleigh with a baby in the seat beside Santa. “This was me!” she said happily. “Look!” She held it up.
“Baby’s first Christmas” was part of the frame itself. But someone had taken a green marker and carefully inscribed “Selene Brand,” and her birthday.
She grinned and handed it to Joey. “We always joke that I was conceived by the Corral. Born nine months to the day after her doors opened.”
“Yeah, Barroom Baby,” said Melusine.
“Saloon Sister!” Kara threw in.
“Beer Barrel Brat,” Maya called.
“Happy Hour Half-Pint,” Edie sang.
“Enough already!” Selene said, but she was laughing so hard she had tears brimming in her eyes, and she was leaning on her husband Cory as if she’d fall down without him. He was laughing too.
Bobby Joe frowned though, and sent a searching look Vidalia’s way, but she averted her eyes.
