Christmas with Tucker (20 page)

Thankfully, she darted off and did not see me playing the part of George, the red-faced Santa Claus.

After I changed out of my costume and said some hurried but wistful goodbyes to a few friends—all of whom swore they’d be my Kansas pen pals forever—I found my family by the main door and we made our way out to Grandma’s car. I ran ahead
to let Tucker out and then we circled back to the join the group. Suddenly, there was a shout from across the parking lot. I assumed it was just another neighborly well-wisher.

“Hey, George!”

It was Frank Thorne. He walked toward us, holding a package.

My grandmother gave Thorne a big hug, which surprised me, until I remembered the role she’d played in helping Thorne shake off his old ways and take some steps forward—some very large steps, indeed.

“Our George was in the Christmas play. He was the star.”

Thorne looked at me approvingly. “I saw. A damn, I mean darn, good Santa Claus.”

He reached out and shook my hand. “I want to thank you, George. What you and your family have done for me means more than you can imagine. I want you to have this.” He handed me the package he had been carrying.

I took the package but did not know what to say or do.

“Go ahead, open it.”

The paper came off easily enough, but in the dim light of the parking lot, it took me a moment to understand what it was that I held. It was the picture of Thorne and my father that had hung on his wall. I swallowed hard and held out my hand to shake his. “Thank you, Mr. Thorne. I’m pleased to have a picture of you and my dad.”

His words were soft and gentle this time, without the old edge I’d first encountered. “You can call me Frank. Your dad was a fine man. Best friend I ever had.”

Thorne had taken many a wrong turn and made more than one bad decision, but in a few short weeks I learned how good a man he truly was. I had Thorne wrong, all wrong. He taught me
an important life lesson that December—that rushing to judgment rarely worked in anyone’s favor.

While I was grateful for the picture and the kind words, what he said next meant more.

Thorne stared down at his boots for a few seconds and then looked up at me. There was a glint in the eyes that I could only describe as profound determination. Tucker pulled on his leash and whined. I let go and he made his way over to Thorne, who bent down to pet the dog, then buried his face in his fur. When he stood up, there were small tears in his eyes.

“George, I’ve got a job. First job I’ve had in years. It’s at the plant, putting together Fords in Kansas City. That’s why I asked you to hang on to the dog a few extra days, because I had to make some arrangements. Red here needs to be on the farm. I wonder if you and your grandparents would mind taking him for me?” Before I could answer, he continued, “For good, this time.”

I was leaving for Minnesota in a few days, but I was counting on my mom letting me take the dog with me, if not on this trip then at least on the next one. I looked to my grandfather with every ounce of
want
I could muster, but it didn’t take much convincing.

Before I could say a word, my grandfather nodded his head approvingly. “Frank, we’ll do it. We could use a good dog.”

Thorne nodded too, as if to reassure me. “Go ahead, George. You’d be doing me a favor.”

I knelt down to scratch Tucker. He cocked his head at Thorne, then looked back at me. It seemed that Tucker understood. He looked at Thorne one more time and barked.

“Stay,” Frank said to him, with a little smile. “It’s all going to be okay—Tucker.”

As I felt Tucker’s cold wet nose and warm fur on my face, I did not understand what rule allowed us to have this dog, but I felt a gratitude that seeped into the very marrow of my bones. As excited as I was to get Tucker one step closer to being mine, it was going to be very disappointing if I couldn’t take him with me.

“Mr. Thorne—Frank …,” I stammered, looking up to thank him, but he was already walking away, heading back to his truck. The old engine turned over and with a final wave he drove off, leaving me stunned. I held Tucker like I would never let him go. As I got to my feet, I tried to think of a thousand ways to thank Frank Thorne, but I didn’t get the chance. The next morning, his worldly possessions were loaded into his truck. He got in it and drove off without saying goodbye, never to be seen again.

WHEN WE
got home, Mom kept hugging me and asking for more details about everything I had been doing the last few weeks. Sitting on the living room floor, I answered her questions as best I could.

“Weren’t you scared of driving that big old maintainer?”

“At the beginning. But I got used to it after the first few days.”

“Tell me again about the ice.”

Tucker chose that moment to offer a friendly bark at Mom. She ran her hands through his fur. “I know just how you felt, Tucker. Some days I was so worried about George, too.”

My sisters and grandparents joined us in the living room to open a few presents, as we’d always done on Christmas Eve. It was quite late, but this was a McCray family tradition. I didn’t feel the urge to unwrap anything, though, since to me Tucker was the best package under the tree.

It was hard to believe that he was mine. Every few minutes I hugged my beautiful red dog and let him know how pleased I was to have him back on the farm for good.

My mother sat in the chair closest to the fireplace and stared at all of the packages. Even though there was a smile on her face, her eyes still looked sad. I think we all had the same hollow feeling in our stomachs. With all the commotion surrounding our impromptu open house, followed by the excitement of the Christmas pageant and then Thorne’s “gift” to me, I’d managed to avoid confronting the reality we all now faced together: the first Christmas we would share without my father.

She caught me looking at her and said, “You have a lot of thank-you notes to write, young man.”

Around midnight, with yawns and droopy eyes, we opened the packages from our neighbors and friends, saving the more personal family gifts for Christmas Day. My sisters played the roles of Santa’s helpers and read each gift tag aloud, all of us chuckling at how many packages were for Tucker. “Here’s another one—For the Big Red Dog!” There were many presents for me, as well.

Of course, I can’t remember all of the gifts that showed up that night, but there were a few that stood out, including a thank-you note from Mrs. Slater with a picture of Tucker she had drawn and a little red plastic dog Christmas ornament that I still hang on the tree.

With the fire burning warm and the gift opening behind us, I felt very content with Tucker and the rest of my family all in one room. As I became even more relaxed, I remembered how comforting it was to just experience family conversation, without listening to individual words. What they said didn’t matter. It was like a symphony—the sounds of the particular instruments were lost to the larger pattern and movements of sound. Although it had been a very long time since I had heard it, and one important instrument was missing, it was still an
old familiar concerto that played through our home once again that night.

I drifted off listening to my sisters and my mother sitting around the table struggling to find the shapes that would fit into a still unknown pattern. The last words I remembered were “Grandma hasn’t touched last year’s puzzle.”

ON CHRISTMAS DAY
, while Grandma and my mother made breakfast, Trisha and Hannah gave the McCray men their first present for Christmas day—helping with the chores. Even with electricity, it still took us over two hours to do the milking. Watching Trisha and Hannah try to strap the Babson Bros. automatic milking machine onto a cow not only made me feel like an old pro but kept me laughing for most of the morning. Grandpa and I could knock our routine out in an hour and a half, but I doubted with as much cheer.

Breakfast was served in the dining room. Special occasions, like Christmas morning, usually brought forth the same menu of warm buttermilk biscuits, smoked bacon, and scrambled eggs piled high on an antique dish. Our appetites were intact and before long we pushed away from the table content.

We were all trying very hard to be thankful for what we had and not dwell on what we had lost. But try as we did, the excitement from yesterday wore off and we were all faced with the difficult realization that John McCray, our father, son, or spouse, was gone. It was one of many firsts that we had to get through.

With a wet dish towel in my hand and the breakfast dishes almost behind me, my mom took me aside. She handed me a sack and whispered into my ear, “Merry Christmas.” I opened the bag to find that it was full of my favorite oatmeal cookies.

“Thanks, Mom.”

She gave me a big hug and said, “George, you’ve turned into such a nice young man, but I still think I am going to miss my boy.”

Of course, I beamed when she called me a man.

“Your dad and I are both so proud of you.” She held me tightly a minute longer before she took my hand and said, “I’ve missed you. It’s going to be good having you home with me again.”

I didn’t know what to say. There was no use telling her that I was torn in two about leaving. It would have broken her heart. Still, she could tell that something was bothering me.

“Come on, George, we’ve got family presents to open. It’s Christmas!” She wiped her eyes quickly and headed for the living room.

We were about to gather around the tree, but we could not find my grandfather. Grandma Cora yelled for him several times, but he did not appear. She went to the bedroom to look for him. When she returned, her energy seemed drained and she asked us to be patient; Grandpa Bo would need just a few more minutes. When he finally came into the living room, he looked so worn-out that I thought he must have journeyed a hundred miles from that back bedroom. In some ways, I suppose he had.

Before he sat down, he placed under the tree a package wrapped in brown paper, cut from a grocery sack.

Typically, we unwrapped presents in a frenzy, but this year
we took our time, offering polite thank-yous along the way. Hannah handed the gifts out one at a time. Eventually, the presents dwindled down to that little brown package.

Hannah cried out, “We forgot this one!” She held the last little brown paper package in her hand. “It says, ‘To Tucker, from the McCray family.’ ”

She passed it over to me. “Here, George, you open it for Tucker.”

We were all excited to have something to offer our newest family member. His brushed red coat was perfect for Christmas and his fine figure adorned the living room floor with as much flare as any ornament on the tree. I pulled the simple wrapping off the package. I gasped.

My grandfather had carefully sculpted the most beautiful dog collar I had ever seen. It was made of soft brown leather and he had burned in the words T
UCKER
M
C
C
RAY
. There were brass rivets to hold the buckle in place. I put the collar around Tucker and it stayed there for many years to come.

As everyone dispersed about the house, Grandma called me into the kitchen. She and Grandpa were standing by the sink. Grandma spoke first.

“Your grandfather has another gift for you. It’s a going-away present.”

“George, I want you to know how much I appreciate all of the help you’ve given us these last few weeks. You’re going to be a tough hand to replace.” He then handed me a box wrapped in red paper. There was a handwritten note that went with it, scrawled with words in my grandfather’s old-fashioned handwriting:

I unwrapped the box and lifted the lid. It was my grandfather’s tin cup that had sat by that kitchen sink for so many years. It would have gone to my father, but instead it came to me.

I stared at the gift for a long time, strangely touched by the simple tin cup that had been handed down from father to son for four generations. My grandfather must have been holding two very different thoughts in his head at the same time. He was glad to pass this piece of family history to me, but how sad he must have felt to skip a generation.