Finding Father Christmas (4 page)

Aside from the ATM, everything else about the room I sat in to be away from the cold looked and felt as if it hadn’t changed
in fifty years. I noticed one modern addition. An electronic sign was positioned over the door listing the trains’ times and
destinations in a trailing news flash. To the right of the contemporary timetable was an old-fashioned, round-faced clock.
I consulted the clock and then the sign with the trailing, red-dotted letters. The next train to London was scheduled to leave
in twenty minutes.

My watch still gave the time as 11:58. I tapped it again and held it up to my ear. No sign of life could be heard.

Maybe I’ll buy myself a coat
and
a new watch for Christmas. Or at least a new battery.

I sighed and leaned back. I was the sole traveler at the station. The only other person in the building was a dozing gentleman
who sat on a stool, manning the newspaper kiosk.

Glancing again at the wall clock I wondered,
What time is it in San Francisco?

Not that it mattered. I didn’t have anyone back in the City by the Bay waiting for me to call him or her. No one would
wonder why I wasn’t coming to dinner on Christmas Day. I had covered all the bases at the office. I was a holiday nonentity.

That thought wasn’t a comforting one. I could leave the country—or this planet, for that matter—and very few people would
realize I was gone.

How did my life come to this?

Apparently the career I had begun at such an early age as a backstage apparition was still in effect. I was invisible.

Discontentment over my invisibility had fueled my passion-fire last week when I decided to book a ticket to London. I had
been lying alone in bed, wide awake in the middle of the night, when I concluded that I had lingered too long at the shallow
end of my life, staring across the divide at the unblinking father I had chosen to believe in. If he did exist, I needed to
know. If for some reason he wasn’t ready, willing, or able to come to me, then I would make the first move. I would float
toward him and see what happened.

Hence, here I was in England. And nothing had happened.

“Well, I tried,” I muttered defensively. I had followed the few clues and had tracked down the village of Carlton Heath only
to find that the photography studio no longer existed. What more could I do?

There was Katharine’s statement that she thought she recognized the photo. Someone in Carlton Heath quite possibly had a copy
of the same photo I had. Someone who might know something.

Could I really leave now and have no regrets? Would I be content returning to San Francisco with nothing more than a new coat
or other after-Christmas-sale merchandise? What about the answers I had come in search of?

No one else knew the purpose of my trip. But I knew. And I knew that a week from now, when I lay awake in the middle of the
night, I would ask myself why I had given up so easily. Especially when one small lead still dangled in front of me.

I thought of what Katharine said about decisions.

You can make a new one whenever you like.

For several long minutes I didn’t move. I thought briefly—only briefly—about what it would be like for the kernel of my short
life to be tucked under a blanket of cold earth. Could I die knowing I had not exhausted all possible leads to finding my
father?

Rising and pressing back my shoulders, I stepped away from the waiting room bench, drew in a deep breath, and made a new decision.
I decided to go to the theater.

“Merry Christmas, Mother,” I muttered. “I am going to see a play.”

G
rey Hall, where the Dickens performance was being held, was easy enough to find. I had roused the dozing clerk at the newspaper
kiosk inside the station, and he had given me clear directions in the most charming accent I had heard yet during my nearly
seven hours on English soil.

The walk from the train station was uphill, and the temperature had dropped another few degrees. At least the wind had died
down. The exertion of heading uphill warmed me as I walked. The distance was farther than I had estimated, and I hesitated
at the second crossroad.

It’s not too late to go back to the train station. You don’t have to do this.

“Yes I do.”

The abiding thought that kept me walking was that I needed to know. I needed to know who my father was, and I needed to know
him. The only clues I had to his existence had led me to Carlton Heath. Although I didn’t understand my trailing thought,
I sensed that as much as I needed to know, I also needed to be known.

One determined foot in front of the other brought me into Brumpton Square and there, set a short distance off the main road,
stood the Victorian-style meeting hall. Eight metal
shepherd’s hooks lined the walkway, and from each hook hung a lantern, illuminating the path in the crystalline air. Ropes
of evergreen garlands draped the entrance, and magnificent curls of gingerbread façade on the building’s face disguised its
true age. The name, Grey Hall, appeared across the front of the theater in raised letters.

A large dedication plaque beside the entrance read, “Dedicated May 19, 1987, The Society of Grey Hall Community Theatre.”
The building had been constructed over a century too late for a Dickens appearance, yet it felt easy to believe that the author
himself might be in attendance this evening where past and present seemed to have merged.

No other theatergoers were in view as I stood in front of the closed doors. My guess was that I had missed the opening curtain.
I reached for the long handles on the double doors and slowly opened the right side just enough to slip into the foyer.

A short woman in a flowing pink evening dress came to my side. With a gloved finger held to her lips, she motioned for me
to follow her to the far left of the reception area where a thick, blue velvet curtain separated us from the theater seating.

The woman’s short, tousled hair was as pink as her dress and dotted with sparkles. Her perfectly shaped lips were painted
the same cotton candy shade and dotted with a jewel above her top lip on the right side, a distinguishing beauty mark. She
appeared to be in her early forties; yet, dressed up as she was, her heart seemed much younger.

Without a word, she drew back the curtain and nodded for me to step inside the dark arena. I entered and stood to the side,
waiting for my eyes to adjust.

A booming voice called out, “Come in, come in!”

It was the merry Scotsman. For a moment I froze, thinking he was extending the invitation to me.

In actuality he was delivering the line onstage to a very short Scrooge who stood trembling before the ominous presence of
the kilted greeter. Behind the Scotsman was an open door.

The invitation was repeated by the man with the wide, wooly-white sideburns. “Come in, come in, and know me better, friend!”

“Who are you and what is this place?” Scrooge cried in a pipsqueak voice. Under a long nightshirt and floppy cap, the leading
actor was obviously a child.

My spirit softened to all things theatrical. Some images of make-believe had never truly left me, no matter how belligerent
I had been about them. Just as I had earlier remembered wanting to be Lucy walking through the wardrobe into Narnia, I now
found myself disarmed by this classic Dickens character, who brought an Oliver Twist feel to the role of the miserly Scrooge.
I could see myself in the pint-sized presence who now held center stage.

The Scotsman wore a trim jacket atop his kilt and finished the look with a flat sort of hat perched slightly to the side and
sporting a feather. From under the hat flowed a cascade of wavy white hair. I’d seen his balding head uncovered at the tea
cottage and knew the tresses were part of his costume, but the tumble of hair was convincing.

Taking his cue, the Scotsman declared, “I am the Spirit of Christmas Present.”

I smiled.
So he really was a Christmas Present, just as he said.

“What will you do to me, Oh Spirit of Christmas Present?” Young Scrooge asked.

“Enter, and you shall see.” Christmas Present stepped to the side, and the sliding prop door was moved off-center by unseen
stagehands. Where a dark closure had been, a wonderful spread of Christmas cheer was revealed, with a flickering fireplace,
a tree trimmed in lights, a stack of gifts, and a table spread with a feast.

“All has been made ready for you,” the Spirit of Christmas Present declared. “Come.”

Scrooge hesitated.

In that moment, I felt my defenses slide off me like pool water. All had been made ready for Scrooge, and yet he hesitated.
I saw how I had been in that same Bah Humbug role for many years. I understood the hesitation. The standing back and not trusting.
But no one had ever made a celebration ready for me and invited me to come in.

An old fountain of tears I had kept capped for ages began to leak. Instead of looking for a seat in the back of the hall where
I could watch the rest of the play anonymously, I slid through the velvet curtains and returned to the reception area.

Feeling around in my large shoulder bag for a tissue, I didn’t notice the woman in pink as she came to my side.

“Here,” she whispered. She held out to me a handkerchief with a pink rosebud embroidered in the corner. Once I’d dried my
eyes and curbed my tears, I held onto the handkerchief and stared at the crumpled cotton in my hands as the woman patted my
arm.

I told her in a mumble that it had been a long day, hoping
that would explain my breakdown. But I wasn’t sure I could even explain to myself why the image of a feast and gifts accompanied
by a warm invitation to Scrooge had struck such a chord of longing inside me. I sensed that Young Scrooge was being offered
everything I wanted but didn’t know how to find.

Taking a deep breath and summoning another round of fortitude, I whispered that I was fine. Really.

With a nod of understanding, she continued with the gentle pats on my arm. All the while she seemed to be trying to fix her
gaze on my eyes. Even in the dimmed lobby lights, I was sure the weariness of jet lag showed. No doubt she was checking for
more tears. I had successfully repressed them and my eyelids were now puffing up with the reserves. Dabbing my nose, I continued
to look away. She continued trying to look me in the eye.

“Well, thank you.” I awkwardly held out the used handkerchief. I wasn’t sure if I should offer to have it laundered before
returning it. I had never been given a handkerchief before.

“Keep it,” she said softly.

I hadn’t decided if I was ready to go back for the rest of the performance. But she made the decision for me by ushering me
through the velvet curtain and pointing to an empty chair in the second row from the back. I had just enough time to settle
in and refocus before Scrooge began to argue with the Spirit of Christmas Present over his discomfort at the revelations he
had faced during his waking dream.

With his skinny arm dramatically shading his gaze, Scrooge cried out, “Take me from this place, I beg of you, oh, Spirit of
Christmas Present. Do not force me to look any longer at what I have become. Tell me instead what is to come.”

“And so it shall be.” The Spirit of Christmas Present turned, and his kilt’s pleats kicked up. Scrooge stood alone on the
stage. The lights dimmed as Scrooge drew both fists to his mouth, frightened as a mouse.

“Please! I beg of you! Do not leave me like this!”

All the lights extinguished, and silence covered us all. Then a shuffling of feet and clicking of theater seats rolled across
the room as the curtain closed and the lights came up slowly.

While the rest of the audience rose and made their way to the lobby for intermission, I stayed in my seat, taking in my surroundings.
The auditorium was smaller and narrower than I had pictured in the dark when I entered. Fresh boughs of evergreen had been
shaped into huge Christmas wreaths that hung from Victorian-style lighting sconces. The ceiling was inlaid with plaster frescos
that had a repeating pattern of mellow golden white on purer white. The padded seats were covered in deep blue velvet and
matched the dark blue velvet of the stage curtains that were trimmed across the top with golden tassels.

The deep blues reminded me of my mother’s eyes. She would have liked this theater. She liked small, intimate settings where
she felt she could wrap her arms around the audience and keep it in her embrace.

I settled into the comfortable seat and took in the whole “envelope”—the size and shape of the theater and the deep blue velvet
stage curtains with the golden tassels. In a strange way, I felt as if I were sitting inside an enlarged version of my mother’s
secret blue silk purse. Now I had become one of the curious clues hidden under the tasseled flap.

T
he blue velvet purse had been given to me along with the rest of my mother’s meager possessions after her death. She had no
other surprises in her green Samsonite suitcase nor in any previously unrevealed secret places such as a safe-deposit box.
She left this earth without providing a clue as to how to find another living relative such as a grandparent or aunt.

In light of my true orphan status, Doralee, the bald woman in Santa Cruz with the seven cats and no television, gathered me
up.

When I first went to live with Doralee, she was determined to track down my father and do the right thing—give him the option
of claiming me. All we had to go on was the name listed on my birth certificate, Jay Ames.

Doralee checked all the “Ameses” she could find. Nothing matched up. After weeks of diligent searching, we came to the conclusion
that, true to form, my mother had invented my father’s name on the birth certificate.

I then became Doralee’s “niece.” My new aunt proved to be as skilled as my mother had been at fabricating information to fit
comfortably into what people wanted to hear. Documents
were created as needed to enroll me in public school for the first time in my life. Stories of my genealogical history were
embellished to satisfy probing principals, and Doralee made sure that I was well clothed with her own sewing-machine creations.