Christmas '00

There was a time... There was much time, long spent. But there was one time in particular, at Aaron’s grandparents'. A time when he was eight, back in Wales.

That was the time where he found his thoughts now, cast far back before the hearth, small hands holding the croquet stick in his lap, brown eyes set upon the four balls he'd lined in an arc at his feet. The fire had burned well that night, dancing to a whistle of wind which echoed down the flue. It dried his eyes so they felt like sharp rocks, ill fitting beneath heavy lids when he blinked; which wasn't often. His eyes had remained open with stubborn attention, fixed to those balls in an arc.

Red, yellow, blue and green... like he'd tugged away a greater piece of the rainbow, leaving less in anothers grasp. Aaron had picked up one of the balls, weighed it in his palm, then he’d quickly set it back. The balance had seemed lost with only three balls in that arc. So he’d sat there and looked at all four balls, his hand tingling with the memory of how the ball had felt in his grip.

'Weather clears up 'morrow,' his grand-da said, 'we'll have a game out in the yard.'

Aaron hadn't answered, instead given a small shrug.

'What'ya think o' that?'

He’d turned to the old man, smiled shyly and politely, given a slight nod.

As he’d turned back to the fire he thought of Jimmy and Robin, back in Sussex, of how impressed they'd be when they’d see his new set. Thought of how much he wanted to play a round with them when he returned, rather than play with his grand-da. He’d chanced a brief glance back at the old man and his eyes said all this and more. The old man had returned a solemn gaze which in turn said "Fair enough". But was it? Had it been?

There'd also been an unspoken sadness in his grand-da's eyes. One which he'd noticed all that time ago, but had really only seen now. It was the last Christmas that he'd spent with his grand-da. It was his grand-da's last Christmas.

And in the Christmas to follow, when he was then nine, he'd seen the same look his grand-da had had, there in his father's eyes, far away in Sussex. It was a look which Aaron had seen in himself many years later, before the bathroom mirror in the Summer of 1964, as he'd thought of his own father and cried. Far away from England, far away from Wales.

There was much time, long spent. And it all found him here in Australia where he'd lived for the good part of sixty-four years. But now, thinking of Wales, thinking of Sussex, and the men of his family who'd passed on... Now, he felt as though he had no home at all to his name. He gave a gruff sigh, shifted in his armchair and looked to the gas-heater, poor-excuse let-down of its ancestor hearth.

Is there ever really progress? he thought. But aloud he said, ‘Everything changes. Nothing's the same.'

Margaret looked at him from her neighbouring chair, inquisitive gaze above lowered glasses. They sat on the tip of her nose as she read her book, lending a scholarly air which always made him feel like a child.

'What's not the same?'

'Everything,' he grumbled. 'Heaters, Christmas, the world... Our son.'

She lay her book in her lap, pursed her lips for the lesson to come. He shrank down in his seat. 'Well, our son has a wife, and she has parents too Aaron. We spent Christmas with them last year... It's only fair.'

'I know that. It's just that... Well, I don't know.'

He looked back to the heater, stared at the floor with its lack of a rainbow, felt the tingling absence of a ball he'd once held, and the grand-da he'd never quite known.

'I think you do know,' Margaret said. 'It's not just about Judith. It's the grand-kids as well. I'm sure her parents felt just as bad last Christmas when we had the lime-light. And look where we are Aaron...' She removed her glasses, jutting them to and thro about the small room. 'We can't rightly host a party in a flat like this, and with your hip there's the question of travel.'

Aaron scowled at her for feeling much older.

'And don't you go pulling that face!' she chided. 'There's no point denying we're old my dear. We've been through a lot and we've had our time.

These are the years we're meant to enjoy. These are the golden-' 'Golden years...' Aaron sighed. 'So everyone says. What do you suggest then Margaret? That we go to a disco?'

She frowned and put back her glasses, making a point of staring down through them as she lowered them on her nose. 'Now you're just being silly Aaron. And they don't call it that anymore. It's called clubbing.'

'And how would you know?'

The glasses slipped lower, the frown grew sterner. 'I know because I keep up with the world. I don't shut it out and brood.'

Aaron scowled yet again and sunk in his chair. 'I don't brood,' he brooded.

With a loud, crisp turn of the page, Margaret returned to her book without comment. Aaron looked back to the heater, sure that if he squinted enough, he just might see clear through to Wales, all that time ago.

Wales didn't come, however. The heater took him only as far as that Summer of '64. Took him to Christmas day and a drawer in the kitchen reserved for knick-knacks where he'd rummaged about for a cork-screw. He'd found the cork-screw easily enough, just as he'd found the card. It was still in the envelope, postmarked from England four months earlier, torn at the top in a jagged fray, like the edge of a rain-soaked feather.

Aaron had knelt there, staring at the envelope, breath caught in his throat like it was his precious last. He needn't have opened it, even if he'd wanted to.

The small wreath embossed upon the card within may as well have been stamped on his heart. It was the same as that of the sympathy card he'd received three years earlier, when his mother had died. When he'd received the second card, condolences from his Aunt, he'd wondered whether she had a steady supply of the bloody things, an even steadier eye on the obituaries.

He'd picked up the cork-screw with nervous fingers, slammed the kitchen drawer shut. He’d gone to the living room, handed Margaret the cork-screw, and had looked to their son Peter sadly. It was then a matter of living room to the bathroom. He couldn't remember ever walking, passing along the hall.

He'd simply found himself standing before the mirror, his father's eyes looking back at him, which furthermore mirrored his grand-da. It all went so fast. So much time, so much life and it all went so fast. It all... went.

Aaron gave a loud sigh, feeling as though he'd been winded. Back in the community flat, far from the Summer of '64, far from the Winter of Wales, he leaned closer to the heater and shuddered.

'The box...' he said softly.

Margaret glanced up from her book. 'Hmmm?'

Cheeks already flush with broken veins darkened as he felt very foolish.

He shook his head with a dismissive mutter and struggled up out of the chair.

'Where are you going?'

He rubbed at his hip as he walked slowly to the doorway. 'Bathroom,' came his answer. It surprised him as he was in fact heading to the bedroom.

Margaret watched as he rounded the doorway, then she shrugged and returned to her book. Aaron entered the bedroom and closed the door behind him, looking back through the crack like a child awake past his bed-time. He turned and surveyed the room, expecting the sigh which followed. There was always a twinge of indignity when he came in here, always for the fact of the two single beds.

For almost a year now he and Margaret had slept in separate beds due to his hip problems. It was a blow to his manhood in his ageing years, missing the closeness of her beside him. What really nagged at him though was her habit of kissing him on the cheek when he'd hopped into bed, before she herself lay down to sleep. It was an affectionate gesture he'd always appreciate but also curse, for it made him feel like a child, being tucked into bed by his mother.

Aaron gave a final glance to his bed and shook his head despairingly, then he turned to the closet. Even as he stepped toward it, even as he opened its door, he wondered why he'd come here. Why he wanted to look at that card. All it would do was make him more miserable than he already was. Why on earth would he want to do something so foolish? He pulled down the box from the high shelf, wincing as pain stabbed his hip, and set it down heavily on the floor. The movement was one more of gravity than of any intention he had.

The box hit the carpet with a dull thud and a slight hint of dust rose from the cardboard depths. As he lowered to his knees a musty scent struck Aaron's nostrils, raising memories and feelings like the dust that had risen from the box.

It was only then that he knew why he was doing this. He wanted - no, needed - a reason to cry, when he felt he had no reason at all. No valid reason anyway.

A photo album lay near the top of the box, an introduction to greater stories to come. He flipped back the cover to see the photo of his and Margaret's wedding day and smiled for only a moment before indulgence made him close the album, wearing instead a frown. He pulled it from the box and laid it beside, intent on finding the card.

His fingers wandered over long known territory, pushing aside this and fumbling at that, pausing now and then to caress a velvet jewellery box or touch a photo like a handshake. His hands held a wonder of their own like tourists returning to a familiar town, seeing the sights and gawking at landmark trinkets. And then the tourists stopped, the fingers twitched, attention caught by a faded envelope, pressed to the side of the box.

It was the envelope, frayed edge rising from behind a small pile of books, Margaret's diaries from when she had something to write of.

The last to be used sat atop the pile, 1974 stamped upon it in gold... like an invitation to aged wine. Aaron shifted where he knelt, rearing back from the box as though he might fall in to become yet another knick-knack.

He regarded the box with a heavy sigh and felt so very old. He felt like he stood at a graveyard, the envelope like a headstone. In a way it was, wasn't it...

He nodded to himself, leaned forward and slid the envelope out from beside the diaries. Held it in his hands, smelled the heavy scent of its age, the fine grain of its paper, slick with the gather of dust. And then he slid a finger between the tickling tear of the envelope, closed his eyes as the finger ran along the wreath upon the card, circling it slowly with a thoughtful pace. His thumb also slid into the envelope and he pinched at the card firmly to slide it out into view, to read the chicken scrawl writing within telling of regret with reserved simplicity.

Dearest Aaron, words can't express my sympathy for the passing of your father, John. Yours sincerely, Aunty May.

And that's all she wrote, Aaron thought sullenly. Words couldn't express her sympathy. Nor could a card with a wreath impression. One sentence and a short sign-off, sincere as it was. At the time, when he'd first opened the card, he'd resented those simple words. Resented more so his own reply, his two lines of regret for not attending the funeral as money was tight. That's what he'd written;

All apologies and condolences, sorry for the absence, but money was tight.

Aaron ran a thumb along the cards dull edge. It had seemed much crisper when it first arrived. He folded it shut, looked at the cover, the embossed wreath had also lost its edge, seeming flat and dull. He turned it over again to examine the back. There was no barcode, you wouldn't find that these days would you?

Everything was coded these days and they didn't make cards like they used to and penmanship wasn't the same as it was in Aunt May's day... and money was never that tight.

Aaron closed his eyes, held the card to his chest and sighed. Money was never that tight. Would that be his son Michael's excuse? Money too tight? Do you get what you give? Or don't give, as the case may be.

Aaron smiled only faintly at the thought of starting a savings fund for Michael, funeral fare for when his own time would come. He could even include a card to save Michael the trouble. The smile fell away and he stifled a sob as he realised that just wasn't funny. Nothing was.

Christmas... he always felt like this at Christmas. Always felt so alone, so fragile. It was as if each year he tore the wrapping paper and ribbon from his soul, leaving little to find the next, growing weaker and smaller each year. Or was it like that all year round, only noticeable in December?

77 years old. Living in a flat smaller than a third of the house he’d once owned. A flat smaller than a third of that house and it was only filled a third again by the meagre possessions he had. He had a shed once, had a garden. He'd sit in his shed and look out to the garden, hybrid smell of sawdust and turpentine dancing with that of flowers outside. Where had it all gone for Christ's sake? 76 years old and where had it all bleeding gone? What did he have to show?

'Aaron... Aaron are you okay out there?' Margaret called.

Aaron closed his eyes, didn't answer, hoping she'd call out again. Her voice had never changed, even when so much else had. He closed his eyes, didn't answer, and pictured the face to the voice. The face he had once asked to dance at the hall back in Sussex. Sometimes when Margaret spoke, when his eyes were shut or his back was to her, sometimes he'd hear her voice and feel young. Sometimes it felt like her voice alone was enough to carry them back, to sweep clean the sands of time.

'Aaron? What are you doing?'

He shut his eyes, didn't answer. Just one more time, he thought, just one.

'Aaron? Are you okay?'

He smiled, opened his eyes. 'I'll be out in a minute!' he called back.

He slid the sympathy card into the envelope, slid the envelope back into the box, neatly hidden behind the old diaries. He looked at the diaries, smiled, and then struggled the box back up on the shelf.

When he returned to the small lounge room Margaret threw a short glance before nosing back into her book. Aaron sat in his chair, looked at the heater, then looked across to Margaret.

'I was thinking...' he began in a hush, waiting for her attention. Margaret gave a soft “hmm...” then turned when he hadn't continued. 'I was thinking Margaret, there's four more days until Christmas and I've got you a present but...' He blushed.

'Yes Aaron?'

'Well,' he stared sheepishly at his lap. 'Well I thought I'd ask to be sure, but, would it be foolish of me to get you a diary?'

Margaret smiled. 'A diary?'

'Yes,' Aaron nodded. 'You used to always keep a diary. I just wondered if you still would, if you had one that is.'

Margaret put down her book and removed her glasses. 'It's a nice thought Aaron, but yes it would be foolish. It's been a long time since I kept a diary. What would I write about?'

Aaron nodded solemnly.

'Thankyou anyway Aaron, but it would be foolish. You'll be wanting me to get you a train-set next,' she laughed. 'No... you said yourself, everything changes.'

'Not everything...' Aaron whispered.

'What was that dear?' Margaret asked, picking up her book. When there was no reply she looked back to Aaron and frowned. 'What did you say Aaron? I didn't make it out.' She shook her head and frowned again when there was still no reply. 'You're a strange man Aaron Butler.'

Aaron smiled, closed his eyes and didn't answer. Only listened.

-- Cherri (sams@brigadoon.com), December 23, 2000