type, temp, yep, my, yet, met, pet, me, pye
WHEN I WOKE up the next morning, I tiptoed out of my room still wearing my rocket-ship pjs, which were starting to ride up my ankles. I thought I’d read my book on the couch for a while and have a piece of toast while Mom slept because she always sleeps late on Sundays.
So I was surprised to see her at the kitchen table, drinking a cup of coffee from the WORLD’S GREATEST MOM mug I’d bought her three years ago at a garage sale for twenty-five cents. She was looking through the Courier, a free newspaper that got delivered to the door twice a week. I poured a bowl of no-name multigrain flakes into a bowl and chopped up a banana on top and sat beside her. She was looking in the classifieds, under APARTMENTS FOR RENT.
‘Mom, c’mon.’
‘I’m not comfortable living in the same house as that young man,’ she replied.
‘But we don’t even know what he did.’
‘Well, whatever it was, it got him a jail sentence, so it can’t be good.’ She took a sip of her coffee. ‘I just can’t believe how expensive everything is.’
We spent the day doing laundry. The Economopouloses had offered their washing machine to my mom a zillion times, but she didn’t want to knock on their door and walk through their house to use their machine. So every weekend we wheeled a cartful of dirty clothes up to Broadway and Collingwood to the Laundromat. After laundry, we hit a few garage sales, and Mom found a great cable-knit sweater and I found some old Spider-Man comics and a kite. Then we walked to Jericho Beach because, for the first time in a while, it was a beautiful day, and we tried to fly the kite. It got tangled up in a tree and we had to leave it there, but at least it had cost only fifty cents.
That night we made a pizza – my favorite – and Mom even let me put pepperoni on half of it. After she’d done a bunch of exam marking, we played Scrabble. I won, 272 to 203, thanks to the words ‘WHIMSY’ on a triple word score and ‘JIVE’ on another, and Mom didn’t drink anything but water because the ouzo had made her feel kind of sick the night before. All in all, it was a very nice day.
And then it was Christmas. We bought a little tree. It was very Charlie Brownish, and we decorated it with all the decorations we’d made over the years. We did popcorn strings, and I wound up pricking my thumb with the needle a gazillion times, and we hung homemade paper snowflakes on our door. I liked walking down Broadway from Kidsbooks to Shoppers Drug Mart, where they strung up the most beautiful blue Christmas lights. If I squinted my eyes, the lights would go all fuzzy and it felt the way Christmas should.
On Christmas Day, Mom gave me a multicolored hat with a big pom-pom on top that she’d knit all by herself. And she gave me socks and underwear, and two new books – Inkheart by Cornelia Funke and Bud, Not Buddy by a guy named Christopher Paul Curtis. Nana Ruth sent me a cheque for twenty dollars and Mom a cheque for a hundred.
I gave my mom a picture frame from a kit I’d bought at the craft store on Broadway. I’d decorated it with all sorts of found objects, like moss and dried flowers, and inside I put a photo of the two of us. She got kind of teary-eyed when she opened it.
Then the phone rang and it was Nana Ruth. Mom spoke politely with her for ten minutes or so, then Nana and I talked for over half an hour, getting caught up. It was great to hear her voice. I’d sent her a picture frame too, with the same photo of my mom and me inside. ‘I love it,’ she told me. ‘I’ve got it sitting right on top of the piano, where I can look at it every day.’
‘I miss you, Nana.’
‘I miss you too, Ambrose. What’s it like in Vancouver?’
‘Not bad. It rains a lot.’
‘Well, we’re having a hailstorm here, so maybe rain is better.’
‘When will you come and visit?’
There was a pause on the other end of the line. ‘I’m not sure, hon. Soon, I hope.’
After we’d hung up, I felt a little blue. It was very quiet in the house because we were the only people there. The Economopouloses, even Cosmo, had gone to Mr E’s brother’s house in Maple Ridge on Christmas Eve, and they were staying until Boxing Day.
We put on Christmas music to fill the silence and ate a late breakfast of pancakes. Afterward we went for a long walk on the beach, then came home and made hot chocolate. For dinner, Mom cooked us a turkey breast because there was no point cooking an entire turkey for just the two of us. She didn’t overcook it, like she sometimes did, and it was very good. We had pumpkin pie for dessert and topped it with whipped cream from a can, which was a treat. Then we went for a short walk around the neighborhood to digest our food, and I gazed at all the Christmas lights and peered into all the brightly lit windows, where I could see families and friends enjoying each other’s company. When we got home, we watched It’s a Wonderful Life on the CBC, which we’ve done every Christmas Day since I can remember. We opened a bottle of Champagne – not real Champagne because that was too expensive – and Mom even let me have half a glass.
Around eleven o’clock, I went to bed and I waved at the picture of my dad and I wished him a Merry Christmas.
And then I put the pillow over my head so my mom wouldn’t hear me and I cried a little because, even though it had been a really nice day, I felt lonelier than I ever had in my entire life.