Merry Ex-Mas (10 page)

"Okay," I held up her hands, surrendering. "I'm sorry. It's just that
…
"

"Can we change the subject?" my father pleaded.

"Sure," I said. But it was tough to sit there because every time I looked over at Sabrina, I wanted to bust out laughing again.

So I just looked down at my hands as more seconds ticked by. Sabrina placed her hands on her belly and lowered her eyes. Anthony found something of interest outside the window, and my father moved between glancing at me, then looking away and shaking his head.

It was only because of my father that I wished I could take back my words. Even though all I'd been trying to do was help to get some kind of conversation started, I had to do better.

So, I tried again. "I have an idea."

Three pairs of eyes shot to me
—
all wide and filled with horror, as if I'd just pulled a gun on them.

"No, really," I said quickly, trying to assuage all of their fears. "I have an idea. A good idea. Let's open the gifts."

Collectively, they exhaled. And the cloud of disaster that hovered low and close, lifted.

Sabrina said, "That is a good idea, but do we want to do it so early?"

For a moment, I was taken back again to Christmases of decades past. When for Sabrina, it was never too early to open presents.

Sabrina kept on, "I mean, I was thinking after dinner." Then she looked at me and added quickly, "But if you want to open gifts now
…
"

"Yes, let's do it." My father shifted to the edge of his seat. "Sister Henderson said she'd bring dinner over about four."

I glanced at my watch. Good grief! That was almost two hours from now. How would we fill up all of that time?

Yes, we needed to open gifts
…
very slowly. And then, I needed to call Sister Henderson, the woman who'd been preparing special dinners for my father for all the years since my mother had been gone, and offer to triple pay her if she could get that turkey and dressing over here an hour earlier than planned.

"Okay," Sabrina said. "Then let's do the gifts." Her eyes twinkled with excitement, as if she were six years old once again. "I just have to send this one text," she added.

"Who you texting, baby?" Anthony asked.

"Just someone from the office," Sabrina said, already texting. It took her no longer than ten seconds before she said, "Alright, let's do this."

"I'll get the gifts." I jumped up and knelt under the tree before any of them could offer to help. I needed to do something with my hands so that my tongue would stay silent.

There were only four boxes, and they were all tagged with my dad's name. That's what I expected. I didn't know what Sabrina and Anthony did, but Dad and I hadn't exchanged Christmas gifts for years. My thoughts: my father didn't need to be spending his money on me, and really, I tried to make every day Christmas for my dad in some way.

"These are all for you, Daddy," I said, as I stacked the packages one on top of the other, then placed the gifts at my father's feet.

Dad rubbed his palms together and grinned. "Well, Merry Christmas to me!"

For the first time, we all laughed at the same time.

I settled back in my chair and watched my father brighten with joy. But then, I felt a shadow over me; it was Anthony.

"Merry Christmas," he said, holding a box. I stared at it for a moment, then glanced up at him, before my eyes returned to the box. The box and Anthony took me back in time. Back to our first Christmas
…

Even though I had on a sweatshirt and jeans, my feet were bare as I perched them up on the deck's railing. Although the ocean breeze was cool, the hot chocolate warmed me up. I took a small sip and then sighed.

This was the life! We didn't have a bit of money, but I felt like I had everything that money could buy. I had the business that had started formulating in my head when I was a freshman in college, and I was living in a Malibu home that I couldn't even have imagined when I was growing up on the hard streets of Compton.

Yup, I had everything.

"Good morning."

I glanced over my shoulder and smiled at Anthony standing at the sliding glass door. Oh, yeah
…
I had a husband, too. Not that Anthony was really an afterthought. It was just that to me, he was part of the business. When we'd met in graduate school, he was the one who encouraged me, planned with me, and then helped me make my dream come true.

"Good morning," I said. "Merry Christmas."

He stepped onto the deck and kissed my cheek. "Merry Christmas to you." He sat down in the deck chair lined up next to mine. "What time should we head over to your father's?"

I sighed. "I wish we could just spend our first Christmas here, looking out onto the ocean."

Anthony chuckled just a bit. "Your father would never go for that."

"I know. And neither would Sabrina. My little sister would drive over here and drag me back over there." I laughed, and then sighed. "I just want a few more minutes here. And then I'll get ready."

"Okay, but before we do that
…
" He paused and pulled a box from the pocket of the sweat suit that he wore. "Merry Christmas."

My mouth opened wide. "Oh, my goodness. I didn't expect this." Looking up at him, I added, "And I didn't get anything for you."

He held up his hand. "That's okay. I didn't give it to you so that I could get a gift in return." He nodded. "I saw this in the store the other day and thought of us. Go ahead, open it."

I hesitated because I felt so bad. This was our first Christmas together, and I swear, I didn't even think about buying Anthony a gift. I hadn't bought anyone anything. But now that I was sitting here in this moment, I guess I should have gotten my husband something.

"Go ahead," Anthony said once again.

I flipped the cover off the box and gasped. "This is beautiful," I said as I pulled out the silver half-heart charm that hung on a chain.

Anthony said, "I have the other half." He pulled down the high collar of his sweatshirt and showed me the other half of the heart hanging from a chain around his neck.

"We are two halves to one whole," he said as I sat up so that he could secure the chain around my neck. Then he wrapped his arms around me from behind. "My heart doesn't beat without you."

I wanted to say those words back to him, but I couldn't. I wanted to feel exactly the way he felt, but I didn't. I loved Anthony, I did. Because of all that he'd done for me. But the sentimental stuff
—
I'd been trying, but it just wasn't in me. I wanted to, but every time I thought about giving my heart to Anthony, I thought about my mother
…
and my father
…
and my mother's heart
…
and my mother's death.

But I had to find a way to stop making the sins of my father the sins of every man. All men were not the same. All men didn't cheat.

I massaged the silver heart that my husband had just given me. And with his arms around me, I made a silent promise to Anthony. I was going to try. From this Christmas forward I was going to try to be his loving wife. I was going to try to find a way to give my heart to him.

Leaning back into Anthony's arms, I rested against his chest. "I love you, Anthony," I said to him.

I felt him stiffen a bit with surprise because I'm sure he could count the number of times I'd said those words. But then, he relaxed and held me tighter. "I love you, too, baby. Merry Christmas."

I smiled, knowing that I'd just given my husband the best Christmas gift, the only gift that he wanted from me
…

"This is from me and Sabrina," Anthony said, making me blink my way back to 2013.

He was still holding the box out in front of me, and it took a couple of seconds for my brain to comprehend it. A gift? For me? From them?

"Uh...thank you." I took the box, wondering if I were supposed to tell them that I hadn't spent a nickel nor a dime to get them anything. "I didn't
…
"

Anthony held up his hand, just like he did on that Christmas morning so long ago. "No problem," he said, as if he knew what I was going to say. "We," he glanced over at Sabrina, "wanted to do this for you."

So what was I supposed to do now? Open it? Or wait?

Then Sabrina helped me make the decision. "Open it," she said, sounding once again like she was six. "I hope you like it."

Slowly, I unwrapped the box, starting at each of the ends, pulling the paper apart gently as if I planned to use the gift wrap again. The size of the box made it hard to keep my thoughts away from the past. This was just like the box that Anthony had given me back then.

I lifted the top of the box and gasped.

"You like it!" Sabrina exclaimed. "I'm so glad."

It took a moment for me to lift up the chain with a heart, a full heart this time, that dangled at the end. Another heart? From Anthony?

Then Sabrina explained, "I saw this in the store the other day and thought of us." Her words were eerie, just like the words Anthony had said back at our first Christmas. "Do you see the inscription?"

I turned the heart over in my hand:
A sister is a gift to the heart.
My eyes stayed on the words, reading them over again. And then, I felt that tug on my heart again. I knew what it was this time. Something was trying to pull me away from my anger. But I wasn't going to fall for the sentiment.

It wasn't until I heard my sister's voice that I looked up.

"I really mean that," Sabrina whispered. Now she was the one standing over me. I hadn't even noticed that she'd stood up.

Sabrina continued, "No matter what has happened, you've always been a gift from God to my heart." With her big belly and all, she leaned over and hugged me. "Merry Christmas, Sis."

Just as I lifted my arms to hug my sister back, to wrap her in an embrace for the first time in more than six years, the doorbell rang, and I jumped away from Sabrina and out of the chair. That doorbell felt like a save that had come directly from heaven.

"I'll get it." I rushed to the door, praying that Sister Henderson was on the other side, hours early with our dinner.

I pulled open the door, and a second after that, my mouth stretched wide with surprise. "Oh, my god!"

Sabrina had been right behind me, and she rushed through the door.

"I didn't think you were gonna get here on time," Sabrina said. Then, with a grin, she turned back and pulled him inside. "And now, here is my Christmas gift to everyone!"

He stepped over the threshold.

"Hey, everybody, Merry Christmas!"

"Oh, my god," I said again, as I wrapped my arms around his neck. "What are you doing here, D'Angelo?"

Now, this was a man that I wanted to hug.

He grinned when he stepped back. "It's good to see you again, Kendall."

"D'Angelo!" my dad exclaimed. He pushed himself up and moved to the door to greet him. "Man, it's so good to see you. How many years has it been?"

D'Angelo shrugged. "I don't know. Too long, though."

Finally, D'Angelo turned to Anthony. The two stared at each other for a long moment before D'Angelo reached out. "How you doing, lil bro? How you doin'?"

He embraced his brother, but from where I stood, I could see that Anthony's reaction to D'Angelo's hug was the same as my reaction had been to Sabrina's; he barely touched his brother.

I folded my arms and leaned against the door. Sister Henderson could take her time because I had no doubt there would be plenty of conversation now. Christmas had just become very, very interesting.

"So come on over here and sit down," my father said once D'Angelo stepped back and away from Anthony. "My, my, my, this is a great Christmas gift." He led D'Angelo to the chair where I had been sitting.

But I didn't mind. I had the best seat in the house. I stood, leaning against the wall near the door, feeling like an observer outside of the circle. Exactly where I wanted to be.

"So, are you just getting back in the country, or have you been here for a while?" my father asked.

"I just got back in from Iraq last night, Sir. I decided to come home after I heard from Sabrina."

"Sabrina?" Anthony piped in. His eyes moved from his brother to his wife. "You two've been in touch?" he addressed Sabrina.

"Yes," she said. "We've been talking through email."

Wow, that was a bold move. Talking to Anthony's brother without Anthony knowing it?

"And a couple of times on Skype," D'Angelo added.

I could tell by the way my sister bit the edge of her lip that she wished D'Angelo had kept that part of their communication to himself.

"Emails? Skype? Why were you guys even talking?" Anthony asked.

"I wanted him to know about the baby," Sabrina said quickly, and she placed her hand over her husband's. Only I seemed to notice the way Anthony slipped his hand away from Sabrina.

Sabrina explained some more, "I wanted him to know that he was gonna be an uncle."

I wondered if I were the only one who could feel my ex-husband's rage. Was it because we'd been married? Or was it because now I, too, felt rage?

Sabrina had contacted D'Angelo, who was halfway around the world, to tell him about her baby. Yet, she hadn't dialed the ten digits of a local number to call her sister? Hell, I would've appreciated even an email.

"So, how is it over there?" my dad asked.

D'Angelo shook his head. "The same. It's tough. Still unstable."

"But you're not in the military, right?" he asked. Before D'Angelo could answer, my father added, "For the life of me, I can't figure out why anyone would go over there if they didn't have to. What were you doing over there, Son?'"

D'Angelo paused for a moment, then said with a smile, "Well, Sir, I was making an honest living, but that's all I can say." A beat. "'Cause if I tell you, then I'll have to kill you."

Another beat, and then my dad leaned back and laughed. A hearty laugh, a cleansing laugh, a laugh that I hadn't heard from my father in a while.

Sabrina chuckled along, but Anthony didn't. And all I did was smile. D'Angelo may have been trying to present it as a joke, but I had a feeling that what he said wasn't that far from the truth.

D'Angelo was a bad boy from way back; he still wore his gangster swag like a designer suit.

He'd been back and forth between the US and Iraq since 2003, and from what I'd been able to piece together, he worked for some kind of militia; his was a private group, not sanctioned by the government. So, I was sure that D'Angelo meant what he said when he told my father that he couldn't share secrets. He lived on that kind of edge.

D'Angelo had been living like that for all the years that I'd known him, and for the many years before. Every time I was in the same room with this man, I was fascinated.

Two years older than Anthony, the brothers were as different as the East was from the West. While Anthony was a straitlaced, live by the law, live by the book kind of guy, D'Angelo didn't believe that there was a rule or a law written that applied to him.

According to Anthony, it was that thinking that had landed D'Angelo in juvenile detention centers for short stints several times before he was even sixteen. But he was bright, a superior athlete, and with the help of his parents, who were both teachers, and his high school guidance counselor who saw his potential, D'Angelo excelled his last two years in high school.

It was in high school where I met D'Angelo. Well, I didn't exactly meet him; actually, I didn't know him at all. I was just a freshman, he was a junior, and my girlfriends and I would be in awe every time we saw D'Angelo and his boys pimp-strutting through the halls of Compton High. It was funny to me later when I found out Anthony was in the same school; we were in the same grade. But I never noticed him at all. All the air was taken up by his brother.

After D'Angelo graduated, he attended the University of California at Berkeley, and the college years allegedly calmed him down. He ended up graduating with honors and tried his hand as a salesman in corporate America, first as a salesman for IBM, and then a pharmaceutical salesman.

But I guess old ways die hard because soon selling legal drugs had led to selling legal drugs illegally. And from what I heard, D'Angelo had moved up in the streets pretty fast. He was living large, well-respected, and always two steps ahead of the law. I always believed that it was D'Angelo's legal businesses (real estate, small business investments) that kept him off the radar. That, and a couple of cops on his payroll. He was even known around Compton as a philanthropist.

After high school, I never saw D'Angelo again. Just heard his name here and there, so I was shocked the day Anthony took me to his home, and D'Angelo was there. The teenage crush that I
’
d had came rushing back. But I was smart enough to know that it was only a crush. Plus by then, Anthony was really into me and I
…
was really into the business plan that Anthony and I were putting together.

"The whole region is still recovering from the US invasion."

D'Angelo's voice brought me back, and as he talked to my dad, I crouched down and sat on the floor with my back against the wall and my knees pulled to my chest. I just sat there and listened as the conversation flowed easily between my dad and D'Angelo, with an occasional question from Sabrina. It was only those three who spoke; Anthony and I didn't say a word.

They'd been talking for about an hour when my father said, "Wait a minute; you've been here all this time, and I haven't offered you anything to drink. You want something?"

"Maybe just a glass of water," D'Angelo said.

Before my father could stand, I did. "I'll get it for you." I asked, "Does anyone else want anything?"

When my dad, Sabrina, and Anthony shook their heads, I moved toward the kitchen, grabbed a glass from the cabinet, and when I turned around, D'Angelo was standing right behind me.

"I would've brought this to you," I said.

"Why would I let you bring this to me when this will give me a couple of minutes to spend just with you?"

I tilted my head just a little. Was he flirting with me? And then I pushed that thought right out of my mind. No, he was just doing what bad boys did. He talked to all women this way. Every conversation was a flirtation. I held the glass up to the dispenser on the refrigerator, filled it with water, then handed it to him.

He took the glass, sipped, and said, "I was really sorry to hear about you and my brother." He glanced over his shoulder and made a motion with his head toward the living room. "What the two of them did to you, that was foul."

"So they told you?" I asked. I folded my arms and leaned against the counter.

"No,
they
didn't." He swallowed the rest of the water. "Sabrina did." Resting the glass in the sink, he asked, "So, even with all of that, you guys are cool?"

Sabrina obviously hadn't told D'Angelo everything, and I wasn't about to explain the real reason why I was here. Whatever my dad wanted D'Angelo to know, he'd have to tell him himself. So all I said was, "Cool is not exactly the word I'd used. But we try
…
mostly for my father, you know."

He nodded. "Yeah. I've always liked your dad. He's cool people." He stood next to me, mimicked my stance, and leaned back against the counter. "So you haven't remarried?"

I shook her head. "Nope. I've been too busy with life, with my business. Haven't had too much time."

Then he did that thing that all bad boys seemed to do. With hooded eyes, he looked me up, then he looked me down, and then he did it again. "You sure've been doing something, 'cause you look good!"

I laughed, though I was filled with a couple of other emotions, too. Like, how uncomfortable D'Angelo was making me feel; but how at the same time, I kinda liked it.

It had been a long time since any man had shown me any kind of attention. Or maybe I should correct that and say it had been a long time since I noticed. After Anthony, I'd decided that getting married had been a bad move, and I wasn't going to try again.

But this right here, standing with D'Angelo, felt
…
interesting.

"You know," D'Angelo said and then he leaned a little closer. "My brother's loss is going to be another very, very, very lucky man's gain."

He was so close to me now that his breath heated my skin. He was so close that surely he could feel my heart beat.

"Excuse me!"

At the sound of Anthony's voice, I jumped away from D'Angelo, leaping to the other side of the kitchen. But D'Angelo didn't move an inch. He just lifted his head, turned to his brother, and grinned.

"What's up, bro? Me and Kendall were just catching up."

Anthony glared at his brother, and before a fight broke out, I asked him, "Did you want something?"

"Uh
…
no. When you didn't come back, I wondered
…
yeah, I want a glass of water." Anthony marched to the cabinet, got his own glass, filled it with water, and just stood there.

I expected him to take his glass back with him into the living room. But he made it clear; he wasn't going anywhere.

I could actually feel the air, it was so thick, but it seemed like I was the only one who noticed. Because Anthony just stood there glaring at his brother, and D'Angelo just stood there, chuckling at Anthony.

Since I wasn't going to be able to stop whatever was going to go down between the two of them, I made a move to leave them alone. But before I stepped out of the kitchen, I said, "Remember, it's Christmas."

I didn't get two feet out of the kitchen, though, when the doorbell rang. I glanced up at the clock
—
just a little before four.

"That's our dinner," I said, thinking that this was another bell-saving moment. It would at least put the all-out battle I felt brewing between the brothers on hold.

When I rushed out of the kitchen, D'Angelo followed behind me. My father got to the door before I did.

"Sister Henderson," my dad greeted the woman. "Merry Christmas."

"Same to you, Brother Leigh." She lugged in a sagging pan that looked like it was filled with a twenty-pound turkey. "The rest of the food is in the backseat of the car," she said as she traipsed through the house.

My dad and D'Angelo jogged down the three steps to the walkway just as Sabrina pushed herself from the sofa. "I'm going to go to the bathroom before we sit down to eat," she announced.

As my father and D'Angelo came back into the house, Sister Henderson and I took the dishes from them and lined them onto the serving table in the dining room.

"Now, if y'all are gonna eat right away, we won't have to worry about heating any of this good food up," Sister Henderson said.

"Ma'am, may I just say that I'm ready to eat right now," D'Angelo said. "This looks so good."

"This young man has been over in Iraq," my dad explained. "He ain't seen food like this in months."

As Sister Henderson chatted with the two men, I decided that this would be my moment to escape. The way that food looked, the way I planned to eat, I needed to get comfortable. My plan was to go into the bedroom, kick off my boots, and slide into my slippers.

But right as I got outside of my bedroom, I stopped. It was the hushed voices that made me press my back against the hallway wall, then tilt my head so that I could hear.

"I can't believe you did that, Sabrina," Anthony whispered. "You know how I feel about him."

"With our baby coming, I just thought we needed to fix all of that. We've got to get this family right." Sabrina's voice was as low as his.

"You haven't been talking about fixing anything with Kendall."

"Are you kidding me? I've wanted to fix things with my sister since forever."

"Yeah, well, you haven't made much of an effort."

"Look, Anthony
…
"

"No, you look. I don't want to have anything to do with D'Angelo, and you know that. But you didn't care about my feelings. You were just gonna try to force it."

"He's your brother; he's family. And that makes him worth fighting for."

"Why? Why should I fight for a relationship with the one person who's responsible for my parents' death."

"He's not responsible for that. It was an accident, and I can't believe that you're still saying that."

"It wasn't an accident!" Anthony growled. "You know what people on the street are saying."

"People on the street? Really? Years later and you're still listening to people on the street? Why not listen to the police?"