former employer. I don't think Empire ever sponsored so much as a Little League team.
The priest was followed by our Mayor Flynn, who was blessedly brief in his remarks. Then the premier of Nova Scotia began an interminable speech that I couldn't follow. Nancy huddled back against me.
About ten feet from us, four guys wearing Boston College varsity jackets started a chant. 'Light the fuckin' tree, light the fuckin' tree.'
I laughed. Nancy muttered, 'You're contemptible.'
Finally, Harry Ellis Dickson, the conductor emeritus of the Boston Pops Orchestra, had his turn. He introduced Santa to much squealing and wriggling among the kids, many of whom were hoisted by dads and moms onto shoulders. Then Harry led the crowd through several carols. 'O Come, All Ye Faithful,' 'Joy to the World,' 'Hark, the Herald Angels Sing.' Everybody knew the first few lines, most of us dah-dah-ing the rest.
Between carols Nancy sighed. 'We've become a one-stanza society.'
Two slim figures in oddly modified Santa outfits danced up the steps of the patio.
Nancy said, 'Who are they supposed to be'?'
'Santa's eunuchs.'
Again she shrugged off my arms. 'I take it back. You're beneath contempt.'
After a few more carols the star on top of the tree was lit, setting off a reaction in the crowd like the first firecracker on the Fourth of July. The long vertical strips of lights came on next. Then, beginning at the top, sequential clumps mixing red, blue, green, and yellow flashed to life, more a shimmer than individual bulbs, until the magic had hopped down the entire tree.
We finished with a universal 'Silent Night,' the crowd breaking up while the last notes echoed off the buildings.
'Maybe a half each left?'
Nancy shook her head as I held the bottle of Petite Sirah poised over her glass. She had traded the sweater and long johns for a puffy print blouse that brought out the color of her eyes. We were sitting at the dining table of the condo I rented from a doctor doing a program in Chicago. Only a couple of blocks north of the Pru, it was a short but cold walk from the tree-lighting ceremony.
Cold in more ways than one.
Nancy said, 'I cooked, so you clean.'
I corked the wine and cleared the table of the remains of a pretty good meal of lamb chops with mushroom- and-sausage rice. My praising the food, even its color and arrangement on the plate, hadn't done much to warm Nancy up.
From the kitchen I said, 'We can talk about it, or we can brood about it.'
No reply.
I loaded the dishwasher and sponged down the sink and counter. Back in the living room, Nancy was sitting stiffly on the burlappy sofa, using her index finger to swipe tears angrily from the sides of her eyes.
'Nancy – '
'Just shut up, okay?'
I stopped dead.
She said, 'I hate to cry.'
I believed that. As an assistant district attorney, Nancy had seen an awful lot. A person who cried easily wouldn't get through one of her typical days, much less the couple of years she'd put in.
I said, 'Is it one of your cases?'
Shake of the head.
'Medical? Physical?'
'No, dammit, it's you.'
'Me?'
'Yes.'
'My face? My breath? My – '
'Goddammit, John. It's…'
I walked toward her. Not told to stop, I sat next to her.
Nancy turned sideways to me, took a breath. 'Look, it's not easy for me to talk about my emotions. It never has been.'
'Hasn't affected-'
'Don't interrupt, okay?'
'Okay.'
She took another breath. 'My dad died when I was little, John. Three years old. They didn't have a tree-lighting ceremony in Southie, but even if they had, I didn't have him to swing me up onto his shoulders to watch it. I really don't remember him, not from real life. Just his face in photos, the pictures Mom kept. Holidays, especially Christmas, were hard on her because she did remember him from real life.'
I thought back to my holidays with Beth, then to the period after I'd lost her to cancer.
'Once Mom died, my last year of law school, I didn't like the holidays anymore. All I'd had of the early ones was Mom, trying her best to be both parents at once. The later ones, I was always kind of propping her up, keeping her in the spirit of the season. When I rented the Lynches' top floor, they tried to include me in their stuff, but it was awkward, you know? I wasn't anybody's niece or girlfriend or anything. I was just the poor tenant with no place else to go.'
'And then?'
'I met you. And for the first time, I thought I had somebody to share the holidays with. Really enjoy them, equal to equal, nobody making up for anything. I've been looking forward to the tree-lighting for weeks, then you behave like a freshman on his first trip to the big city.'
I thought she was overreacting, but I said, 'I'm sorry, Nance.'
'No. No, you're not. You don't even understand what I mean, do you'?'
'I understand. I guess what happened in my life just turned me a different direction as far as the holidays go.'
She sniffled.
I said, 'Maybe you just got under my skin a little over the marathon.'
A sour face. 'You big turd.'
'Finally, a term of endearment.'
She punched me on the arm. A little hard, but now playfully. 'That rugby shirt doesn't even fit anymore.'
Standing, I pulled it over my head, whirling it by a sleeve and letting it fly across the room.
Nancy looked at my pants. 'Never cared much for those corduroys, either.'
Leaning forward, I braced my hands on the back of the sofa to either side of her head. 'Lady, are you trying to get me into bed?'
'That depends.'
'On what?'
'On how much harder I have to try.'
Afterward, we lay in the dark under just a sheet. The window was open a crack, the wind whistling through. I was on my back, Nancy on her side, cuddled up against me.
'John, you ever think it's odd, the way we talk about it?'
'Can't be helped. Catholic upbringing.'
'No. I don't mean us us. I mean people in general. We call it 'making love'.'
'As opposed to…?'
'I mean, it just sounds so mechanical, almost like a label for some manufacturing process.'
'It's worse than that, Nance.'
