Christmas morning. A cold and blustery north wind had picked up overnight, whipping the Santa Monica Bay into a cauldron of angry white. To the west, ominous clouds hung on the horizon, heralding another approaching storm.
As I started up the coast, the back of my Suburban laden with groceries and presents, I scanned local radio stations, futilely attempting to find one that wasn’t playing Christmas music. Finally I gave up and rode in silence. Approaching Malibu, I noticed that the skies over the palisades were thick with gulls, wheeling and soaring in currents of air thrown up by the cliffs. Glumly, I sensed myself, like the birds, caught in the grip of forces I could neither predict nor control. Over the past months it seemed my life had been twisted and buffeted and sent spiraling in directions I’d never expected, and there appeared to be nothing I could do about it.
Again and again my thoughts returned to Catheryn. My infidelity with Lauren had been a mistake-a terrible, hurtful, inexcusable mistake. But it was finished. What about Catheryn and Arthur? How long had that been going on? Unable to accept that my marriage might be over, I pushed away the image of Catheryn sleeping with another man.
I realized I was at a crossroads. Unexpectedly, I asked myself a question that I hadn’t considered for a quite some time: With all the possible future courses my life could take, what was really important to me? My job? My marriage? My family? My freedom? What did I truly want?
The answer that came back was immediate and unconditional. I wanted Catheryn. And I wanted my family to be whole again, healthy and intact. And despite everything that had occurred, I was resolved to make that happen. No matter what.
When I arrived at the beach house, Catheryn barely acknowledged my presence. During a curt exchange, she quickly made it clear that I was there solely for the children’s sake, and that any discussion between the two of us would take place after Christmas. Afterward she avoided me altogether. But if not a truce, at least a ceasefire prevailed, and although puzzled that she hadn’t mentioned Nate and Ali’s revelation regarding the break-in, I resigned myself to postponing a discussion of my relationship with Catheryn, as well as deciding what to do about Allison and Nate, at least until tomorrow. Since that day in the cemetery I had detected a change for the better in both of my younger children, and in Travis as well-an improvement I attributed to their having finally revealed their secret. I also knew it was merely a first step, and I wasn’t certain what the next one should be. Nevertheless, I felt confident that Catheryn would, and that she had probably already begun.
As if trapped between warring camps, after my arrival the children gradually staged strategic retreats to various locations in the house-Travis joining his mother in the music room, Allison retiring to her bedroom to work on an essay for school, Nate shadowing me in the kitchen.
Ninety minutes later, to the sound of Catheryn and Travis’s playing drifting up from the music room, I glanced around my kitchen workspace. Having finished my initial preparations, I began mentally ticking off elements of the holiday meal. As usual I was preparing the entire Christmas feast, and despite enthusiastic but dubious aid being offered by Nate, everything was progressing on schedule. The turkey was trussed, mounted, and turning on the Farberware rotisserie. Although the large bird had been cooking only an hour, the skin was already turning a crisp, golden brown. A pot of potatoes sat on the stove-pared, quartered, and ready for boiling. A saucepan containing gravy giblets simmered on a back burner. The yams were baking in the oven. The pies could wait. Time to get the dressing going.
Glancing at my youngest, I discovered that he had already begun, with predictable results. “You done helping yet, squirt?” I asked patiently.
“Sorry, Dad,” said Nate, gathering a scattering of seasoned bread crumbs he’d spilled while ripping open the bag. Brushing his palm across the counter, he swept them into a large metal bowl. “Good as new.”
“Right, if you like dog hair in your stuffing.”
“It’s not stuffing, Dad,” Allison pointed out, joining us in the kitchen. “Stuffing goes inside the bird and gets all mushy. You’re making dressing. ”
“Correct. Nice and gooey too, right?”
“No!” both children cried.
Callie, who had been sleeping in the corner, sat up in her basket. She had recently come into season, and her normal run of the house had been restricted to kitchen privileges only. Already confused by her puzzling confinement, she reacted to Allison’s and Nate’s outburst with cocked ears and a quizzical turn of her head.
“Wet, dry, I don’t see what difference it makes,” I teased. “You two always slop so much gravy on your plates, I may as well make everything soggy to begin with.”
“Gravy-soggy’s not the same as soggy-soggy,” Allison pronounced with a conviction that would bode no argument. Leaning over, she examined the lineup of ingredients I’d arranged on the counter. “What’s going in this year?”
“Same as always. Turkey feathers, the Pope’s nose, maybe a couple of Callie’s fur balls.”
“C’mon, Dad. You’re not putting in oysters this time, are you?”
“No. That was a mistake,” I said somberly, referring to an experiment the previous Christmas that had met with less than categorical approval. “No more oysters. I’m the worst dad on the face of the planet for ever putting them in. Now, quit your yammering and let me get to work.”
“Can I do something else?” asked Nate.
“Besides bugging me, you mean?”
“Besides that,” Nate giggled.
“Okay, dice the onions. And keep your fingers curled like I showed you. Make sure it’s only onions you chop.”
“Jeez, Dad. I know how to do it.”
“Just checking. You want to help, Ali?”
As Allison started to answer, a series of hacking coughs interrupted her reply. “Nope,” she finally managed. “Two maestros in the kitchen are enough.”
“You coming down with something?”
Allison sat on a counter beside the stove. “I’ll live.”
“I hope so. You sound terrible,” I said, turning again to my cooking. Using a large chef’s knife, I cut up several sticks of celery, a half pound of mushrooms, and some giblets I had reserved from the simmering-pot. I sauteed these in butter, adding the onion that by then Nate had reduced to a pile of irregular chunks.
As the smell of butter and onion joined the aroma of roasting turkey, I chopped a red pepper, a handful of parsley, and a large bag of walnuts. These I dumped into the bowl of seasoned bread crumbs, then stirred in the contents of the saute pan. That done, I shook in salt, paprika, nutmeg, thyme, and basil, moistened the contents with chicken broth, and thoroughly mixed everything together. A sprinkling of dry sherry finished it off.
“Is that it for now?” asked Nate, watching as I ladled the dressing into a baking pan and covered it with aluminum foil. “Can we open presents?”
I checked the turkey thermometer, then glanced around the kitchen one last time. “That’s it, at least for a while,” I said, speaking more to myself than the children. “The bird’s doing fine. We’ll get the potatoes going an hour before the turkey’s done and shove the dressing in the oven around the same time, along with the pies. I can do the rest later,” I added, referring to various side dishes that, as at Thanksgiving, always accompanied the Kane Christmas meal.
“So it’s time?”
I smiled. “It’s time. Let’s open gifts.” Turning for the living room, I slapped my palm against my forehead. “Oh, no.”
“What’s wrong?” asked Allison.
“Shoot,” I groaned. “I forgot to get you kids anything.”
“No, you didn’t,” laughed Nate. “I saw you bringing in presents when you got here!”
“Maybe I did get you all a lump or two of coal,” I conceded. “Ali, tell your mom and Travis it’s time to rip open the gifts. And take Callie out for a quick walk before we start, okay? Her eyes are turning yellow.”
“Her eyes are always that color.”
“Just do it, Allison.”
“Sure, Pop. C’mon, Callie.”
“And don’t forget she’s in season. I have a breeding lined up for her next heat with a champion field-trial Lab, but tomorrow she’s going to the vet’s till this heat’s over. In the meantime, I don’t want her hooking up with
