Page 44 of Always Us

Jade’s watching me. “Why are you getting so many lights?”

“Because you like lights, and so do I.”

“But 10 boxes?”

“We need some for the tree and some for the windows and wherever else you want them. You want me to switch out the blue lights in the bedroom for the multicolored lights?”

She looks like she wants to say yes, but instead she says, “That’s too much work. The blue lights are fine.”

I grab two more boxes of lights. “I’ll switch them out. I’m tired of the blue ones.”

She smiles really wide. I knew she wanted them changed out.

“Let’s go look at ornaments.” I take her hand and lead her to the next aisle. The shelves are full of boxes of shiny glass ornaments, the kind I hate because they remind me of Katherine. She’d only allow the decorators to use those fancy glass ornaments on our Christmas tree, along with white lights. That house is white enough. It doesn’t need even more white, especially at the holidays when you want a warm, homey feel.

When I was a kid, my mom decorated our tree with colored lights and a mix of ornaments we collected over the years. Every Christmas, my dad would give her an ornament. And every year, she’d take me to the store and let me pick one out for myself. I always picked ones that were sports-themed or superheroes, which didn’t match the nice ones my dad got her, but she didn’t care. To her, the tree was about family memories, not looking like it came out of a magazine. She’d even include the ornaments I made in school that were ugly, but special to her.

“I don’t really like any of these,” Jade says, picking up a box of blue glass ornaments. “They look like they’d shatter if you touch them. And I hate to say this, but they kind of remind me of Katherine. All of these do.” She motions to the rack.

I laugh. “I was thinking the same thing. So you want to look somewhere else? We don’t have to get the ornaments here.”

“Maybe we could just go with the lights.”

“You don’t want ornaments?”

“I do, but I don’t want to get them all at once.”

“Why not?”

“I was thinking that maybe we’d collect them over the years, like get a couple this year and a couple more next year and make them special for each year so they mean something. Like this year we could get some that would remind us of our first Christmas together as a married couple.”

I never told Jade about the Christmas tree I had as a kid so it’s odd that she’d suggest that. It’s almost exactly how my mom’s family did their tree and how she did ours.

Noticing my silence, she shrugs. “I guess it’s a dumb idea. You don’t want a tree with just two or three ornaments. We’ll just go to another store.”

“Jade, it’s perfect.” I lean down and kiss her. “I love that idea. Come on. Let’s check out and go home so we can get to work. We’ll stop for dinner so we don’t have to make anything.”

I take her to her favorite Mexican place for dinner, then we go home and start assembling the tree. Well, I do, while she watches.

“You sure you know how to do this?” She laughs as she watches me try to figure out which piece is the bottom.

I’m sitting at the kitchen table, looking at the diagram on the flimsy instruction sheet. “There are only four pieces, Jade. I think I can figure it out.”

“But your dad said you weren’t handy around the house.”

I stand up, tossing the instructions aside. “No, he said he wasn’t handy, not me. And this isn’t the same as installing a light fixture.”

“You think you could do that? Install a light fixture?”

“Yes. But I’d rather hire an electrician.” I pick up the tree section that appears to be the largest of the four and set it in the metal base. The base wobbles a little and I see that I forgot to put in the stabilizing pins.

“It’s not sitting straight,” Jade says, laughing. “Do you want me to do it?”

“Okay, that’s enough.” I pick her up and throw her over my shoulder. “You’re waiting here until I’m done.” I drop her on the couch and toss the remote on her lap. “Watch TV so I can do my work.”

“But I was helping.” She sits up, hanging over the back of the couch, watching me.

“You weren’t helping. You were disrupting my concentration. Now turn around.”

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