Page 47 of Tommy

18. HARDIN

I hadn’t anticipated for how much joy a tree would bring Tommy. He was obsessed with getting the decoration just right, and he wouldn’t put a single strand of tinsel of row of lights on it until he’d first drawn it out on paper to see what would look best. His excitement also might have had something to do with June ruining the surprise I’d had planned for him. I hadn’t picked out the teddy, but I knew June wouldn’t have steered me wrong with her choice.

Tommy sat in his underwear and a blanket around his waist, after I’d forced him to undress out of the snow wet clothes. He’d been too excited to notice how wet and cold they were at first, but I was adamant about him not getting sick, and he seemed to fight me on it with his actions at every turn with his lack of gloves or a scarf, and sometimes even too few layers.

As Tommy drew and showed each of them to me for suggestion, I was unboxing all the treats I’d asked June to get for me. I knew candy canes were a must for the tree, and also from an old recipe of peppermint hot cocoa. I wanted to make to make Tommy feel at home here, and that thought still surprised me considering how I’d been so willing to let him live in the cabin without any interference.

“The other option is just to throw everything in the box at the tree and then hope it sticks,” he said.

“And that would create a mess,” I reminded him. “I like the options you’ve shown me already.”

“Yeah, but they’re not amazing. And the back of the tree will be naked.”

“The tree is already naked.”

He snorted. “Born naked and the rest is drag.”

“That sounds familiar.”

“Well, it’s a quote from drag queen, RuPaul,” he said. “I guess you are gay then if you’ve heard it.”

“What do you mean I am.” I laughed, wondering if he’d been thinking this entire time that I was pretending.

“I just mean, you’re you, and I’d never have expected you to know how RuPaul was,” he said.

In my defense, I didn’t know who that person was, I’d only heard the phrase in passing or conversation while in the city on the couple of times a year I ventured off the ranch to visit one of the many cowboy associated conferences. A lot of them were to show off livestock, and when I worked with cattle, they were much more useful to visit. Now, I visited to see old friends and horses. The stable had room for four, but I was getting on in age now to be breaking in new horses.

Tommy eventually settled on a design for the tree, just as I made him one of the peppermint hot chocolate, topped with crushed candy cane, marshmallows, and a thick spiraled layer of whipped cream. And I was again went back on my word, from saying I wouldn’t help to wanting to give him my help. He needed it, the tree was tall and he was short.

I couldn’t recall the last time I’d helped dress a tree. It must’ve been back when I was a teen. On all the ranches I’d worked growing up, now many of them had Christmas trees, especially not in the bunk houses I’d lived in. The main houses where the owners lived often did because they had kids. I never had any particular jealousy toward it because I found the holiday season to be forced, everyone had an idea of what it should be, and how happy you had to feel. If you didn’t fit in that idea or feeling, then you didn’t belong.

In this moment with Tommy, I belonged.

Tommy had peculiarities for putting the tinsel, baubles, and lights on the tree, making sure they were accurate to the drawings, and the drawings weren’t to scale, so it was difficult.The only thing I could get right was the large star to go on top of the tree, but even that was scrapped for a new idea.

“We should put a teddy up there!” he said, grabbing me.

“You have a spare?”

“I do, but I—” he paused, breaking eye contact.

“Go on,” I said. “What’s the problem now?”

“If I put a teddy up there, it’s gonna stay,” he said. “And I’m gonna have to leave it behind.”

“You can take it when you go,” I told him. “I don’t know how long it’ll stay up once you’ve left anyway.” Either it would stay up, or all the needles would fall off, becoming bare and all of it would be thrown out, decorations and all. “But we don’t have to talk about you leaving, because it’s two weeks away.”

Tommy smiled again. “Good idea. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Perfect.” I pulled him in a squeeze of a hug and kissed him.

“Where’s the Santa hat?”

Stuffed in the back pocket of my jeans, the Santa hat was about to make a reappearance. I hadn’t intended on putting it back on, but if it meant seeing Tommy’s big smile, I’d wear it proudly, inside and where it was just the two of us.

Tommy grabbed the hat from my hands and then jumped up my body, wrapping his legs in place at my waist. “I might glue it on,” he giggled, fixing the hat to my head. “And that way you can never take it off.”

“That would be awful,” I told him. “You’ll pull my hair out and everything. That doesn’t sound kind.”

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