Bluegrass Christmas

“Merry Christmas,” greeted the woman behind the counter. “I’m Emily Sorrent, we met at church. You’re Mary, right?”

Mary was still adjusting to strangers calling her by name. “That’s me.”

“Must be hard to be in such a new place for the holidays. Away from home and family and all. Are you settling in okay?”

Mary imagined such a new start might be a challenge around Christmas—for other people. For her, it was the best present of all. “Just fine. It’s so peaceful here.”

Emily smiled. “Peaceful? Are you sure you’re in Middleburg? I haven’t seen our little town so worked up in years. No, Ma’am, ‘peaceful’ is not a word I’d use to describe Middleburg these days.”

“That’s okay. People used to think the big city orchestra where I worked was glamorous, but I wouldn’t ever describe it that way, either.”

Emily got a funny look on her face and turned away for a moment under the guise of arranging some holiday ornaments. Mary couldn’t figure out what she’d said wrong. Maybe being new in town wasn’t all fresh starts and clean slates. “I saw that blue vase in the window,” she offered, changing the subject. “I think it would be perfect for my dining-room table.”

“It’s made by an artisan in Berea,” Emily described, brightening. “That color is his trademark. Look, here’s an ornament he made in the same style.” She held out a brilliant blue sphere with a sparkling gold center. “For your tree.”

“Oh,” Mary interjected, brushing her off. “I don’t think I’ll get a tree up this year.”

Emily looked surprised. “No Christmas tree? You can’t be serious?”

Mary took in the store, and realized there must be six fully decorated trees in Emily’s shop alone. The woman took her holiday decorating very seriously. Even for a retailer.

“There’s just me. I’d never be able to lug a tree up all the stairs to my apartment, and I own about three ornaments, besides. Christmas was my busy season in past years, and I never really had time to do all the trimmings. I’ll just take the vase, thanks.”

Emily crossed her arms over her chest. “No, you won’t.”

“What?”

“I don’t know where you came from, but if you’ve never had a real Christmas, Mary Thorpe, it’s high time you got one. And I am going to start you off. You can buy the vase, but it just so happens I’m running a special today. Every vase purchase comes with a free Christmas ornament. And I happen to know a whole bunch of big burly guys who will gladly lug your tree anywhere you want it. MCC’s new drama director will not be too busy to have her own Christmas if I have anything to say about it. And I’m on the church board and the town council, so you can bet I have something to say about it.”

Mary could only smile. “Okay, I’ll think about it.” She’d just effectively been commanded to have a happy holiday, and she couldn’t be more pleased. She took the ornament and spun it in the sunlight, enjoying the blue and gold beams it cast around the room. “Dinah warned me about you.”

Emily winked. “Oh, honey, you ain’t seen nothing yet.”

Chapter Three

Curly was singing.

This was a bit hard to take, especially because the bird insisted on singing the same piece of music he’d learned from Mary Thorpe’s stereo earlier. Even an extra dose of sunflower seeds had failed to quiet the cockatoo. Mac looked up from the drafting table a third time, then let his forehead fall into his hand. “Enough, bird. You were funny once—and not really funny at that—but you’re singing on my last nerve.”

“Yep!” Curly squawked, and Mac regretted—for the umpteenth time today—teaching the bird to agree with everything he said.

There was only one thing for it. Maybe the sheer repetition of the aria had stomped out his neurons, but Mac was relatively certain the only way to stop this bird from singing the same thing over and over was to give him something new to sing. And while the Kentucky Fight Song might have been a masculine choice, Mac also knew that would wear even worse than the opera.

He felt like a complete idiot walking up the stairs to Mary Thorpe’s apartment with Curly doing the bird equivalent of humming—a sort of half whistling noise accompanied by a comical head bob—on his shoulder. He didn’t, however, have Mary’s phone number, and he was sure in another hour he’d be incapable of putting a sentence together. “Behave yourself for both our sakes,” he told Curly as he knocked on the door.

She opened the door cautiously, trying not to broadcast her alarm at seeing Curly. “Hi there,” she said too kindly, forcing her smile.

“Do you think,” Mac spoke, finding the words more idiotic by the second, “we could teach Curly something else? I’m living with a broken record here and it’s driving me nuts.” On a whim he looked at the bird and stated, “You need a bigger repertoire, don’t you, boy?”

“Yep!” Curly squawked, nodding.

“No offense to your opera,” Mac confessed, “but I don’t think I could take even my favorite song nonstop like he’s been doing.”

She opened the door a bit more. He could see she’d gotten much farther in her unpacking, and the small apartment was starting to look like a home. “Haven’t you taught…” she inclined her head toward the feathered occupant of Mac’s right shoulder.

“Curly.”

“Curly any other songs?”

Curly bobbed a bit at the mention of his name. “No, actually. I didn’t know he could sing until you moved in. Seems bluegrass doesn’t interest him, but whatever it was…”

“Mozart,” she reminded, a hint of a smile finally making its way across her features.

“…catches his fancy. So,” Mac continued, daring to bring Curly off his shoulder to sit on his forearm, “you got any more Mozart for Curly to learn? A CD of something quiet and background-ish to get me through these last two days?”

Mary opened the door wide, raising one eyebrow. “Mozart didn’t write elevator music.”

“There’s got to be something. As long as it’s not the 1812 Overture, it’ll be an improvement.”

“I’m not in the habit of giving singing lessons. Not even to humans.”

Curly started in on the aria again.

“I’ll pay you. Another ten minutes of this and you can name your price.”

Mary looked at the bird. “Hush up, Curly.” She had a teacher’s voice—gentle, but you knew she meant business.

Wonder of wonders, Curly hushed. Now Curly gets cooperative? Where was all that avian obedience ten minutes ago? “Whoa,” Mac reflected, turning Curly so he could look him in one traitorous black eye. “Teach me that first.”

Mary shrugged, as if she didn’t have an answer to that, and motioned Mac and Curly into her apartment. Mac was right—she had settled in. The place looked more lived-in than the months Cameron Rollings had laughingly called it his “bachelor pad.” She went to her bookcases, traveling through her CD collection with dainty flicks of her finger. “I’m thinking he needs voices, so none of the chamber music will do—that’s all mostly instrumental. Oh,” she noted and plucked a CD from the shelf, “this might work.”

She inserted the disc into her player and a soft, high, female voice lilted out of the speakers. Curly cocked his head to one side. Mary looked at Curly and sang along, conducting with her forefinger. Curly began inspecting Mac’s watch.

“I’m thinking that’s a ‘no.”

Mary pulled another selection and popped it into her sound system.

The same tenor voice as Curly’s previous obsession came over the speakers, but this time Pavarotti was singing Italian songs. The kind guys in striped shirts sang as they pushed boats through Venice. Not very hip, but still better than opera. Mary walked up to Curly and began singing along, conducting with her fingers again. This time Curly took notice, swooping his head around to match the movement of her hand. She caught Mac’s eye, and they both nodded. “I suppose technically I have you to thank for my job, since part of my job description is to take everyone’s mind off the mayoral conflict. This lesson will be on the house.” She sang a few more bars as the chorus came around again, and Curly began making noises. “Future lessons from the tonic for Middleburg’s mayoral malaise might cost you.”

“Very catchy, but I don’t think it’s the civic disaster they’re making it out to be.”

“For what it’s worth,” Mary said over the swelling music, “neither do I.”

“There will be no more lessons. The floor guys will be done with my house by Friday. After that, Mr. Music here stays home.” Pavarotti launched into another song, a Dean Martin number Mac recognized from his ma’s record collection. “Who knew my bird has such questionable taste in music?”

“Curly has very good taste, actually.”

When she looked at him, he realized he’d just insulted her CD collection. Just hitting them out of the ballpark here, MacCarthy, aren’t we? She didn’t say so, but it glared out of her eyes just the same; better taste than you, evidently.

“Could I make a copy of that CD?” he said sheepishly.

“Music is copyrighted material, Mr. MacCarthy. I’m sure you wouldn’t take kindly to my Xeroxing your latest blueprints and passing them around, would you?”

“Okay,” Mac conceded slowly, feeling like this conversation had started off badly and was slipping further downhill fast.

She softened her tone as she handed him the CD. “But you may borrow this one for the moment. If Curly needs further…inspiration…I’m sure you can find your way to a copy. An original copy, bought and paid for.”

“Absolutely. You got it.” Mac took the slim plastic box from her, and Curly put his head up to it, rubbing against the corner in a disturbingly lovesick gesture. “And, well, I’m sorry you got hired to fix whatever it is people think I broke.”

“I’m not sorry,” she commented, opening the door for them to go, “but if I get sorry, I’ll make sure you’re the first to know. I think it’s sort of sweet, actually, how much people care about getting along here.”

“If people cared about getting along here, you could have fooled me,” Mac observed. “There’s a town hall meeting tomorrow night—come see how much getting along we actually do.”

“Pastor Anderson,” Mary began.

“Dave,” the older man corrected.

“Dave,” she said, still not entirely comfortable with the concept of calling a member of the clergy by his first name. Up until this summer, she’d seen people like Dave Anderson as almost a different species. High, lofty souls who didn’t bother with the likes of “sinners” like herself. Not that she thought of herself as a sinner. She was pretty proud of all her accomplishments then. Back before she’d realized “achievement” didn’t always translate into “happiness.”

It was, in fact, happiness she was speaking of—at least to Dave. “You know, Dave,” she continued carefully, “I’m worried about how much people are expecting out of this Christmas drama.”

He smiled. “You’ll do fine. Actually, when you think about it, you can’t help but do fine. You’re our first drama coordinator, so folks don’t have anyone to compare you to. You can’t help but improve us. And they like you already—I can tell.”

How to say this? “It’s not the drama I’m worried about. It’s the…well, the result you’re looking for. Don’t you think town unity’s kind of a high expectation for a little church drama?”

Pastor Dave sat back in his chair. “That’s because you’re expecting it to be a little church drama. It will be church, it will be drama, but I guarantee it won’t be little. Complications might be just what the doctor ordered in this case.” His eyebrows lowered in concern. “I want you to pour your creative energies into making this as all-consuming as possible.”

“Aren’t there more direct ways to resolve the town’s conflict?”

“I suppose there would be—if the town was willing to admit they had a conflict. Most of them want a big Christmas extravaganza to make them feel good. Just you and I and a few other wise folk realize they need something to agree on to take their minds off the many disagreements.”

“What about Mac and Howard?”

The pastor chuckled. “I think Mac knows he stirred up a hornet’s nest. He enjoys it—always has been one to whip things up a bit. I think Howard feels the conflict, but he’s likely to read it all wrong. He feels attacked because I think he’d much rather change on his own terms, not on those of someone like Mac.”

“But Howard was bound to retire someday.” Mary leaned one elbow on the corner of Dave’s desk. She was still sorting out the complexities of “simple little Middleburg.”

“I’m not so sure Howard’s caught on to that truth yet. He’s been mayor for so long he may not remember how to be anything else. We’ve got sixth-graders who’ve never known Howard as anything but mayor. You have to respect that.”

“All things considered, I’m not so sure a Christmas pageant is the way to cope. We’re sticking a tiny bandage on a great big wound here.”

“Miss Thorpe, you ever been a parent?” He got up from his chair and walked over to his office windows overlooking the preschool. “Ever given a toddler a bandage?”

“I’m sure I have at some point.” Mary didn’t really see where he was heading.

“They believe it makes things better. A child may get stitches for a nasty gash, but they won’t calm down until somebody puts on a bandage. It’s the stitches that do the real healing, but they still need the bandage. You and I know it’s an illusion, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work.” He grinned and pointed at her. “Some of my best work is done with Band-Aids.”

Mary blinked. “I’m a diversionary tactic?”

He walked toward her. “Would it make it easier if I said you were a coping mechanism?”

This had started out as a simple job. A calmer life serving an undiluted purpose, a chance for Mary to get away from the agenda-laden world of professional music and advertising. Suddenly she had more agendas than a diplomat and a goal so complex and obscure she could no longer say what it truly was. “I’ve got a headache just trying to make sense of this.” She looked up at him. “Can I have a Band-Aid?” It was supposed to be a joke, but Mary couldn’t quite muster the confidence to pull it off.

“Take two rehearsals and call me in the morning,” Pastor Dave joked.

Mary sat in her living room that afternoon, trying to make sense of it all. How many people thought of the drama as just a nice holiday event? How many of them were aware of its secondary goal of unifying the community? How to balance the two? Lord, I prayed for hours over this job. I asked You to take me someplace where I could figure out all this faith stuff. Someplace easier than Chicago. This isn’t looking easier.

Mary smiled as the faint strains of Pavarotti’s tenor voice singing “Ave Maria” reached her ears. She wondered if Mac found it an improvement over the Mozart aria. It was hard to think of that bird crooning a ballad. Too bad it wasn’t summertime; she’d have been able to hear Curly through the open window.

Then again, maybe it was better all the windows were shut. She wasn’t entirely sure Curly the cockatoo was up to the high note at the end of the song.

Laughing at the thought of the bird straining to hit the note, his creamy neck extended and his feathers fluttering, Mary reached for the mail that had been forwarded from her old Chicago apartment. She sorted through the envelopes until she spotted the familiar gray stationery of Maxwell Advertising. She’d forgotten, until now, that she had one more bonus coming. She opened the envelope and slid out a substantial check. How ironic that her “swan song” had been her most lucrative project ever. God had given her enough resources to take whatever job she wanted, wherever she wanted. And He had brought her here. Maybe, for now, she could trust that, despite the growing complexities.

Mac shut the door to his office with a fierce thunk and walked briskly toward Deacon’s Grill. A piece of pie couldn’t really do anything about the storm of aggravation he carried around, but it couldn’t hurt, either. At least a warm cup of coffee might soothe his annoyance. “Peace on earth, goodwill toward men?” Today felt more like “profits on earth, bad will toward any consumer.” No wonder Ma had asked him to handle the procurement of one of those idiotic Bippo Bears for his nephew, Robby. Finding the fuzzy blue singing bear proved to be more like warfare than Christmas shopping. Not counting the two trips to two separate malls yesterday, Mac had just spent three hours on the phone and Internet in search of a Bippo Bear. He sat down on his counter stool at the Grill with such force that the thing rocked under his weight.

Gina, no stranger to diner psychology, read his body language and immediately swapped out the ordinary sized stoneware mug at the island for a much larger one she produced from under the counter. Gina was smart. “Regulars” who obviously had a bad day were quickly given what she called a “comfort cup.” That was Gina’s entirely-too-female term for “the really big mug of coffee.” He accepted it gladly, needing the hot beverage too much to care that it announced his disgruntled mood to the rest of the diner. He was pretty sure his entrance had already done that, anyway.

“And a Merry Christmas to you, too, sugar,” Gina said as she slid the sugar container in front of Mac withholding the cream pitcher. Apart from baking the best pies around, Gina also had a great memory for customer preferences. “Rough going on the campaign trail?”

Campaign? Who had time for a campaign when Christmas shopping was sucking half his day into the trash can?

Gina’s reference to the mayoral campaign halted Howard Epson in his conversation. Mac hadn’t even noticed Howard as he came in, he was so annoyed. Epson and his wife were sitting in their favorite corner booth with Mary Thorpe of all people, probably advising her on the mayor’s expected role in all holiday ceremonies. Divine drama aside, he was sure Howard took pains to stay a highly visible mayor during the MCC’s Christmas season.

Mac swallowed a gulp of coffee, telling himself to back down off his soapbox. Howard could get to him so easily these days. They’d chalked up a lot of reasons to dislike each other over the years, some of which everyone knew—Mac had a long, checkered history of behavior Howard disapproved of—and some that were more private.

Years ago, when Mac was a senior in high school, he’d pulled a prank of sorts that ended up with Howard in the crosshairs. Actually, to call it a prank was making it too deliberate—it was more of an impulsive reaction. A stupid, angry gesture that ended up damaging church property and Howard’s car one night. The whole town had seen the wreckage, but no one had ever discovered Mac was behind it. When God and the passing years finally granted Mac some maturity, he’d still never found it in himself to fess up to the deed. Howard would surely blow it way out of proportion, and Mac had convinced himself it was one of those secrets best left buried. Not that it hadn’t nagged at him over time, but lots of stuff about Howard bothered Mac—civic and personal. It was one of the reasons he felt God had asked him to run for mayor; to prove he was better than the angry kid he once was.

Mac caught sight of one of Howard’s campaign brochures on the place setting next to Mary. She was surely getting a suggestion or two about the proper way to vote. At Gina’s mention of the campaign, Howard inclined his balding head slightly toward Mac and stopped his words midsentence. Even the French fry on the way to his mouth had been stilled halfway. Mary Thorpe caught Mac’s glance for a split second before looking down into her pie.

“No,” Mac answered Gina’s earlier question clearly enough for Howard to hear. “The campaign’s going fine.” He tried not to emphasize the word too much. “As a matter of fact, it’s a pathetic stuffed animal that has me riled up. I’ve just wasted half the morning trying to find something called a Bippo Bear for my nephew. Evidently even the secret service couldn’t get their hands on one of these if they wanted to—and don’t you know, it’s the one and only thing Robby wants for Christmas.”

“A what?” Gina asked, flipping open her order pad and pulling a pen out of from behind her ear.

“A Bippo Bear. It’s blue and sings to you and can’t be found for love or money. Already. And it’s still early December. What is it with these toy people? Don’t they realize they have to make enough of these things to go around? Do they enjoy disappointing kids and making parents crazy?”

Drew Downing looked up from his sandwich a few seats to Mac’s left. “Bippo Bear? I saw something on the news last night about those.” Drew used to host a church renovation television show until an episode had brought him to Middleburg and introduced him to the love of his life, hardware store owner Janet Bishop. The man knew a thing or two about the power of advertising. “I saw one go for a hundred dollars yesterday on an Internet auction site. This year’s must-have toy, it seems.”

“Why does there have to be a ‘must-have’ toy, anyway?” Mac complained in a cranky voice. “My nephew doesn’t even like stuffed animals. I’ll spend two weeks tracking down one of those things and he’ll play with it for two hours before he tires of it.”

“Oh, yeah,” remembered Gina, “it’s that commercial that’s on eleven hundred times a day. How could I forget?” She began to hum a few bars of the annoying little Bippo Bear song.

The one Mac had been forced to listen to for forty minutes while on hold with the toy company in a misguided attempt to locate a Canadian retailer. While he thought going foreign to be a smart alternative, the cheerful customer service representative at the Bakley Toy Factory informed him that he was her sixtieth such call of the day.

“Mary,” came Howard’s voice over his angry thoughts, “are you all right? Your pie okay? You look like you swallowed your fork all of a sudden.”

Mac glanced over and Gina raised her head from her order pad. Middleburg’s newest resident did indeed appear a bit ill, but Mac doubted it was anything Gina fed her. Howard had probably just said something insensitive, as he was known to do when he became overly focused on impressing someone new.

“Oh, no,” Mary protested loudly. “It’s wonderful pie.” Mac recognized the forced cheerfulness she’d used when telling him it was “okay” that a maniac bird attacked her in her living room.

“Hi, Mary.” Mac waved and she waved back, but it was a weak, wobbly gesture. “Hello, Howard,” Mac said more formally.

Howard had become extremely formal with Mac since he’d announced his candidacy. “Good afternoon, MacCarthy.” Howard had begun calling him Mr. MacCarthy or just MacCarthy whenever they met now. He didn’t even turn around, just twisted his head half a turn in Mac’s direction and puffed up as though they were on podiums debating issues instead of just eating in the same diner.

“Apple as usual, Mac?” Gina interjected. Her tone of voice seemed to imply that all conflicts could easily be solved with the right slice of pie. “I’ll even heat it up for you, how’s that?”

“Perfect.” He settled more peaceably onto his stool and inhaled the rich aroma rising out of his wonderfully enormous coffee mug. “I refuse to let a stuffed blue bear steal my holiday.”

“Good plan,” Drew Downing offered. “But I know what you mean. My sister e-mailed me yesterday, and she wasn’t too subtle about asking me what strings I could pull to get my hands on one of those for her daughter. The old ‘Can’t you do this ’cause you’re famous?’ ploy.”

Mac smiled. While Drew still made occasional appearances for his former Missionnovation television show, Mac had taken to ribbing him about his “has been” status. And really, Downing had just walked head-on into another teasing with that remark. “You’re just not famous enough anymore, sport,” he taunted, digging into the pie Gina had just placed in front of him.

Drew caught onto the game and cracked a wide grin. “Hey, I still rate. I still have fans. My Web site got six hits last week.”

“Wow. Maybe I should ask you to endorse my candidacy.” Mac thought he’d said it quietly enough to escape Howard’s hearing, but the man seemed to have radar for that sort of thing, and Mac saw his head incline slightly in his direction again.