Sylvie and the Christmas Ghost-1
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Sylvie and the Christmas Ghost
By Foxglove Lee
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Chapter One
WHEN I TURNED TO SEE if the bus was coming, my mom wrapped my scarf tighter around my neck. “Zip up your coat, Sylvie. You’ll catch your death.”
Rolling my eyes, I said, “I’ve got a huge sweater on underneath. Besides, it isn’t very cold for December.”
I don’t know why my mother insisted on waiting with me on the bus platform. If anyone heading to Erinville for the holidays wanted to stab me with a fork, wouldn’t they wait until I was alone on the bus? Not that I would suggest such a thing to my mom. She was concerned enough about letting me travel on my own.
“Where’s your ticket?” she asked.
I held it up, valid one day only: December 21, 1994.
“And where do you sit?” Pop quiz!
“Up front, near the driver.”
“And if anybody makes you uncomfortable, be sure to report them.”
Groan! “Mom, we went over this already.”
“I know, Sylvie, but I worry about you.”
“I’m fourteen years old. I can take care of myself.”
My mom looked at me in a sappy way that meant she was about to cry. I hated it when my mom cried, and ever since she and my dad started their whole “trial separation” thing, she’d been doing a lot of it. Not in front of us kids, of course. She always put on a strong front. But even if she was downstairs and we were up in our rooms, we could still hear her.
“Graham and Alley are getting restless,” I told my mom, and pointed at my two younger siblings pummeling each other in the back of our station wagon. “You don’t have to wait with me. I’ll be fine. Really.”
The waterworks came on like a storm. My mom wrapped her arms around me and hugged me tight. “You’ve never spent Christmas away from home. I’ll miss you so much. You know that, right?”
Her tears fell hot on my head. I hadn’t worn a hat, so I felt them seeping through my hair and wetting my scalp. “I’ll miss you too, but I’m sure Dad’ll miss Graham and Naomi and Douglas and Alley just as much as you’ll miss me.”
My mom brushed my bangs from my eyes. “You see? That’s what I’ll miss most: you’re always thinking about others, putting their needs above your own. Most kids your age can’t manage that.”
She said the exact opposite on nights when I refused to dry the dishes because there was a new Simpsons on TV. But moms were like that. At any given moment, they could either adore their kids or despise them. No mother could look at her children and see just normal, average individuals. My siblings and I were special or we were trouble, but never anything in between.
When the bus pulled up, a woman in uniform stepped out to open the luggage hatch. My mom smiled with relief. If the driver was a woman, I’d be taken care of. That was my mother’s way of thinking.
“Be safe,” my mom said as the driver heaved people’s suitcases into the luggage compartment. “Call home to let me know you arrived in one piece.”
“But Dad’s doesn’t have a phone yet.”
“Call from a payphone.” My mom placed a few quarters in my gloved hand and snickered. “Assuming they’ve got one in Erinville.”
“I’m sure they must have one,” I said, going along with her joke.
The driver took my case and shoved it in with all the rest. My mom thanked the woman, then gave me a final once-over. When I took a step back, she must have noticed I didn’t lift my foot properly, because she asked, “You’re not wearing your leg brace, are you?”
“I packed it,” I said. “It doesn’t fit right under these boots.”
She gave me the squinty eyes. “Are you sure you packed it?”
“Come on, Mom. Would I lie to you?” Yes. Yes I would. And I’m lying right now, because my leg brace is under my bed and if you go looking for it I’ll get super-mad that you were snooping around my room.
“It’s in your suitcase?” my mom asked suspiciously.
“Yes.” Nope.
“You definitely packed it?”
“Definitely.” Under my bed.
“And you’re going to wear it?”
“Every day.” Lies, all lies!
My mom’s eyebrows did that thing where they looked like two caterpillars falling into a martini glass. “I’ll check with your father, you know.”
Sure you will. “Ask away. If his house is being renovated, why would I go around in bare feet? I’d probably step on a nail and have to go to the hospital for a tetanus shot.”
My mom smiled when I said that. She was obsessed with tetanus shots. Every time my siblings and I even looked at something rusty, she would lecture us about blood poisoning.
But what she said was, “I don’t think they have a hospital in Erinville.”
“Not even one?”
Mom shook her head.
“How can they not have a hospital?”
“It’s just a small town, honey.”
In my best small-town accent, I said, “Everybody knows everybody. Nobody locks the door.”
“You laugh, but you’ll soon find out.” Ruffling my hair, my mom said, “Wish your father a Merry Christmas.”
When she hugged me again, I almost cried. Not because we were saying goodbye for a week, but because it was rare that my mom showed she cared about my dad anymore. Not that she went around bad-mouthing him. Neither of my parents said anything negative about the other—that was a pact they’d made that they thought we didn’t know about.
But just the fact that my mom would tell me to wish my dad a Merry Christmas showed she still had feelings for him, didn’t it? My one and only wish was for them to proclaim the trial separation a big failure. Maybe by the end of the holidays they’d get back together.
Anything was possible...
Chapter Two
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