“That and penicillin,” Freddie said.
When they hung up, Freddie called her sisters. They were the first and second children, born only eleven months apart. They liked to call themselves Irish twins, though they were not even Irish. Freddie was the youngest, separated from Pamela and Laurel by almost a decade, but they acted like little sisters to Freddie’s mind, giggling and teasing each other, trading clothes, trying each other’s lipsticks, doing each other’s hair. Freddie had never paid much attention to them, two squealy older girls off on their dates, counting their sweaters. It was no surprise when, both divorced, they opened a boutique together, though why they chose Rio de Janeiro she could not fathom. They must stand out in that city like two sore thumbs, two plump pink sore thumbs, she thought. They resembled Freddie’s mother, though they did not remind Freddie of her mother. They were pinker than her mother, who had skin that was soft and blushing, and they were chubby. Freddie’s mother had spoken like an adult woman who hoped someone might listen to her now and then. Her older daughters spoke like girls at a slumber party, breathy and secretive, then shrieking with laughter. And now, presumably, in Portuguese. Freddie could not envision them among what she imagined to be the slender, sophisticated bronzed beauties of Rio. They had done well with their boutique, but when Freddie tried to picture them in their store, she saw only the two of them selling clothes back and forth to each other.
She had been closer to her brothers in age and in temperament. But they had grown up and gone their own ways, like her sisters. If any one of them had moved any farther away from Los Angeles, they’d have ended up being home again, the world being round and all.
“I’m keeping you informed,” Freddie said when Pamela answered. Laurel immediately picked up another extension. How quaint, Freddie thought. Like our grandparents.
“He’s a marvel,” Pamela said.
“What are you two doing for Christmas?” Laurel asked.
“Well, Molly had to go to New York to see her mother, so…”
“No, I meant you and Dad.”
“Oh.”
“He won’t know what day it is anyway,” said Pamela.
“I could take him to the track.”
Neither of them thought that was a good idea, but they were sure Freddie would come up with something.
“I picture you two sitting in front of the fire at Green Garden,” Laurel said.
“Oh, perfect!” said Pamela. “Drinking eggnog. Just the thought of you and Dad in front of the crackling fire makes me nostalgic.”
Freddie did not tell them Green Garden had no fireplace.
She called her brothers next, but she got the time wrong and woke one up, and the other did not answer.
“Molly, I miss you,” she texted.
“Never again” said the text that came back.
*
There were certain things about the Christmas Hanukkah season that Coco did not like. First of all, she felt guilty for having a Christmas tree, not because she was Jewish, but because it was such a waste. A living thing cut down for nothing.
“I understand not eating meat,” Daniel had said the first time it came up, when Ruby was two. “I understand being a vegetarian. But you’re not a vegetarian. And even if you were a vegetarian, you would eat vegetables. Vegetables would die so you could live. Isn’t a Christmas tree like a vegetable? It grows out of the ground. It’s like a big stalk of broccoli.”
“We don’t eat Christmas trees. It doesn’t die so I can live. It dies so we can decorate it.”
“We could eat it. We could chop it up and cook it after Christmas.”
“Very funny.”
Coco hated waste. It was that simple. The death of the pine tree was not the issue. She was not a fool, she was a science teacher, and she understood the importance and beauty of decomposition, how it brought new things to life. But the planting and cultivating and harvesting of what was essentially a big bauble, a bauble on which to hang other baubles—that was unconscionable.
“It provides employment,” Daniel said.
“Those Canadians who drive down every year and sell them on the street?”
“It provides enjoyment!” he said, pleased with the rhyme.
She sniffed her disapproval.
“Ruby really, really wants one.”
Then, of course, Coco said “Okay!” instantly. For Ruby, anything.