Chapter 50. ‘Twas the Day Before

  Minnie had been waiting for this day for a while now. Ever since dad had told her and Naomi about it, oh so many months ago. When they were first in the frozen north. The idea of special days, like birthdays and Christmas were exciting. That one day would be unlike every other day, treated different. Ever since the idea of weekends had come around she found herself looking at the calendar. Thinking about what they would do on the weekend, how to celebrate birthdays, and of course these next two days. She didn’t really know what Christmas was, dad had explained of course but there were many things that she just didn’t get. Why on this particular date? Why does that Santa guy wear red? Who thought up the names of his reindeer? Cause the burrows guys didn’t name theirs. And they didn’t fly, at least not why she was there. Now that made her giggle, the thought of the three big guys flying around on reindeer. “He’d probably call his oatmeal.”, she muttered. It was a lot for her to take in, this adopting a holiday just like that. When she talked with Naomi she found the other girl felt the same way, excited and nervous. Dad was so looking forward and they were both afraid of letting him down, that things wouldn’t be as fun as he remembered.

  While she was mulling all this over her nimble little hands had been busy. Sometimes she would be thinking and find she had tinkered away without realizing what she was doing. Her creation sitting on the desktop in front of her, sometimes with no clue what it was. An amalgam of parts with no purpose, just her hands showing off. Her workshop was on the lowest deck, along with the various storerooms, dad let her choose. No, that’s not right, she thought. He didn’t let her, he said that made him uncomfortable, that he was in control and allowed this or that. Sometimes he had to make a decision about the boat as captain, but never about their little family. Any concerns anyone had, questions about travel plans or menu ideas, they talked it over and decided together.

  So when she mentioned that having a workroom would be nice he had smiled and together they chose a location. He helped her with desks, cupboards, tool racks, everything her instincts told her she needed. This was where she had been working on her gifts for dad and Naomi. It had been difficult and frustrating, but so rewarding. Learning to make and shape, cutting and bending metal, glass and wood, to actually create with your own hands. And now looking down at the fruits of her labor, the hours and days of careful work, now she could hardly wait to give them away. Carefully wrapping both gifts in soft clothes, then into a small wooden box inscribed with their names, she set them aside and started cleaning up. Tools back in the right place, scraps in the bin, left over supplies put in the right drawer, desk wiped clean and floor swept. Surveying her domain she was satisfied. Taking her gifts, placed in her side bag, she carried a few plates and bowl, empty mugs and glasses, even some silverware that had migrated here somehow. All this on a tray, she hoped to get it back to the galley without being caught.

  Tiptoeing up the ladder to the mid deck she looked around, seeing the coast was clear she made a beeline to the galley and placed the tray of dishes in the sink. Mission accomplished! Now to the lounge to leave her gifts under the tree. Walking a bit easier now that the contraband had been dropped off in the galley, but there was still no sound of sign of life on this deck. She knew dad was drinking tea on the bow, but not sure where Naomi was. Shrugging she opened the lounge door, no one in here. The gifts were carefully placed in the box the tree sat in. There were…she quickly counted, eight presents there now, but no name tags, just numbers. What a dirty trick! Laughing she left the lounge and went up and on deck.

  Naomi’s room door creaked open slowly and her head slowly and carefully looked to see if the corridor was empty. Finding no one around she quickly went the few steps to the lounge. She also had gifts in hand, both carefully wrapped in what was once plain paper but was now very festive. She had worked on the wrapping paper for the last couple of days trying to get it just right. Looking at the array of gifts under their tree she hoped her offerings would be well received. Knowing dad and Minnie well by now she knew their tastes, time would tell though. Also shaking her head at the numbered gifts it was time to get some fresh air on deck. And fresh air it was, a bit of a colder front had blown in from the north, nothing much like the storms of the north, but still chilly. Sweater weather. She found Will lounging in his deck chair, tea in hand, frowning at his notebook. “What did it do?”, she asked. He jumped slightly at her words, then shook his head. “Nothing, just having a bit of a block in my writing. It happens from time to time.” He replied. “Oh, the stories for the children, or the grownups?”, Naomi continued as she sat with him, and poured a cuppa from the pot. Will closed his book with a sigh, “The stories for older people, about the little people and the dragon. That can wait though, it’s Christmas Eve. No more work.”.

  The Rose was anchored in a small natural harbour they had found along the coast. Never noticed before as they hadn’t been this close to shore. Will preferred to keep a good distance while making way, but after leaving Newton the day before the plan was to take two days and celebrate then back to work. After a few hours cruising this place had been found. The boat was as clean as could be, they had worked like fiends before and after tying up. Tanks emptied and flushed, decks scrubbed, all the crews laundry in its place, perhaps never to be used again. The galley had been running non stop preparing their feast for today, not everything that Wills family used to have, but enough that they wouldn’t starve. Cakes and biscuits, soft rolls and fresh bread. Nothing hot for today but a goodly amount of what Will called finger food. “Why did you call it that?”, Naomi asked. “Cause you eat it with your fingers, don’t need knives and forks.”, Minnie answered. Set up buffet style in the lounge the crew was ready to attack. By the amount of biscuit crumbs that Minnie was wiping from her whiskers, she might have had a bit of a munch already.

  After a final check of anchors and weather they all went below to enjoy the day. Started off by playing canasta, a nice long game. Taking lots of breaks to load up their plates with all the good food. Devilled eggs, cheeses, smoked sausage, soft rolls, even some pickled beets and pickled onions. Minnie tried the pickles and hated them, Naomi liked both and regular pickles as well. “How could you like those…things, they’re awful, taste like bleargh and look like green poops, and the red ones are even worse, they made my tongue curl up in my mouth.”, Minnie ranted. Will shrugged, “We made them for years, we both loved them.”. Her eyes widened “Mom liked these, the green ones too?”. Laughing he shook his head, “Oh no, she despised regular pickles, she liked her pickled beets though, regular beets too.”. Minnie sighed in relief “As least she wasn’t all the way nuts then, just a bit…oh look at that dad,”, Will had made a play and discarded a card on to the pile, “I just happen to have opened, and have a pair of eights, that discard pile is mine.”. She drew the huge stack of cards towards her with glee. “Well, good one, but didn’t you just say you weren’t open and not even close to getting it.”, Will said. Looking up from counting her treasure she said “I lied.”, and went back to sorting. Naomi was keeping score in this hours long game and flipped her cards on the table, “I concede, Minnie you’ve won by nearly ten thousand points.”. “Yeah me too sweetie, you’re the winner and well done.”, Will added. Minnie leaned back in her chair and stretched her arms, “Let’s go on deck and tell stories under the stars, then you can read that night before story you wrote.”. “Good idea, I’m just gonna fix a plate, some cheese and buttered buns, maybe some sausage and more pickles.”. Minnie was fixing her own as was Naomi, “You can keep the pickles dad, but that last piece of sausage is mine.”, and snatched it and ate happily. “I’m going to make a fresh pot of tea too, anyone else for a cuppa?”, Will asked. Minnie just snorted but Naomi said she’d like one too.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  On deck the sky was glorious. Even though it was winter the weather was warm, a very light wind gently blew over them as they took their regular spots. Setting his plate on a side table Will had no fear Minnie would appropriate his goodies, there was a protective barrier of pickles. She wouldn’t go near. Naomi had brought her violin and Minnie her penny whistle. They limbered up for a moment then started playing their favourites, ‘Whiskey in the Jar’, or the unicorn song, ‘The Lady in Black’, ‘Gypsy Rover’ and so on. At one point Will stood and bowed in front of Minnie, she had no clue what that meant. Naomi kept the song going as Will showed Minnie how to dance. Minnie discovered that she was naturally good and she and Will danced to the sweet sounds. Then switching partners Will took Naomi for a twirl while Minnie played ‘The Orange and the Green’. A few more songs, dancing with each of his daughters and Will called it quits. “That was so much fun Pop, I love dancing and you’re so good at it.”, Minnie laughed. She was rumpled and a bit wind blown but her eyes were sparkling and her ears were up, tail wagging like mad. Naomi was the same, her usual impeccable hair was tousled and messy, “Where did you learn to do that dad, I’ve never danced like that before!”. Sitting down and taking a long drink of his now lukewarm tea Will said “My wife loved to dance and for years I didn’t like to. I just felt self conscious about it, that everyone was watching me and laughing.”, he sat back with a sigh. “It took a while but we finally went for dance lessons and I loved it. I wish we, well mostly me, had done it years earlier. I was stubborn and shortsighted and it’s one of the very few regrets I have, that I wish I could do over.”. Minnie could feel he was a bit upset about that, so she quickly changed the subject. “Hey, you were supposed to tell a story, a funny one, remember?”. Will stared at her for a moment or two, lost in another place then laughed. “Oh you’ll love this one.”.

  A long time ago, we lived in this little duplex, Will started to tell. It was a nice place, the front door opened up to a huge play field and the kids school was right there. A great place to ride bikes, skateboards or whatever. We had a big yard with a swing set for the kids, raspberry bushes and a good size veggie garden. Your mom worked day shift and night shift, sometimes back to back and slept during the day, which was tough with rambunctious children around. I usually cooked dinner, not always but most of the time. But anyway, I had made an easy dinner, bangers and mash. We were all sitting down to eat and our son wanted ketchup for his sausages. “What’s that?”, Minnie interrupted. “It’s a sauce like mustard but made from tomatoes, it’s thick red sticky goo.”. “Thanks pop, go on.” she waved.

  So dinner was ready and we were all sitting around the table, and our son wanted ketchup. So he got up and grabbed a new bottle from the pantry. Now, there was already a bottle on the table, but it was mostly empty. He started opening the new one, my wife said to use up the old one first. Complaining that he wanted the new one he continued to fiddle with the bottle, trying to open it. Mom took it and put it to one side and told him again to use up the old one. We got to talking about her day and how things were going at work. Our son waited until she was distracted and took the new bottle of ketchup and tried opening it again. This thoroughly irritated mom and she grabbed the bottle, yelled at him to leave it and slammed the bottle down on the table beside her.

  It was a big plastic bottle, and when it hit the table it shattered and went off like a bomb. It was everywhere, we were all wearing it. It was dripping off the ceiling onto us. I was covered, mom was covered, the kids were covered. And we all just sat there, waiting, not knowing what was going to happen, should we laugh or cry. Mom was shaking and I thought she was going to blow up and she did, with laughter. Great belly laughs and tears running down. Our son looked at his ketchup covered plate, said thanks mom, and ate his sausages. We never did get all the ketchup stains out of the ceiling and walls.

  Minnie dissolved into laughter as did Naomi. “Yeah, I wouldn’t have moved until she did either .”. “Oh that’s a good one dad, at least he did get the new stuff after all.”, added Naomi. That made Minnie start up again, and Will had to laugh too. It was a good story and the memories were too.

  Next Naomi told a tale of how she and her family had been snowed inside their house one year. So much snow had fallen, different from other years. Usually the village got a bit of wet snow but this year a blizzard had come off of the lake and dumped six feet of snow everywhere. Then a high wind had hardened the crust til you could walk on it. Her and her sister had to climb out of an upper window and shovel their way to the door then clear all around the house. The children enjoyed the deep snow, the adults not at all.

  After these stories were told, Will noticed Minnie looked a bit sad. “What’s wrong sweetheart?”, he asked putting his arm around her. “I’m okay, I just don’t have any cool stories to tell. We’re always together, you guys know everything that goes on.”, she sighed. Ah, he thought, I see now. “Honey, we have years and years together, this is just year one. Think of what we will be in a few hundred, you’ll probably have a story or two then.”, he said. Naomi looked at her mischievously, “Well you could tell the story when you walked in on William and Greta in the galley. I’m sure dad would be interested in what was going on.”. Will swivelled his head and looked at her, “Pray tell.”. Minnie laughed nervously, “I promised never to peach on them, they gave me biscuits, really yummy ones, Willys dad made them.”. “Not in his smoker I hope?”, Will asked. “Hope not.”, Minnie replied. She had cheered a bit and asked a question that had been on her mind. “Is this okay, what we’re doing for Christmas Eve, like what you used to do with mom. We don’t want to mess it up, ruin it for you.”. Will looked over at Naomi, she looked a bit nervous too, he hummed a bit. He stood and sat between them, pulling Naomi close too. “Spending time with the ones you love is always fun. If we’re fishing, or playing cards, singing Christmas carols, or just sitting around. When I’m around you two my life is complete. What we have here is different from before, and that’s fine, we’ll make our history from here on.”. Minnie burrowed her head into his shoulder and hugged him, “I was so scared of ruining this for you.”, she mumbled. “My dear little girl,”, he lifted her face and looked into her eyes, “You couldn’t do anything of the sort.”. He looked at Naomi too, “Same for you sweetie, when Minnie and I met you we just knew. I think we’ve turned out pretty well, our little family.”. She returned his hug, reached over and flicked Minnie’s ear, “Told you so.”. Minnie gave an irritated squeak, glared at the girl and promised revenge, but not tonight. “Hey dad, can we dance again, I loved that.”, Minnie asked. “Sure, you and Naomi can take turns playing and twirling, makes me wish I could play a tune now. Perhaps it’s time to learn.”, Will answered.

  And again merry tunes rang out, from a fiddle and a penny whistle, some times one and sometimes both. Happy laughter, whoops of glee as the dancers capered across the deck. At times Will clapped out a rhythm and sang the ballads so Minnie and Naomi could dance together. Strumming a guitar or ukulele would be enough to keep a tune, promising himself to get on that as soon as he could.

  Seeing that things were winding down, they left the now chilly deck and repaired to the lounge. Will had written down a poem to the best of his recollection but Naomi had rewritten the words in her much better hand and Minnie had illustrated the events. It wasn’t a very long poem, but that was okay. It was just the thing for tonight. With Minnie on one side of him, Naomi on the other Will turned the first page and began to read,

  ‘Twas the night before…