Oh Holy Fright Read online

  “Hey, Tyler, look at this,” he called out. “We can get a PlayStation 3 console for $59 over at this new store called Crazy Eddies.”

  Tyler came bounding down the stairs, proving to us all how much he could hear from his room. He swooped in next to Zach, planting his elbows on the table.

  His mouth dropped open. “Dude! That is so incredible. How much do you have?”

  Zach gazed up at the ceiling, doing math in his head. “Uh, $37.50.”

  Tyler pursed his lips and blew out a sigh. “Man, I’ve got twelve bucks, and I need money to take Tiffany out.”

  Like clockwork, both sets of eyes turned toward me. The nonverbal pleading had begun, and it was so good they could have worked a telethon.

  Zach put his palms together as if in prayer, but his urgent request was directed at me, not a divine presence. “Mom, please! We just need a little bit more.”

  “No. It’s right before Christmas. There is no way I’m going to help you buy a toy.”

  “So, are you saying,” Zach smiled knowingly, a gleam in his eye, “that perchance this item is already under the tree?”

  Tyler’s eyes lit up at Zach’s assumption. I was between a rock and a hard place. The video game console they were coveting was not under the tree. In the real world, toys like that were five hundred dollars not fifty-nine. Raising three kids was not cheap.

  I reddened slightly, feeling boxed in by this parent-child negotiation. “I plead the fifth. It’s too close to Christmas to talk about what’s under the tree.”

  Zach started jumping up and down. “It is. It is. It must be under the tree. When she says ‘no comment,’ it has to be there.”

  This was turning into a nightmare. “I never said that.”

  Zach pointed directly at me. “And there it is again. Rocky said it’s what they don’t say that really matters. She’s proving it. The PlayStation is under the tree.”

  The two boys ran off to the Christmas tree in the corner of the den and began shaking boxes and rustling paper, leaving me to a tricky decision. Do I go over to Crazy Eddies and pick up this $59 game console? I stepped over to the ad Zach had left open on the table. The PlayStation was there, but there was also a big banner that said this item would only be on sale Christmas Eve.

  Christmas Eve? He really was crazy. Why would a store have its big sale on a day many families chose to be together? Something like this would really impact our community. Pastor Green and his congregants, as well as many of the other churches in town, had spent months preparing for this service. Feeling my resolve weaken, I made a mental note of the sale.

  “Enough manhandling the gifts. Go do homework,” I called out to the den. The package-shaking stopped. At least for now, I had declared a cease-fire in the War of the PlayStation.

  “Here, Mom,” Coco said. “You need to buy this for fun-raising. If you buy enough then I get a Christmas teddy bear. Please buy enough. I want a Christmas teddy bear,” my daughter, Coco, repeated.

  I was surprised that the little Christmas bow I had put in her dark-brown hair was still in place. At the age of three, Coco was beautiful—and into everything. I glanced at the glossy brochure she pushed in front of me, filled with pictures of scrumptious-looking frozen bread that could be popped in the oven on any holiday. When I glanced at the prices, I couldn’t believe how expensive this stuff was. Each loaf was at least twenty dollars.

  “I don’t know, Coco. This stuff is pretty expensive.”

  Coco’s eyes clouded. “I want that Christmas teddy bear.”

  “I’m aware of that, but you will be getting presents from Santa.”

  Coco stamped her foot. “I want that Christmas teddy bear.”

  Leo reached over, grabbed a cookie, and handed it to Coco. “Young lady, according to this brochure, you would have to sell twenty loaves of this high-priced bread to get that toy. And I think you need to watch your tone. Santa doesn’t like little girls who make demands.”

  “But, Daddy—”

  Leo gave her a look that stopped her protest. Her dark eyes blazing, she took a giant bite of her cookie, walked out of the kitchen, and plopped down in front of the TV in the den.

  Leo grabbed a cookie for himself. “Do you know anybody who will buy this stuff?”

  I glanced back at the brochure. “Well, we can start with our relatives. I’m sure Aunt Maggie and my dad will buy a loaf. We might get a sale out of Rocky, but he can be cheap.”

  “And then there’s your mother,” I suggested. Maybe getting that teddy bear wouldn’t be so hard.

  “Yes. She’ll do anything Coco tells her to do, especially if it’s in the name of school fundraising.” Leo’s mom, a widowed science teacher from Galveston, usually joined us this time of year but had decided to take a Christmas cruise she won playing bingo. We would miss her.

  “And that’s why we love her,” I answered.

  “This is silly. They know exactly what they’re doing when they put some toy up there to enslave our kids by their own greed,” Leo said.

  I had to agree. “Kids don’t care how hard the parents have to work to get rid of the merchandise.”

  I let out a tired sigh as I put some chicken breasts in the frying pan. “Maybe we can get some of the neighbors to pitch in. This time of year, people can’t wait to donate to a school fundraiser.”

  Leo came up from behind me, put his arms around my waist, and nibbled my neck. “You’re being sarcastic, right? I love it when you get sarcastic.”

  I pushed him away, intent on getting dinner together. “I love you too. What about your work? Don’t you think some of those weather guys would love to have hot, delicious overpriced bread for their holiday breakfast?”

  “No. They’re all gluten-free. It’s a science thing.” Leo grabbed another cookie, disproving his gluten-free-scientist claim, and bounded up the stairs to his computer to catch his favorite website, the Weather Channel.

  Chapter 2

  After hearing endless requests to win the Christmas teddy bear, I set out with Coco for the neighbors’ houses the next day to beg them to buy overpriced bread. I rehearsed with Coco how we would approach each neighbor.

  “When they open the door, you hold up this paper.” I demonstrated, holding up the glossy brochure, a big smile on my face, which I was sure looked totally sincere.

  “And they will give me the teddy bear?”

  “You have to sell a lot of the bread to get the teddy bear. Do you understand that, Coco?”

  Coco nodded her head, her dark eyes boring into mine. Many of our neighbors were not at home, and I was pretty sure I saw some drapes being pulled as we walked up a few sidewalks. We walked to the next block, and then the next. No doubt other industrious preschoolers had been on these doorsteps trying to sell bread.

  “It doesn’t seem too many people are home today, sweetie.”

  Coco’s eyebrows gathered as if she felt she had just been the victim of a cruel hoax. It looked pretty suspicious to her that now she had a chance at the teddy bear everyone was hiding. “Where are they?”

  “I don’t know. Work probably. You know, they go to work just like Daddy and Mommy do.”

  Coco’s face clouded. “Then we have to go to their work. You have to drive the car.”

  I patted her on the shoulder. “We’ll just try a few more doors. And if we don’t have any luck, we’ll try again tonight. That will be when people are eating their dinner, and people love to be interrupted at dinnertime,” I said, knowing I was the only one who understood my own joke. If this didn’t work out, maybe I could get a job as a telemarketer with bubbly wit.

  “Okay.”

  The sound of a buzz saw came from a garage as we were about to knock on the front door of yet another house. “Looks like somebody’s home. Mrs. Baldwin must be in her garage.”

  Coco put her hands over her ears as the saw droned in front of us. “Too loud.”

  I put my arm behind Coco’s back to lead her in the direction of the garage, holding her
hand no longer an option. “Mrs. Baldwin? Karen? It’s me, Betsy, from down the street. Could we just get a minute of your time?”

  Karen Baldwin looked up from the project she was working on, smiled, and shut off the saw. “Betsy. It’s nice to see you.” Her deep-blue eyes caught sight of Coco. “And how are you today, Coco?” Karen was in her late forties, although she looked younger and spoke with a sweet Texas drawl.

  “I want a teddy bear,” Coco answered.

  “You do? Well, you’re just going to have to wait for Santa Claus then, aren’t you?” Karen reminded her.

  Embarrassed by my daughter’s obvious greed, I apologized. “I’m sorry. We’re selling bread loaves to raise funds for Coco’s daycare.” I nudged Coco, who held up the glossy brochure for Karen to see. It would’ve been even more effective if she had put it right side up. I quietly reached down and turned it around.

  “That certainly looks delicious, darlin’. I think I want everything on the page.”

  Coco’s eyes widened in sheer happiness. She turned to me. “Then I could get the Christmas teddy bear?”

  “Oh, I see. You have to sell so much bread and then you get the toy?” Her eyes met mine with a sympathetic gaze.

  Karen did carpentry jobs around town, specializing in kitchen cabinetry. Today she was putting the finishing touches on a hand-carved sleigh I assumed would be for the festival, and I made a mental note to get some good shots of it for the Pecan Bayou Gazette. Karen Baldwin had experienced her share of ups and downs in life, but one thing she could do well was work with wood. Painted in a bright red, the sleigh had white sturdy legs and black runners. Karen was working on two matching reindeer to put in front.

  “This is great. Did you make this all yourself?”

  “I sure did. The town bought my supplies, and I’m pitching in by donating my time. I’m glad to help out any way I can.”

  “Can I get in the sleigh?” Coco asked.

  “Sure. You’ll be the very first person to try it out. I would be honored.” She reached down, picked up Coco, and put her into the sleigh.

  “Is this Santa’s sleigh?” Coco asked.

  “Oh no. This is a copy of his sleigh, so the boys and girls can get their pictures taken at the Christmas festival. Santa’s sleigh is at the North Pole with Santa. I think his elves are polishing it up right now. Have you been a good little girl?” Karen was so good with kids.

  “Yes,” she replied quickly, not giving Karen a chance to ask my opinion.

  “Then I guess I’m going to buy some bread so I can help you toward your goal. It’s always important to have a goal.”

  “You do beautiful work.”

  “Thank you. I try very hard to make what I do something that will last.”

  “Have you ever thought of building a house?”

  Karen Baldwin held up a hand as if swatting away a pesky fly. “Oh no. I used to think that way, but not anymore. I’m happy with the level I’m at. I’m not quite as ambitious as that. I think I’ll leave the house-building up to the smooth operators.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. I just happen to think that some of the developers around here are 90 percent hype and 10 percent quality. People get wrangled into these loans they can’t afford, and really they’re highly inflated and put out there by unscrupulous contractors.”

  It was obvious Karen had quite an opinion on homebuilders. I had to wonder if she had been burned. There were so many people who were paying off mortgages. Predatory lending had decreased in the last few years, but people still had to pay for that folly.

  “You speak as if from experience.”

  “My ex-husband is a builder. Frankly, I wouldn’t live in one of his houses, and I certainly wouldn’t borrow the money to buy one. He builds with the cheapest materials and labor and barely skirts the building codes.”

  “Wow. He must have a tough time being in business.”

  “That’s the part that makes me the angriest. He’s a real successful guy. Not successful enough to keep track of his family, but he’s made a lot of money off other people’s misfortune. He’s the kind of guy who moves a crew into a city after a hurricane and charges way above the norm. You know the kind?”

  Indeed, I did. I explained that any time we had transplants from hurricane zones like Houston or Galveston, we heard horror stories of shoddy work that was never even completed.

  “Well, then. That’s the way my husband does business.”

  “So because of that you’ve never considered becoming a builder?”

  She sighed. “I’ve thought about it. I even own a piece of land out on Wildflower Lane. Oh, I had visions of a house there years ago, but I kept hitting snags in the permit area. I just figured it wasn’t supposed to be, you know?”

  “What kind of snags?”

  “You know. I couldn’t get water out there. I couldn’t run an electric line.”

  “That’s weird. One of our friends just built a house in that part of town and hasn’t reported any problems at all. Maybe now that they’re out there you can try again.”

  Karen laughed to herself. “I don’t know about that.”

  “Why not? You are the most talented carpenter in town. You have a great business sense, and the land is already bought. What’s stopping you?”

  Karen stared at me for a few seconds as if she were rereading a map and finding a path she had previously ignored.

  “You know, I still have the sign I was planning to put up on the land. Want to see it?”

  “Sure.” Coco had been incredibly good during this time, probably because she was playing with some wooden blocks Karen had put out for her.

  “Here it is,” Karen held up a sign that said: Baldwin Building. New properties coming soon.

  “Nice! You’ve had this idea all along. I say try one more time. What could it hurt?”

  Karen smirked and put the sign down. “You know, I have a good friend who I think would agree with you on this. Maybe I’ll talk to him. You’re right. What could it hurt?”

  “Great.”

  Karen quickly filled out her information for Coco’s fundraiser. After thanking her, and feeling flush from our first sale, we walked further down the block to the house of the choir director, Joe Nelson. Hopefully, he would be open to a purchase in spite of Maggie’s recent tantrum.

  We knocked on the door, but there was no answer, our winning streak already coming at an end. We heard the sound of something heavy thumping to the ground, and Coco ran off the porch toward the garage. “He’s probably in here like the lady with the saw.” The garage door was shut and locked, and I doubted that Joe was in his garage. I walked over to get Coco before she started trying the handle.

  “I don’t think Mr. Nelson is home right now. We’ll have to come back tonight.” Joe Nelson had retired as the town’s mail carrier last summer, and I couldn’t be sure, but I thought Maggie once mentioned he loved to play cards with some friends at the town’s only assisted living center.

  “Look in the garage. Is he making a sleigh too?” Coco asked.

  There were a set of windows on the top half of the garage, so I peeked into the darkened space. What looked like a large room divider had fallen, revealing several standard white mail crates that had U.S. Post Office written on the side. I didn’t think mailmen were allowed to bring those crates home. A stack of fliers overflowed from the top of one of the crates nearer to the light of the window. Was this how they made enough room for the junk mail in the tiny Pecan Bayou Post Office? It couldn’t be. Something didn’t seem right. I curved my hands around my eyes to see more of Joe’s garage.

  I heard the sound of Karen’s truck idling in the next driveway. “Hey, Joe’s over at the senior center playing cards today. Did you need something in his garage?” she asked.

  “Uh, no. We were just seeing if he was home,” I answered. I was curious, though, about that mail overflowing the crates. “Does Joe bring mail home with him? For storage?”<
br />
  “Huh? Not that I know of. Why?”

  “Because there has to be thirty crates of mail in his garage.” I suddenly felt like I should have been minding my own business.

  “That is interesting.” Karen’s phone rang. “Have to go give a quote on some kitchen cabinets. I’m running late. Hey, let me know what you find out, okay?”

  “Sure.”

  As Karen drove off, Coco asked, “Mama, is he there?”

  “Nope. I don’t know about you, but I think it’s time to hit the real patsies in our family. Let’s go visit Grandpa.”

  “Grandpa’s name is Patsy?” Coco asked.

  “When it comes to his adorable little granddaughter, it is. Let’s go see if he’s at the station, okay?”

  “Do I get my teddy bear now?”

  With Christmas almost upon us and toy commercials on children’s TV almost overtaking the programming, Christmas couldn’t come soon enough.

  On our way to the police station, a young man with a large streak of blue in his hair stopped to hand us a blue flyer. “Crazy Eddie’s my name, and I’m hoping you’ll come to our special Christmas sale.”

  I took the flier, and to my surprise, Coco interrupted. “I have a sale too. Would you buy some of my bread? It is for a fun raiser.” Amazingly, she pushed the brochure in his face. Whether he was trying to make it a pact of you-buy-mine-I’ll-buy-yours or he just liked bread, he put his name on the form!

  “There you go, little girl. Now you need to come into our store and visit sometime.” He pointed to a store on the corner and then giving a nod and a pat on Coco's head, strolled away.

  We found my father behind his desk at the Pecan Bayou Police Department doing what looked like serious work. As I came closer, I realized he was watching a video for the Super Fish 2000 fishing rod. Coco was not the only one who was looking forward to what would be under the tree.

  “Just look at this baby. The reel speed is like nothing I’ve ever seen. It’s strong enough to get a 50-pound fish out of the bayou. Just amazing. Just amazing.”