She could feel the dull ache in her right knee again. Christmastime.
Snowflakes on the tip of her nose
she thought she could remember. The snap of a crackling fire.
Salty ice and gravel graze the sides of her shovel.
The icicles that captured her imagination,
Frozen gutter art.
Somewhere inside a baby wails, wrapped against the warm breast of his grandmother.
Her grandmother.
Outside, paradise, there’s no other word to describe it, the sun kissing your hair, your hands, your face, the sky stretching, big, bold, blue, not a cloud in sight. Gently, the palm trees sway, rocking
The baby boy calms down. The wailing stops, replaced by the sizzling of the frying pan, stir-fry, soon the smell of chopped garlic and onions wafts outside, an original oriental Christmas dinner.
Dinner with the porch door wide open to let a warm breeze into the kitchen
counter
Her mother stands shelling shrimp, quickly, deftly. Her hands are familiar with the yellow handled scissors she’s had for fourteen years. Hands that have been sliced, burned with oil, rubbed raw, scar tissue her daughter has yet to see. How many years more? She wonders to her reflection in the stainless steel sink. How many years before her memory completely goes and she won’t be able to pick up a pair of scissors without wondering what they were doing in her hand?
He was cutting snowflakes like he’d seen his sister do, little flecks of paper sticking to his yarn sweater, the one he hates, with the little choo-choo train and Christmas tree, but he wears it because he loves the way his mother smiles when she pulls it over his head. She rarely smiles.
Grandson, she wonders forlornly, why have you gone? She peers out at the cement sky. Shelling shrimp, her hands shake and she has to squint behind her bifocals to find the crack in the thin casing. Her husband’s smoking in the next room, the smell of cigarettes mingling with the chicken broth bubbling on the gas stove.
He’s been smoking again; it lingers on his tweed coat. He seems shorter, his walk slower, with a touch of bored aimlessness. Father, why are you doing this to yourself? She finishes her paper snowflake and tapes it against the clear, blue sky.
Snowflakes against edge of her sleeve. Christmastime. She could feel it in the dull ache of her knee.
