Out for the Holidays (Seeking Agent)

  Out for the Holidays is a novel Christmas Story for a modern, ever-changing world.  It plays with holiday story tropes in a narrative about an atheist confronting his religious family during the Christmas holiday.  Tradition collides with a changing world in a story that examines the meaning of the holiday, family, and relevance.  All of this is delivered with twists and humor while never losing the feel of the season.  

Currently seeking an agent for this.  Rather than the opening chapter, this is more like a trailer, Chapter 6, where an initial confrontation finally takes place.  Click here to check out this snippet of the book!

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Chapter 6: Dad Chat

At nearly ten in the evening, the usual crop of crap kids’ Christmas specials had run their course on regular television.  The living room remained ever-abuzz with activities of children, who had gradually moved to playing a card game that evidently involved a lot of yelling and very little cordiality.
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Myles and Jove have made board and card games a common activity in their father-son relationship, so much so, they’ve become a defining feature of the two of them.  Jove had pulled one such card game out of his suitcase and was attempting to teach the other kids.  As with most of their games, it was fairly complex, so the explanation was probably going to last as long as the first actual game, which was being spread out on the floor while inspiring an unexpected amount of laughter and yelling.

Most adults had settled in the living room or dining room as well, clustered around the couch, easy chairs, and end of the dining table near the living room.  After Grandma Dolo had excused herself to take her pie plate to the kitchen and visit the lavatory, she’d ended up in the dining room chatting with Marianne and Evelyn.  Doug had switched from changing channels on TV to switching categories of movies on Netflix.  Melissa was curled up with her husband on the couch and consistently teased him about how, by the time he found something to watch, everyone would have already fallen asleep.  His retort was to grumble and threaten to pick whatever highly inappropriate Z-grade Hollywood shlock fluttered past.  Kimberly was on her phone doing teenager stuff, occasionally telling her dad to pick certain movies that she wanted to see, then sighing loudly when he didn’t select any of them.

Myles and Gayle still sat across the hall in the sitting room with the crackling fireplace, now startled by Henry’s sudden, seemingly sneaky arrival.  With the exception of the kids, the energy in the house was beginning to ebb as lateness and full stomachs combined to form powerful sleep aids.

“Hey Dad,” said Myles.

“You two loners mind if I join you?” asked Henry almost whimsically, but with a slightly judgmental air about his tone.  “I mean, unless you’re too busy avoiding your un-fun family on Christmas.”

Myles looked anxiously toward Gayle, then to the floor as his dad crossed the room to take up residence in the chair Grandma Dolo had previously used.  He picked up her needlework and various grandma-items and set them on the floor nearby.  He settled in the old chair, then looked at both Myles and Gayle with his friendly, yet serious dad-smile.   “I haven’t really had a chance to talk to you since you got here, what with Gayle monopolizing all your time.”

While each comment seemed friendly enough, they had a way of putting Myles on edge which gave his anxiety a jolt.  He wasn’t sure how to respond to any of it, but felt that he really should say something, yet in the moment, said precisely nothing.  Ultimately, he sat nervously, became conscious of his nervousness, and worked to make himself more comfortable and thoughtful—the side-effect of which was the creation of longer awkward silences to which he was also now becoming terribly aware…

“Oh I’m pretty sure I called dibs on Myles earlier in the day, Henry,” said Gayle with a chipper tone.  “But I might be ready to give him up for a bit, if you really want…”

Myles quickly turned to Gayle, and with his eyes wide shook his head slightly indicating he did not want her to leave.  She smiled back reassuringly.  Henry didn’t see their exchange as he had moved to pick up a log for the fire.  He grabbed one sitting on the floor away from the rest, one with curious notched stab marks in it, which he both noticed and felt with his finger as if it was a crime scene to investigate.  After mulling over the marks momentarily, he then laid the notched log in the fire while Gayle turned to Myles and cocked her head with a prodding look, Myles shrugged with annoyance at not wanting to be goaded into a conversation.

He sighed, “Well Dad, if Gayle had dibs, Gayle had dibs.  Gotta follow the rules, you know?” with barely a pause between words or sentences, and sans any deliberate thought at all, he followed with, “besides, Marianne is here.  You guys don’t want to talk to me anyway.  She’s the star of the show.” Upon realizing what he’d said, and the tone with which he’d blurted it out, his anxiety momentarily peaked again.

Gayle raised her eyebrows, both surprised and impressed by the bluntness with which he’d delivered his comment.  Myles hadn’t talked about Marianne in this way since they were teenagers, from the time he’d started consciously trying to have a more mature and adult relationship with her and attitude about her.  Particularly in the presence of their parents.  All done in effort of improving himself in the eyes of the family.  Marianne, on the other hand, tended to keep things strained for a number of years after they were teenagers.

“Well, you know this is a big deal to your mother.  Marianne’s been gone for two years, overseas.  Granted, we haven’t seen you in about that much time, either, you know,” Henry said as he settled back into the chair, satisfied with his wood placement in the fire.

“Yeah, but I talk to you guys all the time.” Myles stalled on this as he realized that much of his talking to them had been via social networks, wherein his mother had recently seemingly ceased acknowledgement of having a son at all.  Somewhat quieter, he added, “send you pictures of Jove and stuff like that, you know.”

There was a tense pause among the lot of them, during which the crackling of the fire seemed more obvious than ever.  Instead of feeling relaxing, it instead brought a note with it not unlike a cricket chirping upon delivery of a dead joke, and perfectly suited to the silence.  Myles began rubbing his hands together as his anxiety grew.  His father just looked on, in part waiting for Myles to speak up, and in part, looking for the courage himself.  He could see his son was uncomfortable with this issue.

Henry put up his hands in a screw it pose and just decided to go for broke.  “Look Myles, I guess I just want to know… Well… I guess we’re just confused about all this… atheist stuff.” He’d uttered that word as if it he was learning to pronounce something in a foreign language for the first time, which carried with it the bonus of making the situation even more uncomfortable.  He quickly tried to recover from this gaffe: “Well, what I mean is… I mean…” He paused, actually completely unsure of what he meant, and then really had nowhere to go.  So he fumbled: “Why celebrate Christmas?”

Myles bobbed his head with aggravation, glanced toward Gayle and then for the first time, looked directly at his father.  The eye contact was lost almost immediately, and with it, Myles lost his nerve and focus, unable to easily answer.  Rather than respond honestly, he ended up muttering something about it being “good for the kids” which came off as both confusing and awkward for everyone in the room.

“What the hell are you talking about?” asked Gayle suddenly, with genuine confusion.  “Myles, are you—“

Myles started waving his arms around to implore everyone to shut up, as his father was also about to say something.  Likely with further confusion.  What followed instead was equally unfocused, and now delivered as a stream of consciousness: “Okay, okay!  Look, what… Geez Dad, this isn’t a… just a religious holiday, you know.  I mean, the peace-on-earth and Santa and the trees and stuff.  You don’t have to be religious for any of that, and you know, I don’t think… um… Spruce trees aren’t natural to Bethlehem.” After a moment of stuttered half-words, he haphazardly added, “besides, I happen to like Christmas and Christmas movies and this time of year and giving presents to people!  Why does Jesus have to be a part of any of that?”

Henry, a little taken aback raised his hands now, but only slightly to indicate that Myles had muddled his way through enough of an explanation.  “Alright, alright!  Okay, that’s fine Myles, I honestly have never… looked at it like that, I guess.  But fair enough!” He paused, mouth agape, waiting for the right words to fill the air.  “I… I guess your mother… Your mother and I… We’re just… concerned…” He paused again, delivered an exhaustive sigh while looking for the right way to restart his own jumbled mess.  He clenched his teeth, eyes scanning the floor, though the thoughts he was seeking did not lie there.

Gayle looked on at both of them, perplexed by their utter lack of communication skills.  She took a large sip of her beer, swallowed and scanned back and forth from father to son and back again.  Both of them were just completely out of their element, and it was dawning on her that Henry was doing this because he may well have been forced to do so.  Heart-to-hearts were never a strong suit of this family, but this was embarrassing for everyone in the room.  She cleared her throat and said, “Henry, what are really you trying to ask him?”

Myles looked at Gayle as she asked this, then turned his attention to his father, who was shrugging and still didn’t know what to say.  For his calm, determined, leadership-like stature when he’d entered the room, he now instead inspired a lack of confidence and ineptness.  Truly a man of a different era, and completely out of his element here.

In his own shorter time as a father, Myles typically had little trouble talking with his boy, as he’d made a concerted effort to be more open and understanding with him, while attempting to paint himself as someone his son could trust and talk to easily.  On the other hand, there is a clear generational gap with how poorly Myles communicates with his own father, and how completely foreign this all seems to be for the both of them.

Finally, Henry just calmly asked, “how long?”

“How long… how long have I been an atheist?” Myles asked in return.  His father nodded.  He exhaled through lips that might otherwise have made a whistle.  “Aw geez, I don’t really know.  Ever since I was a kid.  I think I knew, I was aware of my views—and, and doubts—even before we all found out about Gayle…”

Shocked, and quite literally appalled, his father shot back, “are you serious?  Why, Myles, that’s most of your life!  You’ve been keeping this a secret all this time?” And in a different, more stern though not exactly questioning tone, “all these years?”

Now Myles was confused.  “Um, yeah, I guess so,” he shrugged.  He noted his father’s look of disbelief, which seemed to be an attempt to hide something else.  Was it offense?  Is his father offended by this?  “What?” asked Myles with a tone befitting a teenager attempting to nonchalantly show off some absurd new clothing style.

“Well, I’m sorry Myles, but that seems like a very long time.”

“Yeah, tell me about it,” he snapped.

“I just mean, you’ve been keeping secrets for this long-“

Again, a mood switch as Myles was now the one to be offended.  “Keeping secrets!” he scoffed.  “Yeah Dad, I’m just over here keeping secrets from the family.  Big dark secrets!  It’s not like I’m a drug dealer or selling nuclear arms to unfriendly countries or some shit like that!  I just didn’t tell you guys about this one stupid thing—like what’s the big deal?  Seriously, why is this a big deal!”

They looked at each other as Myles wound down his statement and question.  Henry shook his head, “well, I just… Why wait so long to tell us?”

Sarcastically, Myles quipped, “uh gee Dad, why would I keep this for so long?  Because this Christmas is already off to such a great start what with Mom not talking to me and my sister calling me a Satanist, and I have to sit here and explain myself to a family that’s probably going to disown me for my Christmas present.  Yeah, great question, why would I keep this a secret?” He ended by glowering toward his father, a mix of anger and shame driving him to this point.  He looked down to the beer in his hands, and took a drink.  He looked up again, but toward Gayle.  He sighed and ended this burst of emotion with, “I’d have kept it a secret for the rest of our lives if I could.”

Henry actually looked hurt from all this.  Myles didn’t notice, but Gayle did.  Henry was wringing his hands, a look of deep concern etched on his face.  He had entered this with a hope of talking to Myles about it, but no real plan in place.  This was new territory for him.  Talking to someone about why they’ve abandoned their faith.  Apostasy was something he’d read about in other capacities, not something he thought he’d have to face in his family.  Henry shot back and forth across a myriad of thoughts and emotions.  Did he fail as a father?  What did this mean for Myles after he died?  Was he safe since he was baptized as a baby?  Why would he keep a secret for so long?  Did he not trust his father?  Gayle looked back and forth again between the beleaguered father-son duo, then asked, “Uncle Henry… are you alright?”

The old man nodded slowly after a moment, stopped wringing his hands, and slid his palms back and forth together.  “Myles...” he started, “was it… was it trust?  Did you not trust us with this?  You could’ve… could’ve talked to me, you know.  I’d have listened… I think I’d have listened.” He leaned forward and looked out of the sitting room toward the living room across the way, indicative of someone about to speak and not wanting certain others to hear.  “You could have talked to me, Myles.  I—I think I can understand why you wouldn’t want to bring it up to your mother, but I prefer an honest answer.  I prefer if you could just, just be straight with me.  I don’t like this keeping secrets, you know.  I would rather be informed.”

Myles elicited something between a sigh and a groan.  His anxiety over this issue had been tempered into annoyance—and it was still smoldering hot.  He was only vaguely conscious of his demeanor during this exchange.  More or less, the emotional toll this had taken on him over the years was finally now just spilling out, unfocused as it was.  The sheer volume had been built up over time to a point that it was no longer going to be easy to hold back or approach with any amount of rational control.  He stayed silent for an uncomfortable amount of time.  Gayle was about to force him to answer his father just as Myles finally spoke up.

Clumsily, he began: “Trust?  Trust… Criminy, I don’t know.” Myles stared at the floor for several seconds.  For the moment, he had a conscious awareness—mostly realizing how many awkward pauses had started defining their conversation this evening.  Like a bad first date or an uncomfortable conversation with a supervisor.  “Maybe I’ve read too many stories, or heard too many anecdotes… People disowned by their families.  People with strained relationships.  Mostly, I just didn’t want to have to deal with this… now.  I wanted…”

Myles was aware that what he was about to say was likely to sound crass, but he wasn’t sure it could be prevented.  He looked at his father, who was looking back, listening carefully to his jumbled words.  Myles leaned back and threw up his hands and decided to go for broke, “I didn’t want to ruin what might be our final years together.  How’s that, Dad?” An unwelcome smile curled at the corner of his mouth—those nervous ones that occur when one hears bad news, but the body reacts in an apparent opposite manner.  He fought it away and looked away from his father again.  “And maybe it was some trust, too.  I don’t know, I guess.  I just didn’t want to talk about it, I didn’t want you guys disappointed in me… again.  I didn’t want it to be a big deal.” Myles shrugged.  “Because, frankly, I don’t think it should be a big deal, but I figured it would be.”

Gayle had settled down in her chair in a more relaxed, comfortable position.  Now that the ball was rolling, she was relatively content to sit back and let them just talk, but wasn’t sure Myles wanted her to leave.  She reminded herself that even if she felt uncomfortable by what appeared to be a private conversation, that he had been with her when the skeletons in her closet were set free.

Henry took this in, and while it wasn’t completely helpful, at least it felt like they were finally getting somewhere.  “Well, Myles, to your mother and me, I suppose it is a big deal.  But I can’t say… I suppose I shouldn’t really be surprised.  Looking back, you were never a big fan of church.  Hell, I never saw a kid fight so hard against doing anything in my life!  I guess we just thought one day you’d come around… but I suppose you never did.  Maybe you won’t.  Maybe you will.”

Henry dropped a beleaguered sigh and leaned back in his chair, and gazed towards the crackling fire.  “I want you to understand, Myles.  To us, for us, it feels like we failed you.  It’s a parent’s job to make sure their children are brought up right, and that includes making sure you’re safe and sound in all these kind of things.  It was our job to help you find Jesus and to get into heaven.  We want to see you there, you know.  We…”

“Don’t want to see me burning in hell while you’re in heaven?” Myles interrupted.

Gayle raised eyebrows towards Myles, as he’d uttered this snark while facing her.

Frustrated, Henry quickly interjected, “now listen, we… No, of course we don’t want you to go to hell.  But we… Dammit Myles, we wanted to make sure you and your eternal soul were safe.” He was flustered and had no good response to his son’s smart-ass remarks.

Myles, after a moment of reflection, had suddenly grown offended, and had a further retort.  “And for that matter, you don’t think I was brought up right?  Is that your only criteria on which to… to determine if I turned out right?  Hey, what about, I don’t know, maybe acknowledging that I have a good career, or that I try to be a good father myself.  I know you and mom weren’t thrilled about my marriage or divorce, but it’s not like I ran from my responsibilities or anything!

“And I’ve been self-sufficient for most of my life.  I haven’t asked for help since I was in college, and I’m pretty sure I’m the only one of your kids to have paid you back any and all borrowed money.  Granted, I had to because I wasn’t privy to all the free handouts Marianne got!  I don’t know about Melissa, actually, but I know I paid you back faster than she did, is all.

“I may have been lazy in school, but I finished with honors in college!  I don’t have addictions, I’m not a criminal!  Jove’s mother and I were able to get everything worked out to raise him without involving the courts or destroying his life—I mean seriously, what does it take to be loved by you people?” Myles’ voice wavered and cracked slightly.  A distinct sound of someone nearing a breaking point, tears had to be held back, and he paused to collect himself.  To steady the tension in his jaw that develops when emotions must be held back, when emotion must be controlled.

The room had once again been overtaken by the sound of the fire and Myles was busy attempting to regain composure.  He cleared his throat a couple times, flexed his jaw, finished off his beer, and took more deep breaths than were probably necessary.

Gayle felt that it might be time to chime in, as there seemed to be points neither of them was getting at.  “Henry, do you mind if I say something?  Myles?” Myles, hunched over in his chair, shook his head without looking up.

Henry, realizing that she may have some helpful input nodded and raised a hand towards her, “of course, Gayle.  Please.”

She leaned forward and thought carefully on her approach.  “Henry… it almost sounds like you’re making this about you.  Or you and Evelyn, I guess.  That you think Myles… That Myles not sharing the faith is something you did wrong.  Do you understand where I’m getting that?”
Henry smiled warmly at Gayle, appreciative of her uncanny intelligence and ability to wade through these issues.  “I don’t mean it to sound that way.  But I want Myles to realize… I suppose, to understand why this is a big deal to us.  It’s out of love and concern for him and his well-being.  I didn’t mean to sound like he, like we aren’t proud of him.  Of course we’re proud of him!  Myles had…,” he paused and looked at his son, “you had very clear goals and you went for them and you accomplished them!  We were proud of your drive and determination and success.  Of course we are!  And we are proud of everything you’ve done with your life and with Jove, too.  You’ve got a wonderful son, there.”

Myles was awkwardly wiping the corners of his eyes, which were more watery than usual.  Dust in the air, maybe.  His movement seemed particularly exaggerated and antsy, as if his goal was to hide tears by acting like his face was being attacked by insects that stung him with headaches.

“Yeah, but Uncle Henry, I don’t know if this is about you.  Just like it wasn’t about my parents.” She looked toward Myles, “he needs to know you still love him.  That this isn’t going to damage his relationship with you guys, and you can’t really blame him for his apprehension.  It’s not like he’s been welcomed all that warmly tonight.” Gayle grew mildly angry for a moment, “I mean, Marianne called him a goddamn Satanist.  That didn’t come off like some kind of good-natured ribbing.  She said it, ignored anything else he had to say, and walked away.  That was really rude.

“And for that matter, it wasn’t about my parents for me, either.  In a lot of ways, this is really no different.  I hope you still love and care for me, right?  That has been the only impression I ever got from you guys, from even before the point when my parents went into fits over this.  I mean, hell, you know I’m not a… a believer either, right?”

Henry actually seemed surprised by this.  Confused, he asked, “but you take… you take Dolores to church all the time.”

Partially amused by disbelief, through a flabbergasted smile, Gayle responded, “well of course, because I love Grandma Dolo!  I do that for her because it makes her happy and I care about her!  I know there are some gay people who are also religious, and I just don’t see how they make that work.  The book is pretty clear on gays, despite having homosexual content in it, as I understand it.  I am still a lesbian, Henry.  That’s not going to change!”

While Henry was taking this all in, he had just never considered Gayle to be non-religious either, though for whatever reason, the shock just didn’t strike him all that hard.  Perhaps because she is a lesbian and he could at least partly understand why she probably wasn’t a fan.  But also because she was not his daughter, just his in-laws’ daughter, so maybe he’d never thought deeply on her beliefs, at least not in a manner that felt in any way like his responsibility.  At worst, he was seeing them differently, and couldn’t put a finger on exactly why.

Cautiously, as if afraid to offend someone, Henry said, “Myles, you know your mother and I love you very much.  You know that.  And you have to forgive your mother, I guess, because she—you know how she is.  She wrapped up so much of her life in that church and in the faith.  And you remember how your grandfather was in raising your mother and her sister.  She’ll come around.  We’ll all come around.  I mean, if this is what you want, and if this is who you are…” He sat up straight, hands out like a politician, “if this is who you are, then it’s who you are.  You’re still our son, you’re still a part of our family, and we will always love you.  Okay?

“I guess the only thing I have left to say on this is that I wish you’d maybe just told us sooner, or at least spoken to us about it.  Or spoken to me about it at the very least.  Because it feels like you didn’t trust me or respect me enough to deliver this news to me, you know, man to man.” He glanced at Gayle, seemingly scanning to make sure the term “man-to-man” was not offensive in some way, and she smiled at his embarrassment.  “Um, does… does that make sense?  When you learn something—you know—important like this about someone close to you, you’d kind of prefer to hear it from them.  Not from… the internet or something.”

Myles stretched while remaining seated, arching his back and reaching towards his feet, then shuddered to shake his body through any lingering anxiety.  Composure, for the most part, had been restored.  He nodded and through a yawn forged from the stretching and anxiety, he said, “yes Dad, I get it, I get it.  I’m sorry I didn’t bring this up before, and I’m sorry you guys had to find out from Facebook of all things.  I didn’t really think you guys actually used that stupid site.  I barely use it anymore.  Colossal waste of time anyway.”

He stood up and stretched some more, then he added with a smirk, “I’d especially wish I would have brought it up before just so we wouldn’t have to do it now.  Have it all over and done and crap.”

Henry started saying, “the longer you put something off—“

To which Myles interrupted, “yeah, yeah, I know, Dad.  I know.”

The tension in the room had finally largely abated.  Myles felt a wave of relief and Henry did as well.  Gayle was smiling, simply happy to see this situation had apparently resolved itself without the kind of dreadful fighting she’d encountered when her sexuality had been publicly revealed and her family had pretty much fallen apart.

Henry, it seemed, remained steadfast in his beliefs and attitude, that no matter what, family comes first.  Myles was attempting to bury a wave of embarrassment for having been such a poor judge of his own father’s attitude about this, and for the most part, all that worry seemed to be for nothing.  For the most part, at any rate.

Myles turned to Gayle: “You want another beer?  Because I’m going to get another beer.”  He then turned to his father, gestured towards an empty bottle to see if he also wanted another.

Gayle finished the last sip of her bottle and handed it to Myles while nodding, then added: “Thanks barkeep!”

Myles father held up a hand signaling a “no” to another beer for now, then added: “Look Myles, if you don’t want to talk about this too much more tonight, that’s fine.  Honestly, I don’t know where else to go with it anyway.  But I’m probably going to have more questions…”

Myles, standing halfway out of the room turned and said, “I didn’t want to talk about it in the first place, so stopping now is fine.  I guess if you have more to ask, you can ask whenever, but please don’t turn it into some… some kind of proselytizing.  To be fair, you had your chance to convert me already, and it didn’t really stick.”

“If you can keep that smart-ass attitude in check, I’ll do my best to make sure my questions are just about understanding,” Henry responded with a smile and a nod.  Gayle responded with laughter.

Slightly embarrassed, Myles added, “sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like an ass, but conversations are one thing.  Conversions are a completely different mess.”

Henry simply nodded with a defeated okay, okay in pantomime.

Myles knelt down to pick up Grandma Dolo’s needlepoint, then turned to vacate the room to get more beer.  As he crossed the living room on the way through the dining room to the kitchen, he observed the kids watching borderline inappropriate late-night television with seemingly no adult paying attention.  Though as he walked by, Doug mentioned something to them about bedtime, to which he was roundly booed and rebuffed, so Melissa had to back him up.  Evelyn, Marianne, and Grandma were busy talking, but Grandma wasn’t doing much in the way of actual chatting, so much as sitting nearby while Marianne and Evelyn talked around her.  Myles stopped nearby and placed the needlework in her lap and she smiled and thanked him.

He grabbed three beers and on his way back to the sitting room, was stopped by Jove.  “Hey Dad, do I have to go to bed now, with the other kids?”

Myles looked up at Melissa, who made a pained smile, folded her hands as in a prayer and strongly indicated that she would like Jove to accompany them.  The younger cousins rarely saw him, and neither did Gustav.  As he was comparatively rare during family outings, on account of being the only one of them not living somewhere around the Twin Cities, he was frequently a center of attention among them.

Slowly turning his attention from Melissa down to Jove, he said, “uhhh, why don’t you get ready for bed and join them.  We all know you’re not going to sleep right away anyway, so yeah, just get your stuff together.  Gustav’s getting ready for bed, too, right?”

Jove nodded glumly, “Yeah, I guess so.”

Myles turned and looked toward the sitting room where Gayle was giving Gustav a hug and kiss and he was saying goodnight to Henry.  “Looks like Gus is going to sleep with you guys anyway.  You might as well go along.”

“But Kim’s not going to bed,” he lamented.

Myles smiled, placed his hand on his son’s shoulder and said, “that’s because she’s a teenager, and teenagers are completely uncontrollable.” Several feet away, Kimberly rolled her eyes, but it could just as easily have been to something she was engrossed in on her phone.

Jove groaned, said “fine,” and went about getting ready for bed.

When all the goodnights and everything were done, the kids headed to the basement and their scattered sleeping bags and the adults largely huddled in two rooms chatting.  Marianne, Evelyn, and Grandma continued their conversation, soon joined by Melissa.  Doug eventually joined Myles, Gayle, and Henry in the sitting room after he realized he hadn’t spoken in nearly half an hour among the group in the living room.  A couple more hours ticked away in this fashion before the adults resigned themselves to sleep as well, most of them moving upstairs where Gayle was given the luxury of the one actual guest bedroom of the house, and Myles, Melissa (and Doug), and Marianne headed to the rooms that were considered “theirs.” The parents had their bedroom on the first floor, along with another guest room for Grandma Dolo.  It wasn’t really a guest room, so much as an office with a futon.  While not the most comfortable sleeping surface for a senior citizen, she’d prefer that over having to deal with stairs.

Just before everyone clustered into their rooms to sleep, Marianne trotted out in the upstairs hallway, saying to her siblings and cousin, “by the way guys, I think it will be really nice if we all go to the church together tomorrow to help them set up for the annual Christmas service.  Mom said they will be serving us brunch, possibly in honor of little old me!” She ended this quip with a face-filling smile and modesty so false, it risked becoming an urban legend, right up there with other unbelievable nonsense like kidney thieves and hook-handed psychos.
“I’m always up for a free brunch!” quipped Doug, from out of site in Melissa’s room.  Melissa nodded, though she looked wary of approving of this late-added news of holiday chores.

Gayle delivered only a pursed-lipped, “hmmm…” while nodding slowly.
Myles, again, decided this might as well be the holiday where he’d go for broke on all fronts, “Ooh!  Sorry Mary!  I already have plans taking Gayle and our boys out to breakfast tomorrow.  But you have fun with that!” He gave Gayle a brief look wherein he flicked his eyebrows up and down hoping she’d go along with it, then started backing away into his room.

Before he closed the door completely, Gayle returned a devious corner smile and took the hint, as she had long been adept at a lifetime of shenanigans with Myles.  To Marianne, she shrugged her shoulders, tilted her head and as sincerely as she could muster said, “yeah, sorry Marianne.  We’ll see if we can make it right after or something.  Thanks though!  Goodnight!” and she quickly closed the door a moment after Myles had closed his.

Marianne grimaced angrily, and was dead certain she heard a laugh after Gayle had closed her door.  The snide manner that Myles had blown her off dug at her as well.

Melissa only saw the back of Marianne’s head, so she wasn’t witness to the twisted face she was making, but knew it was likely happening.  “Goodnight Mary,” she said and turned out of view to close the door.
As Marianne was turning around, she saw the door close.  But heard Doug start asking something that was muffled the moment the door shut.  It sounded like, “wait, what are we doing tomorrow?” After the door shut, further muffled and quieter, it sounded like Doug added, “aw shit.”

For a moment, Marianne stood fuming in the hallway.  In her mind, she was giving Myles an olive branch, giving him a chance to make up for how he’d embarrassed the entire family with his apostasy and affront to their religious faith.  All he had to do was go along with this and the family and the event at the church, and she could maybe find it in her heart to forgive him.  Maybe.  In a more petty manner, she was offended that they seemed to be blowing her off and this was her welcome home holiday celebration.

‘Have fun with that,’ he’d said.  Marianne shook her head and walked toward her room at the other end of the hall.  What an asshole.