“The Crystal Swan,” a Christmas story by Evena Gottschalk

Many years ago at Christmas, I received a tiny crystal swan, a mirror on which to place it and a hand-drawn card with lovely crayon work, saying, For you, Auntie. The gift came from my best friend’s six-year-old son, Peter.

The sights and smells of that Christmas morning at Ann’s house have been indelibly inscribed in my brain. I remember looking through the window at the trees, the rooftops and the sidewalks brushed with a fresh layer of snow.  Inside, the fireplace crackled, and the smell of freshly baked ham permeated the air.

On Christmas Eve we decorated the tree, baked cookies, drank egg nog. Afterwards, we bundled up and walked through the crunchy snow to attend the Festival of the Nine Lessons and Carols at a nearby church.  We returned home, cold, tired but joyful. Eventually, sleep called and we retired to our rooms.

“Auntie,” Peter whispered. “May I come in? I want to tell you something.” 

“Sure,” I said. Peter came over to my bed.  To have a better view of his round, angelic face, I turned on the bedside light.

“I bought a gift for you Auntie. I chose it myself. Before I could reply, Peter turned around and ran up the hallway to his room. 

After breakfast, we gathered around the tree to exchange gifts.  But Peter pre-empted the ritual of him handing out the Christmas stockings.  Rather he planted himself in front of the tree.  In his outstretched hand, he held a small box topped with an oversized red bow. “Open it, open it,” he said, rushing towards me. “I wrapped it myself.” He leaned on my lap; elbows on chin gazing at me as I lifted a miniature crystal swan out of the box. 

“Auntie, do you like it?”

“Of course, it’s beautiful,” I said.”

 “Auntie, take good care of it, forever and forever.” 

I did.

Peter’s mother and I are first generation Canadians.  Our parents immigrated to Canada to study and never returned. They were not escaping from a life of poverty. Rather they enjoyed the freedom of anonymity, a difficult thing to achieve on a small island. 

Our two families lived in the same neighbourhood, vacationed together. Peter’s mother, and I attended the same university. We considered ourselves sisters, just not bonded by DNA.  She had been my biggest supporter when my husband unexpectedly died.

Peter grew up, went off to university.  I remember the Christmas morning when he presented his fiancée with a pair of crystal lovebirds. How he repeated the exact words when he gave me my crystal swan, but with a twist.  He said, “Take good care of them, because my love for you is forever and forever.” Then he turned to me and asked like he had done so many Christmases before. “Auntie how is my swan doing? Is she safe?” 

“Of course. Auntie loves you and your swan, forever and forever.” 

One summer’s evening I heard a tinkling sound. I ran to my room to discover the swan lying on its side, its wings broken. My heart leapt.  Why did it break, I asked myself. Because there was no one else around and the windows were closed. I dismissed it all, went to the kitchen to prepare dinner.

About half of an hour later my cell phone rang. “He’s gone, he’s gone,” Ann screamed. Her cries pierced my ears, my soul, my body.

“Who? I asked.

“Peter, Peter, my only son, he’s gone.” The phone went dead. I ran to the bedroom, held that broken bird. Sobbed.

Later I learned that he died in a car crash, on his way home from a business trip. 

After his death, I carried that broken swan in my handbag. The swan has traveled to all the countries Peter promised to visit. Until one day, I realized my tears no longer flowed when I uttered his name or look fixedly at his photos. A quietness had settled within me. I thought it was time for Peter to be made whole again. To fly away. And Ann and I had decided it was time to start celebrating Christmas again. However muted.

At our first holiday get together I visited the shop where Peter had originally bought the bird when he was just a little boy. 

“Do you have this one?” I asked the sales associate. I softly unravelled the tissue paper and showed her the broken swan.

 “Let me go look,” she said. She opened the display case and searched. “You’re lucky. This is my last one.”

She placed it in the palm of my hand. And memories of a little boy, in another place, in another time, flooded my heart. I smiled and swallowed my tears.

“Is it a gift?” she asked. “Shall I wrap it?”

“Yes, please,” I said.

***

Evena Gottschalk grew up on the island of Barbados listening to stories told by her grandmother. Now free to pursue her passion for storytelling, she spends time reading and writing. When not working on her novel, she watches British detective shows. She has spent most of her adult life in Canada with a brief stint in Uppsala, Sweden.

See Brian Henry’s upcoming weekly writing classes, one-day workshops, and weekend retreats here.

“Waiting for Ralph” by Evena Gottschalk

The horn at the Sugar factory signalled the end of the day’s shift. The last donkey cart stuffed with sugar cane rumbled down the dirt track to the factory. Boys playing a game of bat and ball in the road scattered out of its way. Alma Alleyne, a resident of Porter Village, stepped out of the house, and checked for her seven-year-old daughter Cora.

“Cora,” Alma called. “Where are you?” Then from the far side of the next-door neighbour’s house, she heard the familiar sound of hands clapping. Alma raised her voice.

“Listen, Cora, you better get inside, or I’ll have to tell your father when he comes home.” 

Cora, who simultaneously adored and feared her father, ran towards Alma.

“I here, Mummy,” said Cora, offering her best angelic face. Alma ignored her, marched into the house with a sulking Cora behind her.

“Go wash your face,” said Alma, turning to look at the clock. “Your father will soon be home.” 

While Cora washed, Alma peered through the window at the sky painted in brilliant oranges and reds. Although she had witnessed many sunsets, no two were ever the same. Unwilling to miss a moment of the sunset’s surrender to dusk, she remained at the window.

Then, she glanced at the clock on the corner table.

“He should be here by now. I wonder what happened?”

Cora, hugging her rag doll, ran to Alma, nestled her head within the folds of Alma’s skirt. “Mummy, light the lamp, I scared.”

Alma lit the lamp in the front room, carefully replacing the lampshade with its Home Sweet Home etchings on the chimney. She recalled the Saturday afternoon he surprised her with it. They had butchered a hog, and she had just returned from delivering the final package of meat to a customer. Entering the house, Ralph said, “You home already?”

She did not reply. She kept moving towards him. “What you hiding from me?” she asked. 

“Nothing,” said Ralph as he beeped and bopped in front of her. 

“Let me see,” she said. Laughing, she pushed him aside to find a “fancy lamp with a fancy shade.”

“Wait,” she said. “You didn’t get you self in debt with that peddler?”

“No, man,” Ralph said. “You know it’s crop season and I save a little extra money to buy this for you.”

Cora, unimpressed by her mother’s giggling, pouted.  

“Mummy, are there sweet and sour homes? Is our home sweet like the Home Sweet Home lamp?”

“Why would you ask such a thing?” said Alma. “The things you ask. You must be going to be a lawyer or something.”

“But Mummy, you sure you can’t taste a home like sugar cakes or sweet bread?” asked Cora, looking curiously into her mother’s eyes.

“What do you think Cora?”

“I think we have a sweet home, and you and Daddy make it sweet.”

That had been last year. Now Alma went into the kitchen, lit the kerosene stove to boil fresh cow’s milk. From a shelf she removed two enamel cups for cooling the milk. And from the larder she retrieved a tin of Ovaltine.

“Can I have a biscuit with my tea?” Cora asked. Alma handed her two biscuits. Cora broke them into pieces, added them to the milk.

“Sit down,” said Alma. “Say your grace. Thank God for ya meal.”

Alma returned to the front room, checked the clock, the street.

“Mummy, where’s Daddy?” Cora whined. 

Alma ignored her. “Don’t worry,” said Alma. “He coming home soon.” Under her breath she whispered, “I hope this home still sweet.” 

Finally, Cora pushed the chair aside, said, “I hear footsteps, I hear footsteps, it’s Daddy.” The two rushed to the door. Instead, it was their next door neighbour. Alma stepped outside. Cora rested on the doorpost.

“Good night, Mr. Jackson, you see Ralph anywhere?”

“No,” he said. “Don’t worry, you know how it is. Maybe somebody tek real sick at the factory and Ralph had to fill in.”

“I never thought about that,” she said. “Thank you. I was here worrying all dis time.”

“Looka dat full moon, wunna women does worry about everything,” Mr. Jackson said. 

“I was so lost in muh thoughts,” she said. “I didn’t think bout dat. I forgot it was a full moon tonight.”

“Cora,” she shouted. “Come and see the man in the moon.”

Sucking her thumb, Cora stood with Alma in the middle of the gravel road. Cora tugged at her mother’s skirt. 

“I know you dey, Cora Ann,” Alma said. “The moon too pretty and bright. If your father was home, we all could have taken a moonlight walk to the end of the road. Next time.”

“You think any duppees out there in the cane fields?” asked Cora.

Mr. Jackson laughed. “Who tell you dat? With all the canes cut down, the one ting out dey is de big rats running round looking for a new home.” He rubbed Cora’s braided hair. “Better go in before the duppees get ya,” he teased.

Alma grasped Cora’s hand. “Come,” she said. “Your father should soon be home. Sit and play with your doll. I going to check things.”

After Alma had completed her evening housekeeping ritual of sweeping, cleaning, she opened the kitchen window, grabbed the searchlight, flicked the switch. She pointed the light around the yard to check the livestock. Everything was still. Finally, she latched the wooden windows, proceeded to the front room.

She lifted the lamp, called to Cora. “We going in,” she said. “Come.” 

Cora’s eyes weighed heavily with sleep. Alma lit the bedroom lamp. Cora, fading fast, crawled into her nightie. On cue, she dropped to her knees, while Alma sat on the bed.

“Close your eyes,” said Alma. At the end of the Lord’s Prayer, Alma lifted Cora into bed. For a moment, she watched over Cora. Ralph sometimes stayed away for a few days and came home stinking. What would become of the two of them if Ralph disappeared? What would life be like without Ralph? There were endless what ifs she said to herself. She sighed, kissed Cora, hurried out of the room.

Stillness enveloped the house. Only the creaking sound from the rocking chair intruded on Alma’s silence and exhaustion. Occasionally, she jumped out of the chair to peep through the front door’s wooden jalousies. No Ralph. Where was he? How could she sleep? 

She had to be “just in case” ready, she thought. Just in case he needed a cup of tea and biscuits. Or just in case he needed a shot glass for his rum. Alma was unsure about the final “just in case.” 

After a few shots, a new, crude Ralph would emerge. A Ralph who didn’t even know himself. When she’d tried to explain to Ralph, or told him how she hid in the bushes outside, he’d said, “You lie, Alma. No way. Sometimes, I need dat drink It help me to rise every morning to face the back breaking work at the factory from sunup to sundown.” 

If only it were one drink. If only, if only, … and with that going through her mind, she drifted into sleep.

***

At first, Alma thought she heard a knock. She threw her head back, dozed off again. As the knocking rose to a crescendo, she opened her eyes, yawned.

“Ralph? Is that you?”  

A man’s voice said, “Alma, it’s Sergeant Haynes from the district police station. You know me.”

Alma stumbled to the corner table, retrieved a flashlight. She opened the window, shone the light on the policeman. He covered his eyes.

“Turn off the light. It’s me, George. You remember me from school days? I’ve bad news, Alma.”

*** 

Evena (or Avivi) Gottschalk is a Barbadian Canadian writer who lives in Toronto. She has previously worked in Not-For-Profit and Corporate Communications. She has recently started writing fictional short stories inspired by her childhood in Barbados.  Her hobbies include reading, writing and traveling. 

See all of Brian Henry’s upcoming weekly writing classes, one-day workshops, and weekend retreats here.