December 2016
Peter had gone back to school the week after the funeral not wanting to stay at home with Ben any longer. He couldn’t stand the quiet apartment that had been so full of love and laughter just days before. Everyone at school either avoided him or gave him pitied looks as he went by. Even Flash had given him space.
The teachers offered for him to turn in assignments late or push back midterms, but Peter declined. He needed the distraction.
For two months Peter had been going through the motions of going to school, decathlon, and then usually Ned’s house or sometimes the library until he finally made it back home around 10pm. If Ben noticed, he didn’t care. Ben went back to work a month after May’s death, but he was still struggling.
Ben had been a police officer in Queens for twenty years. He had been offered promotions to detective or other positions that would allow him to sit behind a desk, but he declined them all. Him and May would fight about it after they thought Peter was asleep as Ben would have gotten a raise with any of those positions. However, he always said that he wanted to be on the streets interacting with the community. May pretended that she understood.
After his wife’s death, Ben went to his captain and asked to be switched to a position that kept him at the station. His captain, who wasn’t much older than Ben, said he understood and promoted Ben to a Sergeant and assigned him to help with evidence and equipment management.
He hadn’t told Peter any of this, but Peter had to stop by the station one day to pick up the spare apartment key and a few people came over to congratulate him on his dad’s promotion. Peter didn’t bother to correct any of them. Instead, he made Ben’s favorite meal, chicken parmesan, so they could celebrate when he got home.
That night Ben opened the door and was hit by the smell of Italian seasoning and ripe tomatoes. He didn’t bother to set his bag down as he rushed into the kitchen, expecting to see his wife stirring the sauce and listening to Fleetwood Mac. The sinking feeling in his stomach that he had been trying to suppress for weeks suddenly came back as he found just Peter carefully pouring the sauce over the pasta.
Peter must have been too focused to hear the door because he flinched when he saw Ben and spilled some of the sauce down the cabinet. “Shit! Sorry, I didn’t hear you come in. I-I heard about your promotion and so I made, or tried to make, May’s chicken parmesan. I probably messed it up, but I figured it might be nice to have some of her with us, you know?” He was nervously rambling. “I didn’t make any salad, but the chicken is almost done, and the pasta is. Do you want to sit down?” Ben didn’t reply.
It felt like she was gone all over again. He was frozen just like he had been on the street except this time he was staring into his nephew’s wide-blown eyes and not May’s lifeless ones.
“Ben?”
“You can’t replace her Peter, she’s gone.”
And with that, Ben walked into his and May’s room.
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“Peter! Did you get number four on the geometry homework? I asked MJ but she said to ask you.”
Behind Ned MJ rolled her eyes. Peter sat down at their lunch table that was in the far-left corner of the cafeteria. “Yeah man, let me grab it for you.”
Peter dug through his bag to pull out the worksheet which he handed to Ned. May used to pack Peter’s lunch and so he had just been eating a granola bar or a pop tart for lunch and distracting himself with homework. His friends were worried but didn’t say anything.
“Any holiday plans?”
Peter was surprised to hear MJ’s voice as she usually kept to herself during lunch, tucking her knees to her chest and her nose in a book. Peter had no idea what they were doing. “Uh- no, probably just have a quiet night in. You?” Every night with Ben was quiet these days.
“Same. My dad has to work Christmas, so we’ll do dinner and presents just the two of us on Christmas Eve.”
“He’s leaving you alone?” Ned was finally done with his worksheet and had tuned back in. Ned had a large extended family that was spread across New York and New Jersey. The thought of being alone any night, but especially on Christmas, was a foreign concept to him.
MJ seemed to curl in on herself. “I mean yeah, not many doctors want to work the holidays, but somebody has to.” Peter thought that MJ might be embarrassed, not that she would ever admit it. Peter knew how hard it was to be lonely.
“I can talk to Ben, maybe we can do something together for Christmas? I mean only if you want, of course. If you want to be alone I totally get that to, but I just mean if you didn’t I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if I went out for a few hours, or-“
“Ok-“ she had to cut off his rambling before he worked himself up, “I mean yeah that’d be nice”. Peter told her that he would ask, but in truth he would probably just slip out the fire escape like he had been doing a lot lately. Ever since the failed dinner attempt Peter had been giving Ben some space.
The rest of the week went by slowly has teachers tried and failed to control the students. By the Friday before break teachers had given up and were showing movies or playing games with their students. In the back of his English class Peter was able to hide his phone under his desk to check his email. Last week he had submitted three photos that he taken at a climate change protest to The Daily Bugle.
They had finally sent a reply:
Dear Mr. Parker,
Thank you for submitting photos for our upcoming publication that will come out this Sunday, December 25, 2016. Two of the three photos (attached) have been accepted. Please come to our office and collect your check of $100 at the front desk. Our hours are 8-6 Monday through Friday and 9-1 on Saturdays. Thank you again for your submission.
Best,
Cindy
Cindy Namazian
The Daily Bugle
Head Editor
Peter smiled to himself. He had ended up at the protest on Saturday after the library he spent most of his days at was closed. Ned had always encouraged him to send photos to local newspapers, but this was the first time that he had. Peter took the subway to the offices after school before heading to get some last-minute Christmas shopping done.
---
Growing up May’s family had always opened gifts on Christmas Eve and Ben’s family opened them on Christmas morning. Which means every year Peter had to listen to them argue about it.
“You do the gifts the night before so you can spend the whole day celebrating Jesus and not worrying about who got who what! Or have you fallen to marketing schemes and forgotten about the true meaning of Christmas?” May batted her eyes at him in an over-the-top way.
“And that argument may have worked if you went to actually church to celebrate the holiday, but Peter and I both know that you just want to sleep in. Right bud?”
Both would look at him expectantly. “Nu-uh, leave me out of this. I’m happy either way.”
Neither of them were actually mad but they would go back and forth for weeks before Ben would pretend to selflessly let his wife have her way. Peter knew that he would always let her win, but he liked seeing how happy it made her every year.
There was no arguing this year. So far there had only been half-hearted good mornings, packed up decorations, and an empty kitchen table. Christmas Eve came and went with no presents and no mention of the holiday or May. Another part of Peter broke as May kept slipping away.
By 11am on Christmas morning Peter had yet to see Ben and he was just beginning to resign himself to the fact that there was going to be no Christmas this year just as there had been no Thanksgiving. Peter placed his carefully wrapped gifts to Ben, new slippers and a book on Roman history, on the kitchen table as he got ready to pack for MJ’s.
Peter was reheating leftover raviolis for lunch when Ben left his room. He was wearing his Sergeant’s uniform and had an unwrapped box under his arm. Peter froze.
Ben slid the box across the island. “Here bud, Merry Christmas. Sorry it’s not wrapped.” Peter didn’t care about the wrapping; he was just glad that his uncle had said more than two words to him. He thanked his uncle as he opened the box to reveal a new pair of sneakers. He smiled, just what he needed.
Ben headed towards the door. “Wait! I have something for you to.” He handed over the gifts to his uncle who took them gingerly.
“It’s not much, but um I hope you like them.”
Ben put them back down without opening them. “Um, I’ll open them when I get back. I’m headed to work, got the late shift so don’t wait up.” He headed toward the door, grabbing his jacket off the hook. He quietly said, “thanks Pete” and locked the door behind him.
Peter mumbled, “Merry Christmas” just after the door shut.