The Lola Cruz Christmas Story Read online

morning, I found myself climbing a tree. It took me awhile, and I slipped a couple of times, but finally I was a good twelve feet, maybe more, up from the ground. From my vantage point, I could see inside both the upstairs and the downstairs flats. From my parents’ place on the first floor, Christmas tree lights winked, voices chattered in English and Spanish, and laughter drifted out. I could see Gracie at the stove, frying the buñuelos. My stomach growled, and my thighs grew an inch just thinking about the fried pastry melting in my mouth. Ay dios, Christmas was deadly to the diet.

  A branch poked me in the ribs, and it was like an angel sending me a wake-up call. I looked down. Margo had left the safe warmth of the car. She stood staring up at me, little Anthony bundled in her arms, nuzzling her breast. Seeing them renewed my purpose. I shimmied out onto the branch, halfway to the window. I’d brought Margo to safety, her swaddled babe secure in her arms. It was like I was living a Posada, reenacting the story of Mary and Joseph as they searched for shelter. Margo was Mary, which meant I was Joseph. Once inside my flat, I could unlock the front door and let her in.

  The sound of wood splitting jerked me out of my Norman Rockwell painting. Not good. My thighs tightened on the branch. It creaked again, jerking under my weight. Did I chance moving forward, or retreat?

  A snap sounded behind me, followed by the ominous cracking of wood and another jolt as the branch I clung to started to give. I screeched, hanging on for dear life.

  The baby started to cry, his shrieks drowning out my own scream. Within seconds, every member of the Cruz family had raced outside and was standing below me, peering up.

  With one arm clutching the branch, my body sprawled out along the limb, I sheepishly smiled and gave a tiny wave. “Buenos dias. And, um, happy tamale day.”

  “Dios mio, ¿que haces, Dolores?” My mother spit out the words like well-aimed bullets, but her hand clutched her chest in anguish.

  I gave a slight shrug in response, but the small movement was enough to shake my already precarious branch. It cracked again.

  “Ahhhh!” I screamed as the started to give. I was a curvy Latina, built the way a real woman should be. Was it my fault that a pear tree couldn’t support me.”

  “¡Esperate, Lola! ¡Con cuidado!” Gregorio Cruz to the rescue. My father raced to the garage. The branch I clung to cracked and dropped another inch. Hurry, Papi, I willed. I knew I was going to plummet to my death any second.

  I tried to inch back, stopping when the limb rocked with the movement. I froze. I’d wait it out. No one moved. Why hadn’t they called 911? Where were the firemen? The rescue team? Save me, please! I’d offer a buñuelo as a reward.

  But no one in my family had whipped out a cell phone to dial emergency. They just stared at me, half-grinning behind their hands, thinking little Lola Cruz had gotten herself in a bind once again. I could almost hear their thoughts: A private investigator? Loca.

  “Lola!” Chely, my soon-to-be fifteen year old cousin, shrieked, staring up at me in awe. “You’re like the partridge.”

  “What?” I said, hardly daring to part my lips as I spoke.

  “You know,” she said, then broke into song, “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me, a partridge in a pear tree.”

  “Except I don’t have a true love and I’m not a bird. And what does that even mean, anyway?” I mean really. If, say, Jack gave me something for Christmas, I wouldn’t want the gift to be a partridge in a pear tree. But nobody was listening to me anymore. They had finally noticed Margo and her baby.

  I forgot about everything else and held my breath as Antonio walked toward them. I craned my neck to see his expression. His goateed face went from solemn to puzzled to an expression I couldn’t read, all in the blink of an eye. “Margo?” he said.

  They spoke softly, then their voices raised slightly, calming down a minute later. They slowly moved away until they disappeared back onto the driveway and out of sight. “Hello?” I said, praying my voice wouldn’t be the catalyst that split the rest of the wood and sent me crashing to my death. “Can someone help me here?”

  A horn blared from the street just as my father finally emerged from the garage--racing as fast as a man can race with a ten-foot ladder in his grasp.

  Much as I tried not to, I shifted, and the branch started to creak and moan again, giving way under my weight. “Hurry, Papi!” The gate to the yard creaked open, but the sound was drowned out by the groaning branch. My father fumbled as he set up the ladder beneath the pear tree.

  With achingly slow movements, I gently swung my leg over my perch until my backside was toward the lookie-loos and my legs dangled, searching for purchase on the ladder. Papi shouted up at me in Spanish. “A little to the right. Too far! Go to the left.” Finally, I found a rung, eased myself off the tree, and scrambled down three rungs. My father grabbed me around the waist in the nick of time--I was barely out of the way when the branch finally gave with a deafening snap.

  My heart threatened to thud right out of my chest, but I was safe...and so was Margo and her baby. I turned to wave and smile down at my family...

  ...and froze. Jack Callaghan stood at the gate looking right at me, his cousin Margo’s baby cradled in his arms. For the briefest moment, his blue eyes seemed to laser into mine and an unspoken charge of electricity passed between us. His hair was tousled, his dimple flaring in what annoyingly looked like amusement. Heat--of embarrassment or anticipation, or maybe both--spread through me.

  “Thank you,” he mouthed, and a wave of warmth flowed through me. I nodded, smiling back at him.

  My father yanked at me, urging me down the ladder. The magical moment was over. The spell between Jack and me was broken.

  On solid ground again, I was rushed by members of my family. Sure, when I’d been stuck in the tree and needed help, they’d just stared. Now they circled around me, shooting rapid-fire questions at me: Where were you? Who is that girl? And the baby? Why is she talking to Antonio?

  They gathered around me like hungry coyotes. They were full of abrazos and I couldn’t escape a single hug. I brushed the questions away, refusing to give the gossipers the chisme they wanted. Instead, I stood on my tippy toes, searching for Jack, Antonio, or Margo.

  When I was finally able to dodge the love, I made a break for the driveway. A sporty silver Volvo was backing out, Jack in the driver’s seat and Margo on the passenger side. In the back, I caught a glimpse of a rear-facing baby seat. Jack had thought of everything.

  Before he put the car into drive, he glanced back at the driveway and we locked gazes for a moment. Long enough for that spark to fly back and forth between us again. Long enough for me to already miss the light-hearted friendship we used to have. Long enough for all those long-buried emotions I’d had for him to resurface.

  Margo held her hand up in a silent thank you, and I knew she was safe from her husband’s hand. Antonio stood watching them, rocking back on his heels, arms crossed over his chest. A moment later we were both staring at the empty street. I was dizzy with sadness. “They’re gone,” I said, a wave of disappointment washing over me. If I hadn’t been in the pear tree, Jack and I might have spoken. But I’d brought Margo and the baby to safety. That was enough.

  The baby... “Tonio,” I said, a bubble of anxiety rising up in me. “Margo...”

  Antonio nodded as he slowly turned to me. “She told me what happened. The bruise. Her husband. Why she called you. You did good.”

  I shoved my hair behind my ears and looked up at my big brother. I knew I’d done good, but what had he done eleven months ago? “The baby...”

  “Yeah, the baby. Sucks, pero but she’ll take care of him. Jack’ll help her figure it out.”

  “But a baby needs his father,” I said. “Um, should you...”

  He stared at me for a long second, then his eyes opened wide and he grinned. “No, Lol
a,” he said with a laugh. “I shouldn’t.”

  I lowered my chin and peered up at him. “Really?”

  He wrapped his arm around my shoulder and squeezed. “Really.”

  “But you ran into her--”

  “Lola, come on, give me some credit. She’s married...for now, at least. I’ll wait till she’s free,” he said, but for a moment his jaw ticked.

  “Do you think she’ll be okay?”

  “She’ll be fine,” he finally said, but I could feel his heart breaking the way it had back in high school and I knew he’d always have a place in there for Margo. “Jack’ll take care of her.” But he stared into the distance as if he wished it could be him taking care of Margo and little Tonito.

  I wrapped my arm around his waist and we walked back through the gate and into the house. The tamalada was back in full swing. At the kitchen table, Antonio picked up a soft corn husk and started spreading a perfect layer of masa on it, handing it off to Gracie. “Where were you two?” she asked as she spooned pork filling onto the masa.

  “Making sure Margo got off safely.” I picked up a buñuelo from the plate and opened my mouth wide to take a bite.

  “Lola.”

  I looked up to find Antonio grinning at me. “Hmm?”

  “I’ll bet you a hundred dollars I can make more tamales than you can.”

  I elbowed him in the gut. “You’re on.” I did un poquito