The Red Dress

                                            The Red Dress

                                                 

    The family was gathered around the kitchen table, having milk and cookies after school.

    Pammy, age 7, and Jamie, age 3, each sat behind a plate with four sandwich-type cookies and colorful tumblers half-filled with milk. Their mom, Mari, kept getting up to stir the spaghetti boiling on the stove.

    “Why can’t I have friends over after school anymore?” Pammy asked. 

    Jamie took one of his sister’s cookies, when he thought she wasn’t looking. He dunked it in his milk, crumbled it, and smeared it all over his face like a beard. Then he tugged urgently at her sleeve, trying to get her attention to make her laugh.

    Pammy ignored him, still trying to get their mothers’ attention.

    “I have to buy a present for Nicole, I got her name in the gift exchange,” she said.

    Mari turned around quickly, visibly upset.

    “Oh, honey,” Mari said finally. “Can’t you give her one of your books?  You’ve read them all so many times.  We can wrap it up real nice.”

      "Yeah, I guess so,” Pammy said, and left the table.

         ----

      After the fog-horn bleat of the factory whistle blew for the end of the shift that day, for the very last time, Dan and his buddies decided to have a drink or two-- or three. Unemployment was a new crisis for them, since most of the men in their small town (and many women) had been employed making airplane parts ever since they graduated from high school.

    Dan staggered home around midnight, almost knocking down the small table in the hallway as he came in. The noise woke Mari, who came into the living room, clutching a pink bathrobe around herself.

      “Shh, you’ll wake the kids,’ she said.

      “Table wasn’t here before,” he mumbled, noticing a letter from Pammy’s school.

      “What’s this? She needs a new dress?” he bellowed. “Your daughter…specially selected…Christmas pageant…red dress…” He read.

      “We can’t afford no new dress! Mari, have you looked in the thrift shop?”

      “Already have, there’s nothing there.”

      “The ‘lectric bill is overdue; car payment’s comin’ up,” Dan said, suddenly sober.  “And don’t you have a few bucks for tomorrow stashed away in that teapot of yours?  Car’s outta gas."

      “Okay.”

      “Oh, and you’ll have to apply at the food bank…”

      “No!  I’m too embarrassed to take charity!”

      “You will if you want your kids to eat!”

         ----

    Pammy pressed her nose up against the glass of the department store window, her breath fogging the glass in the sub-freezing afternoon temperature. She’s been walking home the long way, just to admire the beautiful holiday dresses on display. One in particular was just perfect, red velvet and in her exact size, with lace around the collar and cuffs---and a big red bow around the waist!  She believed in miracles, although she’d never actually seen one. “And did a silly dress count? It’s daddy who needs a miracle!” She thought.

         ----

      “Oh boy! Real butter!” Jamie said, as the extended family gathered for Thanksgiving Dinner at grandpa and grandma’s house. The aunts and uncles tittered with laughter, as Mari’s face turned bright red with embarrassment. After second and even third helpings of almost everything, grandma brought out her special gingerbread cookies. They were huge and made to look like pilgrims and turkeys, decorated with icing.

      Jamie ate two pilgrims and three turkeys, and almost got sick.

    After all the aunts and uncles went home, grandma asked if Pammy could stay the night and help her get out the Christmas decorations the next day. Pammy and her mom gladly agreed.

      The next morning grandma made a huge breakfast of pancakes with strawberry syrup, eggs and bacon and sausage, and fresh orange juice that Pammy squeezed in the juicer.

    After breakfast, they made their way up the dark and dusty back staircase, with Pammy holding a flashlight, as grandma led the way. The door of the attic was stuck, but a push and a shove soon opened it. Pammy shone the flashlight around the cluttered space. Her eyes locked on a big black steamer trunk, shabby but imposing, that sat in the far corner.

      “What’s THAT?” she asked.

    Grandma drifted over to it, and easily opened the rusty lock with her strong fingers.

      Inside the trunk, nestled next to rolls of half-used holiday gift wrap, lay a bolt of bright red velvet fabric.

      Grandma’s eyes misted over with tears. The fabric was left over from a dress she’d made many years ago, for Pammy’s mother, for just such a Christmas pageant as the one coming up.

      Under the fabric they found several yards of lace and a roll of thick red ribbon. Pammy jumped for joy and clapped her hands.

      The Christmas decorations were forgotten as the two carefully made their way downstairs, clutching the new-found treasures.

      Grandma brought out her old sewing machine. She used to sew a lot, and now didn’t even need a pattern. Pammy helped her cut the fabric and thread the needles, since her eyes weren’t as good as they used to be.

      By evening, when Mari came to pick up her daughter, they had made a perfect replica of the dress in the department store window.

      ----

      A few days before Christmas, it was announced that some investor had bought the factory, and would re-tool it from airplane parts to auto parts.

      Dan rushed to be first in line to apply for a job and soon was joined by a crowd of hundreds. They planned to wait all night, to be there when they opened for applications at 7 a.m.

      The weather turned bad. First heavy rain, then sleet, then icy wind-driven snow beset them.

      Mari and grandma organized the women of the town to bring blankets, peanut butter sandwiches, and thermos’ full of steaming hot coffee to everyone in line.



      The next morning, after the agonizing wait, the new factory owner hired everyone, right on the spot.

----

      Jamie’s eyes nearly popped out of his head when his sister took the stage, right in the middle of a big yellow spotlight.

        “Joy to the world….He rules the world with truth and grace…His wonders to perform…heaven and earth prove the wonders of His love…the wonders of His love…the wonders of His love…Joy to the world…”

        Pammy sang three songs in all; she was the star of the show! Afterwards, Jamie, who had snuck away from his parents, picked a big bouquet of poinsettias from the decorations around the auditorium and presented it to his sister. Everyone just laughed.

        The teachers gave each of the singers a huge Christmas stocking, filled with candy canes, chocolate angels and santas, and marshmellow snowmen.

A sudden thought hit Pammy. “Christmas is about love and sharing,” she reasoned. “And it wasn’t so long ago that Jamie looked just like the Babe in the manger.”  She let him have first pick of the candy.



        And one especially bright star seemed to lead them, as the family made their way home in the crisp, clear night air.