St. Nick Read online

  She started chatting about her family. The presents, she said, were mostly for the “out of towners” and would need to be mailed. She was glad that half her family was in the San Diego area, as she could hand deliver those.

  Nick walked at her slow pace. She said her car wasn’t far off, but she had only a general idea of where it was parked. Nick didn’t care; he wasn’t in a rush. He was listening to a story about one of her grandsons when the shadow descended on them.

  A truck was slowly approaching. Nick felt himself tensing as it pulled up to them. The truck was a gunmetal black color with tinted windows that were too dark for Nick to see inside. The vehicle seemed to hover over them before slowly passing by. Music was playing in the cab, a loud bass. The truck’s brake lights weren’t working, making it appear that much darker. At the intersection of the lot, it came to a stop.

  Nick was no longer listening to the old woman’s story. He couldn’t bottle up the street cop in him any longer. All his attention was fixed on the truck. It was just sitting there, waiting.

  “Hello?” she said. “Excuse me, young man. Here’s the car.”

  The truck finally moved, slowly making a left turn. There was a flash of a match, and in that moment Nick found himself looking into two sets of predator eyes. Then, with an insolent roar, the truck moved off.

  For a moment Nick considered grabbing the old lady’s keys. But he couldn’t risk what might happen during an unauthorized car chase. Besides, no crime had been committed, and he couldn’t even be sure these were his bad guys.

  Nick stood there fuming. He couldn’t make out a license plate number, and wondered if it had been removed. And he couldn’t run after them. If they were his bad boys, he didn’t want to show himself to them.

  “Young man?” asked the old woman, “young man?”

  The truck was making its way towards an exit. The duo wasn’t coming back, at least not tonight. Nick had gotten between the hunters and their prey, and they were going off to look for other game.

  Nick started stowing the presents in the trunk.

  “Thank you so much.”

  “You’re welcome,” Nick said, and then added, “Make sure you lock your doors and drive carefully.”

  “Oh, I will.”

  Nick waited for her to get in the car and start the engine before walking off. His steps were heavier, and his breath was strained. The encounter with the truck and its occupants had a toxic effect. His brief flirtation with happiness felt as if it had been sucked out of him, and his old companion, gloom, returned.

  Chapter 20

  In the Bleak Midwinter

  December 10

  Under the hot lights of the camera Nick felt the perspiration dripping off his forehead. The interview hadn’t even begun and yet he was feeling like he was being readied for the grill. Charlotte kept trying to put him at ease, which only made Nick more nervous.

  His fears were unfounded, of course. Charlotte had already gone over what they were to discuss. She would ask him questions about Laura’s letter, and then he was going to read it. There wouldn’t be any questions about the shooting.

  “Ready, Nick?”

  “Shoot my good side,” Nick told her.

  “Which side is that?”

  “I was hoping you could tell me.”

  Charlotte laughed, signaled to the cameraman, and then started asking questions.

  Nick was relieved when the shoot was done. Maybe some viewer would lead them to Laura. Christmas Eve was only two weeks off; time was getting short.

  Charlotte had also interviewed Angie. They’d taken footage of the letters hanging from the sleigh, and Angie had emphasized how Santa answered every letter personally. Nick was afraid that might bring a new flurry of letters to his mailbox. He hoped he wouldn’t get another letter from someone like Laura.

  After Charlotte and her cameraman left, the rest of the day was quiet. At the conclusion of his shift Nick told Angie that Bret was going to be filling in for him the next day.

  “I have it on good authority that it’s going to snow tomorrow,” he told her.

  “Oh, Nick,” she said, “that’s wonderful.”

  “Yeah, I’m looking forward to it.”

  “I think you’ve arrived,” Angie said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “There are three stages of man,” said Angie. “Think of them as a progression. The first stage is when you believe in Santa Claus. The second stage is not believing in Santa Claus. And the third stage is becoming Santa Claus. You’ve reached that third stage, Nick.”

  “Don’t tell anyone,” he said.

  “Oh, your secret is safe with me.”

  When Nick arrived at the hospital he went over the next day’s arrangements with Easy. She was working a twelve-hour shift and would be around in the morning when the snow started flying.

  “The snow crew is going to be working at dawn,” said Nick. “I want Raymond to toss the first snowball.”

  “I’ll bring him down as soon as they start,” Easy promised.

  “I don’t think we’ll be able to surprise him. He’s probably going to hear them making the snow. It’s a pretty noisy operation.”

  “I’ll make a point of being in his room when the noise starts,” Easy said. “I can say construction is going on, and then ask Raymond if he wants me to wheel him down to see. That will make for a good excuse.”

  “That sounds great,” said Nick.

  “I’m glad you’re doing this,” she said. “Raymond’s been subdued since his mom left.”

  “He’s probably tired,” said Nick.

  “Probably,” said Easy, although she didn’t sound convinced.

  “Don’t worry, I won’t stay long.”

  When Nick walked into the room and saw Raymond’s dull eyes, he knew it was more than a case of the boy’s being tired. As sick as he’d been before, the boy’s eyes had always been bright and piercing, but now Nick was looking at eyes that seemed to have a layer of film on them.

  “How you doing?” he asked.

  The boy barely shrugged.

  One of Raymond’s favorite toys was his Woody doll from the movie Toy Story. The cowboy sheriff was sprawled on the floor and Nick picked him up. He pulled the string and Woody said, “I’ll make a cowboy out of you yet.”

  Raymond’s mouth twitched in a grin. Nick pulled again, and Woody said, “Yee haw, cowboy.”

  On the third pull Woody said, “Hey, this town ain’t big enough for the two of us.”

  Or this world, thought Nick with a suppressed sigh.

  He set the doll on the nightstand, and then reached for the Advent calendar. In his days away from Raymond the boy had kept up with opening the doors, but he hadn’t turned that day’s flap.

  “Chocolate waiting for you,” said Nick, “behind door number ten.”

  Nick held the calendar for Raymond to scan. The boy seemed to have trouble focusing, but at last scratched a feeble finger at the number ten. It was clear he was only making the effort for Nick, and when the flap turned Raymond dropped his hand.

  “I’m not hungry,” he said. “You have it.”

  “Keep it for a midnight snack,” said Nick.

  “Don’t want it,” said Raymond. Speaking seemed to be an effort, but he did sigh out one word: “You.”

  Nick took him up on the invitation, pulled out the chocolate, and swallowed it.

  “Good?” asked Raymond.

  “Good,” lied Nick. The chocolate stuck in his throat like a bitter pill that didn’t want to go down.

  “Are you sure you don’t want me to get Easy, or a doctor?”

  “Just tired,” said Raymond.

  “Get some sleep then.”

  The boy gave a small nod.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” said Nick.

  “Bye,” Raymond whispered.

  The boy closed his eyes. It was a relief to Nick. He didn’t like admitting it to himself, but looking at those dull eyes had unnerved him.
r />   Tomorrow, Nick thought as he made his way silently from the room, the snow will fall and my commitment will be done. Maybe the snow will be just the thing to revive him.

  Chapter 21

  O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

  December 11

  The phone rang just after midnight. Nick was wide-awake, but he still didn’t rush to answer it. He hated late night phone calls. Nothing good ever came from them, and he was hoping someone had misdialed. After five rings that hope vanished and he picked up the receiver.

  “Mr. Pappas? This is Isabel—Easy—from the hospital.”

  No, thought Nick. Don’t say it.

  “I’m sorry to be calling so late …”

  She paused long enough for Nick to offer some forgiving nicety, but he didn’t do that.

  “… but I thought you should know about Raymond. We had to rush him to the ICU.”

  “How bad is he?”

  “He’s in critical condition. The doctors have put him on life support, and he’s not conscious.”

  Nick didn’t say anything.

  “I thought you should know with the snow people coming out in the morning. Maybe you could still …” She almost said the word cancel but instead said “ … get them to come another day.”

  Nick pondered his options. There didn’t seem to be a good one among them.

  “Where’s the ICU located,” he asked, “and does it have a view to that grassy area?”

  “It’s on the third floor. From the south window you can see down to the grass.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  “Let it snow.”

  In the middle of the night Nick gave up trying to sleep and went downstairs. He sat at the kitchen table and stared at the gun. The revolver was in the same spot where he had left it, but for the first time in almost two weeks he took notice of it. He felt like he was back where he had started, and knew that wasn’t a good place to be.

  Anger always darkened his moods. The more he tried to keep things inside, the more they had a way of spilling out, like some personal forest fire that blackened his world. But he was tired of keeping his anger bottled up; he wanted to lash out at something, anything. God, he decided, was a big enough target.

  He lifted his eyes up from the gun, but not very far up. “I tried to do something right, God, and where has it gotten me?”

  His words became louder: “Are you looking to trade, God? Do you need a life so much that you’re going to take this kid’s? Why don’t you take mine instead, then? How about it, me for him? Why don’t you just reach down with one of those divine fingers of yours and cure his ills? I’m offering myself as payment. I know it’s not much to put on the table, but how about it?”

  Nick started rapping his knuckles on the table, and kept rapping them.

  “You keep throwing children in my path, God, and it is one bad story after another. I shoot to protect my life, and I almost take a little girl’s life. I play Santa Claus, and you make me an angel of death. I get a plea for help, but it’s an anonymous plea. Are you trying to drive me crazy, God? You got all these people yelling, ‘Help, help,’ but you’ve rigged everything so that I can’t.”

  Nick’s rapping grew louder.

  “You’d think taking away my career would be payment enough, but I guess not. No, I needed to suffer some more.”

  Nick stopped rapping. He looked at his hands. His knuckles were white and skinned, as if he had been in a fight. I was in a fight, Nick thought, and I lost again.

  “Were you listening, God?” he asked, and then he shook his head.

  “I didn’t think so.”

  Nick left his apartment at 4:00 a.m. It was too early and too dark to be going anywhere, but he was tired of talking to himself.

  The roads were deserted, and he made it over to Los Niños faster than he would have wanted. He considered going to some fast food place for coffee, but decided against it. With his luck, he was afraid he would walk into another armed robbery, and besides, he really didn’t want coffee. He just wanted to get things over with.

  Nick sat in his car for ten minutes before finally getting out. He was wearing a sweater, but he didn’t need one. The coastal clouds had never lifted, and the weather had remained unnaturally warm. The temperature was hovering at around sixty, and it was only going to get warmer. Cruz had told him he could expect the snow scene to last anywhere from a day to three days depending on use and the weather. The cold front Nick had wanted was just another hope denied.

  The hospital was locked to visitors, but Nick already knew the off-hours routine. He entered through emergency services, and signed in with a moody guard who’d not said three words to him during all his other visits. Easy had put his name on the after-hours list; the guard motioned with his head for Nick to pass.

  Everything was quiet, save for the piped-in music. For Nick, there was no reprieve from the Christmas hit parade, even at four in the morning. The songs seemed to be following him everywhere. “Oh, Holy Night” was playing.

  Oh, holy not, he thought.

  Nick walked over to the elevators, but hesitated before getting in. He was afraid of going up to the ICU and being told that Raymond was dead. Nick hated feeling so helpless, so weak. Whenever someone said to him, “I’ve got good news for you, and I’ve got bad news,” Nick always wanted to hear the bad first. Death, snow, and cold feet, he thought. He crossed the elevator threshold and pushed a button.

  On the third floor the lights were dimmer, or maybe that was just his imagination. The floor appeared very quiet. The door into the ICU was locked, and there was no one at the duty station, just a buzzer for paging a nurse. Nick wasn’t in any rush to talk with anyone. He sat down and waited for someone to appear. Eventually someone always did.

  Twenty minutes passed before a woman opened the door. Her head reared back in surprise when she saw Nick, but the movement looked more defensive than vulnerable, reminding him of a snake ready to strike. She was a tall, black woman with short hair and a severe expression.

  “What do you want?”

  The way she was looking at him, Nick figured she had him gauged as an undesirable, and maybe she was right. He hadn’t shaved, and his dark circles were probably a mile long.

  “I’m a friend of Raymond’s,” he said. “A few hours back Nurse Castillo called me. I know I can’t see him, but I just wanted to know how he’s doing.”

  “You’re the cop, aren’t you?”

  For a moment, Nick wondered whether he’d met this nurse when he had brought Chrissie in. But that wasn’t it. Easy knew he was a cop and would have told her.

  “Yes.” One more half lie to add to the rest.

  “Your friend’s not doing very well. He is not conscious and he’s not breathing on his own.”

  Nick nodded to show that he’d heard.

  “Are you still going to be trucking that snow in?”

  Easy must have told everyone about the snow as well. Nick was glad she had spared him the explanation. “It’s still coming,” he said. “If by some chance Raymond’s well enough to look out the window, I’d appreciate it if you, or whoever’s working, could take him over there so that he could see the snow.”

  “We got the word on that already,” she said, and smiled gently. “If he opens his eyes, we’ll make sure he sees it.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I’m from Philadelphia myself. I spent enough winters there that I thought I’d never want to see snow again. But your snow’s got everyone around here excited, even me.”

  The Igloo Ice work crew arrived at 6:30 a.m., none too soon for Nick. He’d been pacing around for over an hour, and had been forced to explain his movements to two different security guards.

  Manuel Cruz had a cold, which was contributing to his deep voice. Between his coughing, sneezing, incessant yawning, and talking, his mouth always seemed to be open.

  “Thought my crew was going to mutiny when I scheduled this job,” said Cruz, “but then I told them
about that kid.”

  There were three other workers, all Hispanic. They spoke Spanish with one another. Cruz collected the rest of the money Nick owed, and then simultaneously carried on English and Spanish conversations; he alternately talked with Nick, and directed his crew. His hands seemed to speak a third language, pointing, signaling, gesturing. Under his guidance, the equipment was positioned.

  “So how’s the boy doing?”

  “Bad.” Nick didn’t want to say more. He didn’t want Cruz and his crew to know their work was likely to amount to no more than a futile gesture.

  “Maybe this will cheer him up.”

  “Maybe.”

  Nick lightly touched an ice block being fed down a rail. It was about five feet long and two feet wide.

  “We call that a rail car,” said Cruz. “Each of those blocks of ice weighs three hundred pounds.”

  The ice looked like some distant relation of snow. Cruz seemed to read Nick’s doubts. “Don’t worry. The crusher’s going to make that ice all powdery. It’s going to look like snow, and feel like snow, ’cept it’s a little more coarse. Next best thing to Mother Nature, man.”

  The crusher started up. It was loud, and that was even before any grinding had begun. The first rail car was fed into the crusher, and then it started snowing. Flakes didn’t fall, and the process was about as serene as a brigade of leaf blowers, but the end product looked like the real thing. The crushed ice sprayed out of a tube, and soon the green grass began to disappear under a blanket of white. As the crusher crushed, and the blower blew, winter came alive.

  Nick was surprised at how quickly the snow was laid down. In mere minutes, the entire lawn was covered. Nick surveyed his white elephant, his folly, but he wasn’t the only one looking. All the hospital windows with a view of the snow were fogging up with little faces staring down. The blinds had been opened, and spectators were watching, but from what Nick could see Raymond wasn’t among them.

  “Pretty, isn’t it?” asked Cruz, opening his hands to the snow.

  Nick nodded.

  “I always feel like one of those pastry chefs, you know, making something that looks so good, but something that’s going to disappear just like that.” He snapped his fingers.