Snow fell on Christmas morning, small flakes, which meant the snowfall would last a long time. It paved the streets and sidewalks of Aurora in trackless white and gave a fresh cover to the dirty snowbanks, like a clean comforter on an old bed. It came down straight and landed soft as dreaming. And Cork, as he turned onto the road to Molly’s, thought it was one of the loveliest snowfalls he’d ever seen.
The big cabin was empty and unlit. The small shabby cabins that lined the lane to the lake stood in two dark rows like silent mourners. Cork walked between them one last time down to the sauna and looked over the lake from the place Molly had hated so much and then loved so well. Crow Point was only a squat gray finger pointing toward something in the distance, something lost in the falling snow. All the signs on the ice that would have marked the desperate struggles there were covered now. The lake wore a face of immense serenity.
He returned to the Bronco and took from the backseat a small Christmas tree in a green metal stand. He’d strung popcorn and cranberries and made paper chains. At the very top, he’d placed an angel he’d constructed from pipe cleaners and a bit of white lace. He didn’t want to go into the cabin-without Molly it would be the emptiest of places. So he set the tree in the snow outside.
“I didn’t do such a good job with the decorations,” he explained as if she could hear, and he held up his bandaged, frostbitten hands to show the reason for his clumsiness. “Even so, I think it looks all right.”
The snow muffled every sound, reminding Cork of the way it used to be in church when he believed in God and felt reverence in the very silence of St. Agnes.
“Jenny was supposed to read a poem at her Christmas program yesterday. I think I told you. She was going to read Sylvia Plath, but she changed her mind. She read Frost instead. ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.’ You know, ‘miles to go before I sleep.’ Jo says she changed it for me. A good sign, I guess.”
He looked down, a little embarrassed by his rambling, although talking made him feel less alone. He saw tracks in the snow near the back door, small hand prints almost human. Raccoons.
“The geese are back. You remember, Romeo and Juliet. It’s nice having them around. Like a couple of old friends.”
Small flakes settled on his face and melted into drops that ran down his cheeks like tears. But he wasn’t crying. He’d cried himself dry already. And if Molly could see him-who knew? — he wanted her, on this morning, to see him smile.
So he did. He smiled upward into all that fell from heaven.
“Merry Christmas, Molly.”
As snow gathered on the branches of the Christmas tree and in the loops of the paper chain and settled lightly on the shoulders of the angel he’d made, Cork turned and walked away.