The Christmas Tree Keeper: A Novel
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Chapter One of The Tree Keeper's Promise
Tamara Passey
Copyright 2014 Tamara Passey
Cover Design by Laura J. Miller 2014
http://www.anauthorsart.com
Winter Street Press
http://www.winterstreetpress.com
All rights reserved. No portion of this work may be reproduced in print or electronically, other than brief excerpts for the purpose of reviews, without permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. All the characters, names, places, incidents, and dialogue in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, places and events is coincidental.
eISBN: 978-0-9909840-5-4
For Steve
Prologue
Hans and Adeline Shafer, Germany, 1880
He watched her unpinned curly hair fly as if in protest. The wind howled a farewell through the trees as he reached for her shoulder. “It is time.”
She buried her face in her hands, dropped to her knees, and cried despairing tears. The wind subsided; a quiet stillness amplified her sobbing and the soft, breaking sound of her tender heart at leaving the only land she’d ever known.
He knelt beside her, watched her tears fall to the ground, and whispered gentle words of love. He cried too and cupped the tear-stained earth in his hands and put it in his leather pouch. “Hush now. It will go with us to the new world.”
Chapter 1
The Nor’easter brought the snow, but that didn’t start it. The radio station began playing carols around the clock, but that didn’t start it. Main Street wrapped the lampposts in candy-cane-striped garland, but even that wasn’t enough. Not until the decorated tree stood in the front window with soft lights glowing around the angel’s contented face did Christmas officially begin in the Donovan family. This year, Angela promised her daughter she could have the honor of choosing the tree.
“Is this the one?” Angela asked as she held her daughter’s hand and stared at the four-foot pine tree.
Caroline leaned closer to it. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Do you feel that?”
“Feel what?” Angela asked.
“The tree. She’s beautiful,” Caroline answered.
Angela bit her lip and glanced at her watch. “Does that mean you want this one?”
Caroline stepped back and spread her arms like she was measuring and gathering the tree’s majesty. “Looks like two broken branches on the lower right,” she declared with the certainty of a triage nurse. “Pretty, but I don’t think so.” She skipped ahead to the end of the row. Angela followed her daughter. Gravel and pine needles crunched under her feet and strings of white lights crisscrossed above her head. “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” played from a speaker hanging on a light pole. Nostalgic words for most people, but unless she could come up with more rent money, they wouldn’t have any home for Christmas.
She looked to her right and left. The line of trees formed a row like toy soldiers and offered no hint of how to get back to the parking lot.
“It’s getting late, Caroline. They’ll close soon.”
It didn’t matter that Angela had botched another job interview and had planned to stay home and cheer herself up with a little Wuthering Heights. No. There would be no English moors and brooding Heathcliff to take her mind off her bleak prospects. She’d promised her daughter they could bring home a tree. Angela’s hope for the day to end better than it began was disappearing with every tree Caroline rejected.
Other customers strolled around them. Angela watched a couple huddled against the chill who looked more interested in each other than the trees. Her attention returned to her daughter, who had stopped walking.
“This is it. This is the one!” Caroline exclaimed.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes! I love it.”
Angela could see the excitement on her daughter’s face. This is what Caroline needed—something happy to focus on, to brighten the mood in their one-bedroom apartment. Maybe their holiday could begin on a hopeful note after all.
A rushing sound started in the tops of the taller trees. The branches on the shorter trees danced in the swirl of wind as a wiry old man approached them. He wore a round, red Shafer Farms pin on his heavy coat.
“Do you believe in miracles?” He looked Angela square in the eye and continued, “People say they do, but mostly, they just want to believe. There’s a difference. Wanting to believe is a good place to start. The problem is, most people wouldn’t know a miracle if they were standing right next to one.”
“That’s good to know,” Angela said as she took a step back, forcing a smile.
“We have some Scotch pines right here. They hold their needles.” He winked at Caroline. “And that’s not all.”
The man wasn’t pushy, but Angela worried she couldn’t afford what he might try to sell them. She nodded, hoping to get past his sales pitch. “Thanks, but we’ve found the right-sized tree for our cozy living room.”
“Why, sure you did. These here are Shafer trees, and they’re special,” he said. “They’re miracle trees.”
Caroline’s eyes widened at those words and she squeezed her mother’s hand. The man seemed to zero in on her fascination, and before Angela could put a stop to it, he filled Caroline’s head with precisely the kind of nonsense she had worked so many years to keep out.
In a deliberate whisper, he said, “I can’t tell everyone in Massachusetts this, but I have a feeling about you. I think you might need a Christmas miracle.”
Caroline nodded while Angela tried unsuccessfully to interrupt.
“What you need to do is put up one of these Shafer trees and believe. Then you’ll have yourself a Christmas miracle,” he explained.
Caroline didn’t waste any time. “Well, my mom does need to pay the rent.”
Angela blushed at the words and looked around to see if anyone else could hear them.
“Is that right?” he asked as his eyes narrowed. “You need some rent money?”
“Thank you for your help. It’s late and we need to go,” Angela said impatiently, more so than she had intended.
“But Mom, don’t you owe like a thousand dollars?” Caroline blurted.
Angela shifted her body too late to prevent Caroline from being overheard by an older couple walking the tree lot with their grandchildren. She looked back at the alarm on the salesman’s face and her pulse quickened with embarrassment.
“Where can we pay for this tree?” Angela asked, purposely ignoring the discussion of rent and miracles and money. She wasn’t mad at her daughter. It wasn’t Caroline’s fault she had to understand the realities of life at an early age. But did she have to disclose their wretched circumstances to a total stranger? Even if
he was an eccentric Christmas tree salesman?
The man moved slowly to the tree and removed part of the tag. “Take this over to my grandson in that farmhouse. I’ll have the tree brought out after we give it a shake and wrap it up.” He handed the tag to Angela, but smiled at Caroline.
Aside from her daughter’s uncomfortable admission, Angela might have enjoyed the walk across the festive lot to the farmhouse. She might have relaxed and allowed herself to feel the excitement of the coming holiday. But Caroline persisted.
“Did you hear him, Mom? All we have to do is believe.”
“Oh, Caroline, if it were really that easy.”
“What’s hard about believing?”
Angela found the cashier inside the warm farmhouse. The glowing fire and smell of hot chocolate did nothing to stop her irritation.
“Is that your grandfather out there?” she asked, nodding toward the large window with a view of the tree lot, still exasperated by her daughter’s newfound hope.
“Do you mean Papa Shafer?” the young man asked. “He’s not my grandfather, but we all call him Papa. He’s the owner.”
The owner. Of course.
“Is there a problem?”
“It’s just that—never mind,” Angela replied, pulling her wallet out of her purse.
“Well, someone paid for your tree,” he said as another man appeared behind the counter.
“I couldn’t help overhearing. Are you unhappy with something here?” He put his hand out to shake Angela’s and introduced himself as Mark Shafer. Angela noticed his broad shoulders and square-set jaw. Attractive. Not what I need right now.
She juggled her purse and wallet and fumbled to return the gesture. His hand was warm and as their eyes met, she confirmed what he looked like at first glance. Definitely attractive.
“Oh,” she answered after too long of a pause, “I didn’t know my daughter was going to hear about your miracle trees. Christmas is kind of hard as a single mom without getting her hopes up, you know, for impossibilities.” Her words lost emphasis as she saw the genuine concern on his face.
How am I supposed to complain to this good-looking man?
She handed the cashier her credit card. He didn’t take it. She looked back and forth between the two of them.
“I can pay for it,” she insisted. I’m not trying to get a free tree, she wanted to add emphatically.
“What I was saying,” he said, exchanging a look with Mr. Shafer, “is that a man paid a hundred dollars for your tree. He said to give you whatever change was left. Here, this money is yours.”
The cashier held out three twenty-dollar bills. Angela scanned the room and saw the other customer who had been listening to them on the lot walk out the door. His windbreaker had a logo with a number she didn’t recognize.
“Maybe you’d like a larger tree?” the cashier asked.
Angela stared at the money in his hand.
“Or if you’re done shopping, I can make sure your tree gets taken to your car,” Mark offered.
She took the bills from the cashier, now in view of her eight-year-old daughter’s all-seeing eyes. I’ll figure out something else for the rent. And the Christmas presents. She handed the money back and said, “I’m sure someone else needs this more than we do.”
Angela grabbed Caroline’s hand and walked out with Mark. He asked them what Papa Shafer had said about the trees. Caroline was glad to repeat it, and since Angela was having trouble finding her tongue, as well as her truck, she let her daughter carry on about how nice it would be for them to have a Christmas miracle.
She found her pickup right where she’d parked it. Mark took the four-foot tree from the employee who brought it up from the lot and lifted it into the bed of the truck. He insisted on helping, although he wore a cashmere coat with a tie peeking out from underneath it, and his dress shoes reflected the parking lot light.
She listened as he explained.
“Sounds like you met Papa, my grandfather. He’s seventy-seven this year and loves the trees, the holidays, and especially the children. His imagination gets away from him. He doesn’t mean any harm—I’d say he has a lot of pride in these trees.”
Caroline sighed and her shoulders dropped. Angela could tell she was deflated, but she reassured herself, better she hears the truth now than later.
Mark called to someone a few cars away. “Hey, Nat, I’ll be there in a minute!”
Angela saw a tall brunette leaning against a black BMW.
Great—we have an audience.
“So, what did you say your name was?” Mark asked.
Ignoring the question, she opened the door and motioned for Caroline. They jumped in the truck, and Angela pulled the door closed, overcome by a sick-to-her-stomach feeling at the thought of a woman waiting for this Mark Shafer, who—at the moment—was being detained by a frazzled, cranky customer. He did not need a name to associate with that scene.
Angela turned the key in the ignition. Her old, worn-out pickup truck sputtered.
No. Don’t do this to me. Not now. “Start,” she demanded.
“Is everything okay?” Mark called.
She twisted the key again. More sputtering.
He took a few steps toward her truck.
“Are we out of gas again?” Caroline asked from the passenger seat.
“No. That’s not it,” Angela answered, noticing the puzzled look on Mark’s face.
She rolled down her window and forced a smile. “We’re fine.”
One more twist of the key and the truck started. She drove out of the parking lot, beyond the white fence, and onto the narrow, tree-lined road—the same road where, a few hours earlier on their way to the farm, they had planned how they would decorate the tree, drink some hot chocolate, and maybe even listen to some Christmas music. That was before they met Papa Shafer, before he told Caroline about miracle trees. Angela slowed as they reached the turn-off. She didn’t look back.
“Do we get to put up the tree tonight?” Caroline asked wide-awake as ever.
“Let’s put it up tomorrow when we’re feeling better,” Angela said.
“What do you mean? I’m not sick.”
“A good night’s sleep might do us both some good.”
“I’m not going to forget what Papa Shafer said, if that’s what you mean.” Caroline declared.
“Let’s call him Mr. Shafer—he’s not our papa. How about we put the tree in the stand now and we’ll decorate it later? We need a good rest.”
“Mr. Shafer is the man you like,” Caroline said.
“What are you talking about?” Was she that obvious?
“You were staring at him. Until you jumped in the truck, like when I used to run away from Brian Mahoney and you said I had a crush on him.”
So much for subtle.
“Look, I just met him. Besides, well-dressed and handsome never works out for me.”
“Papa Shafer is the one who said we can have a miracle,” Caroline said.
“We didn’t have to pay for the tree—let’s call that our miracle. See? We’re good.”
“Getting a free tree was not it,” Caroline said. “A nice man was probably spreading some Christmas cheer. Papa Shafer said we have to put up our tree and believe. That’s how we’ll have a miracle.”
Angela didn’t respond.
Doesn’t she have enough disappointment in her life?
“You don’t believe in miracles, do you, Mom?”
Angela heard the question and watched the road twist in front of her. It was dark as she rounded the corner. The stoplight changed from yellow to red. She sighed. What could she tell her daughter? She had believed in miracles once.
Angela gripped the steering wheel and held back every pessimistic thought. She looked at Caroline, staring at the holiday-lit houses and twirling a strand of hair. She pulled through the intersection, took a deep breath, and answered, “I believe miracles can happen.”
“I knew it. I knew you believed.” Caroline’s f
ace lit up and Angela’s heart sank. That wasn’t the impression she was trying to give. As if finding a job and paying the rent weren’t enough pressure—now they needed their very own Christmas miracle.
Chapter 2
During its opening weekend, Shafer Tree Farm bustled with the energy of a family reunion. Loyal customers came to celebrate the start of the season. Mark watched their eager faces, the children a year older and a few couples with their first baby. Some came for Donna’s crafts and hugs. Others came to be first on the lot to have their choice of tree. This was the weekend they prepared all year for, watched the weather forecasts, and hoped for mild temperatures and clear skies—or, if there was snow, at least passable roads. Maybe if Mark had a family of his own, he wouldn’t feel like a visitor at his own farm.
He watched the old pickup truck roll out of the parking lot, curious about the woman driving it. She had a pretty face or a familiar one—or both. He reviewed what he’d told her about Papa and the trees. She left so fast. Why didn’t she tell me her name?
He pushed his hands deeper into his coat pockets and walked toward the exit of the parking lot. As the truck disappeared beyond the thicket of trees, his focus turned to a small sapling shooting up outside the fence, not far from the edge of the asphalt.
Mark crouched down and brushed away some snow, exposing the ground. He slipped off his glove and felt around the base, the handle, of the miniature tree. He counted the branches and used his hand to estimate the height.
You’re a gutsy tree but you’ll get run over growing here by the road. I’ll have to find you a new home.
He stood up and brushed off his hands. A picture of the fully grown tree outside his bedroom window formed in his mind. It was anyone’s guess what his father had intended to do with that part of the ground he had cleared years ago. This new little tree would be a welcome addition to the view of the back of the craft barn. He looked at the tree once more and made a mental note to extend the fence to shelter it until he could move it in the spring. The wind picked up and he turned to face it. He saw Natalie waiting for him.