Page 22 of Not Home Alone

I’m so happy to be walking down the crowded, narrow sidewalks of Main Street again. It runs through the valley like a ribbon, with historic two and three-story red brick buildings on both sides of the street. They are just as I remember and all the storefronts, as always, are glowing warm against the gray December cold, beautifully decorated for Christmas. It’s like stepping back in time. The Victorian streetlights with wreaths on them and wrought iron balconies hung with garlands and lights. It feels like a movie set, but it’s real. With every breath, I’m inhaling the scent of pine, fresh air, and the quiet joy of small-town living. The businesses look to me like they’re thriving.

Holly Grove is a tourist destination because of its genuine historic charm all year long—there’s no way Robert Moody is dumb enough to drive The Holly Grove Treasure Trove out of business so a Crate and Barrel can move in. Replace The Book Hangover with a Barnes & Noble? I don’t think so. Hell will freeze over before the residents of this town allow anyone to replace Grind Your Own Business with a Starbucks. You can’t tell me people would rather eat at an Olive Garden than at Vinny Sarducci’s—although, yes, I love an Olive Garden breadstick—who doesn’t? But Vinny’s has a huge lit-up sign in their window announcing that they’re sponsoring the Luminaria Night this year. Their watery ravioli dishes are as much a part of Holly Grove as the oak trees.

I’m seeing a few new awnings and storefront signs. Like a medical spa called The Holly and the IV. They offer vitamin infusion IV therapy. There’s Kale Me Crazy—they appear to be offering fifteen-dollar fresh pressed juices with names like Grateful Greens and Inner Peas, which is a pea-protein-based smoothie. The owners are clearly from California, and green juice is disgusting, and I bet they won’t last one winter here, but I love their enthusiasm!

And okay, so there are a few businesses that haven’t evolved with the times. At all. Like The Mane Event, which is an old-school beauty parlor with those retro space-age hair dryers that you sit under and a selection of magazines from the 1990s. But haircuts are only fifteen dollars, and Blanche will tell you the most up-to-date gossip while giving you a perm that looks like you’re wearing a wig from 1983. People love that kind of place! And then there’s Let’s Keep Things Civil, the civil war reenactment supply store that gets tons of online business but not a lot of foot traffic. And yes, The Christmas Barn would be included in this category—not the online business part—the not evolving part. Setting up an online store is on my to-do list. But the Barn is such a fixture on Main Street. And my dad… my dad is just… he’s the best.

I pause outside my dad’s shop to admire the window display. Every store on Main Street is decked out for the holidays, but my dad goes the extra mile every year, starting on November first. And he comes up with something different every year… except this year, apparently. He’s recycled the display from five years ago—Santa’s workshop. It’s great and fun and cute, it’s just not fresh. He’s probably been so busy with Connie this year that he didn’t have time to come up with something new. I don’t know why he didn’t ask me for ideas, but it’s fine!

There’s a sign in the corner of the window. I recognize Joy’s handiwork from all the years we spent together in drama club. It says:

The Christmas Barn is a proud sponsor of this year’s production of The Notcracker!

That’s it. It’s something, but it’s not quite enough. Mentally adding PR to the to-do list.

The store is bustling with customers, which is nice to see. The Moodys can suck our big, brass Christmas balls. I mean, yes, ’tis the season and all. It’s definitely not like this in March. But it’s always Christmas in someone’s heart! That’s the Tucker family motto. We’ll just figure out how to find those people and their hearts, all year long.

I wave to Mrs. Murray, the store manager, who’s at the checkout counter. She’s somewhere between seventy-five and ninety years young and still rings up sales on an old-school cash register because she refuses to use a scanner. But her penmanship is lovely, she can needlepoint a banner faster than you can sing the chorus of “Frosty the Snowman,” and she looks exactly like Mrs. Claus. So of course, my dad has never replaced her. And she just calls me whenever she needs help coming up with ideas for signs and sale items. I see she has the Away in a Manager’s Special set up next to the cash register, as I recommended—classic. And it’s nice to see she took my advice and placed the O Come All Ye Faithful Customers sign at the back of the store, to draw people in.

I spot my dad. He’s chatting with a pair of customers, and I am going to fight the urge to tell him he needs to let them browse more—because I know for a fact that people buy more here because he’s so friendly. But he also needs to remember the ABCCPs of sales. Always Be Closing Christmas Products.

My dad calls out my name, waving at me like he didn’t see me earlier this morning. When I go over to hug him, the tourist couple smiles and goes off to browse the ornaments.

“Hey there, sugarplum! Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?” He examines my face. “Wait a minute. Why aren’t you smiling? You need me to find you some more decorations in the back?”

So sweet. I hug him again and say into his ear, “Daddy, is it true you’ve been late on rent for a few months?”

“Huh?” He shushes me. “Where’d you hear that?”

“Is it true?”

He shakes his head, laughing. “Always worrying, huh, kid? Come on back to my office.”

I follow him through the door to the back rooms. His office is small and completely wallpapered with Christmas cards from customers going decades back. It is very cozy and even more cluttered than it used to be. There isn’t one inch of surface on his desk that isn’t covered with papers. “Did you get a small business loan?”

“I did,” he exclaims. “Frank at the bank gave me an absolutely wonderful rate. He’s a great guy, that Frank.”

“Do you know about the lease? The changes in January?”

My dad raises his insane eyebrows. “How’d you know about that?”

“Daddy. What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know, kid, but it’ll all work out. It always does! It did for my gramps and for my dad and it will for me.”

I have always loved his optimism, but as I look around his office, I am not so sure his optimism is going to be any match for Robert Moody’s corporate greed. Not even in December.

Now the tip of my nose is tingling and I’m tearing up. God! How many ways can a Moody ruin Christmas? I love it here so much. I loved working here after school and on weekends when I was growing up. I can feel my neck and shoulders tighten when I remember how my mom always complained that my dad hardly ever made enough of a profit and had no business sense. But my dad was so proud of the store and refused to let his father down. I would hate for him to lose it. “Why don’t you tell me about all these wonderful papers on your desk?” I say, teasing him and managing to hide the tremor in my voice.

“What, you mean my filing system?”

I pick up a pile of papers and flip through them. “Are these all invoices? You have to pay these.”

“I know that. Of course I’m going to pay them. It all gets taken care of eventually. I’ll pay these first.” He comes over and points to one pile. “See? I put a green line at the top of everything in this pile. Green means go. These will get taken care of ASAP.”

“But it looks like you use this same green pen to write out the addresses for deliveries.”

“Course I do. It’s my favorite color, silly! Blue line means I’ll get to it eventually. Red line means ask Merrily when she comes to visit.”