Macaroni

Chapter 7

Bebe and Scottie were preparing for the holidays, for Christmas. Every morning Bebe was at the store, she and Scottie worked on more booths. They had red and green bows, lights, and Christmas artwork. Scottie had a whole back room full of Christmas antiques that he stored up during the year, and brought them out in November. They changed the entire front window to Christmas decorations and Christmas antiques for sale.

Bebe was unexcited. Her mother was great around the holidays and Bebe felt like she could never keep up with the lineage and the nostalgia that welled up inside of her every November. Her motivation was low to make things cutesy; that was just who she was as a person. Bebe had never been cutesy and she and her mother clashed on that, and had for years. But when she saw how much the customers liked it, and how they flocked to the shop, she felt a little Christmas sparkle well up in her heart.

Now Fridays were filled with Christmas music instead of the usual Open Line Friday with Rush. Scottie liked to mix it up, so they played pop, rock, classical, whatever seemed right. Bebe liked classical best. Scottie liked Taylor Swift and Brittney Spears. They both sung along, and decorated, and made the occasional sale.

Bebe was finding that Mondays and Wednesdays weren't big days for sales, but Friday mornings were the beginning of the weekend, and weekends were busy. The rest of the week, they spent their time fussing around the shop, keeping busy, finding things to do. Bebe sometimes wished she could work weekends, just to see what it was like.

Today, Scottie was playing Mariah Carey, I don't want a lot for Christmas... was blasting through the store. Bebe started to think about her mom, and how her mom baked for a month and gave cookies to all the neighbors. Bebe longed for those days, when someone else was in charge, and making the baking decisions, and the decorating decisions. She realized that Scottie was right about being a mom all the time. She was a mom all the time, and she'd been shirking her duty. She could still have a job and be a mom. That was where things got murky. She had three children and she was their mother. Even if she wasn't the decorator, baker extraordinaire that her mother was, it didn't make her less their mother. She was 100% their mother.

So she sang along with Mariah and smiled.