Christmas Eve
Galen sits alone in her office talking to her sister on the phone. Gail was decorating Galen's house for Christmas against her wishes. Deciding to go out and shop the rest of the day, Galen closes up early and goes outside into the cold. She gets into her Silverado and starts the engine letting it warm up a bit. She turns on the radio and flips the channel a few times until she finds "Jingle Bells" playing. That's a good song for shopping she decides as she heads out down the busy street to the freeway.
She knows there will be traffic to the mall, but she needs to go to the Art Gallery to get one last gift for her Mom. And while she's there she will look for some last minute items. It's is always best to have extra stuff. She didn't buy anything for Mark yet either. Then with a sigh she remembers that Mark is not with her. He needed time to think, time to get his head on straight.
She looks at the lights at the mall, already on during this cloudy afternoon. She wishes that things could be better this year, and that Mark was with her today. But she reminds herself that he wanted to be somewhere else. She feels the lump rising in her throat. It's not like she kicked him out. It's not like she cut all ties. She called him once a week. Well, the last two weeks it went to voicemail. She was left to presume that he had cleared his head and was with someone else.
She has to stop thinking about him so she busies herself while at the stoplight by flipping the visor down and fixing her hair. She pulls out her chap stick. It never hurts to protect her lips from the wind. She flips the mirror over the visor closed as the light finally changes. She just accelerates when "Blue Christmas" by Elvis Presley comes on the radio, and before he sings the second line she is in tears.
"I'll have a Blue Christmas without you
I'll be so blue thinking about you
Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree
Won't be the same dear, if you're not here with me."
She pulls into the mall parking lot and drives up the ramp to the parking garage sniffing, not having the heart to change the radio station.
"And when those blue snowflakes start fallin
That's when those blue memories start callin
You'll be doin' all right with your Christmas of white
But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas
Galen wipes her tears from her cheeks with her coat sleeve. She tries to calm her breathing so that she can get her errands finished. She looks at her watch. It's almost 3pm when she walks into the mall.
She gets herself something to eat and tries to shop. She goes into every store twice before she is finished and still does not feel like she is done. She stops to get her Mom's art framed and then moves on to get some of her other gifts wrapped.
While in line, she sees a pair of Ray-Ban's that would look perfect on Mark. She buys them without thinking. After they are on her Visa, she remembers that he is gone. Tears automatically well in her eyes. He is gone; she needs to accept it. She tells herself it will be ok, that she is strong and will not cry in public
She takes a deep breath and walks back to pick up her packages and then picks up her mom's artwork. She browses at purses. She picks her mother up a new leather Coach handbag and boys her sister a new pair of Jimmy Choo boots. She stops in at Abercrombie for some hoodies and bodywash for her girls and at Hollister for the boys' new coats. Her arms are getting full. She decides that she at least needed to put the packages in the truck. Then she needed just a few more things. She would run back into the jewelry store. Her mother always expected her to buy herself new earrings for her gift. There was a long line so she would just take the packages to the truck and come back she decided.
She steps out of the mall to find it dark outside and snow on the ground.
