Hooks

“Come on! You’re not handing them to me fast enough,” Joey says. Under his breath I can faintly hear a string of muffled swear words. We are putting up the fake tree with the sparse spears of tinsel. We stick each thin branch onto the plastic trunk. It looks anorexic and patchy, like all of its hair had fallen out during chemo. We awkwardly string up lights to fill in the gaps.

Fuck, Nye” he screams. He just stepped on a ruby toned bulb I left on the floor. It shattered into pieces like a delicate bird’s egg, paper thin and vulnerable.

I unwrap the tissue paper covered in pictures of candy canes and snowmen. I pull out each ornament. Joey sits on the couch nursing his foot as I hang the Mexican tin stars up, careful not to step on the shattered bulb. The hangers are made of wrapping paper ribbon that that has become brittle and faded. My ex-husband and I bought those our first Christmas. The plastic lobster and the one eyed panda Ray and I bought during an abnormally warm winter. We hardly fought then. The goofy bride and groom smothered with yellow glitter we got right before he packed up his CD collection and cutlery set.

The years have piled up since the Mexican ornaments. My ex-husband and I sent out fifty-three holiday cards that year. We deliberated over what type of card to get, settling on something funny and traditional. We got even more cards in return, our apartment mail box stuffed with colored envelopes from well wishers. Ray and I picked up a generic box of cards from the drugstore and mailed them out a few days before Christmas. A dozen or so envelopes came addressed to us.

It is the night before Christmas. I didn’t send any cards out this year and only two came in the mail. One was from a realtor. The other from an old high school friend who writes letters from the perspective of her cats. Only my name was written on the front in cheery ink. I contemplate this as I put the last ornament on the tree: a pile of plastic grapes.

“Look Joey, the Tree of Failure. Each one tells the story of the demise of my previous relationships. Good thing we haven’t gotten any ornaments,” I say.

“You’re depressing, Nye. You can ruin just about anything,” he says as he goes upstairs to watch TV with a can of beer in his hand.

“Merry fucking Christmas to you, too!” I shout as I flip out all the lights. I stare at the brilliant bulbs as they dance and make shadows on the ceiling. In some ways it seems fitting to see all of my memories hanging from metal hooks.

In the morning, Joey acts like nothing happened. He has daytime amnesia, forgetting harsh words said during the night. He buys me coffee when his anger has eroded. He’s humming a festive holiday song.

“It snowed! I thought we’d have a brown, patchy Christmas. But look,” he sings as he points out the window. Big clumps of snow fall, making a sickly plopping sound on the sidewalk. The tree’s branches are heavy with the slushy mixture, their naked fingertips brushing the ground. He hands me a peppermint mocha and plants a kiss on my forehead, but all I can think about is what ornament I am going to buy in honor of him.
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