Scrooged Over Page 5

  “Maybe that’s best,” Mindy said.

  “SON OF a bitch!”

  As if tainted baked goods weren’t enough, when Dudley pulled up to the house hours later, another section of lights was out. It was never anything simple, like replacing the bulb in Mary and Joseph’s donkey or untangling the inflatable Mrs. Claus from her husband’s sack. It was always one messed-up bulb in a row of fifty, just like Deke said, which meant going down the line, one at a time, to check them all—blue, red, orange, green, pink, yellow. Blue, red, orange, green, pink, yellow. Naturally it was never the first one either.

  It happened a few more times over the next couple of weeks. Dudley really didn’t have time to be working on stupid lights every night. Nor did he have time to remake all the holiday goodies he’d whipped up that one marathon day in the kitchen. The cookie baskets would just have to be smaller—which meant a trip to the mall to hit Some Enchanted Weaving again.

  “Shit.”

  On top of all that, he’d been neglecting his main gift to his grandfather, the one he hoped would put a huge smile on Gramps’s face Christmas morning—now just days away. He was working on it over at Mindy’s, hence another trip there. Dudley loved it at Mindy’s. Her house was decked out almost as much as his, and she always had on Christmas music—old fashioned stuff, mostly instrumental.

  “I brought fudge.” Dudley held out a festive square Tupperware bowl.

  “You don’t have to bring something every time you come over. Freeze, Jordan.” Mindy’s oldest son had gone for the lid the moment Dudley set it down.

  “You’re afraid it’s poison, aren’t you?”

  Jordan dropped his chocolate-nut fudge square as if it were radioactive. He even backed away.

  “No. Of course not.” In a reversal of command, Mindy picked up the candy and handed it back. “Deke said it wasn’t the cookies. He was sure of it.”

  “Well, I threw them all out just in case—and went shopping for all-new ingredients. New sugar, eggs, flour, vanilla, everything.”

  “So… I won’t die if I eat this?” Jordan asked.

  “No,” his mother answered. “But you will if you eat it before you finish your homework.” Mindy took it back again. Dudley got the impression she wasn’t convinced her words regarding the safety of his confections were true.

  The teen sulked off like a model representation of his peers as Dudley set out his art supplies. He was creating a painting of the Moss homestead from back when Dudley’s grandfather was a boy. It had been in the family for generations but was sold a couple years prior to the two last Mosses in the line moving to New York. Before dipping his brush in the paint, Dudley checked his iPad to see what his grandfather was up to.

  “I hate leaving him home alone. And he’d probably be pretty ticked off if he knew I had surveillance cameras all over the place that I can monitor whenever I do.”

  Dudley checked in several more times over the next forty minutes. “I think I’ll need two more evenings,” he said, eventually packing up for the night. “I don’t want to be a pest.”

  “You’re not,” Mindy assured him.

  “You’re so quiet. We don’t even know you’re here.” Mindy’s husband was a prince. He not only kissed Mindy when he got home that night, just like he had all the other ones Dudley had been there, he also always hugged her—a long time—and not once did Dudley think it was a show for company. It was the kind of relationship he dreamed of having himself. Though Deke didn’t really come off like a hugger.

  “You’re welcome anytime,” Jordan, Sr. said.

  “Well, I’m kind of running out of time. It’s starting to look like my December twenty-third is going to be spent on some hideous blind date. So I’m down to only about three evenings to paint.”

  “Deke won’t be too tough on you. I think he kind of adores you… like an annoying little brother.”

  “Gee. Thanks.” That was just what Dudley wanted to hear. Deke saw him like a little brother… one with a sex toy stash.

  “You guys discuss a plan for this date? Is it supposed to be something serious… funny… just a bit for the show…?”

  “I don’t see how we can get away with not videotaping it for the website—at least portions of it. And we’ll have to say something on the air, obviously. To tell you the truth, I’m relieved I’m going to lose. It would have been tough to pull something off for him… you know… because of the closet situation.”

  “Wire hangers?” Big Jordan asked.

  Dang! He was funny too.

  IT WAS two days later, down to only one before the bet ended. Then it would be Christmas Eve eve, followed by Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day. Deke, Dudley, and Mindy were at the station during the evening, prerecording the show that would air on the twenty-fourth.

  “Good morning, listeners. What’s on your mind?”

  “What’s good about it?” Dudley asked.

  “Uh-oh,” Deke prodded. “Sounds like Mr. Christmas’s bells aren’t jingling this morning. Someone call you a star and stick a tree up your butt?”

  “Long night. Hey, Mindy, you got any of that wrapping paper left that Jessica was selling?”

  “A ton.”

  “I’ll hit you up for every roll after the show.”

  “Buy so much junk you ran out?” Deke asked. “Joe Plan-Ahead? Joe Make-a-List? Joe North Pole. I’d-a thought you’d have wrapping paper up the butt—or you just keep garland up there?”

  Though Mindy’s face begged for further explanation, Dudley stayed on the topic of giftwrap. “Normally I would. But the cats got in the ribbon last night. And you know how cats are. So Cheyenne is all wrapped up in red, Cali in green. It’s cute as heck until they start chewing on it. It’s the sound they make that warns you.”

  “Uh-oh.” Mindy knew where the story was going.

  “My San Fran, she just sat there watching it all. ‘Anywhere but the gifts,’ I said. But a cat’s gonna puke where a cat’s gonna puke.”

  Deke offered a sound effect from the board Dudley could have done without, one he’d also used on a different day to sum up his feelings for Christmas, one he’d made himself a couple days back. This time he added a toilet flush afterward.

  “Cheyenne hit the stack of packages I’d just spent ninety minutes perfecting, and Cali, she hopped into the wrapping paper tote.”

  “Oh no!”

  “Oh yes, which prevented me from wrapping anything else. Nothing could be salvaged.”

  “Sounds like a Deke Sucker story to me,” Deke said. “You coming over to the dark side?”

  “Nope,” Dudley fibbed. “Just a little bump in the road. Of course, after I cleaned everything up, it was too late for choir practice. That was twice for me… so I got the boot.”

  “Booo!” a disgruntled fake audience from the mixer jeered.

  “Rules are rules.” Dudley shrugged.

  “Christmas choir directors play hardball,” Deke said.

  “So it seems. It wasn’t as much fun as I thought. Not without Gramps. It was something I thought we could do together. He’s a good singer.” The radio show was so casual at times Dudley often forgot he was sharing his moods and stories with people other than Deke and Mindy. “I remember Grammy playing the piano and him singing when I was a kid. It was just like something out of another era.”

  “The cat barf on my gift?” Deke asked in typical gruff, impolite Deke and Dudley style. “I know you’re my secret Santa. What’d you get me?”

  “I’ve been struggling with that, to tell you the truth.” Dudley looked at Deke straight on. “Tell me what you want?”

  Deke was silent. That didn’t really fly on radio. He was quiet awhile. Then he swallowed hard as he held Dudley’s gaze. “Hmm.” It took another second or so. “Oh.” Then he recovered. “I know. That garland from the other night….”

  Dudley immediately felt the heat crawl up his neck.

  “Maybe some sort of topper to go with it would be nice. You know, like those old-fash
ioned kinds? Something yay long.” He held his hands almost a foot apart. “Round at the top… kind of fat.” His smirk as he smacked his gum almost made Dudley forget his mood.

  “You said you’d rather have root canal than put up a, and I quote, ‘Sap-leaking, needle-dropping, cat-toilet tree.’ Now you want a topper?” Mindy asked.

  The boys giggled like adolescents.

  “What am I missing?” Mindy wanted to know.

  “Maybe we better cut to break.”

  “Okeydoke. We’ll be right back.” Mindy followed Dudley’s suggestion. “Cut tape.”

  “So the other night, Deke came over,” Dudley began. “Let me pay you for the wrapping paper before I forget.” Once again he was scattered. “You’re a lifesaver, by the way. The mall was pretty much out of anything decent.”

  “Not a problem. All my best suckers, er, customers are here at work. ‘So Deke came over…’”

  “And Blitzen…. Shoot.” Dudley was digging in his pockets, the right one, then the left. “It isn’t here.”

  “What?” Mindy asked.

  “I can’t find my wallet.”

  “Uh-oh.”

  “Relax, Dud Man.” Deke rolled his eyes. “You know how you are. When did you last have it?”

  “Well, we went to the city this afternoon. I know I had it there. Crap. I lost my wallet in Manhattan… at one of ten shops… or on the train!”

  “We don’t know that,” Mindy said.

  “Someone could have charged a thousand bucks to me by now.” Dudley got to his hands and knees to search the room just in case.

  “You should chain it to your belt loop.”

  “Really?” Dudley looked up at Deke from the floor. Somehow he’d ended up between Deke’s knees as he crawled around on the prickly gray carpeting and Deke swiveled in his black leather chair. “You’re scolding me now?” Dudley took only a second to think about how close he was to Deke’s crotch and what he wished he could do there before looking under the console for his billfold. “It’s not in here.”

  “We’ll help you look.” Mindy headed down from the booth.

  “No. Give me five and we’ll finish taping. It’s not fair to keep you guys here all night. I’m sure you have things to do. Christmas things. Especially you, Mindy.” Dudley was having one hell of a time keeping up his spirit. It was one thing after another. Maybe Deke was right. Maybe Christmas did suck.

  It took more than five minutes for Dudley to get on the phone with his bank and credit card companies. He was gone almost thirty. “Sorry.”

  “Any luck?” Deke asked him. Apparently he hadn’t found it.

  “Let’s just finish up here. Ready to continue, Mindy.”

  “So we have to cover the date thing,” she said once they all sat back down. “That’s supposed to happen on the evening of the twenty-third, right? Tomorrow.”

  “Yup,” Deke said.

  “I think it’s pretty obvious Deke’s going to win.”

  “Yup,” he said again.

  “Christmas hate rules.” After cancelling all his credit cards, including his main bank one, then freezing his account on the advice of the representative, Dudley still had a ton of gifts on layaway he could no longer pay for. He was more depressed than hateful. So many people were going to be disappointed.

  “We’ll talk about the dinner in broad strokes,” Mindy said. “Do you know who you’re fixing Dudley up with? Is it going to be something real, or did you opt for a blow-up doll or something like that?”

  Deke smirked. “I got it covered. Just, like, ask me what kind of person I thought would be a perfect match, and I’ll roll with it.”

  “You good with that, Dudley?”

  “Sure. Yeah. I’m good.” He so wasn’t.

  “Okay. So… roll tape. We’re on in three, two….” Mindy held up one finger. “So tell me about this date. We had the contest… the bet….”

  “And I won, just like I knew I would.” Deke made the ovation sound effects last extralong.

  “We’ll have tape after the holiday break.” They knew they weren’t really fooling most of their audience, pretending they were live when they weren’t. It didn’t work for Today or Kelly Ripa, and it didn’t work for them. “How’d it go, Dudley?” Mindy asked.

  “It was… interesting. For sure.”

  “Come on.” Deke pulled off his glasses. “It was awesome. I took a lot of time picking out the perfect person for you. I know, I know. Everyone thought I was gonna be a jerkwad about this. Everyone expected me to set you up with a dominatrix or a proctologist because you’re a tightass, or maybe you’d walk into the restaurant and your surprise date would be a skunk ’cause you stink. Trust me. I can talk my way into anything. Management would have allowed it if it was a patented Deke McNierney prank. But I wanted to… I wanted to find you someone who thought the world of you, who could see you for the really great guy you are, and maybe, hopefully be… worthy. I’m… I’m not good at all that sappy stuff. And I can’t really put it into words. I knew someone who made you smile and… seeing you smile is pretty fantastic, so….”

  “Wow.” Dudley’s heart was beating a mile a minute. He couldn’t think. “I can hardly wait.” Then he remembered the trickery. “To go out… again.”

  They got through the rest of the pretaping with the kind of filler all chat shows use—the year in review, a bunch of “best of” lists. As down as Dudley was, he hoped he pulled off something close to jolly. He revealed his last pair of socks near the end of the three hours. They’d go up on the website on the twenty-fourth. An entire Bethlehem village sprawled out over two legs, with the nativity front and center on the left one.

  “And look. They light up.” A starry sky twinkled with itty-bitty blue bulbs, the brightest one over the manger.

  They did their drawing then, reminding the winner—Mrs. Christine Sherman from upstate—before they “put her on the air” that it was December twenty-fourth, not the twenty-second.

  “So I’ll see you in a little while,” Mindy said to Dudley at the end of it all. “Think you’ll be able to finish your granddad’s painting?”

  “I should,” Dudley said.

  “Were the gifts on layaway for him?” Deke asked. “I’m sure the painting will be enough.”

  “Naw. They were mostly for….” Dudley couldn’t even finish. It was too sad. “See you in the morning.”

  5

  “WELL, I’M not sure I’m a painter, but… not bad, huh?” Dudley stood back near Mindy’s tree to admire his work.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said.

  “I mean, he won’t have the photograph right next to it like we do to see how far off I am.”

  “You don’t own it anymore… the property?”

  “Naw. It had to be sold a while ago. Gramps has pretty limited assets. I try to spoil him as best as I can without him noticing too much. Good thing I did all my shopping ahead… for him, anyway.”

  Mindy brought over another mug of cider. “You never found your wallet?”

  “Nope.”

  “That sucks.”

  “Hard. And not in a good way.”

  “Speaking of….”

  “Well, there’s a segue.”

  “I shouldn’t say anything.” Mindy straightened some garland wrapped around her huge entertainment unit. Dudley had seen one kid or the other brush against it and make it catawampus six or eight times per night.

  “‘Shouldn’t say anything,’ but…?”

  “But… I think Deke is going to fix you up with himself tomorrow night.”

  “Oh.” Truthfully the same thought had crossed Dudley’s mind. Deke did make him smile. Those nights he just showed up at the house, they’d been some of Dudley’s favorite evenings ever despite injury and cookie-related illnesses. “Naw. Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  If he and Mindy were both thinking it, there had to be some validity to the notion.

  “How would you feel about that?”

  “Umm�
�� great. I mean, we have the show to think about. I don’t know how the suits would react. We might have to keep it all on the down-low. You know, if… if anything came of it.” Dudley’s phone rang then. “Not to be sappy… even though I’m the biggest sap going, but if Deke showed up at that restaurant and told me he was into me, it’d be the best Christmas ever.” Dudley checked the screen. “It’s Gramps.”

  “Oh. I hope everything’s okay.”

  “Hey, Gramps.” Dudley picked up his tablet as he answered his cell phone. “What’s up?”

  “I found your wallet.”

  “You did? Where?”

  “Out in the yard. Under one of the shrubs. It must have fallen out of the tight pants you wear to impress Deke.”

  “Ha, ha. What were you doing outside? I made sure Blitzen was taken care of before I left. It’s cold out there.”

  “And I’m all grown up, Duddy. I can go outside any time I want.”

  “I know… I….” Dudley felt scolded. He felt bad. Then he saw something on surveillance and felt something else. “What the…? Wait a minute.”

  “Wait for what?”

  “Not you, Gramps. Thanks. All good otherwise?”

  “Hunky-dory.”

  Funny he should mention hunky.

  “Something wrong?” Mindy asked, coming over.

  “Gramps found my wallet. Thanks again,” Dudley said into the phone. “I’ll see you when I get home, okay?”

  “I’ll be here.”

  “Love ya.”

  “Love ya back, kiddo.”

  “Everything’s fine,” Dudley said, clicking off. “Except… it seems he has company. Is that…?”

  “Who?” Mindy looked at the screen. “Oh.”

  “Who is it?” Jordan, Sr. wanted to know as well. “Oh.” He said it too.

  “Yeah. Standing at the door with Gramps while we talked on the phone. Why wouldn’t Gramps mention he was there? And now they’re saying good night.”

  “They’re having an affair,” Mindy said on a gasp.

  Dudley glared. “Seriously?”

  “No?”

  “I doubt it. That son of a….”