The Box It Came In

Gemma raced around the house, snatching toys off the couch, ripping clothes off the backs of the kitchen chairs, and trying to pretend the sink would magically empty itself while she wasn’t looking. She’d spent all day yesterday cleaning. How did a house with just one mom and just one toddler manage to self-destruct overnight?

She didn't even notice the telltale buzz of the delivery drone until her phone chimed to alert her of a package arrival. Gemma stared at the delivery app, brow furrowed. Everything she'd ordered was already under the tree. What the hell?

She glanced out the front windows in time to see the drone speeding away. She could only see the edge of the front porch from the second story window, and the corner of the brown box that had been delivered. It looked big. Bigger than anything under the tree.

Figuring it out would have to wait. She knew she had exactly fourteen minutes before Claire woke up. A baby you could set your watch by, Claire’s wake-up time was 6:52 every morning, and had been for the last seven of her fifteen months of life. Gemma, a chronically late raiser, had learned quickly how precious the 6am hour could be, if she could convince herself to get out of bed for it.

Not that she needed any convincing today. Gemma threw the laundry onto her bed, slipped the toys under her pillow and headed back to the kitchen. She started the coffee pot, then grabbed a can of sweetened condensed milk from the pantry before tackling the pile of dishes. She had just over an hour until everything had to be perfect.

She’d barely gotten a sip of coffee before Claire’s wake-up cry came in scratchily over the monitor. Gemma changed her and put her in the high chair wearing nothing but her diaper, to save on later laundry. Claire’s breakfast - a scatter of Cheerios, cup of milk, and bits of cheese broken off a stick of string cheese - mostly landed outside her mouth, but Gemma wasn’t fazed. She carried Claire to a bath, fishing Cheerios out of her hair and eating them as she went. For once, Claire didn’t pitch a fit about having her hair combed and pulled into two tight pigtails.

As Gemma pulled Claire’s tiny, stubborn arms through the sleeves of a red velvet dress she’d picked up at the church’s thrift store, she remembered the year she and her brothers had all gotten matching red flannel pajamas for Christmas. Tim had promptly split the shoulders on his, midway through a growth spurt that lasted a full year, while Matt didn’t grow into his pair for at least six months. She wondered if she could conjure a holiday between Christmas and New Years so she could get a few more photos of Claire in this dress while it still fit.

She stuck Claire in her crib with one of her most obnoxious toys - a talking, singing bear that lit up in neon colors that Claire couldn’t get enough of - and got dressed. Red sweater, black slacks (jeans were not an option, not today) and just enough makeup to make it look like she’d put the effort in. There.

The buzzer rang at exactly 8:00. Gemma picked up Claire, threw the bear under her bed, and walked through her pristine-for-one-moment apartment and opened the door.

Her mother looked both exactly the same and older than Gemma remembered. She was still dressed impeccably, without a hair out of place, but small lines had begun to sink into once-smooth skin. She didn’t seem nervous - she never did - but she said hello with a small smile and waited for Gemma to invite her in before stepping over the threshold.

Gemma saw her give the apartment a once-over and desperately searched her face for a sign of approval. She should’ve known better than to think she’d get a smile or a nod, but the lack of her mother’s telltale frown was reassuring. It only lasted a moment; her mother quickly turned back to them and smiled at Claire, who was staring at the stranger in her living room.

“You’re so big,” Gemma’s mother said to Claire. She started to lift her hands toward the baby as if to take her, then seemed to think the better of it and put them down. Claire squirmed in Gemma’s arms, then stuffed a few fingers in her mouth, eyeing Gemma’s mother cautiously.

“Can you say hi?” Gemma asked, turning to Claire and praying she was in a mood to perform. Claire didn’t answer but waved her other hand, and Gemma’s mother’s smile grew relaxed and genuine as she waved back.

“Would you like coffee...Ma?” After two years, the name felt weighty on her tongue. Without waiting for an answer, she turned to the kitchen, putting Clare down and reaching for the pot. “Still take it light and sweet?”

“Sweet enough to -” her mother began.

“ - give you diabetes,” Gemma finished, turning around. “Just like me.”

Her mother nodded, taking the cup with both hands, then looking down at Claire, who had decided to attach herself to her grandmother’s pant leg. “Oh my,” she said. “I seem to have acquired a little squirrel.”

Something hot and tight rose in Gemma’s chest as she recognized the tone and the phrase. Her mother had always joked that Gemma could climb her like a tree. She blinked back the idea of tears as her mother maneuvered herself into a chair, taking Claire with her. Gemma poured herself a second cup and joined them.

“Would you like some breakfast? I made a fruit salad, and there’s oatmeal if you want? Or some of the Christmas cake? We can do presents after?” Gemma hated how everything sounded like a question, but couldn’t keep the nerves out of her voice.

“You made Christmas cake?” Gemma couldn’t read her mother’s tone, but it didn’t sound hostile. She nodded.

“Yeah, from your recipe.”

“Where did you get that?”

Gemma paused. There was no way to tell her mother the truth without revealing something she didn’t know, so she took the narrowest possible route. “Matt sent it to me awhile ago,” she said, figuring that her mother didn’t need to know that “awhile” was less than two weeks.

Her mother raised her eyebrows almost imperceptibly. She took another sip of coffee. Claire got tired of playing with her pant leg and started to wander out of the kitchen. Gemma went after her and scooped her up, handing her a wooden spoon to explore.

“Presents?” she asked again, willing herself not to ask if her mother had brought anything to put under their tiny tree. Just showing up is enough, she reminded herself. She hasn’t said anything mean. That’s more than you deserve.

“Sure,” her mother said smoothly. “Let me run out to the car. And I saw one of my packages arrived this morning, right on time."

Gemma suddenly remembered the surprise delivery from that morning and couldn't hide the surprise on her face.

"That was yours?"

"I couldn't fit it into the car," her mother said almost apologetically. Gemma couldn't imagine what would be so big her mother couldn't fit it in her luxury sedan. She wasn't given to grand gestures or grandiose presents. Maybe becoming a grandmother had softened her.

In the time her mother was gone, Gemma scrubbed Claire’s already-clean face, retouched her makeup, and rearranged the gifts under the tiny tabletop tree. She was waiting by the door when her mother returned, a colorful bag dangling from her wrist and her arms wrapped around the one huge box, wrapped in plain brown paper.

“Let me help,” Gemma said, moving to put Claire down. Her mother waved her off and carefully walked toward the tree. She laid the big box down gently, then took out a small box and a medium box from the bag to add to the pile. Gemma watched her fold the paper bag neatly into a perfect square she knew would fit into the bag of gift bags her mother kept in her upstairs closet.

“Well,” Gemma finally said, sitting on the floor with Claire on her lap next to the pile of gifts. “Merry Christmas, Ma. Merry Christmas, baby girl.” She kissed the top of Claire’s head and reached for one of the gifts she’d bought. “Youngest goes first, right?” she said, looking up at her mother, who was still standing awkwardly next to the pile. “Have a seat?” The offer came out like a suggestion.

Her mother perched on the edge of the couch and smiled as Claire tore into the wrapping and revealed a set of colorful wooden blocks that fit neatly into a little wagon. Gemma let Claire continue to shred the paper while she grabbed the gift she’d gotten for her mother and handed it over.

Her mother’s eyes grew bright as she took it, but she quickly composed herself and shook her head. “Age order,” she reminded Gemma, and picked the smallest of her own gifts to pass across the pile.

Gemma’s heart pounded as she unwrapped it carefully, knowing her mother would appreciate it if she saved the paper for a future gift. She opened the small box to reveal a glass Christmas ornament shaped like a swan. Gemma gave a little gasp and looked up at her mother, unable to hide the tender grief in her face.

“This looks just like the ones at the pond,” she said. “The one in Boston. We rode them, those swan boats. It’s beautiful.”

“I thought so, too,” her mother said, the tiniest hint of a quaver in her voice. “The first time I took you, you were Claire’s age. You were enchanted.”

“Thank you. It’s perfect.” Gemma reached up and hung the glass swan from the tree, then nodded to her mother. “Your turn.”

Her mother opened the box and pulled out the leather-bound day planner with an appraising look. Gemma held her breath. “Real leather,” her mother commented, her voice pleased. “Thank you, Gemma. This will work beautifully.”

Gemma exhaled quietly, a knot loosening in her chest. Her mother would fill the planner with appointments she’d never be late to in perfect handwriting. Flawless, organized, measured and precise. Gemma’s efforts were a bare facsimile and only lasted a few hours before dissolving into chaos. Finding the right gift had taken several long, agonizing days.

“And now,” her mother was saying in a far more playful voice than any Gemma remembered, “Let’s give this girl her big present!” She lifted the big box - taller than Claire herself - as if it weighed almost nothing and placed it in front of them. Clare ripped into it, cackling joyfully as the butcher paper ripped under her hands. Gemma’s mother watched her with a playful smile as Gemma opened the top of the box, revealing...nothing. Just empty space. She tried to disguise the horror on her face as she looked up. What kind of a cruel joke was this?

Her mother caught it. “The other gift is a sweater for her,” she explained. “That’s for you. But I remember a thing or two about you kids, and you were all very clear: the best gift is the box it came in. Right?”

Gemma laughed with relief, remembering the forts and castles she’d made with her brothers as children. Claire scrambled out of her lap and crawled right into the box, slapping the sides with her little hands and shrieking. “That’s hilarious, Ma. And look - she loves it!”

“Of course she does,” her mother said a little smugly. “Why don’t I watch her while you go cut us some of that Christmas cake?”

“Sure,” Gemma breathed, getting to her feet. She went to the kitchen and fixed two plates of cinnamon spice cake, each topped with orange slices and bathed in syrup. She crept around the corner to catch a glimpse of her mother and daughter before she came in. Her mother - her perfect, proper, never-a-hair-out-of-propriety mother - was sitting on the floor and peering into the box, her whole face smiling. Her daughter’s happy laughter rang through the cardboard. Her mother looked up to see Gemma in the doorway.

“That cake looks -” she paused as Gemma faltered the tiniest bit, bracing herself for the inevitable critique, “ - perfect,” she finished. “Simply perfect. But we can’t eat on the floor,” she added quickly.

Gemma hid a smile. “Of course not,” she said solemnly, as if she hadn’t spent the morning picking Cheerios out of the rug. “Come to the table, Ma. Let’s eat.”