Group Writing Project #5
The Gift
by Shana
Jim Frayne closed his bedroom door, heaving a huge sigh of relief. Finally, he thought, he was done with all the 'togetherness' that had plagued him since eight a.m. that morning. Finally, a moment for himself.
He took a step from the door and immediately realized someone had moved his Christmas presents into his room. Boxes of sweaters, jeans, shirts, coats were stacked next to shorter piles of CDs, CD-ROMs, a laptop and the annotated Ulysses by James Joyce. "Talk about your conspicuous consumption," he muttered. Downstairs remained the snow skis, the kayak and the monogrammed saddle. His adoptive parents had spent a fortune on him for this, his first Christmas actually spent at Manor House.
The year before, Jim had escaped the Wheelers' celebration by a chance to spend Christmas in Arizona. He'd spent that day happily unreminded of Christmases past, when he'd race into his parents' bedroom at dawn screaming, 'Santa! Santa came!' This year, there had been no opportunity to spend the holiday elsewhere, nor any chance to avoid the inevitable comparisons of this Christmas with those of his childhood. Instead, his departure with his friends to Mead's Mountain was scheduled for the 26th. He had no choice but to spend Christmas with the Wheelers.
He didn't mind it so much, he supposed. It turned out better than he'd expected. His new parents had definitely gone overboard with purchases, but they had done that for Honey, as well, and she was their real child. Their natural one. Their biological one. He was just the invited guest. The temporary son. The trial-basis teenager. At any moment, they could change their minds about him.
Heck, at any moment, he could change his mind about them.
He switched on his bedside lamp and a soft glow flooded the room. He walked to his dresser to pick out some pajamas, deciding to save the new ones for his upcoming trip, but then he spied his open closet door and a dull glint within. He shoved the drawer closed, then opened the closet door further, already knowing what he'd find.
His dark green eyes easily spied a worn, black duffel bag resting innocently on the floor. He stared at it, knowing full well its contents.
His heart thudded in his chest and his wrists felt cold and disconnected for several moments. He couldn't move or look away. Finally, he bent and grabbed the duffel by the long shoulder strap and hauled it out of the closet. He checked his bedroom door. It was still closed. He looked at the clock. It was after eleven. No one would bother him.
He carried the bag to his bed and laid it on the mattress. He sat against the headboard, using several pillows to comfortably prop him upright. He took a calming breath, then unzipped the bag.
He spread open the two sides of the duffel and stared at the revealed contents. One by one, he reached in and removed an object, examined it, then set it beside him. When he'd finally emptied the bag, he used his feet to shove it off the bed onto the floor. He stretched out his legs more comfortably and picked up the objects one by one once more, holding each up to the light before taking up the next.
A stained pair of faded blue jeans.
Two changes of underwear.
Two pairs of thick white socks.
A pair of sneakers, well caked with dirt, mud and grass.
Two gray sweatshirts, with holes.
A brown windbreaker.
A Swiss Army knife.
A suspiciously soft granola bar.
A lighter.
An inscribed silver mug.
A certificate of live birth for James Winthrop Frayne II.
A driver's learning permit for James Frayne of Albany, New York.
A faded photograph.
A small bible.
$1000 in tens and twenties, rolled tight with a thin rubber band.
Jim sat for a long time amid these things, remembering the why and wherefore of each object. He thought back to that summer day he moved into Manor House, when he unpacked his few belongings and tossed the empty black duffel into the trash and went to bed.
An hour later, he had found himself repacking that bag. For a long moment, he had his hand on the doorknob and departure on his mind. He thought he heard the open road calling him, the twin temptresses Escape and Freedom beguilingly beckoning him.
He still heard that call, even now, eighteen months later, but he had renamed the voices Fear and Self-pity.
He wondered why he still kept the duffel, packed and ready to go, why it still mattered to him that it be there. In all the time since putting it in the closet, he'd never opened the bag. He'd never referred to it, not even in his private thoughts, and certainly, despite all the times Celia had cleaned his room, it had never even been touched.
Why now? Why had he chosen now to go through it? To examine each object by the light of one small lamp? What was it that bothered him?
Was it the mere fact of the bag's existence? The mere fact that he was ready to cut and run, that doing so would require no more thought than the impulse? The implication that the past eighteen months meant nothing to him?
Did they mean nothing to him? Were the Wheelers just a poor substitute for his dead parents? Was Manor House and Sleepyside just a way-station to the rest of his life?
Was he just marking time?
Or did the time mean something more than that? Did the friends he'd made have more of a hold on him than he intended? Was this town his home? And the other people in this house. What were they to him? He called them 'Mother', 'Father' and 'Sister', but who were they? Did they truly matter to him?
He sat for a long time just thinking.
When his bedside clock struck two a.m., Jim Frayne was sound asleep. His old clothes were in a box neatly labeled 'Salvation Army'. His tools were in his camping gear, the granola in the trash, the mug on his dresser and his legals in his fire-proof safe.
That Christmas, Jim Frayne gave himself a gift. He gave himself a home.
The End