Holiday of Hope
Synopsis
She was losing faith…until he believed in her. For four generations, Bretton’s on the Boardwalk, a store dedicated to Christmas, has greeted tourists who come to Port Provident, but after Hurricane Hope tears through town, Jessica Bretton is left with a pile of bills to pay and no tourists visiting her store. She doesn’t want to fail her family by closing the doors to the store, but she can’t hold on much longer. As Director of the Park Board of Port Provident, Bradley Thorpe is responsible for getting tourists to Provident Island. It’s been almost three months since Hurricane Hope tore through the island, and while there’s much work to be done, people are ready to get back to normal. The local economy is strained and it looks like the Christmas season is going to be an unhappy holiday. When Jessica suggests reviving a Christmas celebration from Port Provident’s history books, Bradley is unconvinced. His role is to drive the local economy, not plan parties. Could a woman who celebrates Christmas all year long change the heart of a man who’s more interested in the bottom line than a season of hope? And could a little Christmas cheer be just what Port Provident needs to rebuild? Hurricane Hope: One storm changes Port Provident forever...and for good.
Holiday of Hope Free Chapters
Chapter 1 | Holiday of Hope
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Jessica Bretton couldn't get away from it. Everywhere she could see, it was beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Every advertisement that popped up extolled the virtues of some must-have for the holiday season. Every weather forecast showed the temperature dipping lower across the country. Sometimes those reports were paired with photos of snow from other places like Colorado and New York. Thanksgiving had just passed yesterday, and the rest of America had plunged full tilt into the most wonderful time of the year.
Indeed, it was beginning to look a lot like Christmas…everywhere but Bretton’s on the Boardwalk in Port Provident, Texas.
Jessica was the fourth generation of her family to stand behind the cash register at Bretton’s. She’d grown up in retail. She knew that today, the so-called “Black Friday,” had received the moniker because it was the day retailers looked forward to changing their profit-and-loss sheets from red to black. From sweating paying the bills to cash flow. From the lean times to celebration.
This year, though, black more adequately described Jessica’s mood.
Hurricane Hope crushed the island a few months ago and sent most of the island into a mental and physical funk. The economic toll of the storm couldn’t fully be calculated yet.
Jessica had once loved fall and the lead-up to the store’s most profitable season of the year—the holiday season. This year, fall had disappeared into a blur of mucking out and contractors and rebuilding—to say nothing of feverish negotiations and disputes with insurance companies and a mad rush to restock Bretton’s decimated inventory before the holiday shoppers came calling.
Except, despite all of Jessica’s long nights and high levels of stress to get everything back and running, the holiday shoppers weren’t coming.
They weren’t calling.
They weren’t caroling.
The only thing they were doing was staying away. The new mayor, Angela Ruiz, had made the rounds of the major Texas television stations last week, announcing that Port Provident was back open for business.
As far as Jessica could tell, though, Mayor Ruiz’s words had all fallen on deaf ears. The bell on the door of Bretton’s on the Boardwalk was not ringing. It was not jangling. And it was definitely not jingling. In a shop dedicated to Christmas all year long, this year, there was very little Christmas spirit to be found anywhere.
Just then, the small tinny clang of the bell over the door did break into Jessica’s loop of depressed thoughts. She looked up from the bleak spreadsheet she’d been studying. “Welcome to Bretton’s. How may I help you?”
"Hey, Jess—it's just me."
Bradley Thorpe, the director of the Port Provident Park Board, stood just inside the doorway.
Jessica wouldn’t lie, it was always nice to see Bradley—in a “steal a quick glance of the hot guy” kind of way—but she knew he wasn’t here to buy an ornament of a sand dollar dressed as Santa. He might be a momentary distraction, but he wasn’t going to fix the problem that was clearly laid out in black-and-white on the spreadsheet in front of her.
Still, she couldn’t skip Bretton’s expectations of customer service just because Bradley wasn’t actually a customer. “Hey Bradley—what can I help you with today?”
“Nothing, really—I just need to take this poster down.” He pointed at the broadsheet-sized advertisement in the window.
“But that’s the Santas on the Street poster.” Jessica didn’t understand. “Santas on the Street” was a staple of the holiday season in Port Provident. People came to the island one night a year, dressed up as St. Nick. They rode bikes around to local restaurants and stores, leaving money in cash registers and canned food in donation bins. It usually turned into a bit of a wild time for the party-going Santas, but overall, it was positive for the island and the merchants who called Port Provident home. “Why are you taking it down? Your crew just put it up last week.”
"They've canceled it," Bradley said matter-of-factly.
Jessica felt her heart turn to an icicle in her chest. “Cancelled it? Who? Why?”
“City Manager’s office. Colin said that after further review, we just don’t have the resources or the manpower to put this on. We don’t have enough police on the streets to keep our citizens safe right now. We can’t police thousands of tourists—if they show up—and we can’t afford the overtime, anyway.”
Bradley began to pick at the strips of tape holding the poster against the window.
“So, are we doing anything for Christmas, Bradley?” The icicle in her heart began to stretch and reach through her veins. She practically began to shiver.
“Well, I’m sure families will still celebrate. But as a city, I don’t think so, no.”
Jessica’s tongue flapped like a penguin’s flipper. She could barely talk. “But what about Mayor Ruiz’s public goodwill tour? Aren’t we supposed to be open for business?”
“We’re open for business, Jessica. That hasn’t changed.”
She shook her head. "No, we're not. If we're not going to extend the same hospitality Port Provident has always extended at one of our biggest times of the year, then we're not really open for business. We're a tourist town, Bradley. We're not open for business unless we're making it easy for tourists to come do business with us."
He wadded up the poster into a ball. It crunched between his hands, and the sound of crackling paper rang in Jessica's ears like an emergency siren.
Fitting. She may as well just call a code blue. Four generations of Bretton family members had stewarded this store through a century, and two years after getting handed over to Jessica, the store went into cardiac arrest.
RIP Bretton’s on the Boardwalk. It was nice knowing you.
“We’ll be back next year, Jessica. These things just take time.” He casually tossed the ball of paper from his right hand to his left. “Do you have a trashcan?”
There was a small, rectangular trashcan behind the counter. It held unwanted receipts, mismarked price tags, and the occasional empty to-go cup of iced tea quite nicely.
But she was going to need a larger one now to hold the trashing of her family’s dream.
Jessica leaned down and picked up the small gray bin. “You can use this.”
Bradley reached his arm back and shot the paper ball in an arc toward the trashcan. It hit the mark squarely, making a soft swish as the paper scraped the side of the plastic bag that lined the inside of the can.
Today was the blackest Friday ever.
Bradley dug through his pocket for some change to leave behind as a tip at Café Provident. He'd just pulled down the Santas on the Street poster from their front window, and he needed a cup of coffee to warm up the chill that had lingered in his veins since his stop at Bretton's on the Boardwalk.
Canceling the slightly chaotic Santa Parade was in the best interest of the Island right now. He knew that. The night always progressed from a fun opportunity to drop off toys and food to be donated to local charities and wound up as a pilgrimage through the bars and other nightlife of Port Provident. Someone always decided to be Superman. And this year, Port Provident just couldn't afford the chance that something could get out of hand.
But he’d seen the look in Jessica’s crisp blue eyes. A mix of shock and desperation, Bradley had been unable to shake the memory of her obvious distress as he’d continued down the block, pulling posters from shop windows and bulletin boards.
"You gonna order?" The barista behind the counter looked squarely at Bradley. The shortness in the young woman's voice made Bradley feel as though he were back in grade school, being summoned to the front of the class to write his name on the board in crisp, white chalk.
He dropped his extra dollar and spare change in the tip jar, hoping that seeing a gratuity up front would placate the coffee crafter. “I just need a large coffee, black.”
The barista scribbled notes with a permanent marker on the side of the thick paper cup. “Lilly will take care of you at the end of the counter.”
He handed a five-dollar bill to the young woman. “Keep the change,” he said as he walked to the end to wait for his coffee.
The sullen attitude of both of the workers depressed him. It was the same feeling he got when he’d been in Bretton’s on the Boardwalk earlier. Was there really no Christmas cheer in Port Provident this year?
The thought weighed on him more heavily than he wanted it to. As the head of the Park Board of Port Provident, Bradley's role was primarily oversight of the beaches and public parks, but overall, it was grounded in promoting the tourism of Provident Island and ensuring those tourists were safe and had a pleasant experience while in town.
There was no denying that Hurricane Hope’s landfall had changed the game for the residents, tourists, and business owners of Port Provident. And Bradley fully understood why the City Council pulled the plug on this year’s Santa event—with everything else the city had absorbed since mid-September, Port Provident could not afford to absorb the consequences of Santas who might get out of control for one night. Control was tenuously maintained right now—many island residents were still in temporary housing and while, overall, the city was moving in the right direction toward recovery—nothing fit the definition of “normal.”
The barista called out Bradley’s name, breaking his lumbering train of thought.
“Oh, I need to grab that too,” he said, as he reached for the steaming cup of coffee.
“Grab what?” The barista gave him a hooded glance.
"Your other Santas on the Street poster—the one behind you. I got the one in the window as I came in. It's been canceled this year, so I'm taking all the posters down."
Now the cashier joined the conversation. “Cancelled? You can’t cancel Santas on the Street. It’s tradition.”
The pit of Bradley’s stomach felt as deep as the Grand Canyon. He parroted out the same response he’d already given a dozen times today. “Well, it wasn’t my decision. The City Council decided we just don’t have the infrastructure to support it this year.”
The cashier mumbled something to the barista. And while Bradley didn’t understand everything she’d just said, he had picked out a few choice words that more than adequately summed up what she thought of City Council and their plan.
“Really, I am sorry. Everything will be back to normal next year—at least it should be.”
The cashier pushed a lock of hair under a slouchy knitted beanie. “Yeah, I don’t think you guys at City Hall understand how much we count on events like Santas on the Street to give people a reason to come and shop here. How am I supposed to buy Christmas gifts for my kid this year? I’m a single mom.”
Her words were hotter than the cup of coffee in Bradley’s hand.
“Well, shopping local is a great thing, but I think it would be fine if you went to the mall on the mainland this year.”
She shot Bradley a look that told him clearly where he could go and how he could get there. Bradley glanced down at his shoes, certain he’d just stepped in a big pile of reindeer poop.
“I didn’t say where. I said how. That’s our biggest night in December here. The tips I make from Santas on the Street pay for my Christmas presents. Scroogey City Council just ruined my Christmas.” She turned and ripped the poster off the bulletin board behind the register and threw it on the counter then stomped off, wiping her left eye from behind the thick black frames of her glasses.
Great. He’d made her cry.
Well, not him, specifically. City Council had. But as he’d been reminded a few times during his career, he served at the pleasure of City Council. So, it was really all the same thing.
Bradley lifted the coffee cup with one hand and dragged the ripped poster toward him with two fingers from his other hand. He pinched it and wadded it into a tight ball. With some ribbon on top, it could have been an ornament on a tree.
But not this year. Not in this town.
Bradley Scrooge had come to town, not Santa Claus.
*
Jessica stubbed her toe on a segment of sidewalk that had shifted upwards. Yet another roadblock the hurricane had thrown in her way, she thought to herself as she walked and tried to ignore the sting.
She hurried up the steps to the Provident Memorial Library, weighed down with a heavy shopping bag in each hand. The sun was setting in the sky, and Jessica knew the staff would soon be locking the doors to the building—she hoped she could squeak her delivery in before the key turned.
“Jessica! You brought them!” Anita Sullivan opened the massive front door to the large Victorian building. Four stories tall and with a sturdy stone façade, the library’s look and feel took all who saw it back to a different era. The Provident Memorial Library had been an important architectural and community fixture in Port Provident for more than a century.
Anita had been a fixture at the library for almost half a century, and Jessica’s heart thawed a little as she saw the excitement on the face of the woman who had brought so much joy to children, readers, and amateur historians alike on the island.
“They were way up in storage at Bretton’s. I hope this is what you were looking for.”
"Oh, I'm sure it will be perfect, Jessica. I was so excited when Donna said she thought she'd seen them in the attic while doing some post-hurricane cleanup." The gray-haired lady waved broadly with her left arm. "Come in, come in! Let's lock up the doors and take a look."
Jessica followed Anita through the library—around bookcases, down hallways, through reading rooms, and behind large tables perfect for holding an afternoon’s discoveries or research. At last, they came to Anita’s spacious office on the third floor.
“Ok, put the bags right there.” Anita rubbed her hands together with delight. “I can’t wait any longer to see all these.”
No sooner had Jessica placed the bags on the table, Anita dove in, pulling out several white boxes. Gently, she lifted the lid on each—then she paused. “I need my gloves.”
She walked to her desk and opened a drawer, pulling out two pairs of clean white gloves. "One for you, one for me."
Anita handed a pair to Jessica, then slid her small hands into a pair that had clearly seen regular use.
She delicately picked up a photo mounted on thick paper and sighed. “Oh, just lovely. Look at that detail.”
Jessica leaned in. “So… what is all of this?”
“This,” Anita said with a smile that glowed like no sterile overhead light could ever hope to, “this is our history. This is how Port Provident celebrated Christmas when she was the jewel of the Gulf Coast.”
Jessica gingerly touched the photo. A woman sat in a sleigh with two children. A fur wrapped her shoulders, and her hands were bundled in a large muff. Each of the children wore thick coats and a scarf around the neck. A man in a formal suit stood behind them.
In spite of the obvious Victorian charm, something didn’t seem quite right.
“Wait a minute. That’s the Thacker house.”
Anita nodded. “The 1897 Thacker House—and that’s the Thacker family, all bundled up for a cold winter’s night…except that the palm tree behind them appears to be in grand form. Mrs. Thacker is probably sweating under all her furs and wraps and hats.”
“That’s funny, but very true. I think I wore flip-flops to Christmas dinner last year,” Jessica said, still studying the serious faces from generations ago. “I guess Mrs. Thacker would never have done that.”
“Not at all. Her husband established First Provident Bank. She had one of the most coveted social positions in town. In fact, she chaired the Port Provident Ladies’ Musicale Society, the founders of the annual Christmas Carol Celebration that ran in Port Provident for many years, from 1890. The Great Storm of 1910 blew it away—just like almost everything else in town. The joy was gone from this city for years as they rebuilt.”
“Kind of like today,” Jessica said, almost hiding the words under her breath.
“What did you say?” Anita reached in the box and pulled out photos of a stage production. A tall man was wrapped in strips of cloth and draped in chains. She tapped the man with the tip of her finger. “Jacob Marley was always played by Walter Mitchell. He was the tallest man in town—almost six-foot-seven, which was almost unheard of for the time.”
Jessica leaned over to see the detail more closely. He very much looked like the specter of Dickens’ tale. “I said it feels like 1910 all over again. There’s no Christmas cheer on Port Provident this year, either.”
Anita laid the photo down. “How so? I’ve seen far more decorations out than I thought I’d see, considering it’s only the day after Thanksgiving.”
Jessica let out a cold, tight breath that had been hiding behind her sternum. She told Anita about the almost non-existent sales at Bretton’s on the Boardwalk and her fears for the store.
"And then Bradley Thorpe from the Park Board came by today and took down the Santas on the Street posters—the city has canceled the one Christmas activity I was counting on in order to pay my bills this month. I don't know what I'm going to do, Anita. The insurance money isn't going to be enough to cover our losses—and that process is like a trickle of slow progress, when there is any progress. There are no tourists. There are no shoppers. And there is no ring to my cash register. I've talked with some of the other downtown merchants. I'm not the only one. I understand that Santas on the Street can get kind of crazy—that part always annoyed me—but we needed it. The people like me who depend on Christmas sales need something, anything to get people back to the island in December."
“Sounds like you need a little Tiny Tim in your life.”
“’God bless us, every one.’ Tim’s sentiment sounds perfectly lovely, but I don’t see it happening this year. But if it doesn’t happen this year, Bretton’s is done. And it will happen on my watch.” Jessica’s head slouched downward with the weight of failing generations of her family.
She didn’t want to think about it, but she had to prepare for the worst.
Closing the doors to Bretton’s on the Boardwalk forever.
“Before you go, Jessica, I’ve got something I want you to take with you.” Anita sweetly patted Jessica’s gloved hand with her own. “Wait right here.”
The older woman left her gloves stacked next to the photos and padded out the door.
As she waited, Jessica gingerly picked up more photos and looked through them. All visions from Port Provident’s heyday, they showed scenes from a performance of A Christmas Carol, people dressed in their Sunday best and gathered around a banquet table, and even Port Provident residents on the streets of downtown enjoying a snack of real chestnuts that had been roasted over a fire. If she wasn’t mistaken, they were standing in front of the steps to the building that now housed Bretton’s on the Boardwalk.
The scenes immortalized in tones of sepia seemed so charming, so quaint, so perfect.
It tugged at her heart to realize that things were not that perfect anymore. She remembered playing in the store as a child with her grandparents, then later helping out as a teenager when her parents ran the store. So many memories. But in all reality, there wouldn’t be many more.
The click of the doorknob announced Anita’s return before she stepped in the room. Jessica took the nanosecond to push down her emotions.
“Here you go, Jessica.” Anita held out a book. The cover was cloth, shiny with wear and slightly frayed on the corners. “It’s a book all about the Victorian holiday celebrations here in Port Provident. It was published by the Ladies’ Musicale Society—and I am inclined to think that Mrs. Thacker was one of the primary authors of the book. Maybe there’s some Christmas cheer in here that will still ring true, even today.”
Jessica held the book carefully. She could smell a very faint mustiness, like so many older books tended to give off. Gingerly, she opened the book and flipped through a few pages. There was even a section of elaborate sketches in the middle of the book.
“Thank you, Anita. I’ll bring it back soon.”
She didn’t really plan to spend much time with the book, charming as it appeared to be. She just wanted to go home and go to sleep—and spend as much time with the covers over her head until the inevitable happened and she locked Bretton’s doors for good. In spite of that, she appreciated Anita’s attempts to raise her spirits.
“Keep it as long as you need to, my dear. I know you’ll take good care of it.”
Jessica tucked the book into a pocket in her purse and forced down the lump in her throat that formed as she realized her family had once said they knew she’d take good care of Bretton’s on the Boardwalk, too.
At least she trusted herself not to let Anita down. She didn’t have that level of confidence about any other promises she’d made.
*
Bradley arrived at the Park Board office early to go over some insurance paperwork that had come in yesterday.
He’d skipped his usual stop for a cup of black coffee, though, and the morning was dragging. He couldn’t face the stern disapproval from behind the counter at Café Provident again.
The loud knock at his door jolted him like a shot of super-concentrated caffeine. The office had been completely quiet. He took a deep breath before calling for the unknown knocker to open the door and come in.
If the knock had surprised him, the visitor about dropped him out of his chair.
He’d come to the office this morning expecting a morning reviewing highly technical insurance language regarding repairs on several buildings on the beach owned by the Park Board. He had certainly not expected the very determined face of Jessica Bretton to appear in his doorway.
“I have a proposal for you.” She wasted no time crossing the gray carpet and getting in front of his desk. Jessica placed a small green book on top of the pile of paperwork in the middle of Bradley’s desk.
The tone of her voice told Bradley he had no choice but to listen.
“Okay?” Bradley wasn’t sure what else to say. He decided that just letting her do the talking was the best plan.
“We need to bring Christmas back to the island, Bradley. It’s not just going to come by itself. I read this whole book last night. I couldn’t put it down. I know what we need to do.”
He raised his hands, flipping them over in an empty gesture. “It wasn’t my call, Jessica. I know this is hard on you and everyone downtown, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”
She sat in the chair closest to the desk and leaned forward with intent. "I've thought about it and I agree to cancel the Santa night was the right move. By the time I close my store, it's become a bar hop, and then the police have to babysit grownups for the rest of the night. I understand we can’t afford the risk of an event like that. But what if we did something that focused on families? Something that involved our own Port Provident families?”
She tapped the book with one manicured nail. Bradley couldn't help but notice the red polish with white diagonal stripes like little candy cane bites at the end of each finger.
“But why the book?” Bradley couldn’t help but ask the primary question on his mind.
“Before the 1910 hurricane, Port Provident hosted a celebration of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. It was a contemporary celebration at the time—A Christmas Carol was a very popular book that had come out in the mid-1800s. In 1890, the ladies of the town put on a community play of A Christmas Carol. Over the years to come, it evolved with a street parade, chestnuts roasting over open fires, and even visits from British royalty. People from across the community made it happen, and then people started coming from far and wide to take part.”
Bradley shook his head. “That sounds cool, but I don’t understand what you want to do.”
“I want to bring it back.” She locked her blue eyes on his face. He felt the pierce of her stare like the point of an icicle.
“But how, Jessica? You don’t just throw together an event like that on the fly. We plan all year for our major events in the city. And while you’re right, the crowd would likely be more tame, I just don’t think the city can handle any big crowds of any kind right now.”
She picked up the book and held it gently with her candy cane fingertips. Jessica opened it to a section of lavish illustrations. “Look at these. This was Port Provident’s heyday. What if we could bring that back? What if we could bring some hope and holiday cheer to the people in our city?”
Bradley could understand why she was so taken with the idea. The illustrations looked like they were straight out of those Christmas cards his mother used to find so charming—Carrier and Chive?
He shook his head. No, that wasn’t right. What were they called? He began to vaguely hum a tune.
“So, you’re not even willing to give it a try?”
“Wait, what?” Bradley didn’t understand the knife-edge of frustration in her voice.
“You shook your head.”
“Oh, I was just trying to remember something that these illustrations reminded me of. Old Christmas cards my mother used to love.”
She traced the face of a woman immortalized on the stage. “Like Currier and Ives, right?”
Bradley let out a chuckle. “That’s the name. I couldn’t think of it. Carrier and Chive stuck in my head. I knew that was more like the name for a loaded baked potato, not iconic art.”
“And it’s a little early to be thinking about lunch.” She smiled. “But if you’ll help me with this, the potato is on me.”
“I work for the government. I can’t take bribes.”
“Can a carb really be a bribe, Bradley?”
Bradley tried not to laugh at her, but her tone was completely serious. “I’d need to consult the manual.”
"So, you’re saying there's hope?" The look in her eyes had softened, and he could see a little golden flicker on the edge of the iris.
He didn’t want to disappoint her—especially since he knew he’d tanked her day yesterday—but there wasn’t much encouragement to give.
“I wish I could, Jessica, but it really isn’t my call. There’s a City Council meeting tomorrow. You could try and get on the agenda and see what they think. That’s my best advice right there.”
She picked up the book and tucked it back in her purse, then gave her lower lip two distinct chews. A twinkle in her eye brought back more Christmas memories of long ago, this time of stories of Santa Claus and the joy and mischief he carried with him.
“So… you’re saying there’s hope.”
Chapter 2 | Holiday of Hope
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Jessica looked through the windows of Bretton’s as she passed by. She saw Donna behind the cash register, but other than that, not a creature was stirring inside the shop. Jessica would have been grateful for a mouse today—especially if the mouse had brought an AmEx card.
Normally, Jessica would have popped in the store. She would have stocked some merchandise, straightened some shelves, then gone back to her office in the corner of the stockroom for an hour or two to catch up on the never-ending pile of paperwork.
But not today.
Today she was on a mission, one every bit as determined and frantic as Santa’s one-night-only trip around the world to bring holiday cheer.
She would put together a plan to bring back the joy of Christmas past to Port Provident. She would get in front of the City Council tomorrow. And she would not fail to convince them that her idea was just what Port Provident needed.
She just wasn’t quite sure how.
Armed with the book on loan from Anita and a folder full of other notes and copies of photographs Anita had pulled together for her this morning, Jessica ducked into Café Provident for something warm. Surveying the menu, written with swirls and stripes and other whimsy on a chalkboard, Jessica decided on a hot chocolate as she stepped to the counter.
“Marshmallows or whipped cream?”
Jessica knew most of the people behind the beverages at Café Provident, but this face was new.
“Mmm. Marshmallows, please.” She smiled at the thought of the fluffy clouds melting into the warm cocoa. “I’m Jessica. Are you new here?”
The blonde nodded. “This is my first day. I’m Emily.”
“It’s nice to meet you. Are you new to Port Provident?” As a lifelong resident of the island, getting her degree at Provident College, and working at her family’s store since childhood, Jessica always said she’d seen just about every face on the island at one time or another—but Emily’s clear complexion and braids framing each side of her face were not ringing any bells.
“About a year. I came here to do PR for PYT—the Provident Youth Theatre company—but since the hurricane, my hours have been cut. We don’t think we’ll be able to do a show until the spring, at the earliest. I just needed something to make up the difference.”
Jessica’s brain began to spin as Emily introduced herself.
“PYT? Why are you not able to put on shows? Is the theatre badly damaged? I thought I’d read there was actually minimal damage.”
“There was. We’re very fortunate—everything is cleaned up and back to normal in the building, for the most part. But good luck getting anyone to come to Port Provident right now. There’s been so much progress and rebuilding here since Hurricane Hope, but people in Houston and other places think we’re still a disaster zone. We just don’t see that we’d be able to get a return on our expenses for putting on a show until early next year.”
Jessica nodded. She understood the bleak picture and the numbers game all too well.
“What about a one-time thing, more of a community event?”
Emily poured hot milk in the cup she’d designated for Jessica, then swirled chocolate in it. “What do you mean? I don’t know of any community events going on. Everything has been so quiet here since Hurricane Hope.”
“Exactly. But what if there was a way to change all that? Do you think PYT might be interested?”
A garnish of small marshmallows topped the hot chocolate. Once the lid was secured on the cup, Emily handed it to Jessica.
“I’d certainly talk to Denise about it. I know she’s dying to get back to business in any way we can.”
"I'm going to sit right over there by the window." Jessica pointed to a table in the corner with room to spread out her notes and research. "If you have a break or things slow down and you want to talk about what's on my mind, so you can go to Denise…come on over, and we'll chat."
About thirty minutes later, Emily slipped in the chair across from Jessica. “So tell me more about your idea.”
Jessica pulled out the copies of photos that Anita had sent and started walking Emily through the history of the long-ago celebrations and community-driven play of A Christmas Carol. As Jessica noted different aspects of the event and how she thought they could modernize it, she noticed a light begin to flicker in Emily’s eyes.
“I’ve got several of my reporter contacts who are just waiting for PYT to reopen so they can do a story on it. I could definitely call them up to cover this and help us promote it.” Emily paused. “Beth, come over here and listen to this. Jessica, could Beth have some kind of booth for Café Provident out at the event?”
Jessica couldn’t stop the smile that pushed across her face. “Wassail, cider, hot chocolate…chestnuts roasting on an open fire. If you can do any of that, Beth, you can have as many booths as you’d like.”
Beth Greenling, the owner of Café Provident, stood just behind Emily. “We can do all of that, Jessica. And more. I wish we could do a special high tea. How British and fun would that be?”
Jessica raised her hands in an open gesture. “Why can’t we? If you can dream it up and we can get the idea green-lighted, I say the sky is the limit.”
“So how do we get the idea green-lighted?” Beth wiped her hands on the Christmas-themed apron that covered her street clothes.
Like a reindeer pulling up to another chimney, Jessica’s enthusiasm came to a quick stop. “Well, that’s the catch. We have to convince City Council that this won’t be an event with the potential to be out-of-control like Santas on the Street. There’s a meeting tomorrow. Can you come with me?”
“Absolutely. Can I bring a few others with me?”
"The more, the merrier," Jessica replied. "At least I ho-ho-hope so."
*
“The lady at the front desk told me I’d find you out here.” Jessica held a brown paper bag in her outstretched arms. “This is for you.”
The sound of Jessica’s voice broke through the silence, startling him. Bradley stepped out from behind the new playground set that had just been installed at the small beachside park. He was touring several of the Park Board’s properties this afternoon, checking renovation progress.
“What’s in there?” He eyed the bag skeptically before reaching out a hand.
“A potato.”
He couldn’t help himself from laughing at the matter-of-fact tone in her voice. “A potato?”
“Yes. With Carrier and Chive. Or something like that. I told you lunch was on me if I could enlist your help.”
Bradley unrolled the top of the bag and looked inside. Sure enough, there was a three-dimensional oval, wrapped in foil. Small disposable containers of cheddar cheese, bacon, and more than one container of chives had been tossed in on top, along with some napkins and a plastic fork.
“Jessica, as much as I’d love to eat this potato—I just don’t think I can help you. The City Council has spoken. I work for them. I can’t just thumb my nose at the people who sign my paycheck.”
She let out a deep breath. “Don’t go bacon my heart, Bradley.”
He wanted to laugh, but inside he could feel a corner of his heart crumble. He’d tried a hundred different ways to ask Jessica Bretton out in the last year or so, but she’d always been so focused on her responsibilities at the store that she’d declined every single invitation. He’d finally given up—and had gone out of his way to avoid her, so he wasn’t tempted to look foolish by asking her out again. Yesterday was the first time he’d walked into Bretton’s for months.
Now, she needed something from him, and there was nothing he could do about it.
That simple fact gave him a bigger headache than all the insurance paperwork he’d seen since Hurricane Hope’s September landfall. He’d spent plenty of time praying for a chance to get to be more to Jessica Bretton. This seemed more like a cruel joke than the answer he’d been hoping for.
“I ham trying not to, Jessica.” He decided the best thing to do was to just play along. It would be far easier to talk about cured pork products than to ever let Jessica on to the crush he’d been harboring for longer than he cared to admit. “But it’s a conflict of interest.”
She frowned, and the filtered sunlight caught the furrow of her brow, highlighting the lines that ran across her forehead.
"There's nothing you can tell me? Not even a tip or a hint?" Jessica glanced briefly at her feet. "That just sounds desperate, doesn't it? I'm sorry, Bradley. I don't mean to put you in a bad spot. I'm just…I'm in a bad place. I can't eat, I can't sleep. I can't think about anything except the tiny number in the Bretton's bank account. I'm almost to the point where I can't pay the store's bills. And since the store pays me, if I can't pay those bills and make payroll, then I can't pay my own bills either."
Bradley put the sack with the potato on the table nearby. He had to battle his instincts. He wanted to give her a hug. He wanted to do something to reassure her that everything would be okay.
The problem was, he didn’t know whether or not everything would be okay. He knew she had a lot of enthusiasm for this Victorian Christmas idea. Plus, he could see how a family-friendly event made far more sense than a long night of Santas on the Street. But he didn’t know how he could be her advocate on this. It would be overstepping his bounds.
Things at City Hall had gotten tight since the hurricane. With so much scrutiny from so many organizations regarding red tape and rebuilding, the city government was going above and beyond to be seen as checking the boxes and playing by the rules.
And speaking of playing by the rules, Bradley steeled his arms to remain at his side.
Hugging Jessica—even as good-natured reassurance and nothing more—was not in the rules. She clearly wasn't interested in him, and he just had to accept that and abide by it.
He saw the droop of her shoulders and the slouch of her head. Everything about her posture screamed a silent cry of emotional pain. He had to at least find something to say to give her some hope.
“When you do pitch it to them, be sure and help them understand that it’s a partnership between the merchants and show them clearly who is onboard. I don’t know if they fully understand how make-or-break this seems to be for many of you.”
Slowly, Jessica lifted her head. “Do you think that could change their minds?”
Again, he wanted to reassure her—to tell her everything would be okay. But he had to be honest, and the honest truth was he just didn’t know. “Anything is really possible. But I don’t think it’s going to hurt you to show a united front with other business owners.”
She wiped a finger below her left eye. Bradley hadn’t even realized tears had escaped. “I can do that. It really isn’t just me.”
He thought back to that very uncomfortable stop for a cup of coffee. “I know it’s not. I just wish there was more I could do. I wish things were more of how they used to be. Before the hurricane, I had the freedom to pull a few strings. But now, with the feds watching everything we do and tying even the most benign things into whether or not we get approved for certain recovery funds—I can’t do my job the way I’m used to doing it.”
Bradley couldn’t put his finger on it, but even his own roles and responsibilities at the Park Board seemed to be in some kind of flux. He certainly wasn’t going to bring up his own uncertainties, though. His concerns felt more abstract—he could tell something was different, but he didn’t know what.
Jessica’s were real. As in black and white on a spreadsheet real.
“I know. I’m sorry for putting you in a hard place, Bradley. I really don’t mean to. I just…” She let her thought trail off like the roll of a wave reaching up onto the shore. “Anyway, I hope you enjoy the potato.”
She tried to put a smile on her face.
“I’ll probably russet down at the table and eat it shortly. Get it? Russet, sit…”
Bradley noticed that Jessica had hesitated in getting the right words out for most of their conversation, but she didn’t stall one second in rolling her eyes at Bradley’s poor attempt at a joke.
“Awful, right?” he asked.
“Don’t quit your day job. Standup comedy is not in your future.”
After she’d walked off, Bradley sat down at the picnic table and pulled the potato and garnishes out of the bag. He could see Jessica’s car turning out of the parking lot and on to Gulfview Boulevard. He followed the little red hatchback with his eyes until it was out of sight.
Standup comedy likely wasn’t his future, but he wished something different was—he wished Jessica Bretton was.
*
“I’m glad you’re here a little early, Bradley.” Mayor Pro-Tem Carter Porter caught up to Bradley the next afternoon as soon as he came through the door of the City Council chambers ahead of the scheduled meeting. “Can you step over into the other room with me?”
Carter gestured at a double door just to the left of the dais where the Port Provident City Council sat during their public meetings. The doors led to a private room where they could have discussions which met the requirements to be held behind closed doors.
Bradley could feel sweat begin to dampen his palms. He couldn’t place what Carter Porter would possibly want to talk to him about—and anything that did come to mind wasn’t good.
He followed behind Carter and let the echo of his shoes on the tile floor do all the talking. He couldn’t think of any words to start the conversation with. Small talk about the weather probably wasn’t called for.
Carter closed the doors carefully behind them, then walked over to one of the tables in the center of the room and leaned against it. “We’re announcing some changes at the meeting today.”
Bradley nodded. His palms continued to generate sweat, like humidity after a summer rainstorm. “I figured you weren’t inviting me back here to offer me a raise.”
“Nobody’s getting a raise this year—but you’re a department head. You know that. The hurricane washed all those hopes away.” Carter drummed his fingers over the edge of the table. “But I am offering you a new opportunity.”
This felt worse than he could have imagined. Carter’s voice was way too serious for this to be an option Bradley would be excited about. The hesitation he heard in Carter’s words spoke volumes. It clearly said Carter was searching for the right words to put on a sell-job.
“New, huh? Not better, not good? New.” May as well just come right out with it, Bradley thought.
“Well, we hope you’ll think it’s good.”
Hope. Yeah, just like the last round of Hope that hit Port Provident—Hurricane Hope—this wasn’t going to end well. Bradley brushed his palms down the front of his khakis.
“Try me.” Bradley couldn’t muster a third syllable of enthusiasm.
"You know restrictions are being tied to this recovery money, right?"
Bradley nodded. The red tape was long, it was sticky, and it was knotted tighter than something the Coast Guard would use to secure a ship.
“Well, we’re having to—ahem—bring efficiencies to our departmental structure.” Carter paused with a slight roll of his eyes. “We’ve had some outside consultants working on how best we can achieve the hurdles that the government has placed in front of us. We’ve settled on a set of recommendations we’re prepared to accept, and one of those affects the Park Board.”
Bradley braced himself for the punch and hoped it wouldn’t be a total knockout.
“Go on,” he said skeptically.
“We will be combining the Park Board with the Convention and Visitors Bureau—pulling our tourist-focused departments under one umbrella.”
Bradley wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, but it wasn’t this. “Okay, so will the CVB be moving into our offices? And I guess Deborah is now reporting to me?”
“Not exactly.” Carter shrugged one shoulder. “The way things have to go—at least for now—is that the Park Board is being absorbed into the CVB. You’re going to report to Deborah.”
Bradley’s palms were no longer sweaty. Now they were on fire. So was every inch of his skin. In fact, he briefly reached up and patted one hand on top of his hair.
No, there were no actual flames leaping out of his head.
It felt good to confirm that minor detail since all body temperature evidence seemed to point to the contrary.
“This isn’t an opportunity, Carter. This is a demotion. A big slap in the face.” He pointed a finger in Carter’s direction. “And you know it, or you wouldn’t have brought me in this closed-door area to tell me.”
Carter held up both hands in the age-old gesture of deflection. “It should only be temporary. We just have to get through this rebuilding and get to the next phase.”
Bradley clenched his jaw against the thoughts in his head. He could not say what he was thinking. Talk about a career-limiting move. Not that it would matter much. The Number Two person in city government had just been very clear about what the powers-that-be in Port Provident thought of his career.
“I’m not a party planner, Carter.” Bradley bit out the words.
“No one is saying you are, Bradley. And you and I both know that’s not what the CVB does, either.”
Bradley couldn’t keep his eyebrow from raising. “Tomato, to-mah-to. Look, I'm sure they do great work. But my team and I keep your greatest asset running. We keep the beaches clean, safe and well-managed. Who is booking conventions if the beach is a mess? I think you have the order of things backward, Carter. The CVB should be reporting into the Park Board."
Carter sidestepped, then moved away from the table. "I don't necessarily disagree with you, Bradley. But for now, we have to abide by the consultant group's recommendations. That's basically all there is to it. We're between a rock and a hard place. We have to have those recovery funds. We can't jeopardize them."
Collateral damage.
That’s what Bradley realized his career had become.
He couldn’t keep a bitter sigh of disgust from filling the space between him and Carter before turning around and walking out of the room. Bradley wished he could go anywhere but the City Council chambers.
He wanted to sit anywhere but his usual seat on the second row.
He wanted to look at anything but the other directors of the various city departments, knowing he was technically no longer one of them.
He thought about just standing at the back of the room, quietly biding his time until Mayor Angela Ruiz dropped the gavel to close the meeting.
Then he saw blonde hair, a green cable knit sweater and a pair of jeans with a wash so dark they appeared to be midnight.
Bradley actually couldn’t just bide his time and then sneak out—he was required to be at these meetings. But all of a sudden, he realized he really didn’t want to go anywhere. He wasn’t the only one who had a lot riding on the decisions of the group of elected officials taking their seats on the dais.
Well, if no one stood up for him when the decisions about his career, at least there would be one person to stand up for Jessica Bretton when it came time for City Council to decide the fate of her business.
He didn’t have anything to lose anymore—and he knew she had everything at stake.
*
There were several seats saved on the second row for those who had official agenda items. Jessica held a copy of the agenda tightly in her hand. Her name stood out clearly at the top of the speaker list. She walked toward the front of the room, giving a small, covert wave to Emily and Beth from Café Provident as she passed them. There were several other familiar faces in the crowd, owners of small businesses from across the historic district. And in the third row, she saw Anita.
Anita provided the inspiration for this whole wild and crazy idea. She knew Anita wasn’t scheduled to speak and she wasn’t a business owner who could weigh in. But somehow, just having her here gave Jessica an added dose of encouragement.
Jessica slipped into the open chair on the aisle of the second row. Anita sat just behind her on the third row and leaned forward, placing her hand as light as a snowflake on Jessica’s shoulder. The gentle touch reassured Jessica in a simple way she hadn’t felt since her mother died two Christmases ago.
As she sat down, Jessica opened the folder she'd brought with her. She decided to waste no time reviewing her notes. She wasn't concerned with anything else going on at this meeting—only that she was prepared when her time to speak came.
She read each of the bullet points carefully, then as she flipped the page to look at some additional notes she’d written on the back, she became aware that something changed.
Specifically, her nose became aware.
Jessica smelled a blend of pine and sandalwood and turned her head toward the source of the spicy, clean notes.
“You ready?” Bradley Thorpe gave her a slight elbow to the forearm as he sat down.
She tried to control her surprise at Bradley sitting next to her as she turned the paper full of typed and handwritten notes back and forth. “I hope so. I couldn’t sleep last night, so I started writing everything down in a brain dump.”
"That's good. Get it all out there and organized, then just review and remember." He smiled, and his teeth were as white and straight as the neat rows of twinkle lights she'd hung in the windows of Bretton's last week.
"It's kind of like preparing for a big presentation in college or studying for the final exam. I didn't think I'd be going back to that again. Even thinking about those memories makes me nervous."
Bradley laid his hand on Jessica’s thigh, just above the knee and gave a squeeze. His palm rested there warmly. Jessica’s gut instinct told her to twitch or adjust her position or something.
But then, something in the very back corner of her mind told her to stop, to just stay still.
She liked having the steady reassurance.
She liked having someone she trusted sitting next to her. Outside of Anita’s friendship and mentorship, she hadn’t experienced anything close to that since her mother died. Jessica knew no one could ever replace that kind of steady support—but for this moment, for right now—she wanted to remember how nice it used to be to have someone unconditionally in her corner.
Sure, Bradley’s support would come to an end once this meeting was over—kind of like Cinderella and her pumpkin at midnight—but in the absence of the mother she’d loved so dearly, Jessica decided she’d take any semblance of a fairy godmother.
Jessica took a deep breath to calm herself as the meeting got underway. The pine and sandalwood next to her tickled her throat, but the mellow spiciness definitely made all the what if? thoughts in her mind settle down.
During a brief break in the discussion between the council members, Bradley leaned over and whispered in her ear. “It’s almost your turn. When they tell you that you can’t do it, tell them you’re doing it anyway.”
Jessica turned her head slightly, trying not to attract attention. She didn’t understand—Bradley had made it very clear yesterday that giving her advice would be a conflict of interest. Why was he giving her advice now—and why this advice? If that wasn’t a tip that could get him in trouble at his job, she didn’t know what would qualify.
“I don’t understand,” she whispered back with a confused hiss.
“I know how to make this work.”
Now she began to get nervous. Not only did her notes not say anything close to what Bradley was telling her to do, no one had ever accused her of being confrontational. Much less in front of Port Provident’s mayor and all the major elected officials.
“I don’t,” she said simply, shaking the paper in her hand.
Bradley plucked the paper out of Jessica's hands. "Can you trust me?"
Her jaw softened. She flashed back to an almost imperceptible squeeze of the hand in a hospital room on Christmas Eve two years ago. In a voice she could barely hear over the machines, Linda Bretton left Jessica with a set of parting words that would stay with her through all the days to come.
“Trust me,” Linda had said. “The person beside you may not look like me. Their voice may not sound like mine. But when you need someone, God will send you the right person at the right time. And when they speak, that’s how you know I’ll be right there.”
Jessica looked upwards, wishing she could see all the way to Heaven instead of the ornate plaster of the ceiling in the council chambers.
A lump formed in her throat. She tried to swallow past it.
“Jessica?” Bradley tapped her leg. “They just called your name. It’s your turn. Don’t worry. Just be bold. I’m right behind you on this one.”
For the first time since that most difficult holiday season, Jessica felt a mantle of hope settle on her shoulders like the wrap of a Christmas tree skirt. She finally knew what her mother had been talking about.
Jessica walked deliberately to the podium, standing directly across from the mayor. She took a deep breath, remembering the tingle of breathing in Bradley’s cologne. Her mother had been there as she sat on the second row.
Thank you, God. The right person at the right time. She whispered the shortest prayer of thanksgiving, then reached forward and flipped the switch on the microphone.
She remembered the story of the star over Bethlehem so long ago and filled her mind with the visual. It was her time to shine brightly. She hoped she was up to the challenge.
*
“Hello, Mayor Ruiz. Hello, City Councilmembers. My name is Jessica Bretton, and I own Bretton’s on the Boardwalk on Harborview Drive.”
Bradley sat on the edge of the uncomfortable chair. He’d sat through hundreds of City Council meetings—maybe thousands—but never had he found himself gripping the underside of the chair and leaning forward like his life depended upon it.
But maybe this time it did.
His professional life lay in ruins, thanks to some consultants who didn’t know anything about him or his job.
His personal life wasn’t any better. At least Jessica hadn’t flinched when he patted her knee. He’d only meant for it to be a friendly gesture of reassurance, but he knew she could have viewed it as something negative.
Bradley heard Jessica take a steadying breath as she continued. “It is my understanding that the Council has canceled the Santas on the Street event this year.”
Every head on the dais nodded.
“We have,” said Carter. His voice fell without emotion on the microphone in front of him.
Bradley couldn’t get a read on Carter. Did he sound flat because of their earlier conversation? Was he just tired of talking about Santas on the Street? Or was he completely uninterested in what Jessica had to say?
“We’ve always had a tourist-focused economy. We depend on others to come visit the island and generate revenue. The winter months are always tough because people don’t organically come here to visit the beach. Business owners like me depend on the big, well-known events that the city has a hand in to help bring crowds. Santas on the Street has long been one of those events. I’ve come today with several other local business owners to ask you to reconsider.”
Jessica gestured toward Beth from Café Provident and a few other small-business owners sitting near her.
Bradley couldn’t quite tell what Jessica’s strategy was. The last time they’d discussed it, she accepted why Santas on the Street couldn’t go on. He thought she’d be fully focused on her Victorian Christmas idea.
Angela Ruiz leaned toward her mic. “We know a lot of people—tourists and locals alike—look forward to Santas on the Street every year. But Hurricane Hope has changed everything. We just can’t afford to staff an event like Santas, and we can’t risk the type of rowdy crowd it’s generally known for.”
Jessica looked down and shuffled her notes. “Would the city be able to hold a more family-friendly event?”
The mayor locked her eyes on Jessica. “What do you mean?”
Bradley saw Jessica’s head straighten up.
She shuffled her notes. “A century ago, Port Provident was known for a Victorian Christmas celebration that featured the play A Christmas Carol, and other traditional things like wassail and caroling and chestnuts roasting on an open fire. All the things we hear of in stories and songs—they were here in Port Provident. They were at the heart of a Christmas celebration for the entire community. And as it grew, people came from Houston and beyond. I think something like this would be the perfect event this year.”
Carter spoke again. “I don’t understand. We don’t have the staff to do something old or new.”
“I think you’ll find that it won’t be a burden on the city. I have a number of local businesses who are ready to do their part. We all need a spark this holiday season.”
Bradley had heard this tone of Carter’s before. Carter tended to make up his mind quickly and be unchangeable. It made him a formidable opponent on Council.
It also made him sort of a jerk sometimes.
Surprisingly, Bradley realized he was holding his breath, waiting to see if Jessica would back down. He wouldn’t blame her if she did. It was hard to have all those eyes staring down on you. Many, many times over the years, he’d been behind that same microphone where Jessica now stood.
“Ms. Bretton, I’m sorry, but I don’t know how we could do anything like what you’re describing. This Christmas season will have to be low-key this year. Next year, you’re welcome to come to our planning session in the summer and submit your idea. We’ll certainly consider it.”
Bradley began to stand up. He owned that meeting. Surely it wouldn’t be inappropriate for him to say something.
But just then, Jessica’s shoulders pushed back and leveled out. He saw her shift her weight on her feet and stand a little taller.
“Sitting around and waiting is not what Port Provident has ever been about. I won’t need to be at that meeting next summer because I will not have a business to represent then. Without intervention now, I will be closing my doors in the new year. Your Christmas may need to be low-key, Councilman, but Bretton’s on the Boardwalk has been in the business of holiday cheer for a century. I believe there’s more that can be done.”
With that, she turned and walked back to her seat.
Carter’s voice followed Jessica back down the aisle. “You’re welcome to do something individually at your own business, but Ms. Bretton, be aware that you will be responsible for everything—including security. The city cannot and will not be supporting this.”
“I understand,” she said as she took her seat. The edge to her whisper could have cut an ice cube in half.
She crossed her legs at the knee. Bradley wanted to reach out one more time. He wanted to give her a pat of reassurance.
But he stopped himself.
Jessica Bretton needed a solution. Not a crush from a guy who didn’t have much of a future in Port Provident. She needed to believe in something. He wasn’t that guy…not anymore.