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next door, and maybe he’d have one after work, seeing it was so convenient for him to do so. That was how easily it started. You had to be on your guard. As soon as somebody balled up a handkerchief, left it lying on the end table, there’d suddenly be a couple of pennies, a pen, a scrap of paper beside it.
    â€œRosie,” Bethany had told her sister, “you’ve got yourself and those kids to think of. Don’t let Ma go bullying you if you don’t want her living with you.”
    â€œI just think you ought to take a turn for a while,” Rose said. “Just give me a break from her, that’s all.”
    But that kind of thinking was the beginning of the end. It was the beginning of Ma and those dresses she couldn’t be botheredto wash, and that stinking little dog she’d adopted last year and doted on more than she ever did on Bethany. It was the beginning of forgetting where you drew the line. For by the time you were in a particular situation, that line got hard to see because there were people stepping all over it, waving their arms, hollering and crying and making demands. The thing was to keep yourself clear of those troubles. The thing was to understand your limits, to put your foot down with a boom. Bethany had known before she’d married Fred that he had his family’s taste for booze. But she also knew he had a kind heart and a yearning for better things, and she’d designed the house to feed those inclinations.
    After supper, Fred led everybody into the living room to play cards around the coffee table as Bethany put the leftovers away, did the dishes and wiped down the cupboards and washed the floor. By then it was nearly eleven, time to leave for Midnight Mass—if you didn’t get there early, you’d end up standing at the back. Bethany had taken the boys each year since they were old enough to sit up in a pew. Religion, like a spoonful of cod-liver oil, was an easy ounce of prevention, even though some might protest its bitter taste. She stuck her head in the living room. The Christmas tree cast a warm light over the crèche in the big bay window, and Bethany admired the faces of the shepherds, the wise men, the little drummer boy. Even the animals’ dull expressions were made human in the presence of the Baby Jesus. Mouths parted expectantly. Eyes solemn with hope. She’d draped the top of the crèche with red ribbon that matched the ribbons on the gifts beneath the tree, and these matched the tiny red bows she had glued to each of the golden ornaments. The angel she’d seated at the tree’s tippy top, a white bulb illuminating her dress, looked down upon everything with pleasure—except for the bottle of Wild Turkey, the men hunched over their cards. Pete and Robert John sat beside them; Gabriel dozed on the love seat, hismouth open on one of her nice throw pillows, his coat tugged carelessly over him.
    â€œPete, Robert John,” she said. “Time to get ready for church.”
    The men had cigars tucked in their shirt pockets; Bethany saw Pete had one too. And perhaps it was that cigar which made him decide to feel his oats a little. “Oh, Ma,” he said. “I’m too old for that sort of thing.”
    â€œMe too,” Robert John said.
    â€œThen I guess you’re too old for what Santa brought you,” Bethany said.
    Pete sighed theatrically; Robert John popped to his feet. In the fall, Fred had taken the boys out to look at snowmobiles, and they suspected, rightly, there was something waiting for them in the milk house under a tarp. But then Fred said, “Aw, Beth, don’t you think Pete’s old enough to make up his own mind?”
    And before Bethany could reply, Pete said, “Dad’s right. I’m not a kid anymore.”
    Dad . She’d been after the boys to call Fred that since they were married, but this was the first time either one had done so. Fred beamed, knuckled