Read The Last Noel for Free Online

was a hard worker.”
    â€œI don’t say him no. He worked long as somebody told him what to do and handed him money to do it. Minute that job quit, he quit too.”
    Kaye stepped into the other room and watched the great hewn coal-black slabs of Tat's hands as they floated, folded, atop his rising belly. “He’d look silly sewing. He's too big.” Examining himself in the mirror over the blue threadbare velvet couch, the boy stretched up his shoulders, arched his feet, and then went back into the kitchen. “Was my real grandpa, was Grandpa King big or little?”
    â€œBig.” Amma closed her oven door, took Kaye's hands in her own, and held them up to his face. His hands were like hers, a light cinnamon brown with broad palms and long slender fingers. “Kaye, you stop all this worrying about being tall. Look at these hands of yours. You got big hands. Big feet too. You gonna be big as Tat there, big as Bill King. I married two big men.
    â€œBut I tell you one thing, son, the biggest man I ever knew in my life was my daddy and he was the runt of his litter. My daddy Grover Clay was no bigger than you are now the day he died.”
    This was news to Kaye, and the first positive thought he’d had about the forced move to Moors: that there were useful discoveries to be made here. “What was your daddy like?” He sat down, hoping for a story.
    But Amma looked at her kitchen clock, handed Kaye the wrapped gift, and motioned him to the door. “Like your mama,” she said, chagrin and pride in her voice. “He was like your mama. Just ’cause he couldn’t win didn’t mean he wouldn’t fight. Get on over there.” She plugged back in her radio, found her station, and began to hum along with the choir, “Jesus, Oh What a Wonderful Child!”
    As Kaye left Clayhome, he put two of the bumper stickers he’d brought from Philadelphia into his pocket: STOP THE WAR and IMPEACH NIXON. (Even though Nixon wouldn’t even be inaugurated until January, his mother had already wanted to impeach him.) He’d give the stickers to Noni as a way of demonstrating that he was, as always, far ahead of her.

    Despite the season, the day was warm and sunny, with a mild breeze that swayed the Victorian kissing balls hanging on red ribbons from the porch cornice of Heaven's Hill. The wide white door opened just as Kaye reached it and Noni stepped out to welcome him. He could see her whole face lighting up as if bright candles were shining through it. He also saw that she was still taller than he was. Standing as straight as he could, he took solace in his grandmother's prediction about his large feet and hands. “Merry Christmas,” he said, frowning. “My grandmama sent me over here.”
    â€œMerry Christmas.” Noni's smile faltered in response to his scowl. “Happy Birthday.”
    â€œYeah, you too.” He looked at her, then looked at the porch roof, then sighed, making a loud noise through his lips. “Listen, I’m sorry about what happened to Gordon.”
    Noni nodded slowly, swallowing the abrupt tears that always came whenever anyone was kind to her about her brother's death.
    Kaye frowned. “Gordon was okay.”
    â€œHe liked you a lot.”
    â€œI liked him too. So, I guess you heard…” Kaye made a face, pointed at Clayhome.
    All of a sudden Noni wasn’t sure if she should mention Kaye's mother's hospitalization. His loss was oddly more complicated, more private, than hers. Anxiety heated herhands and face as she fought to find the right words. “Aunt Ma told me you were going to stay down in Moors and go to school here and you probably wish you weren’t but maybe it won’t be so bad.”
    He shrugged. “Yeah, it will.”
    She felt for a moment defeated by his certainty. Then affection rushed through her. “Kaye, I’m so sorry about what happened to your