In Absentia

"I came to tell you there's a gentleman out front to see you, Mr. H.," Linda said, suddenly remembering her mission. "He says something about a Phil Shelton having had something made here and that it's on layaway, but he doesn't know what it is. I thought you might know what he's talking about."

"In a minute, in a minute," Mr. Hudson said, and then he paused and looked up. "Did you say Phil Shelton? The builder? The man who died at Christmas?"

"That must be the man," Linda said. "This gentleman said the man had died at Christmas." She then went on to tell Hudson about what the gentleman out in the store was looking for.

The curtains to the back swept aside and Mr. Hudson entered the room, his eyes alert and focusing on Chet, who was rocking back and forth on his feet, appearing to be about ready to retreat from the store. Neither Hudson nor Chet seemed to make a connection with the nasty fall Hudson had caused Chet to take out on the snowy curb.

"You were a friend of Phil Shelton's, the builder who died a couple of days ago?" Mr. Hudson asked as he approached Chet.

"Yes, a colleague, actually," Chet answered. "I was the architect for the firm. And I've been helping with the necessary arrangements after his death."

"Sorry to hear about his death," Mr. Hudson said. "A good man, Phil Shelton. When we had the hurricane go through here three years ago, he sent over those sheets of plywood to cover our windows. He did that for all of the shops on this block. And he supplied scrap wood for free from my grandchildren to build a tree house. And when the Nelson's house got wiped out by that fire, he was right there, building them a new on at cost."

"Yes, a real saint," Chet murmured. This wasn't the time or place to note that Danny, not Phil, had been responsible for providing that material. It had been mostly show with Phil, something he was willing to go along with as long as Danny did all of the work and Phil got all of the credit. He wasn't able to look beyond his dick.

"And you he may have had a Christmas gift for his fiancée, Denise?"

"Danny. Short for Danielle," Chet responded. "And with a 'Y.' Danny says she knows Phil had planned something for her. It isn't the gift so much, although he'd told her it was something special. It's mostly that she doesn't want to find it someday down the road and reopen the wounds of his loss. She gave me a list of the stores where she thought he did most of his shopping. I've already been to every one listed down here on Whitmore Avenue. If he didn't order anything in here, there's just one left to check out at Merrick's Mall and then I'll have to go back and tell Danny I couldn't solve the mystery."

"And you've been in other shops on this street and asked them this question?" Hudson asked.

"Yes, I'm sorry. It's sort of embarrassing--going in and asking to check with so little information to go on. But Phil was a good friend to me, and I just want to do what I can for Danny. She's just been so depressed, and this has been eating away at her. I think it will help if I can just tell her that I checked and there's no present coming."

"Well, the order book is over here on the counter," Hudson said. "We'll just check to see if—"

"I checked through the book while you were talking, Mr. H.," Linda said quietly. "I couldn't find—"

"We'll just take another good look," Hudson overrode her. "Hmm. I'm not sure. Maybe yes, maybe no. Ah, yes, I see. Maybe," Hudson said, his nose buried in the order book. "Just a minute. You stay right there. There's an order form here that suggests there might be something in the back room."

"Ah, yes, I found it," Hudson said after having been gone what seemed like an eternity. "The young lady was right. Phil Shelton did order her gift from here. If I'd been the one who took the order, I'm sure I would have remembered it. He always came here for his special gifts. His firm has been very good to the community. He was a good man. Uh, I guess I said that before."

Chet's eyes got big when he saw what Hudson had brought out. It was perfect.

"Yes, a really good man and always a great customer, that Phil Shelton," Hudson said gruffly. "Most customers don't put more than 10 percent down when they order something special like this. But this order form says he paid the full amount when he ordered it. Don't find as good a customer as that anymore. I think his fiancée will like that. He ordered the design especially for her, you know. See that little engraving there on the back? Aren't those their names, Phil and Danny?"

Linda had remained completely speechless from the moment Hudson had reappeared with the pill box. When the delighted Chet had left with the gift in one of the best boxes and with the fanciest wrapping the other shop attendant, Christina, could find, Linda finally managed to stammer a questioning, "Mr. H—?"

But Hudson cut her off. "Well, I said I knew I'd find a use for that other pill box, didn't I? Don't fuss. Get back to work, both of you. There are customers to serve."

Linda's eyes rotated around the room and then I stared out onto the snowy street. There wasn't a customer in sight. "Mr. H.," she said a bit more loudly than necessary. "You said you were making the gold filigree pill box for an unknown occasion. That I understand, and you did a wonderful thing here today—and to be honest I don't understand that too well. But you didn't give the man the filigree pill box. You gave him the diamond pavé pill box you made for Ruth. And it was engraved with those names."

"I know, I don't understand that myself. Not the engraving part, of course. I pride myself in my quick engraving work. But I don't know why I gave him the fancy pill box, either. It's just that I got back there and saw those pill boxes together and thought of what I would want to do for a fiancée who had unexpectedly lost her man at Christmas, and then I just couldn't give the second-best pill. What I said was the truth. Phil Shelton's firm has always been a good to me and the other shop owners here. So, call it a whim. But now I'm in a bind. I just don't know what I'm going to tell Ruth. You won't tell her she's getting second best, will you?"

"No, you will, Mr. H.," Linda answered, knowing from Ruth that Hudson was normally as much the skinflint grouch at home as here and also thinking of what Ruth had told her about what she'd like to receive as a gift. "Christina and I will close up tonight. You go on home. Stop at the florists and get Ruth some flowers, take her out to a nice dinner, give her that gold filigree pill box, and tell her what happened here today with the Phil Shelton's friend. And I mean tell her everything. Trust me, it will be the anniversary present she always wanted from you. I think you've just been slapped with a large dose of the Christmas spirit."

* * *

Late that night, in the big king-sized bed in Chet's house, he and Danny were making languid love. Danny was laying spread-eagled on his belly on the bed, and Chet was stretched out on top of him, legs closely encasing legs, arms extended along arms, the older man holding the younger's wrists, Danny's hips rising and falling in slow rhythm in harmony with the undulation of Chet's pelvis as he fucked slowly down into his new lover, opening and stretching and mining deep.

Both men were sighing in contentment as they fucked, Chet pleased with a day's work well done and a start of a new relationship, Danny melting at the proof of Phil's love for him, the gem-studded pill box sitting on the night stand within his intense gaze and reflecting the light of the night lamp off its diamond facets, as well as his building love for the man who had found the gift for him, the man who was his new, considerate, deep-plowing daddy.