A Nick & Carter Holiday #9
Sunday, May 5, 1963
It's a chilly Sunday morning and Nick and Carter have been invited by their cook, Doris, to join her family down in Mountain View for a big party celebrating a holiday they've never heard of: Cinco de Mayo.
When they arrive, they find a delicious meal awaits them. The main dish is cabrito, which is roasted goat, something Carter developed a real taste for when they lived in the Congo. Fortunately for Nick, there's also a roasted pig which he has with big scoops of that green goop he loves so much that has the name he can't pronounce.
In the end, the day turns out to be one that reminds them both of an unspoken truth: family isn't necessarily the one you're born into as much as it is the one you choose.
Welcome to a year of holidays with Nick Williams and Carter Jones!
This is the ninth in a series of short stories all centered around specific holidays.
Each story is a vignette that stands on its own and takes place from the 1920s to 2008.
Another delightfully fun look into the loves of Nick Williams and Carter Jones. With this holiday short, we see the couple spend a wonderful moment in time honoring a holiday they are unfamiliar with. Seems odd that these two could be unfamiliar with anything as worldly as they are but it's a perfect example of the realism the author puts into these shorts. Let's face it, we all have things that we don't fully understand, appreciate, or know at all(though too many refuse to admit that😉) and that's how life should be, always finding something new to discover.
In Cinco de Mayo, 1963 we see Nick and Carter being their loving selves but we also see friendships and the mens' interactions with said friends. Sometimes how characters are with friends can be even more entertaining and telling, especially established couples in holiday/seasonal shorts. It's these telling glimpses into Nick and Carter's journey that make this such an enjoyable and entertaining series.
1198 Sacramento Street
San Francisco, Cal.
Sunday, May 5, 1963
Just past dawn I opened my eyes. Carter's wide back was facing me. It was moving up and down as he breathed in and breathed out, making that slight snoring sound he always did when he was asleep.
I rolled over and jumped out of bed. We really needed to invest in pajamas, but we never had, so we both slept in our birthday suits. And we usually kept the windows open with a roaring fire in the hearth across the sitting area from my grandfather's big bed. Carter usually got up once in the night to add logs and kindling and to stoke the embers to keep things nice and hot.
Sleeping with the windows open was definitely my preference, provided the fire in the fireplace was keeping the room warm. Carter, however, had slept soundly through the night. The hearth looked as cold as I felt.
I hoofed my way into the bathroom and did my business. As I stood on the cold marble floor, I grinned to myself as I thought about the night before.
We'd started off by going out to dinner at Ernie's over on Montgomery Street. Actually, that wasn't true. We'd started off over at my father's apartment across Huntington Park for drinks and appetizers.
Carter's mother, Louise, and his stepfather, Ed, had just arrived back in town after spending several months in New York City while Louise was being treated for cancer. She was doing better and looked really good but tired easily. After way too much time in hospital gowns and eating hospital food, she wanted to put on the dog and make a show of getting dressed and having a nice dinner out. Carter had driven over to their house in Sea Cliff and had brought the two of them over once they were ready.
When they arrived, Louise had looked resplendent in a coral dress that was just the right length for the season. The color really lit up her face and accented the blonde and red in the wig she was wearing that matched her natural hair more than I would have thought possible.
My stepmother, Lettie, had organized a cocktail party where the guests were asked to drop in on a staggered basis and not stay too long. And all sorts of folks did. They were mostly friends Louise had made since moving to San Francisco from Albany, Georgia, back in '54.
Even a few politicos dropped by, including our Republican Mayor, George Christopher, and his lovely wife, Tula, who was one of those people I always wished I could get to know better. I'd never liked the mayor (the feeling was mutual), but I'd always thought his wife was funny and charming.
George Moscone, a lawyer who was the Vice-Chairman of the citywide Democratic Party, showed up with his wife, Gina. He and my father had a nice long chat about St. Ignatius, the high school Moscone and I had both attended (but not at the same time—he was a few years younger than me) and then Lettie made him promise to run for the Board of Supervisors in November. He assured her he would. As usual, he was a little flirtatious with Carter and me, but nothing beyond an overly long handshake and a friendly wink.
Louise, who would forever be a liberal Republican since she despised the conservative Democrats she grew up with in Georgia, was a big fan of the mayor and cool towards Moscone who, being a natural politician, had turned up the charm. By the time he and his wife left, Louise was talking about maybe voting for him in November.
After everyone cleared out, Lettie, my father, Ed, and Louise had sat down to a dinner catered in by the chef at the Mark Hopkins. Carter and I said our goodbyes since we knew the four of them wanted to spend time alone. Louise and Ed were coming over to our house on Tuesday night to eat by the pool we'd built and that they hadn't seen since it had been completed a few months earlier.
On our way to dinner at Ernie's, Carter and I had talked about how Moscone was definitely going to go far. It was easy to imagine him becoming mayor someday. We'd first met him that famous night in '61 at the Fairmont when Tony Bennett had first sung I Left My Heart in San Francisco. That had been a magical performance and a night I knew I would never forget. Moscone had table-hopped before Bennett started singing and had made sure to come over to our table and introduce himself. Even then, we'd all noticed how much of a flirt he was. Carter had later said, "It was all politics," and I had to agree.
We had dinner alone at Ernie's in the back. I liked the food and, for the most part, the crowd (Mayor Christopher, without Tula, was there, as well, dining with cronies). But I really didn't like the bright red flocked wallpaper. It was too bright in the movie Vertigo and it was too bright in real life. But Carter claimed they knew how to cook a steak for him (beyond well done) better than any other restaurant in town, including the ones we owned at the Mark Hopkins. And my filet of Dover sole had, more or less, melted in my mouth. So, all in all, it had been a good evening.
I flushed the toilet and then walked over to wash my hands. Looking in the mirror, I thought about the fun Carter and I had once we got home. He had pulled out the wooden box that we kept under the bed. That was something I'd indirectly inherited from my Great Uncle Paul Williams.
The box had all sorts of fun things to play with but there were a couple of things that Carter particularly enjoyed using. One was a set of iron police manacles that had to date back to well before the turn of the century. The other was... well... as I looked in the mirror, I could see myself actually blush at the thought of the thing and what Carter liked to do with it.
"Whatcha doin'?" asked Carter all of a sudden.
I nearly jumped out of my skin. "Shit, fireman, where'd you come from?"
He stood behind me and nibbled on my ear as he looked at me in the mirror. "You're blushing, Nick. Are you thinking about last night?" He wrapped his arm around me and found confirmation that he was right. "What do we have here?"
"Look, Chief..." I tried to use a tone of voice that meant business, but he just laughed in my ear.
"How about a second round of fun?" He was pressing into my back in a way that let me know he was raring to go.
Who was I to say no to such a thoughtful offer? I just smiled at him in the mirror and then let him lead me back into the bedroom.
Welcome to a year of holidays with Nick Williams and Carter Jones!
This is a series of short stories with each centered around a specific holiday.
From New Year's Day to Boxing Day, each story stands on its own and might occur in any year from the early 1920s to the first decade of the 21st Century.
Saturday Series Spotlights
Author Bio:
Frank W. Butterfield is the Amazon best-selling author of 89 (and counting) self-published novels, novellas, and short stories. Born and raised in Lubbock, Texas, he has traveled all over the US and Canada and now makes his home in Daytona Beach, Florida. His first attempt at writing at the age of nine with a ball-point pen and a notepad was a failure. Forty years later, he tried again and hasn't stopped since.
Cinco de Mayo, 1963 #9
No comments:
Post a Comment