Chapter 14

As Thanksgiving neared, so did their anniversary, and the extravaganza of lights and Christmas decor that Lanh loves to turn “their” house into. Thoughts of Miss Weberman were pushed to the back as Lanh began her plans to transform the Campbell’s farmhouse and her parents’ restaurant into winter wonderlands, starting with the Campbell’s house.

As luck would have it, there was a great snowfall just before Thanksgiving and a cold front to follow was predicted. Don and Lanh worked hard on the perfect snowman, a project that involved hot chocolate with peppermint schnapps on the sly, and a lot of snowballs. When not laughing, they made a top hat out of sheet metal and painted it flat black, then they drove to the Builders Supply in Bagley and found several lumps of actual coal for his eyes, mouth, and buttons. The snow was perfect for the project, that warmish, dampish snow that packs good and solid, a marvelous art medium that they rolled, packed, and carved for hours. Finally, the perfect sticks for arms and the biggest carrot Lanh could find were added and topped off with a red and green scarf, and they had the perfect snowman. The night before Thanksgiving was when the promised cold front rolled in, and their snowman was frozen solid. The freeze insured that this was a Christmas decoration that was going to last until April.

The outside lights had to be done before Thanksgiving Day because Lanh loved to turn on the outside lights just after sunset on Thanksgiving Day as a signal that the Holiday Season had started. The big white farmhouse was adorned with a huge wreath between the upstairs windows, and Don placed electric candles in every window. The huge wrap-around porch was decorated with those great, old, large incandescent lights. There’s something about them and their gentle and warm glow that the new, smaller Christmas lights didn’t have. The small lights were decorating the bushes lining the front, and the holly garlands on the handrails were filled with tiny white lights.

Don had finished up hanging the old string of lights and was on a stepladder on the porch replacing burned-out light bulbs on the string of Christmas lights and Lanh was holding the ladder for him when he asked, “We are getting married, right?”

“Well duh! What have we been talking about for the past three months?” Lanh loved Don with all her heart, but sometimes guys can be so dumb.

“We’ve been talking about being married, but we haven’t talked about getting married.”

“What do you mean?”

Don screwed in a new lightbulb which came to light then started climbing down the ladder, “We need to know the when, where, who, how of our nuptials.”

“You forgot why,” grinned Lanh as she put her arms around him.

“Why is easy, I want to become one with you, to walk with you forever, I want to make wild passionate love to you for the rest of my life, collect the full set of babies, and raise them all with you. I want to spend my golden years bouncing grandchildren on my knee and bouncing you on my bed.”

“Mmmm, I love it when you say babies,” purred Lanh.

“Babies.”

Lanh’s beautiful smile bathed Don in its radiance, and her nose crinkled as she grinned. They kissed long and dearly on the porch as the wind blew the light snow on them. When their lips parted, Lanh looked him deep in his eyes and said, “You are going to propose to me sometime, right?”

“Only if you agree to say yes,” he smiled. “I don’t like asking questions I don’t know the answer to.”

“Let’s discuss this in your office.”

The office was an old, attached bunk house, a large, rambling room with a fireplace on one side, and a toilet and shower in the far corner. It once housed up to eight field workers and is now being used as easy to get to storage, even though the house has a large attic and basement. Several windows overlooked the side field where a bare apple orchard patiently awaited spring. Near the fireplace, an ancient table and miss matched chairs were centered under a forlorn hanging bare bulb that served as the farm’s office. An even older couch sat in the corner, covered by a sheet where Don and Lanh found privacy. There, in the cool recesses of the “Office” they drew their plans between kisses.

On Thanksgiving morning, Don and Lanh curled up together on the wingback chair Don loves so much, morning milking was complete, and breakfast dishes were put away. Don and Lanh were in their skintight thermal underwear with a handmade quilt over their laps. Tam sat next to them in the matching wingback chair and the three were watching the parades. Lanh slept in the “niece/nephew” room last night with Tam and they stayed up till late in the evening talking about boys. As they watched the parades, Lanh had a huge mug of hot coffee with fresh cream, while Tam and Don were sipping a concoction of contradictions, Vietnamese coffee; hot and cloyingly sweet, yet outrageously bitter at the same time.

While the network cut away for a commercial break, Lanh and Tam were chatting a little bit in Vietnamese. Don didn’t mind it much, Vietnamese is practically musical to his western ear, and to Don, it brought forth the inner person of the speaker. Hearing Lanh speak in her parents’ native tongue made her cuter than she normally is, and Don loves it when Lanh is purposely making herself cute. Under the tree will be a package for Lanh holding a Sunshine Bunny! T-shirt in neon colors, and a matching Sunshine Bunny! Purse just because she looks so cute with that stuff that Americans consider being children’s clothing.

When she speaks, Tam sounds like a woman of mystery, like “The Dragon Lady” from the old 1930s movies, full of mystery and intrigue. Her looks reinforce Don’s “Dragon Lady” perception of her, but the odd part is that “Dragon Lady” is becoming Lanh’s nickname on the swim team. Like Lanh, Tam has beautiful eyes, but Tam’s eyes are narrower than Lanh’s, giving her a look of being sneaky. She also rarely smiles. When she does smile, her face lights up and it’s a joyful experience to see her smile, but normally her face has a deadpan, disinterested look, and often an expression that looks like anger. This doesn’t detract from Tam’s breathtaking beauty, but a smile sure would help, thought Don.

Before the parade came back on, Don asked Lanh, “Why did you call Tam your mom?”

“I didn’t call her that.”

“You did,” insisted Don. “You called her má, that’s the same thing that you call your mom.”

“I didn’t do that ... did I?” Lanh looked over at Tam, who sipped her Vietnamese coffee and nodded.

“All the time, since you were one.” Tam raised her coffee cup in salute to Don. “You’re learning!”

“I guess so,” said Lanh, a look of embarrassment on her face. “Tam raised me. Bao and Kim-ly were such brats that má couldn’t keep up with them, so Tam raised me which freed up má to smack Bao and Kim-ly around.”

“She was too kindhearted to them,” said Tam as she sipped her coffee.

“So, who is going to be the mother of the bride?” asked Don as quietly as possible.

“I’m going to ask Tam to be my maid of honor,” Lanh whispered in Don’s ear.

Tam watched a parade float travel along a street she would never walk on, in a city she had no desire to visit, but the giant balloons were always interesting. She always hoped for a windy Thanksgiving morning, so the balloon tenders must work for their few minutes of notoriety on national TV. She also has incredible hearing, and she realized she needed to talk to má, ba, and Ralph as soon as possible.

Thanksgiving dinner was held at the Pho restaurant on a day when a cold front known as an Alberta Clipper blasted into Minnesota from the prairies of Canada and North Dakota. The curtains were drawn, and the sign said Closed for Family Gathering. It was so cold that the windows were frosting over on the inside. There were fourteen people in attendance, the entire Nguyen family, the Campbells including Sandy Robertson, and special guests, a beautiful young Korean girl named Ahnjong Park from Huy’s law office who accompanied Huy, and Trung who was teaching at the University of North Dakota brought his blond, blue-eyed teaching assistant Angela Sabbe.

As the women bustled around the kitchen, alternately preparing dinner, and pumping Angela and Ahnjong for information, the guys sat out at the Sushi bar and drank beer (hey! it’s a bar) and watched their Vikings play against Green Bay. Don and Lanh, being the youngest, arranged the square four-setting tables into a single long table, then added chairs, and set the table. After that, they relaxed in a secluded booth and began whispering more wedding plans, but they were interrupted by a knock at the door. “We’re closed!” called Lanh.

“Please,” called a voice, “our car won’t start, and we need some food.”

Don and Lanh looked at each other and opened the door. Peering at them was a young couple with an infant and a toddler bundled tightly against the cold. “Oh, thank God,” said the man. “We stopped and spent the night because of the storm, and now everything is closed, and the car won’t start.”

Don and Lanh looked at each other, then they opened the door and Lanh said, “We’re closed, so we can’t sell you any food, but since you said the magic words, you can join us for dinner.”

“Magic words?” said the man, a bit confused.

“You said thank God on Thanksgiving Day,” his wife whispered in his ear. Overjoyed with the offer, they shook Lanh and Don’s hands vigorously as they began shucking their coats. Lanh held the baby while they disrobed and somehow ended up keeping it.

Hearing the bells ring when the door opened, Duong came to see who arrived, and Lanh informed him in Vietnamese that they were stranded travelers. “Come on in, this is Minnesota, we don’t let travelers freeze or starve, come in!” smiled Duong.