Ten

I hesitate with the tenth tablespoon of butter, unsure whether I should add more or not. I have tried varying amounts of butter so far to no avail, and it is not as if my grandfather ever wrote the recipe down anywhere. After giving myself a few moments to think, I decide against adding more than ten.

When I was a kid, my grandfather would use a fork to beat the butter in the bowl, then hand it to me to let me "finish up." The sound of the hand mixer's beaters clinking against the metal bowl sounds nothing like the muscled scrapes of my grandfather's fork technique. The butter should be smooth and creamy, like my grandfather's singing of Christmas songs wafting from the kitchen, along with the heady scent of cinnamon and the deep earthy essence of baking.

Next are the brown sugar and molasses. The soul-warming aroma of the combination reminds me of how my grandfather made his oatmeal every morning. He always told me that oatmeal was healthy, then would wink at me as he mixed five tablespoons of brown sugar and molasses into the pot before heating it over the stove.

After creaming the dough’s mixture once more, next comes one large egg. My grandfather used to raise chickens. He had built the chicken coop himself and once cut his hand on the chicken wire when he was putting it up. My favorite chicken had been one that I would watch grow up. My grandfather had called him "One-toe" on account of having lost some toes as a chick. At the time, I had not understood the name and spelled it "Wunto."

A teaspoon of vanilla is next. While my grandfather and I had been making his recipe one Christmas, I had forgotten the difference between a tablespoon and a teaspoon—not that it had made the recipe taste much different. However, my grandfather continuously teased me about it afterward. Up until the end, even though the rest of his memories faded, he always remembered that. Even when he forgot my name, a smile would light up his face when I entered the room, and he would cry out, "Vanilla!"

I have learned more about baking since I was a child. My grandfather would just throw everything into the same bowl with no regard for keeping wet and dry ingredients separate. I am a little different in where I do not combine the wet and dry until after each has been mixed, respectively. My memory of which spices my grandfather used is hazy, however. He had a jar on the kitchen counter full of a spice mix he had made decades ago. Since it only got used around Thanksgiving and Christmas, the tall jar had never been emptied. I am convinced that my grandfather did not even remember what spices were in it. We just called the mix "Thanksgiving Spices."

Despite the online research I do, I have not matched the Thanksgiving Spices' unmistakable smell or taste. I do my best with online recipes, but it never tastes the exact same. However,I take my best shot at the spices—salt, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, clove, nutmeg, pepper—then combine the wet and dry ingredients in one large metal bowl.

This is my first Christmas without him. I have spent all week trying different recipes to get it right. I have the week off and no more family, so I might as well. The storekeeper knows me by name now because of my frequent trips this week. It is nice, I guess, to finally spend Christmas at home. Is it worth it, though? Is it worth trading the companionship of my ailing grandfather for the comfort of being at home for the holidays? It does not feel like it is, but I did not really get a choice.

Most recipes online say that it is mandatory to chill the dough, but I do not recall my grandfather doing that. We made the cookies all in one day and, while they were not ever like the kind you could buy in the store, they warmed my stomach and my heart. I disregard chilling the dough and jump straight into rolling it out onto the floured counter. When I made the hard choice to move my grandfather to a nursing home, he told me I could keep whatever I wanted from the house. I had not saved much—his house was cluttered from floor to ceiling with miscellaneous knick-knacks the man had never gotten around to refurbishing. However, I had kept all his baking supplies. One of my apartment kitchen cupboards stored a translucent plastic bowl full of old metal cookie cutters.

I retrieved the gingerbread man cutter and the "gingerbread boy" cutter that my grandfather had made himself. I remember having been peering over the sheet of gingerbread men, eyes wide and sad, and my grandfather had asked me what was wrong. I complained to him that the gingerbread men seemed lonely—sure, they had each other, but what else did they have to their lives? They had those large, empty gingerbread houses all to themselves and no family. Although my grandfather rolled his eyes, he did it with a loving smirk, then glanced around the kitchen shiftily before inviting me to his "secret place."

That had been the first time I had ever been in his work shed. My grandfather understandably never let me in there—it was full of sharp metal and tools that could have gotten me hurt. For him to trust me enough to let me in there and watch him made a smaller-sized gingerbread man cookie cutter meant the world to me. I still do not know what exactly it meant to him, but I always think back on that moment fondly and with a smile.

Each gingerbread man gets a gingerbread boy, which makes ten pairs of families. Ever since my grandfather made the cookie-cutter, I have always positioned the man and boy, so their hands were touching. My grandfather once complained he would have to pull them apart to separate them after they baked. I looked up at him with all the love in my heart and told him that he should not—the gingerbread men loved their gingerbread boys. To break them apart would be to break their family apart. He smiled at that, eyes wrinkling and corners of his mouth disappearing under his white beard.

Once the sheets of cookies are in the oven, I set a ten-minute timer before I finally allow myself to sit down. While sitting there, my eyes unfocused as my gaze lazily floats upward toward the ceiling. The small foamy bumps above remind me of the popcorn my grandfather would make every Christmas Eve. Once he moved into the nursing home, he had not been able to, so I brought some with me every year. He gave me such a quizzical look when I presented him with the popcorn. His speech had degraded so much by then that he only shook his head before returning to stare out the third-floor window.

The nursing staff had given me a call the week prior, telling me that they were not sure he would make it through the holidays, so I visited every day for ten hours a day. That evening, given how important that day and the following were, I stayed the night. Although my grandfather never moved from his wheelchair positioned by the window, I opted to sleep in one of the guest chairs, leaving his bed empty for if he wanted it.

I do not know when he passed. The RN had said sometime around ten at night. Just a few hours prior, I had moved my chair next to his, kissed his forehead, and whispered to him, "Merry Christmas." I had fallen asleep next to him, holding his frail hand that used to be so much stronger in my now much-larger hand. Never once did he take his eyes away from the window. However, I feel like I remember him saying something. I am not sure if I dreamt it, or if he really did whisper it in that cracked voice of his, but I feel like I remember him mumbling "Vanilla" to me, then squeezing my hand.

And before I know it, ten minutes is up. The timer brings me forward in time, where I sit not in a plastic nursing home chair next to my grandfather but in the white wooden chair in my apartment. I retrieve the pans from the oven, careful not to drop any of the gingerbread families. And once they are cool, I gently pick a pair up with both hands so that I do not break them apart. I take a deep breath before I bite into the cookies, preparing myself to be disappointed at having gotten the recipe wrong again.

But instead of disappointment flooding through my senses, memories do. And suddenly, I am back in my grandfather's old kitchen, kneeling on the wooden stool that he made himself, leaning over the counter to watch him spoon the butter into the bowl. The old man pauses, twinkling eyes catching mine, and he smiles at me. Then, right before he closes the tub of butter he's so fond of using, he puts the tenth spoonful of butter into the bowl.