...and we danced...

"Jesus, Joseph, and Mary," she muttered as she stood in front of the ticket agent on Christmas Eve morning. Meredith knew she was tempting the fates, but it couldn't be helped. Her youngest daughter didn't get home from her most recent gymnastics meet until late the night before, with an injury to boot.

"I'm sorry, ma'am. With this flight being delayed, there's no way you're going to be able to make your connection in Chicago," the ticket agent said, wildly tapping the keys on her computer."

"Are you absolutely sure? Can you put us on any other flight that will get us to Indianapolis?"

More tapping. "There was a direct flight to Indy, but they've just closed the doors. We can get you there on the 26th, though."

"See, that's the problem. We're supposed to get there today. We have things planned, people we have to see, and the whole point is getting to Indiana before Christmas," Meredith said, and she tried to be pleasant. She really did. It wasn't the ticket agent's fault that the flight crew had to start an hour later than scheduled to avoid going into overtime.

"You could always rent a car in Chicago and just drive to Indianapolis," the ticket agent said. "Keep all of your receipts, and the airline will reimburse you."

Meredith wanted to cry. By the time they got their bags, rented a car, and dealt with getting out of O'Hare, then faced Chicago holiday traffic...it wasn't fair. And now, her daughters were being awful to each other, and by renting a car, she would be committing to spending an extra three or four hours in a confined space with the two of them. "Is there an earlier flight to Chicago that we could get on?"

The ticket agent shook her head. Super. Terrific. Yay. Christmas was looking bleak. Meredith texted her sisters to give them the play by play. If she timed it right, she could get to Indianapolis in time to have a shower before dinner, and then head to church.

Seven hours later, she didn't get a shower and was pulling the rental car into a restaurant parking lot, and she understood why some animals eat their young. She would sit as far away from her offspring as possible.

When she saw her sisters, nieces, nephews, and brothers-in-law, all the headaches and hassle faded away. She buried her face in her siblings' hair during a group hug that couldn't come fast enough or last long enough, and her whole body trembled. Her sisters felt Meredith's angst and frustration and held her tighter. Everything was fine and would be fine.

Christmas morning arrived. No one bothered to wrap presents anymore, and it worked. Everyone knew what they were getting anyway. But then came lunch. Meredith and her sisters began toasting Meredith's single status with wine, vodka, bourbon, prosecco. And then they had to find someone in the family who hadn't been overserved to return them to her oldest sister's house for cocktails and dessert because, YAY! Single!

Their family was loud anyway. So loud. Their father's regular speaking voice was yelling. He yelled when he was angry. He yelled when he was happy. He yelled when he was just talking about sports, the economy, what he was going to eat for his next meal. This was good yelling. This was yelling that didn't end in snipes and barbs, and it was so much better than the quiet little jabs of her ex-husband, a Napoleonic-statured bastard who wielded whispers of hatred, anger, jealousy, and cruelty. Meredith would take her family of yellers over bitter whispering any day.

They gathered around the piano while her drunk oldest sister played a bunch of songs, and they sang in and out of key, questionable harmonies and all. They drank more. Then the elderly parents went home, and one of the brothers-in-law volunteered to drive them the hour each way.

All the children gathered around the dining room table to play a card game in an attempt to escape the drunk sisters and lone brother-in-law, and that guy deserved a medal for his mettle. Then the sisters started their own dance party in the kitchen, and the oldest nephew asked if they could contain the middle sister who moved around like she was part of an experimental dance and movement troupe. The oldest sister started a conga line that consisted of...well...of just her. And then there were the photos. It was time to commemorate this Christmas without their former brother-in-law, (Meredith's ex-husband--"that weasel," either sister number 1 or number 2 said, and someone else said, "The barbarous, little fucker."), and dance, and drink, and try to remain upright, and dance some more. And did someone request Bizarre Love Triangle? "Oh, my gosh! I freakin' love this song!" shouted one, two, maybe all three sisters.

The kids entered the room, and there was a moment, a fleeting glimpse of a moment, when the sisters thought their children would join the dance party, but it wasn't meant to be. The youngest niece said, "You know you guys are 51, 54, and 56, right?"

The 56-year-old said, "Nuh-uh. I'm 47," and danced herself into another room.

The kids left the party. But the music continued, and then the middle sister decided to take a short nap, and being kind sisters, they covered her with blankets and asked if she wanted to watch a movie, and the middle sister was out cold. Meredith and her oldest sister danced around the sleeping middle sister and took photos of her. Now and again, a middle finger made its way out from under the blankets. But the music continued, and the dancing, and the oldest sister's dogs were confounded by the humans.

And then sister number 2 awakened, rolling off the couch, springing up to a standing position with the poise of a...nah, there was no poise or grace. But they went back to the piano and sang songs and drank and laughed and fell all over each other. They tried to drink and dial their children, and only one of their calls had been answered. The oldest nephew said, "Can I talk to my dad?"

And then the brother-in-law reported back to the sisters: "The kids said to stop calling. They're going to ignore your calls."

The oldest sister yelled, because that's what they did when they were together, "We're going to text the shit out of them."

Meredith said, "Yeah," and like Glenn Close said in Fatal Attraction, "I won't be ignored." So much laughter, falling down, getting up, spinning in big and small circles, and singing and yelling and pressing buttons on phones.

And then they fell asleep. Like marionettes, whose strings had been dropped.

The next day, someone asked the oldest sister, "How was your Christmas?"

She responded, "Hilarious. It was like someone let all the animals out of their cages at the zoo." She thought for a moment, "My youngest sister's divorce was finalized a few months ago, and it was like we finally got her back again. And it was wild. The best Christmas in my adult recollection. But, yeah, it was nuts. I don't think our kids liked us much that day, but we had a blast."