Henry's Room

Henry had waited all afternoon for his aunt to take the children away. Now she had, but the hour was late and his mind remained on the clock as he hurried upstairs. Behind him, from down in the dining room, his grandmother called for him to bring down two more tablecloths from the linen closet. "Can you just wait a minute?" he grumbled. After a full day of scrubbing floors and washing windows, following one order after another, he just wanted to be clear of it all and to do the one last job that remained, and then to sit on his bed alone for a few minutes. The house would be full soon, and hot, and noisy, for the whole evening, and he wanted the peace of his room, if only for an hour or less. His grandmother called after him again, and he grumbled again, sure she had not heard him either time. He missed her annoyed reply as he closed the bedroom door behind him.

Making his way to the closet across the room he tripped over one of the children's toys. He grumbled again, this time about the constant use of his room as their play area anytime his aunt brought the children for a visit. Today they had arrived just before noon so the aunt could help prepare the house for the Christmas party. It was now nearly five o'clock. The party was to begin in barely ninety minutes. They had stayed all day, the aunt and her three boys, and now Henry waded through the mess the boys had made of his room. He inadvertently kicked several more toys, the sighs from his nostrils sounding more frustrated each time. He reached his closet door and when pulling it open he heard it smack yet another object on the floor in front of it. Something heavy this time. He looked down and saw a large plastic truck meant for a boy of maybe eight or perhaps younger. Without thinking he wound up his foot and with a swift kick launched the truck across the room. Pieces of it flew in several directions when the thing smashed into the wall. Henry found no joy in watching it fall broken to the bed. After staring at it with enraged eyes for a long moment, and with fists clenched tightly against his sides, he turned and looked down, at the high tide of toys, none of which belonged to him, that covered much of the floor of his room.

Near his feet lay a toy soldier in battle dress. He raised a foot and stomped the soldier once, with enough force to flatten it and send the head flying off into a corner. His other foot then came down on a house made of plastic building blocks. The sound of it crumbling was close enough to glass shattering that Henry paused for a moment to listen for anyone who might have heard it downstairs. Nothing. Satisfied, he began stomping all about the room, moving from corner to corner until the eruption spent itself.

Standing again just inside the door to the room, he moved back across it to the closet. From the high shelf he pulled down three boxes. With a sweep of one arm he cleared broken toy bits from the bed and set the boxes down in a perfect row. From the closet he took three rolls of wrapping paper, some tape, and three bows--one silver, one gold, one striped with Christmas red and green. On the high shelf of the closet was a plain shroud that Henry pulled down, revealing three toys behind it. One at a time he took them down and set one next to each of the boxes. For Maurice, his aunt's youngest boy, Henry had chosen a wooden airplane made for Henry by his grandfather, who had flown fighters during the war. It had been a gift Henry received on his eighth birthday, the year his parents died and he moved here to the house where his mother had grown up, to the room where she had slept all her life and where Henry spent the first few months of his.

For Charles, the middle boy, Henry had chosen a baseball glove Henry's hand had outgrown several years before. It was still in pristine condition. It, too, had been a gift, from a great-uncle who had once tried out for the major leagues but was never quite good enough for that level. Henry never had anyone to toss baseball with, so the glove had remained in the closet so long that Henry could not recall the last time he had used it.

For Sidney, the oldest of the three boys, Henry had chosen a book of bird and butterfly photographs, with some drawings made in it by Henry's great-grandmother. She had been a teacher of science and nature at the women's college, and her drawings won her several prizes around the state. When Henry was eleven he found it in the bottom of a storage chest. His grandmother had been sure the book had been thrown away, and since no one could lay claim to it anymore, the book has been given to Henry. When none of the birds in the backyard ever seemed to match the birds in the book, Henry tucked it away and forgot about it.

Henry took the lids off all three boxes. He measured out pieces of wrapping paper and laid each by the box it was meant to cover. The small bows were set on the paper, and then rearranged for the best color coordination. He picked up the tape and began to roll off small strips to cut for wrapping. He had just cut the first piece when his bedroom door was thrown open.

"Henry! I asked you for two tablecloths! We're waiting for them downstairs. What are you doing?"

From where he knelt on the floor next to the bed Henry looked up to see his grandmother standing in the doorway. Before he could answer her, she looked around at the toy carnage that covered the floor and cut off his reply.

"Henry, what on earth happened in here?"

"I just came up to-"

"All of these toys are broken! How did this happen?"

Henry looked around at everything he had done. His grandmother lightly kicked away a few pieces of toys closest to where she stood.

"Did the boys leave these like this?"

Henry stood up and assumed the same stance as his grandmother, and looked at her with utmost sincerity.

"Yes."

She put her hands on her hips and twisted her mouth sternly.

"I can't believe they left this mess for you to clean up."

"I know."

"Is that what you were doing?"

Henry looked at the bed and made a wholehearted gesture with his hands toward the gifts. His grandmother's shoulders dropped as the tension left her voice.

"Oh, dear! You're wrapping gifts for them, and look at the present they left for you!"

With a frustrated sigh Henry replied, "Yeah." He shrugged his shoulders, with a magnanimous expression on his face.

"You sweet boy! Don't you finish cleaning this. Do your wrapping. I'll fetch the tablecloths."

"But I can-"

"Those boys will be back in a bit. I'll make sure they take care of this."

Henry bit his bottom lip and looked around the room again. His grandmother came to him and put a hand on his shoulder.

"And that they apologize to you!"

"That's okay, Grandma. I can clean-"

She touched his chin and lifted his face so their eyes met.

"Those boys don't deserve what you're doing for them in here, I can say that for sure."

She hugged him. Henry did not return the embrace. She never noticed. She was looking over his shoulder at the gifts lined up on the bed. She pulled away from him.

"Are you giving away these, to your cousins?"

"Yeah."

"But why, Henry? You loved these! I remember when you got all of them. Why would you give these away?"

"I... I don't know. It's family stuff. It's all for kids. They're kids. I didn't know what to buy them. I don't know what little boys want."

"But you're a boy, Henry. You can think of-"

"I'm not a boy anymore, like them. I don't know what they want, what they play with."

His grandmother looked around at all the shattered items on the floor.

"Well, they like to play with... this."

Henry looked around the floor, too. He had nothing left to say.

"I'm sure they'll get plenty of presents from their mother and father, Henry. Keep your things. I want you to keep those things here in the house."

She hugged him again. He didn't hug her back. She did not notice this time, either. When she left the room she pulled the door closed behind her without looking back. Henry sat on the bed and enjoyed the peace of his room for the hour or less he had left until the house filled up for the rest of the evening.

Downstairs Henry slipped in and out among the throng of aunts and uncles and distant relatives he had not seen since the previous Christmas and would not see again until the next one. At various times he heard the names of his three younger cousins, called out by an annoyed grown-up. Drinks were spilled. "Maurice, look what you've done!" A wadded tissue was launched onto someone's dinner plat. "Charles, that's rude. Say you're sorry." On and on the evening went. When gifts were opened Henry disappeared into the kitchen with his package of new socks and his small stack of school notebooks. He heard the names of his three cousins called again. Then the voice of the uncle who was playing Santa Claus. "And these are from... Henry! There you are boys! Merry Christmas!"

"From Henry? Oh, what a sweet boy!" His grandmother's voice was rising above the murmurs in the other room. "I told him he didn't have to do this!"

He heard her call out for him, asking where he had gone. No one answered. He heard the boys tearing the paper from the boxes. "Open it! Open it!" he heard from his aunt, the boys' mother.

He didn't know which boy had gotten his box open first. He had put extra amounts of tape on all three, to keep the lids secured extra tightly. He heard the ripping of tape, finally, and then the crashing of broken toy pieces hitting the floor. Then the same sound repeated, and repeated again. The other room fell silent, and it seemed even quieter as he moved up the back stairs and headed toward his room.

"What are those?" a clueless grown-up asked. No answer came. After more silence, his grandmother's voice shouted "Henry! Henry where are you?"

On his bed, in the peace of his room, he lay with his head resting on an old baseball glove, like a pillow. An old wooden airplane was set next to him, and he was looking quite contentedly in a book, at drawings of butterflies.