Blue Christmas

Chapter 1

Yes, this is a Christmas story. Coming from the Grinch herself. It started as a random idea I had after reading the recent Loretta Christmas article and at first I though I'd just do a one chapter thing. But it kept on  growing and growing and a really long piece is a pain to proofread so I though I'd break it up into a few chunks to make that part easier on myself. It'll only be a couple of chapters though and I'm looking to finish it before Christmas. Updates on my other stories will obviously be slower during this time, but I couldn't help it with this one. I have no idea when Loretta's stuck in Texas incident really took place, but for the sake of this story, it's 1971 because it just works and they were both just gorgeous and at their peak vocally around  1971. I know the cover isn't what either looked like in 1971 but that's the best I could do.

Loretta hadn't wanted to go this time. That wasn't too unusual in itself. What mother in her right mind wanted to leave her little twins for weeks at the time, whether they were with their father or not. But she especially hadn't wanted to leave so close to Christmas. Nothing could be done about it though, not when shows were already sold out and venues might as well sue the ballgown off her if she canceled without a good reason.

So she didn't get to attend any of the Christmas parties the twins had in school, nor bake cookies with them, nor bask in their youthful excitement over the holidays.

No one saw it coming, including Loretta herself, although she'd had this sinking feeling that something would go very wrong for weeks. But this, being stuck in the middle of nowhere on Christmas Eve with no prospects of her making it back to Hurricane Mills by the morning, was the very last thing she considered.

She thought that they were going to go around the closed highways. That was what her driver, Jim Webb, had said. But apparently the highways weren't the only streets that were closed.

Texas is safe even in the winter time, Doolittle told her so many times. You ain't gonna get stuck in Texas. There's just no way.

No way indeed. Maybe he had been tempting fate with his words but either way, she was stuck.

Loretta retreated to the back of the bus as tears began to pour down her cheeks. She was supposed to be home tonight, so she could rock the babies in that chair in the front room though they were getting too big for it. She was supposed to read Twas The Night Before Christmas with them, maybe with the grandchildren too if Betty Sue and Jack Benny brought them over.

She heard quiet talk about checking into a hotel up front. The desire to kick and scream and shout at the top of her lungs overcame Loretta.

Wallowing in self-pity never did anyone any good but that was exactly what Loretta did. She did manage to stop crying long enough to check into a hotel, where they were told the King Suite was taken -she didn't want it anyhow. Loretta resumed her sobbing as soon as she was safely within her hotel room.

The guys asked if she was alright, if she needed anything from food to company but she told them to make the best of out it for themselves. She wasn't the only one with a family but God knew that none of their children had to wake up without a mother there on Christmas morning.

The tears kept on falling, the sobs racking her body making it hard to breathe after a while. There was no shutting out the images flashing through her mind like a newsreel, the way your life was supposed to flash when you were about to die.

In the end, she picked herself up and did what she knew she had to do- she picked up the phone and dialed their so-called unlisted number.

"Lo?" Doolittle's voice sounded on the other end, and Loretta almost burst into tears again.

A strangled sob escaped before she managed to speak. "Doo? It's me. I'm... honey, I'm not gonna make it back home for Christmas."

And then the tears fell again, though she was so certain that they had spent themselves, that there was no way that she even had any tears left.