Oh, Ho! The mistletoe hung where you can see; somebody waits for you -- kiss her once for me! - Johnny Marks
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I miss Danny the most at Christmas time. Every year, he went all-out with the decorations. Danny was far better at holidays than I ever was. After Mom left us, Dad never really ever got into the 'holiday spirit' again. We'd exchange gifts, of course, but it was never the same.
There was one Christmas staple that Danny refused to use: mistletoe. I remember our first Christmas together; we went to Vermont for Christmas and I bought a sprig of fresh mistletoe, intending to hang it over the doorway, but instead I received a lecture.
"You are not bringing that into the house." Danny said, splitting firewood.
"Why not?" I asked, holding the mistletoe over his head, "Don't you want to kiss me?"
Danny gave me what Francie and I would later dub 'the doctor look' and went back to splitting logs. I went back into the cabin to unpack. I placed the mistletoe on the kitchen counter.
An hour later, Danny had the fire going in the fireplace and proclaimed that he was going into the kitchen to make me a home-cooked dinner. Thirty seconds after he walked into the kitchen, I heard
"Syd! What is this?"
I slowly walked to the kitchen, afraid that Danny may have found a dead rat or something equally gross. Being a spy is one thing, killing rats is another. Ick. I stood in the doorway of the kitchen and saw the mistletoe in Danny's hand.
"Well honey, it looks like mistletoe to me." I said, leaning against the doorway.
"You can't just leave this shit laying around, Syd. Especially in the kitchen." He walked over to the trashcan and threw the mistletoe in it. Danny proceeded to scrub down the counter.
He later explained why he had freaked out over the mistletoe. When he was five, one of his cousins had fed him mistletoe and juniper berries while they were playing house. Danny ended up in the emergency room, only two hours later. The doctors had to pump his stomach. He was in the hospital for three days. I never knew mistletoe was poisonous.
This was one of the many reasons why he wanted to be a doctor. He would have made a great doctor.
On our last Christmas together, Danny surprised me with a small green box.
"What is it?" I asked, shaking the box.
"Open it." He said, with that familiar ornery glint in his eyes.
I carefully opened the box, finding a sprig of plastic mistletoe with a red ribbon tied at the end.
"It's safer than the real stuff." Danny explained, taking the sprig gently from my hand. "Unless, of course, you eat it. But I'm sure you're smarter than that." He said with a slight wink.
I watched his hand as he raised the mistletoe over our heads. He leaned in and kissed me gently, but passionately. That year was one of the best Christmases I had in a long time.
I miss Danny the most at Christmas time.
