Layaway

POETRY

by David Armand

When I was a kid we’d go to K-Mart during Christmas
and pick out the toys we wanted but couldn’t afford.
Then we’d take them to the back—down a hall 
with flickering overhead lights and two gumball machines 
against the wall—and to the layaway counter. 

My mom would put down five or ten bucks, 
and for weeks after, leading up to the Big Day, 
she’d put down another five or ten here and there, 
until it was all paid off.

                                    Then we’d cart it all home 
and she’d wrap everything and put it under the tree 
that we’d decorated with strands of popcorn 
strung together with sewing thread.

                                                             It didn’t matter
that we already knew all the gifts. 
Or that we had to pay for them with fives and tens 
and sometimes quarters. And that it would take a month 
or more to pay it down. Who really cares about that 
when you’re a kid? What kid cares about anything 
but just wanting to be happy? To be like everyone else? 

Even if you have to do it week by drawn-out week 
with a handful of crumpled one dollar bills stashed
in an envelope that just has For Christmas written on the front.