Photo credit: Dave MacIntyre
[Being the fourth installment of Robert J Wiersema's original holiday tale of the ghostly and the miraculous. To read the previous installment go here; to start at the beginning go here.]
Graham awoke in a strange room, in a strange bed, bathed in cold blue-white light. His head was throbbing, and he had no memory of how he had arrived there. Turning slightly on the pillow, which smelled of unfamiliar shampoo, he found himself looking at the back of a woman’s head. Red hair. Tussled.
Ah. Christmas.
It was as close as he came to a tradition these days.
Every Christmas Eve he went out by himself, found a bar to lost himself inside. There weren’t many places open, but there were always some: havens of hushed voices and no music and spilled beer.
He’d get there fairly early, but it didn’t take very long for those sorts of places to fill up. It seemed like Christmas hit a lot of people the same way, and it was better – marginally – to drink it away in public rather than alone at home.
Those determined to be alone usually stumbled off early, leaving the place to those determined not to be. The ones who were left started the dance: the glances, the smiles, the awkward openings, the shared stories.
Shelley. That was the redhead’s name. Two kids. Early thirties. Alternating holiday rights with “that asshole”. This was her off-year.
Which brought Graham to the last part of his Christmas Eve tradition: pretending, the next morning, that it hadn’t happened.
Shelley, however, wasn’t willing to play along.
“Are you just going to sneak away?” she asked as he stood up carefully from the bed and started to dress. Her voice was too level, too clear: she’d obviously been awake for a while.
She had turned over to face him and her expression was disarming – simultaneously resigned, yet still oddly hopeful.
“It’s Christmas morning,” he said, as if that explained everything.
“Uh huh,” she breathed. “Got plans?” She said it almost teasingly, and her face fell when he nodded.
“I’m going to see my brother,” he explained. “It’s…tradition.”
“Oh,” she said curtly.
“Really,” he said. “We’ve got–”
“Whatever,” she said, cutting him off and turning over so her back was to him. “I’m not going to get up. Let yourself out.”
He looked at her for a moment, thought of how easy it would be to just crawl back under the covers. It wasn’t like Dustin was really expecting him. He could–
He pulled on his shirt, buttoning it as he reached for his shoes. Once he was dressed, he navigated his way through the apartment, trying not to notice the toys, the kids’ artwork on the walls, the small glasses on the coffee table, the miniature artificial tree with no presents under it. None of his business. Not his story.
Only when he closed the apartment door did he allow himself to relax.
That had gone better than some years. More than once he had spent the night holding someone as she cried, reassuring her through the darkest night of the year, only to bolt as early as he could the next morning. This, at least, had been polite.
Sort of.
Walking down the hallway, he fished his phone out of his jacket pocket and turned it back on. He had turned it off as he walked into the bar the afternoon before.
The third message was from Dustin. He stopped, and listened to it as he waited for the elevator, his eyes widening as it played.
“What the fuck?” he muttered as he pressed the button to replay the message, not believing what he had heard.
Halfway through the message the second time he bolted for the stairs, not wanting to waste any more time waiting for the elevator.
[Return tomorrow for the fifth installment of "Just Like the Ones He Used to Know"]
