Part 3 (1/2)

”Stevie!” he whispered. He was afraid to look in the pale light of dawn, half expecting to find blood running down the wall from the upper bunk. ”Stevie, wake up!”

Jeff heard a sharp indrawn breath. ”Jeff! Santa didn't get us.”

They both started laughing. ”Come on, let's go see.”

They tumbled out of bed, then spent ten minutes dismantling the barricade of toys and small furniture they had placed in front of the door. The house remained still and quiet around them. Nothing was stirring, not even a mouse.

Jeff glanced at the dining room table as they crept into the living room. The cookies were gone. The milk gla.s.s had been drained dry.

Jeff looked for a contorted red-suited form lying in the corner-but he saw nothing. The Christmas tree lights blinked on and off; Mom and Dad had left them on all night.

Stevie crept to the Christmas tree and looked. His face turned white as he pulled out several new gift-wrapped boxes. All marked ”FROM SANTA.”

”Oh, Jeff! Oh, Jeff-you were wrong! What if we killed Santa!”

They both gawked at the presents.

”Jeff, Santa took the poison!”

Jeff swallowed and stood up. Tears filled his eyes. ”We have to be brave, Stevie.” He nodded. ”We better go tell Mom and Dad.” He shuddered, then screwed up his courage.

”Let's go wake them up.”

Kevin J. Anderson has written forty-nine national and international bestsellers and has over twenty-three million books in print worldwide in thirty languages. He has been nominated for the Nebula Award, the Bram Stoker Award, and the SFX Readers' Choice Award. He is best known for his highly popular Dune novels and h.e.l.lhole, written with Brian Herbert, his numerous Star Wars and X-Files novels, and his original science fiction epic, The Saga of Seven Suns. He has also written comics and produced and wrote two rock CDs as companions to his nautical fantasy trilogy, Terra Incognita.

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What is your best, funniest, or darkest holiday-season memory?

It was the first Thanksgiving that my sister's in-laws were celebrating with our family. My mother wanted to make a good impression on the Kanes, who were from an upscale town in Connecticut. Our town was pretty nice too, but we lived on a dairy farm, and my mother didn't want our new relations to think we were hokey or ”backwoods” in our ways.

Everyone was getting along, socializing in the open kitchen area while Mom mashed yams. She glimpsed movement out of the corner of her eye. Mom discreetly waved my father over to her side.

”Paul,” she whispered, ”I think I just saw a mouse over by the refrigerator. Do something!”

My father has always been a man of action, and he moved quickly. Grabbing a fork off of the meticulously laid-out table, he crouched down in the far corner of the kitchen. He waited...waited...then jabbed underneath the fridge in a flash. Dad proudly held up his fork, which now had an impaled, squealing mouse on the end of it.

My sister and I clapped. My brother-in-law complimented Dad on having the reflexes of a cat. And my sister's in-laws, along with my mother, no longer had an appet.i.te for Thanksgiving dinner.

-Stacey Longo.

.

TINSEL.

by John Boden.

Avery stood on the stoop as the wind and snow swirled around him. His cheeks were raw yet hot, even in this weather. The frigid sting of the cold was welcome.

He slipped the key into the lock, and with a turn, he was inside. Leaning back against the door, he drew a deep breath. The house still smelled like Marie, that faint flowery smell of her shampoo, the powder-diffused tang of sweat emanating from the recliner. He took a slow visual tour of the living room and basked in all the memories there-the basket beside the chair, the crossword puzzle book that still lay open to the page she was working on when she had the stroke, the barrister bookcase...

They were in their twenties when she spotted the bookcase from across the parking lot at the flea market. Dark mahogany, etched gla.s.s in the pull doors...it was beautiful. Over the years, her nimble fingers must have danced countless times over every nick and sc.r.a.pe along its aged veneer.

”How much?” she had asked that day, with her bubbly giggle so lovely.

The man behind the counter removed the cigarette from his cracked lips to answer: ”Two hundred. That's an antique.”

Avery held out his hand, Marie took it, and they made to walk away.

”I can take a hundred, just so I don't gotta lug the d.a.m.n thing back on the truck.”

They stopped and smiled at one another, proud of their charade's success.

”Sold!”

Now it sat in the corner of the living room, as it had for these last fifty years. Half a century worth of books and gewgaws. Worn, pulp paperbacks and hardcovers had long ago filled it to capacity. The piece now stood nearly hidden behind stacks of books and magazines.

Avery sighed and dropped his wool coat on the floor. ”Hang it up, Ave,” he could almost hear Marie holler as he went to the kitchen.

Fifty-seven years with the woman. A lifetime.

They had met when he was twenty. Marie a clerk at the Save-U-Mor, and Avery a long-haired hood who worked at The Sound Pound, a record shop next door. When shopping, he would make a point of going to her register, telling her stupid jokes. She pretended not to find him amusing. He asked her out but made it sound like she was doing him a favor. She accepted but disguised it as a pitiful gesture.

They saw Night of the Living Dead and had a great time, so they went out again. Love notes clipped to timecards, under winds.h.i.+eld wipers, roses on car seats. He once gave her a bottle of rain. With Marie, a mundane trip to the grocery store was a loving adventure. The years fluttered by like birds.

Until now.

Avery heated up a can of chicken soup, and set a steaming bowl of it down on the only clear spot on the dinner table. Staring ahead, he slowly sipped the broth.

All the mail from the week-bills, junk mail, newspapers-sat in a heap beside him. There were pencils and pens, a pile of clipped coupons, a roll of paper towels, a dismantled cuckoo clock he had been fixing for the last three years, a Mason jar full of pennies. He shook his head and smiled. ”How ever did you tolerate me, woman?”

Sipping golden broth, it was hard to get it past the lump in his throat.

They had been watching Jeopardy when the stroke hit.

”What is Pygmalion?” she had uttered, followed by a strange noise.

Avery sat with his nose in one of his old pulps. ”What?” he responded to the question he a.s.sumed she must have asked him. No answer came. After a few minutes, he looked over and saw her slumped in the chair, breathing fast and heavy, her face drawn on one side. Her blue eyes, wide and full of panic, fixed upon him. She whimpered like a child.

”My G.o.d,” he said, and jumped for the phone.

In the hospital, he had sat in the uncomfortable chair and watched her wane, a beautiful picture fading before his eyes. With their gnarled fingers intertwined, he reminisced about their courts.h.i.+p, their wedding day, how divine she had looked in her dress, and how he had made that silly face when they raised their toast because he hated the taste of alcohol. But most importantly, how very lucky he was. He whispered about the birth of their son, and how beautiful she had been while she carried him, and how blessed he was to have spent every one of the last 20,805 days with her as his wife. He told her how much he loved her, no less than one hundred times.

Small sighing breaths were the only response from Marie, until even they disappeared on that fifth day.