by Chris Morey
They began to sing "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer." It was the version where people say "Like a light bulb!" and other things that weren't in the artist's original creative vision. Mom always disapproved of that version, so it was good that she was upstairs.
Uncle Jack gestured to the rest of us. He didn't actually point with the gun, but he successfully conveyed the message that if we didn't join him at the doorway, he would start shooting us. So we walked over to the doorway. I tried to tell myself that he merely wanted us to enjoy the carolers' heavenly voices, though I knew that most likely was not the case.
"You'll go down in history!" they sang. "Like Columbus!"
"Stab them!" Uncle Jack shouted.
As if to demonstrate, he jabbed a candy cane into the face of the woman closest to the door. She'd been starting up a new song, and suddenly the pitch went way, way up.
Now Uncle Jack pointed the gun at us. "Do it! Do it!"
We didn't have a choice. I mean, technically we did have a choice, but none of us wanted to get shot, so we rushed out the doorway with our sharpened candy canes and we started stabbing, stabbing, stabbing the carolers.
In most cases, the candy canes broke off without piercing their jackets. So we quickly figured out that Uncle Jack's process of stabbing people in the face was the best way to go. Eyeballs in particular were very susceptible to being punctured.
Blood and candy-cane bits sprayed everywhere.
It was an awful experience. Not as awful as being on the receiving end, presumably, but there was not a single moment where it was even remotely enjoyable.
Three of the carolers got away. The other three lay dead in a pool of gore on the front porch.
Uncle Jack hurried back into the house and returned a moment later with the box of candy canes. "Now we have to pick up the pace," he said. "We have to stab as quickly as we can. Every second counts. This is our chance to rule a post-apocalyptic wasteland, so let's not screw it up. Go!"
"What about the pieces that didn't break skin?" I asked.
"What about them?"
"You said you needed a thousand candy-cane daggers to create a thousand stab wounds. So what about the ones that broke off? Do you have to suck them into points again?"
"No, no, don't worry about them."
"We need to do something with them, right? I mean, this whole blood ritual thing doesn't make much sense if it's okay for them to break off in somebody's winter coat."
"It'll be fine."
"Do we just scoop them up and grind them into somebody's flesh?"
"There's not time. Look, the three carolers that we didn't stab to death will probably tell somebody what happened, so we need to get going."
"Yeah, but Uncle Jack, I don't understand how your ritual would work if it's okay for some of the candy canes not to part flesh. Is it a deal where only a certain percentage of them actually have to get blood on them? I'm not trying to tell you how to raise demons, but it seems like the rules would be more strict than this."
Uncle Jack took a deep breath, exhaled, and suddenly looked as if he wanted to cry. "There was no blood ritual. Sucking candy canes down to points and then keeping them is a fetish. I get sexual pleasure from it. When I'm home alone, I take the candy canes, and—well, I'm not proud of it."
"You mean you—?"
"Yes."
"Just to be clear, you're saying that you—"
"Yes."
"And you let us—"
"I never told you to eat them."
"But that's—"
"Yes."
"But—"
"Enough." Uncle Jack began to weep. "I was ashamed of it. So ashamed that when the doctor told me I only had weeks to live, I decided that it would be better to let all of my loved ones think that it was part of a blood ritual than having you discover my Christmas kink. Sure, I burned my diary and erased the videos, but without something bigger to distract you, you would have eventually figured out the truth."
"You let us murder those carolers!"
"I know, I know. It was selfish. I lied. It wasn't even a thousand candy canes. It was, like, eight hundred and something."
"What the hell, Uncle Jack?"
"Hate me if you must."
"I do! We all do!"
All of my surviving relatives nodded their agreement.
"I understand. In retrospect, knowing what I know now, I should've just let you find me dead with a sharpened candy cane up my ass. Who knows? Maybe you still will. Either way, I can hear sirens, so I vote that we all flee in different directions."
Everybody ran off, leaving me alone on the porch with the corpses. Getting out of there was an excellent idea, but I couldn't just leave Mom. I raced upstairs.
I turned a corner and Mom slammed a candy cane into my chest.
I screamed.
"I'm sorry!" Mom said. "I thought you were Uncle Jack! I'm so sorry!"
"Then quit doing it!"
Mom yanked out the cane. "Sorry. Caught up in the frenzy."
I fell to my knees. I wasn't sure if this was a mortal wound or not, but the blood was generously flowing.
"It was all a lie," I said. "He was never trying to raise demons. He just didn't want us to know that he was a perv."
"I already knew he was a perv. I once caught him masturbating to Grandma and Grandpa's wedding pictures."
"Not an appropriate revelation right now, Mom. We have to get out of here."
The sirens were getting closer. And by "closer," I meant that I could hear large vehicles pulling into the driveway, and I could see red and blue flashing lights through the window.
"This is bad," I said.
Mom shook her head. "They're here to rescue us. It's not like you helped stab the carolers to death."
"This is bad," I repeated.
Sure, I'd been forced to do it, but I suspected that my lack of fault was going to be a tough sell to the average jury.
"Come out of the house with your hands in the air!" a voice boomed through a megaphone.
"Maybe his lie was a lie," said Mom.
"What do you mean?"
"Maybe instead of having a candy-cane fetish, he really was trying to raise demons, but when he realized that the demons thing wasn't going to work out, he made up the fetish as a cover story so that he'd seem less evil?"
"I don't think so."
"I don't think so, either, but it's worth a shot, isn't it? I can't let my own son rot away in prison. If there's even a fraction of a percentage of a chance that Uncle Jack's original fucked-up story is the one that was truthful, we have to try."
"But we can't stab those cops a thousand times," I said. "They'll have bulletproof vests and stuff."
"That's not who we're stabbing. Wait here."
A moment later, Mom returned with the box of canes.
"This is a terrible, terrible idea," I said.
Mom nodded. "But it's the only way."
We quickly stripped down to our underwear. I was pleased that Mom was wearing appropriately motherly underwear, because if she'd been in a thong, I would've made sure the first cane went straight into my eyeball.
"Should we stab each other, or ourselves?" I asked.
"I don't think I can stab myself."
"Start with legs?"
Mom nodded.
We each took a sharpened candy cane out of the box, spent a moment working up our courage, and then stabbed.
§
We lay in the back of the ambulance, drenched in blood. It wasn't easy to use up all of the candy canes before the police broke down the door and apprehended us, but we'd managed to do it in the nick of time.
We were almost certainly going to bleed to death. Hopefully the demons would devour humanity and make us the rulers of earth before that happened. Our assumption was that we'd be healed when this happened, although that wasn't based on any real evidence and could be entirely inaccurate.
Mom said something to me that I believe was, "I love you." I couldn't quite understand it
because our bodies were pretty much shredded.
"I love you, too," I said. I'm sure she couldn't understand me, either, what with the gargling and choking, but she was my mother, and I'm sure she got the idea.
It occurred to me that the original problem, the part about the candy canes that had broken off in people's jackets, had never been addressed. That could be an issue.
Oh well. Nothing I could do about that now. All in all, it had been a pretty bad Christmas, but not as bad as the year that I got a Playstation 3 that had broken in transit and took several days to get replaced. I gave a contented smile as the world began to blur and visions of bloody sugarplums danced in my head.
NAUGHTY
It’s my turn to die. This is my year. Everyone else is already dead. He got them. Or it did. Whether it’s a he or an it doesn’t matter really. My brother and his friends were killed, either way.
Sitting on my dad’s favorite chair, I face the fireplace and grip the shotgun with both hands. Audrey doesn’t know I bought the shotgun. Parents don’t either. A little Christmas present to myself. Not that I wanted it. But I was never one to get what I really wanted for Christmas.
No yuletide decorations in my parents’ house. Not for four years.
The clock tells me I have fourteen minutes before midnight. Which means I really got about twenty minutes. David had set the clock forward some to keep from being late to school and work and our parents never fixed it.
I don’t know what I’m looking for. What I’m listening for. Hooves clippity-cloppeting on the roof? Milk and cookies for bait? Grow up, right? Get real. Shit, after everything that’s happened I don’t know what’s real anymore. I don’t know what to believe.
A scream explodes from my bedroom. Audrey. It’s a trick. Has to be. I ain’t moving. Not for nothing. I point my new gun at the chimney and hold my breath.
“Bobby! Something … something’s wrong!”
She’s right about that. Something’s definitely wrong. Has been for five years.
Not that Bergstrom, Texas was ever a good place to begin with.
§
The whole thing was David’s idea. Everything they ever did was. His friends went along with it because they went along with anything David told them to. So did I. He was my big brother. Not my idol or anything, but I still looked up to him some. Even though he could be an asshole and mean as hell. When he really put his mind to it, he could be scarier than any monster I ever seen on any movie. Of course, you ask anyone else in Bergstrom about it and they’d tell you different. Everyone loved David. Good-looking and smart and athletic and good at talking. Said he had a bright future and all that. Everyone always smiling at him, especially the girls. Nobody ever said those things about me or smiled at me … especially the girls.
I bet those folks who thought he was so great would shit their church britches if they knew the kinds of things David would say when it was just him and his buddies. Or, worse, when it was just the two of us. He never did anything, not in front of me anyway, not at first. But he liked to talk about it. Girls mostly and the stuff he wanted to do with them. I didn’t really understand what he was talking about, but I could follow along all right. Didn’t seem like the kinds of things anyone would want done to them. He used to show me pictures on his computer that I didn’t like too much. People taking shits on and into one another. Piss and vomit and blood and even animals sometimes. David would laugh when I turned away from that stuff. I didn’t understand how anyone in the world would want to see something like that, let alone participate in it.
But still, I looked up to him some. Maybe I shouldn’t have, but I did anyway. When he wasn’t talking bad or showing me nasty things, he was a pretty okay older brother. Let me hang out with him and his buddies sometimes, and that was all right.
Our parents didn’t have much money, but they did okay. Enough to get by and keep us well fed and clothed. Enough so we each got one present each on Christmas morning. Got me some new sneakers. Not the ones all the other kids were wearing, but still some pretty good ones. David got our dad’s old car. Wasn’t the nicest car but it ran pretty good. David was damn happy to have it even though I could tell my parents wished they could get him something better. He had just graduated high school that year, and they said it was for college. Not many folks in Bergstrom went to college, so when David said he wanted to, my parents damn near exploded with pride.
“Where we going?” I said.
“Meetin’ up with the guys.”
“What you want me to come for?”
“You’re my brother. Why wouldn’t I?”
I smiled and nodded and followed him out.
“Besides,” he said when we reached the end of the driveway. “Wanted to give you your Christmas present. Got it all set up for you.”
“Really? You got me a present, David?”
“You’re gonna love this. Somethin’ real special. Can’t wait to see your face when you see it.”
We grabbed our coats and told Mom and Dad we’d be back later and took off in the car. During Christmas, you always see movies or shows or newscasts from other places around the world. And there’s always snow. Piled up on the ground and on cars and on roofs. Not in Bergstrom, though. Or anywhere driving distance for that matter. I heard some of the old folks say it snowed once back in the sixties, but that might as well have been Jesus times for me. Only snow I ever touched was the stuff that piled up in the back of the freezer. That year, it did get cold enough for some sleet, but not much. Just enough so that you had to watch where you walked or you might step on an ice patch and end up on your back with both your feet sticking up in the air. Made driving dangerous too, but they had already salted the roads to keep the cars from sliding all over. Our street had a bunch of brown slush packed up by the curb that reminded me of Coke Slurpees.
We drove out to the retention pond across the neighborhood close to Ethan’s house. Same place we used to all gather and play baseball before everyone outgrew it. The ditch we called it. The ditch used to look huge to me, and I wondered when I would be strong enough to hit a home run, which we decided was when the ball hit the side of Mr. and Mrs. Helfond’s house. That was until David actually hit one and broke a window. Had to use a tennis ball to play after that.
I wondered why we used the car just to get across the neighborhood.
“There they are,” David said and parked along the curb, then jumped out before I could ask any questions.
Austin, Ethan, and Drew were there. Fog exploded from their mouths like they were exhaling rainclouds. I stepped out and they greeted me with small head nods then turned their attention back to my brother and his new car.
Austin whistled past the crud on his teeth and stepped past David and me and ran his fingertips along the hood. “This yours?”
“Christmas present,” David said. “All mine.”
“Your pop’s car, isn’t it?” Ethan said.
“Was.”
“Kinda old, isn’t it? I mean, how long till it breaks down?”
“Why you always gotta be a dick?” Drew said to Ethan. “Always gotta say some shit. Where’s your car at?”
“Don’t need one,” Ethan said.
“Right.” Drew laughed and clapped David on the back. “It’s nice. We going for a ride?”
“Somethin’ like that.”
Ethan rolled his eyes and shot me a look like I smelled bad. Austin called shotgun and jumped in before anyone could argue.
Drew squeezed my arm and smiled. “Those your new shoes?”
“Yeah.”
“Sweet. I was thinking about getting the same ones. Same color, too.”
“I like ’em.”
“Good taste, kid. One thing, though.”
“Huh?”
“You’re riding bitch.”
§
When I found out Audrey was pregnant, I didn’t care what my parents thought. I was happy. If it would have happened before Christmas day five years ago, maybe I w
ould have been upset or freaked out. But now the news was like a breath of air in a room filled with tear gas. Something to actually smile about, look forward to. My parents seemed happy enough about it. Probably just didn’t have the energy to try and get worked up over it. Audrey’s parents just about disowned her, though. Kicked her out.
I always expected Audrey to leave me, especially with me being so on edge all the time. I never told her what happened or that I thought I was next to be taken out. She never brought up David because she thought it was good manners not to talk about it. Especially in my parents’ house, where we both live. Any mention of David would bring my mother to her knees and my dad to the liquor store.
Audrey is too good for me. I knew that right off the bat. I guess I see her pregnancy as a way to keep her around. I’m not sure if I’m ready for a family. Don’t have a clue what to do with a baby or how to raise a kid. But we’ll be together. A family. That is if I live long enough for that.
David and Ethan and Austin, they were the ones who really did it. I would say I have nothing to worry about because I didn’t do anything wrong. But neither did Drew. Not really. Not nearly as bad as the others. And he’s dead.
“Bobby, what the hell are you doing?” My father’s voice.
I keep my eyes on the fireplace. Can’t move. Can’t look away.
It’s officially been Christmas day for an hour now.
“Bobby! Help me!”
I want to go to her. I love her. I turn my head just slightly and see my mother running toward me, holding her robe closed with one hand.
“Her water’s broke. We need to get her to—”
“No.”
“No?”
“We aren’t going anywhere. We can’t.”
“Bobby … what are you—”
“It’s not safe, Mom. We can’t leave.”
“Safe? Audrey’s in labor. She needs to go to the hospital!”
“You’re a nurse.”
“Bobby …”
“You can help her.”
“Now I know for goddamn sure you can hear that girl back there hollerin’.” My dad’s in white briefs and nothing else. He never used to have a beard but stopped caring much about shaving after David. His hair had started to go white on him a few years back, too, not to mention the belly from the alcohol. When he comes stumbling into the room I damn near blow a hole through him.
