The final part of the Christmas Special.
Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 3)
(Christmas 2010)
The party was hitting full force. Little radiated more energy than a large group of college students past their final what-not—exams, projects, papers—and needing to unwind after a stressful session. The music was harsh and loud and assaulted the senses even more than the lighting and the crush of bodies as one walked through the dance area. Alcohol flowed freely.
Daniel Malcolm was nursing a dark beer he had pilfered from a table set up for that purpose at one end of the large basement room the party organizers had commandeered, somewhere in a half-abandoned building on campus. It was not a rave but it had been orchestrated as one, with its location advertised by word of mouth. Daniel suspected that the University knew about the party; while they could not officially sanction it for all the obvious reasons, it was better to have such an event occur under quasi-supervision rather than having it take place completely outside its jurisdiction. The two dead giveaways were the near total lack of freshmen, and the absence of drugs.
“I find it somewhat unexpected that there is a preponderance of alcoholic beverages over hallucinogenic and mind-altering substances at this event,” said Radhu Krishnamurthy quizzically, not for the first time voicing exactly what had been going through Daniel’s mind. Then again, perhaps I’m not very good at hiding what I think, he reflected. Jenn certainly seems to think so.
The though of his brand new girlfriend—Jennifer Hansen, smart, sexy, beautiful, wholly undeserved, and conspicuously absent from this Holiday party, the last before everyone split off to their respective family homes for Winter Break—made his heart ache. Which surprised him. He itched to call her again, the fourth time this evening, but was fighting hard not to. Appearing too needy was never a smart way to go. Calling a few times to tell her he missed her already was cute and romantic—sentimental, he could almost hear her correct him, a smile in her voice—but more than that was pathetic.
He turned instead to his Indian friend, tall and lanky and holding a glass of punch whose neon color gave no clue as to its ingredients but suggested nothing healthy. Radhu did not take well to alcohol. It made his already idiosyncratic behavior even more… idiosyncratic.
“Perhaps I should venture to dance tonight,” Radhu said, and Daniel feared that his friend was serious. Daniel had seen Radhu dance before. He was actually a good dancer, unexpectedly so given his gangly body. He had learned to dance watching Bollywood movies, Radhu had told him early in their freshman year when they lived on the same dormitory floor. But Bollywood-style choreography did not mesh well with the mosh-pit slamming that passed for dancing at this point of the party.
“Maybe you can do that later, Rad.”
“Very well. You look absent, Daniel. Are you thinking of Jennifer again?”
Daniel sighed. Radhu was perceptive, in his own way. “Yeah. Guilty. I miss her. Weird, I know. But there it is. She’s off to her mother for the break, and wanted to leave early to beat the storm.”
“Snopocalypse. It does sound pleasantly apocalyptic.”
“I’d argue your use of pleasant when my girlfriend’s on a Greyhound heading north.”
“I was referring to the lexical entity, not the denotation of said lexical entity, but fair point.”
Two month. He and Jenn had been dating two months now, and he already had her under his skin. He was hooked, and hooked bad, his stepbrother would have called it. And Daniel could not deny it. While they did not spend every minute of every day together, she was never far from his mind. They talked several hours every day, either in person or on the phone or via chat. It scared him a bit, too, this longing he felt that he had not know could be triggered in him. She seemed to feel the same—that by itself Daniel found astonishing—but she also took it in stride, as if she had always expected to feel that way and was merely glad it happened with him.
“Jeez, are you already pinning for her? It’s been what, an hour?” came the mocking voice from his left. “You’re pussy-whipped but good, boy!”
Daniel grinned. Only one person could wield that combination of come-hither and mocking in a single voice. Serena Banks strode toward him in a pair of jeans that looked like their were sprayed on and a tank top that left little of what it was meant to cover to the imagination. The top was white and stood out delightfully against her dark skin. With her long hair, full lips, and more curves than anyone would know how to handle, she was sexy, she knew it, and took full advantage.
She was studying journalism, and worked at the University paper. And she was good at it. Although how much investigative reporting one could do in a small town lost in the middle of nowhere New England remained up for debate.
“Hey Serena. How are you?” he greeted her, raising his bottle to bang it against what looked like an oversized cocktail glass. How did she manage to find a cocktail here?
“Fucking elated,” she said. “Term paper for Media During Reagan submitted and out of my face forever. Can’t help but wonder how things would have gone if we had the Internet back then. What do you think, Rad?” She asked the lanky Indian.
Radhu had still not said a word. He was gaping like a lost puppy, not an atypical reaction of his to Serena’s presence. That Radhu had a crush on the black journalism student was the worst kept secret, although everyone acted as though they did not know, Serena first. But she liked teasing the poor boy.
Daniel had asked her point blank once whether she would ever date Radhu. She had merely shrugged. “If he ever gets the balls to ask me out, we’ll see. I am curious whether he’s long and thin all over.”
And so Daniel had been pushing Radhu to ask Serena out. But he resisted—Daniel suspected that Radhu not only feared rejection but also acceptance. He worried what he would have to do on a date with her. Somehow, pining for Serena felt safer than dating her.
“Rad,” said Daniel, subtly kicking his friend whose gaze was threatening to dip down to the generous cleavage of Serena’s tank top. “Hypothetical: how would the 1980’s presidential elections have differed had the Internet been around?”
The direct question snapped Radhu out of his reverie.
“Oh. Well, I would submit that the results would have been sensibly similar. Ronald Reagan had a strong following, that is undeniable, and the Internet would have undoubtedly exacerbated the outpouring of support. The main impediment to the Reagan campaign I would surmise would have been his behavior during his Hollywood years, from which secrets might have emerged. I am basing this on the assumption that the Internet would have fostered the release of information from those years, not unlike what happened to Rock Hudson whose secrets came to light once there was a vector on which to promulgate them. I posit that these two conflicting directions would have annihilated each other.”
Serena made a face. “I wonder if the added scrutiny would have picked up on the fact that he had Alzheimer’s?”
Radhu arched an eyebrow in a way that Daniel could not help but find highly amusing. “There is no proof that Reagan was ill during his presidency.”
Serena grunted. “What about falling asleep at meetings?”
“I will offer the evidence of your own falling asleep in class as the first exhibit in a counter-argument. Do you believe you have Alzheimer’s disease?”
Before the conversation could degenerate further, Serena squealed as a pair of large hands grabbed her breasts from behind. “Guess who?” came a drunken voice.
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Serena grinned, wrapping her hands over the man’s, and pressing them more firmly over her large breasts. “You got here before my boyfriend, so you get the spoils. Wanna fuck?”
“Wait, what?” came the man’s confused voice. Serena turned around and kissed the man, who was about the same height as her but twice her width—a mountain of muscles, and not much else. Serena’s current boyfriend.
Daniel shook his head and smiled. Serena liked sex, and liked it with a particular class of men: big and strong. And dumb as doorknobs, Jenn would have added.
Radhu, meanwhile, watched with longing in his eyes Serena kiss her boyfriend—all of a week old, and with probably a week or so to go—and watched the man’s hands dip down to Serena’s ass to squeeze it.
“I’m gonna go dance with my man,” Serena said over her shoulder. “You boys behave. And you,” she said to Daniel, “quit sulking. You’ll see your little sexpot soon enough. Ta!”
Daniel and Radhu watched her sashay her way through the crowd, her boyfriend trailing behind her.
“Special, isn’t she?” Daniel said to Radhu. It was a rhetorical question.
“That she is,” Radhu replied, wonder in his voice.
* * *
Daniel did not last more than twenty more minutes before calling it a night. His melancholy mood was not helped by the people and the music and the thrumming of the bass in his bones, and the last thing he wanted was to be a downer to his friends.
Radhu had run into a fellow student from one of his Computer Science classes, and they soon became engrossed in what Daniel guessed was the redesign of a popular online role-playing game. Serena had gone off in a corner to make out with her boyfriend, and while she had always made it clear that he would be welcome in a threesome, not only did Daniel not particularly want to join in, but he surmised that Serena’s new boyfriend would consider such an intrusion as the perfect opportunity to see if it was possible to rip a body in two like a telephone book.
It was a half-hour walk back to his dormitory, and while the night was not especially cold for December, the snow fell thick and heavy, the wind sending it twirling around the trees. He walked and listened to the silence all around him, that special silence that only a snow-blanketed night could provide. He wondered whether Jenn was okay, whether the snow would make the bus drive treacherous, familiar as he was with New England winters—but then, so was she. He fought back the urge to call her. He even shut off his phone to avoid the temptation.
The lobby of his dormitory was empty, most of the students having already left for the Holidays. Daniel was scheduled to depart in two days himself, but he felt less drive than usual. His mother and his stepfather Gerald had left for the Bahamas to celebrate their fifth wedding anniversary. He had been invited, as had his stepbrother Sam. The sixteen year old Sam had jumped at the opportunity to go off and hang out on the beach and ogle beautiful bodies.
Daniel understood that impulse, of course—though his own preferences ran to female bodies as opposed to male bodies, unlike Sam—but he had no desire to spend Christmas in the Caribbean. There was too much for him to do over the break—he was doing some undergraduate research work for one of his Foreign Policy teachers that he hoped would help him land an internship in DC come summer—and the thought of being out in the sun while he missed Jenn felt strangely like a betrayal. And so he was heading down to spend the Holidays with his aunt Selma and her family.
He opened the door to the rooms he shared with Jimmy, a quiet and shy sophomore. Daniel had lucked out: Jimmy was the perfect roommate. Daniel wandered whether the feeling was shared. He thought he was pretty easy-going as a roommate, but it was difficult to be objective about such a thing.
There was a light coming from Jimmy’s room, and Daniel expected him to be playing a video game, as he was wont to do most nights.
“Hey Jimmy,” he said. No response. He poked his head through the door, and saw Jimmy at his desk, his oversized headphones dwarfing his head, his eyes closed, his arm pumping up and down in a characteristic fashion with a hand in his lap.
He was masturbating.
Daniel grinned and silently stepped away from Jimmy’s door and headed to his room.
His room was small, but he had grown to like it. A bed against the wall, a working desk with his laptop at its foot, a small nightstand. A small bookshelf, a dresser. It was small but cozy, and he had decorated it in a way that reminded him of home.
He eschewed the harsh overhead light for the small lamp on his desk that gave the soothing warm glow he preferred, and wondered what he would do for the rest of the night. He was not sleepy. Watch television? Read a book? Stare at the walls? Maybe Jimmy had the right idea and he should masturbate.
He turned on the radio, and selected a soft rock channel. Soul music. Romantic. Mellow. Exactly his mood.
“Hello lover.”
Daniel jumped at the sound of the voice, nearly smashing his head against a hanging shelf by his desk.
He spun around, his heart in his throat.
Jenn was there, leaning against the door, dressed in a way that cause his breath to catch. If one imagined a sexy Christmas-themed costume, it would come close to what she wore: a short red tunic with a large black belt, fur-trimmed, zipped up but leaving a cleavage that rivaled the one that Serena was sporting earlier that evening. Her perfect legs looked like they were bare at first, but close attention hinted at the presence of a thin pair of nude stockings. The outfit was topped off by a pair of black boots with a stiletto heel. In a word, she was stunning. And more importantly, she was there.
“What… what are you doing here? I thought…”
She grinned, and shrugged. She had a red Santa Claus hat on her head. “Weather sucked. They canceled all bus routes for the night, and we may not even be able to leave tomorrow if the snow’s too bad. I figured you wouldn’t mind me dropping by and surprising you.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“And miss that expression on your face? Let me tell you, you do know how to make a girl feel pretty.”
“Trust me, it’s no hardship. You look… you look beautiful!”
“You are so sweet. And that deserves a reward.”
“Does it now?”
“Oh yes.” She pushed back from the door and walked towards him, slowly, making sure to swing her hip like a model on a catwalk.
The radio played its part. It was playing an old ballad, one that Daniel had always liked, that he had first heard on that sitcom that first introduced Michael J. Fox to the world, before Back to the Future.
What did you think
I would do at this moment
When you’re standing before me
With tears in your eyes
“Care to dance?” Jenn asked, a step away from him. He wanted to kiss so badly that it was almost enticing for him to postpone that pleasure.
“I’d love to.”
She slipped into his arms as if it was the most natural place in the world for her to be, and as far as Daniel was concerned, at this moment, in this place, it was. He took her in his arms, and there she was, tight and smooth and perfect. She put her head on his shoulder, and molded herself against him.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “Your roommate won’t bother us. I slipped my panties on your doorknob.”
“You did what?”
“I slipped my panties over your doorknob. You know, to tell him that we’re busy and not to come in? Isn’t that what you boys do?”
“Generally, we use socks.”
“Ah. Well, I didn’t have any socks.”
Visions of Jenn naked beneath her tunic swirled in his mind. He wanted to grab her and throw her onto the bed and mount her like an animal. But he controlled himself.
Instead, they danced.
It was foreplay.
“I love this song,” she whispered against him. “Always have.”
He did not expect that. “So do I. You know it?”
“Of course. Family Ties.”
“The episode where Alex gets his first girlfriend—wait, what was her name?”
“Ellen. They danced to this song, and they kissed.”
“I remember. Mushy.”
Jenn lifted her head from his shoulder, and looked him in the eyes. The doused light from his lamp cast a shadow on her face, which he could not read. “Yeah. My mom always thought it was romantic. I thought it was sentimental.”
“Lovey-dovey.”
“Schmaltzy.”
“Who does that anyway?”
“Losers, clearly.”
He leaned toward her, and they kissed, a slow kiss that did not keep them from dancing, body against body. Daniel did not want to break the mood, but also wanted to run his hands down his girlfriend’s body and go explore for himself her lack of underwear. He was getting hard. And Jenn felt it.
“Someone’s happy,” she grinned, breaking the kiss, but remaining pressed against him. She shifted her hips against his erection.
“Sorry about that,” he said. “I sort of didn’t think I’d see you for a while.”
“And you were thinking of sporting this monster for the whole vacation? Sounds painful.”
“No, but it did cross my mind to…” he almost blushed.
“Oh. I see. Want some help?” The way she said it made his cock even harder. “Mrs. Claus is feeling naughty tonight, what with Santa out on his trek around the world. She needs some attention.”
He kissed her again, and ran his hand down to her ass, under her tunic, luxuriating in the feeling of her naked cheeks, and confirming the absence of any underwear. Stretching he managed to run a finger down between her thighs and just tickle her slit from behind. He was not surprised to find her wet—Jenn got aroused easily.
“Someone’s being naughty,” she said with a shiver in her voice.
“Look who’s talking, Mrs. Claus. You’re drenched.”
“It gets so lonely at the North Pole when Santa’s gone. What’s a sex-starved woman to do?”
“I guess she’d have to find a man…”
“That’s why she dresses like a slut. It makes men hard. And when men are hard, they want to fuck her.”
“Really?”
“Oh yeah. She can tell when she looks in their eyes. They want to spread her legs as wide as they go and pound her into submission. And you know what?”
“What?”
She finished off whispering in his ear. “Mrs. Claus loves being pounded into submission.”
Daniel groaned, and Jenn laughed as she pushed both of them onto the bed. Daniel landed on his back, and Jenn straddled him, surprisingly nimble in her stiletto boots.
She kissed him hard, pressing her ass against his crotch, and he responded by putting one hand behind her head to keep her in place and using his free hand to flip her short tunic onto her back, baring her ass.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she moaned.
“Just providing better access.”
“You perv!”
“I’m not the one who showed up here like a wanton Mrs. Claus, am I?”
“I don’t see you—or feel you—complaining.” She punctuated her statement by pressing her crotch against his cock. Before Daniel could react, she slipped by his side and unfastened his trousers. “Your roommate didn’t seem to complain either.”
“So he’s the one that let you in then? I’ll bet he didn’t complain. I’ll have to have a little talk with him about rules. Oh fuck!”
Jenn had pulled his cock out and grasped it with a cold hand before running that hand up and down, slowly. Daniel closed his eyes and sank into the feeling.
“Don’t be mad at him,” she smiled as she stroked him, one of her legs draped over his. She was gently humping him, and that movement by itself was enough to drive Daniel wild. “He didn’t have much choice. I can be very persuasive when I want to be.”
“I’m sure,” Daniel moaned. He could just imagine Jimmy opening the door to the vision of loveliness that was Jenn. Jimmy had met her before, of course—but never when she was dressed like she was out looking for a wild time
He also had a pretty good idea what Jimmy had been jerking off to now, and Daniel did not quite know how to feel about that. On the one hand, there was pride kicking hard, that he had landed such a hot girl that his roommate masturbated to her memory. On the other, it was disconcerting that he was, and Daniel almost felt dirty because of it.
Jenn was jacking him off slowly, her eyes closed, unaware of what he was thinking. Or maybe she did.
“He was so cute. He couldn’t help staring at my legs, his mouth hanging open almost the whole time. Just adorable.”
She might as well have been talking about a puppy rather than a man ogling her, though Jimmy was admittedly inoffensive.
Jenn’s hand on Daniel’s cock danced up and down. “He let me come into your room and wait for you. But I feel bad now. Perhaps I should have waited out there, with him. I don’t know, maybe given him a little bit of Christmas cheer too. After all, that’s what Mrs. Claus does, no?”
“What do you mean?” He was having difficulty thinking, and Jenn had a way with words, and her voice was soothing and her hand was maddening. He wanted to flip her back onto the bed and fuck her, and at the same time wanted nothing more than just lie back and let her take him wherever she wanted him to go.
“I don’t know. Maybe I should have sat down on the couch with him? He’d have offered me tea, or something to drink—I don’t think he’d have tried to get me drunk, but maybe. And while drinking that tea, making sure I wasn’t burning myself, my tunic probably would have ridden up, and maybe just maybe I would have been distracted enough to not notice how I was spreading my legs and he would have gotten a peek of the pretty little G-string I wore for you tonight.” Her hand was stroking him faster now—did she pull out some lubricating gel without him noticing? Her hand felt wet.
“Except I didn’t get to see it.”
“It’s on the doorknob if you want to look.”
“Right—I’m pretty sure it’s gone by now.”
“What do you mean? Oh. Oh!” She looked up at him while jacking him off, his cock a steel bar in her hand, clamoring for release. She had a naughty smile on her face, and her voice dropped low. “You think he took it?” She sounded almost shocked, but her hand was a blur on his cock.
“Fuck, love, don’t stop! Yes, I’m pretty sure he took it. I would have!”
“But you’re a perv, we established that already. Jimmy is sweet and innocent.”
“Right. Sweet and innocent and probably jerking off into your panties as we speak.” He did not mention what Jimmy was doing earlier. He did not even know if what he was saying was true or not, and he did not care. He was in a particular headspace with Jenn, and he needed to come.
“Oh my God! He’s jerking off into my pretty little G-string? But it’s so tiny. I mean, it’s barely there, just a few strings and a bit of silk that covered my pussy! And he’s jacking off with them?”
“Urgh…” The pressure in his balls was starting to become unbearable. His hips were starting to move of their own volition. “Jenn…”
“That’s so weird—to think he’s jerking off in my panties. It’s like he’s fucking a little part of me. I feel so… violated.” She made eye contact with Daniel, and winked at him before giggling, never letting his cock go.
“Jenn, I’m gonna come…”
“Do it, lover. Come for me.”
Her hand was a blur. And then she did something that she had never done before—she leaned over and took the head of his cock in her mouth, and sucked.
He had no idea what she was doing with her tongue or her teeth or anything else, but what he felt was an overload of sensations, centered on his cock. And then he grunted out loud and grasped his sheets with clenched fists as he exploded, and Jenn never stopped stroking him and never let his cock slip out of her mouth as she swallowed everything he discharged.
He collapsed back on the bed, realizing that he had been crunching up in a painful spasm throughout his orgasm.
“Yum,” she said, licking her lips and gently caressing his sensitive glans.
Daniel merely groaned in response.
Jenn laughed. “I’ll take that as a compliment.” She slipped up to lie beside him, wiping her lips with the edge of his sheet.
“That was… that was incredible,” he sighed. He took a few breaths, then frowned. “You didn’t have to do that, you know.”
“Oh, I did,” she said. “Laura was right.”
“What?”
“Never mind,” she laughed, and hugged him tight. He knew she wanted to kiss him, but probably feared how he might react, and so he leaned over and kissed her. She stiffened for a second and then relaxed into the kiss.
“Can you spend the night?” he asked her. It was against the rules, but at this point, he did not care much. He did not want to let her go.
“I certainly hope so,” she replied. “In case you didn’t notice, I have a very wet pussy here that will require a lot of attention.”
“Would some of that attention take the form of me sinking between your thighs and licking you into oblivion.”
Jenn shivered. “Definitely.”
And Daniel did. And Jenn came. And they fucked. And they both came once more.
And the next day, when the weather cleared and bus service was resumed, Daniel followed Jenn to Maine and spent Christmas with her and her mother.
And they had a most wonderful time.
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
Sunday, December 28, 2014
New Story: Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 2)
Part 2 of 3.
Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 2)
(Christmas 2007)
It’s way past two in the morning when Laura drops me off at home. It was a kind thing for her to do—my house is out of the way, out of town, isolated. And December snow in this part of Maine can get pretty treacherous. But Laura’s a good driver, and I had no other way to get home because cabs are few and far between at this time of the night and they hate coming so far out.
Laura didn’t drink at the party. She’s sixteen, she loves to have fun, but she’s also the most responsible girl I know. It’s a weird mix, but one I’m grateful for. I tried to be as good as she was, and only had two shots the whole evening. Then I nursed a piña colada for much of the night. That’s the trick, it seems: if you’re holding a glass, people don’t bug you to get something else. Especially if they’re pretty hammered themselves.
My name is Jennifer Hansen, and it’s Christmas Eve—well, by now, it’s really Christmas Day—and I’m coming back home after what I consider a very successful party, my first real one. It was a Christmas party, though everyone made it a point to avoid calling it that explicitly. Christmas parties are dorky, of course, the sort of things kids like, or parents who work in an office and whine about everything and everyone while they figure out what to get for “their fucking Yankee swap.” (Direct quote from Laura’s mother, I swear. The woman is a hoot and a half.)
It was a glorious party. Lots of fun folks from school—the good crowd, the fun crowd, the almost-but-not-quite popular crowd—were there. And Sebastian was there. Sebastian, nearly six and a half feet tall and skinny as a bone, and smart and funny and a boy that maybe just maybe might like me. And a hell of a kisser, too, I discovered. I blush as I think back to the half hour we spent with me sitting on his lap in the lounge chair, and my blush is half from the memory and half from the biting cold.
Behind me, Laura honks as she navigates my driveway and heads back to her own place.
I go inside. Winter jacket off, boots off, and I’m back in my knit black dress Mom convinced me to wear if I really “wanted to snag that boy I wanted” even though I’m not used to wearing stuff that isn’t denim. I did put on pantyhose though—not only because of the cold, but also because I couldn’t make it too easy for those pesky boys and their wandering hands. Not that it kept Sebastian away, of course.
There’s that heat again that spreads throughout my body at the memory of Sebastian’s hands on me, sliding up my sensitive thighs as I sat on his lap in that lounge chair, kissing softly, my skin on fire. Laura teased me that I was acting like a slut—she’s one to talk. She lost her virginity two years ago, doing it with her brother’s best friend while vacationing. She said it was good but not great. That her dildo felt much better. She’s been fucking around ever since though, and none the worse for wear. The only thing she doesn’t do is oral; she says that taking a boy’s dick in your mouth is one of the most intimate things you can do, because it’s a gift, done purely for the boy’s pleasure.
I’m in no rush myself. Still a virgin at sixteen. I like my fingers a lot, too. But that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy a boy’s hands on me. Sebastian’s hands. I can’t help but imagine what it’ll feel like when I lie down in my bed later on—that bed with the nice winter flannel sheets, the kind that warm up in no time—when I slide my hand into the waistband of my pajamas, on my fuzzy little peach, finding it all wet with anticipation, picturing Sebastian’s hand in its place, tickling me, rubbing me, fucking me. I’m going to come so easily that I’m practically shaking already.
Maybe I won’t even put on my pajamas. Maybe I’ll just lie on the bed in my dress, and pull it about and slide my hand beneath my pantyhose and imagine I’m still at the party, with Sebastian taking liberties with me, touching me—oh yes, that’ll do it.
That’s when I notice that the television is on in the living room, the sound a simple murmur in the background. Peeking around the corner, I see the shadows it casts on the hallway wall.
I shake my head. For once, I’ll be able to reprimand Mom about leaving the television on. I’m usually the culprit. Not that it’s really my fault—it’s just so much part of the background sometimes, just white noise, that I forget it’s even on. Then again, maybe I’m the one who left it on this time as well. Maybe it’s been on all night, entertaining the Christmas tree and the elves.
My mom’s gone off to her own Christmas party, with her new boyfriend, Luke or Luca or something like that. Nice guy. Body of a Greek god, the kind that artists like my mother die to get a chance to sculpt or paint. Which is how Mom met him: posing for one of her sculpture classes at the local community college.
We went our separate way her and I this Christmas Eve. First time ever. She was stressed about it. I admit, it felt weird, but also exciting. A bit of an adventure. A big step into the world of—let me say it—adulthood. That we both had parties to get to was the excuse: me with my friends, her with an overnighter at Luke/Luca’s place with some of his friends. My party was also supposed to be an overnighter, but to be honest, I was getting pretty tired of it by the end, and the gang seemed ready to go on for several more hours. So when Laura told me she had to go, I hitched a ride.
Mom and I are supposed to meet at IHOP tomorrow morning for a late breakfast. Luke/Luca knows the owner, and we can beat the predictable line.
I’m fantasizing about what sort of pancakes I’m going to have as I go in to shut the television.
“Hi sweetie. How was your party?”
I nearly jump out of my skin! In the dark, on the couch, barely illuminated by the glow of the screen, is my mom—a glass of wine in her hand, her feet up on the coffee table. She’s in her dressing gown.
“Mom! Jesus! You scared the shit out of me!”
“Language, young lady.”
“Well, excuse me, but you just gave me a heart attack—that should cut me just a tiny bit of slack!”
She shrugs. “Sorry. I thought you heard the TV.”
I look at her, taking in the scene. I can’t tell you how I know, but she’s been here all evening, I can tell. She didn’t go out. No party for Mom.
I drop down on the couch beside her. On the large television screen, our one decadent luxury, almost larger than life, I spot Michael J. Fox in his old eighties sitcom, Family Ties. I know it well, somewhat unfortunately, because it’s one of my mom’s favorite series. That, and Golden Girls. She has all the DVDs, some in duplicate. I prefer Fox in Spin City myself.
Mom only goes through a Family Ties binge for one reason.
“How was the party?” she asks.
“Party was good.” I snuggle up next to her and she accepts me because she’s my mom and she’ll always accept me that way and there’s never been any question about it. I have to remind myself regularly not to take it for granted. “Kick-ass beer pong tournament.”
She turns her eyes on me, trying to gauge how much I drank. I grin after a long pause. “Don’t worry. I watched a Terminator marathon with Laura and folks in the living room.”
“All three? Or is it four now?”
“I dropped off after the second.”
Mom nods knowingly. “Second was the best.” She takes a sip of her wine. White. Sparkling. Our New Year’s Eve bottle, I’m guessing. Shit.
“Oh yeah,” I second. “That music…” On cue, we both thump the theme from Terminator 2, that industrial drum beat that sticks in your head like nothing else. Then we chuckle. I snuggle up closer.
On the television screen, Michael J. Fox is having an argument with what will turn out to be his first girl on the show, Tracy Pollan. I’ve always preferred the other one, the brunette, Courtney Cox, pre-Friends. I’ve always thought she was prettier. And smart. Probably because I’m a brunette myself, and not too dumb.
“That’s the episode where they get together, right? They go to this school dance and they kiss and she runs away and then she’s catching a train to go and marry her boyfriend and Alex drives all night to catch her before her train arrives to tell her that he loves her?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
“Super hokey. Like gag-me hokey. I mean, come on!”
“My daughter the romantic.”
“That’s not romantic, it’s… sentimental. At best. And cheaply so, too. I mean, at least have him jump on the train that’s just leaving only to discover that she stayed at the station hoping he would come by and stop her and poof, you’ve got room for a lot more development. This is… too easy.”
“Sometimes easy is good.”
“But it doesn’t make for satisfying storytelling.”
“My daughter the critic.”
“Hey, if you didn’t want a smart daughter, you shouldn’t have raised me as one.”
“I didn’t do anything but try to hang on tight as you became wonderful all by yourself.” There is something in her voice, and I don’t say a thing as I stay there against her.
We are silent for a while. On the screen, Michael J. Fox is at the college party—which looks so much dorkier than the one I’ve just come back from it’s actually pretty funny—looking forlorn. That haunting song is playing in the background—What did you think I would do at this moment? I love that song. It’s also fucking sentimental. But I don’t care. Just don’t tell my mom. She’d never let me live it down.
We listen to the song. At least I do. I don’t know what my mom is thinking, but I listen to her heartbeat.
Tracy Pollan runs away. The song ends.
“Mom, what happened?” My voice is low, and I wonder if she even heard me. Then I feel the shrug more than I hear her words.
“Nothing.”
“Mom, you spent Christmas Eve by yourself.” It was not a question.
“I wasn’t by myself, I had the Keatons.” The Keatons. That ideal through-thick-and-thin family. My mom’s an incredibly well-adjusted divorced woman who’s not looking for a long-term partner because she thinks all men are fundamentally scum, except when she’s down, and then she likes to compare her life to idealized Hollywood versions. A recipe for disaster, that.
“Mom?” My voice gets harder. I don’t like this. She should not have been alone. Not on Christmas Eve.
She shrugs again. “Didn’t work out with Lucas. We’re at… different stages. We want different things.” She answers the question I do not want to ask. “I let him down easy two days ago.”
At least she’s the one who broke it off.
“And you didn’t tell me because…?”
A long silence. “Did you snag that boy you wanted to snag? What was his name?”
“Sebastian—you know full well his name’s Sebastian—and don’t try to change the subject.”
“I’m not changing the subject. You wanted to know why I didn’t tell you? Because you wouldn’t have gone to that party. And I can tell you did snag that Sebastian boy. Like he had any chance at all. You used protection, right?”
“Mom!” I slap her arm. “I did not sleep with him! We kissed! That’s all! And you’re damn right I wouldn’t have gone to that stupid party if I knew you’d be spending Christmas Eve here all alone moping over reruns.”
“First off, watch your language. Second I wasn’t moping. I was just hanging out and watching some good television.”
“And getting drunk.”
“Not drunk. Buzzed, maybe. Celebrating my new-found freedom.”
“I should have been here with you.”
“Not your call to make. You’ve been talking about that party for the past two weeks. That party, and that Sebastian. I wasn’t going to take that away from you because I’m too picky about my male companions.”
“Well, that wasn’t your call to make either.”
She shrugs. “Next time, we’ll use the eight ball, okay? I wanted my only daughter happy. I won’t be convinced that it’s a bad thing. And don’t worry, I’m fine. Beside, a bit of sadness isn’t bad once in a while. It’s inspiring.” She nods towards a sketchbook on the coffee table. “I got a few ideas for the Spring Expo.”
“You know I don’t like that self-sacrificing crap.”
“It’s romantic,” mom said with a small smile.
“No it’s not. That’s also sentimental.”
“Not the ending you’d have written?”
“Definitely not.” I lean back against her, close my eyes. “Let’s see. You’ve have gone to a club, one that throws a big Christmas bash with gaudy costumes and you’d have been wearing one of those super sexy Mrs. Claus costumes and you’d have met a nice man dressed as an elf or a reindeer and you’d have laughed and chatted the whole night and he would have loved the fact that you’re an artist and he would have asked you all sorts of questions about it and he would not even have been bored when you told him how cubism was such a revelation to the world and how Dali didn’t know what he was talking about it and it wouldn’t have been until you crawled back here that you would have even noticed that you still didn’t know anything about him since he only wanted to talk about you and how wonderful and talented you were and all you knew was that he was kind and warm and loving and also a hunk in that nondescript and subtle way and that he had slipped you his phone number before putting you in a cab while still gallantly staring one last time at your legs to let you know that he found you sexy as hell but that he was too gentlemanly to take advantage of you then but that he hoped you would want to sleep with him even though he was not twenty any more and didn’t model for artists in the region.”
Mom is silent for a long while. “Who’s sentimental now?” she asked in a voice that was choked up a little bit.
I choose not to answer, and she hugs me tight. I sink into that hug as if I were a kid again.
On the television screen, Michael J. Fox was lamenting having missed Tracy Pollan at the train station, not knowing she was in the restrooms.
“So how was Sebastian?” Mom asks, and I can detect a smile in her voice, and it sounds like a genuine smile, and it’s not until much later than I realize how wonderful it made me feel to know that I pulled her out of her melancholy mood.
“He’s a great kisser,” I reply after some hesitation.
“That’s good to hear. A man with a good tongue is a prize to be cherished.”
“Mom!” I blush as I pick up her double-entendre, which I know is fully intended. She gets raunchy when she’s had wine.
“Did you really not sleep with him?”
“Mom! What do you think I am? Some sort of slut?”
“No. A sixteen-year old girl with a raging libido, a young healthy body, and a dress tight enough to make any hetero boy drool.”
“You chose that dress for me!”
“Because it fits you like a goddess. What’s wrong with that Sebastian boy anyway?”
“What?”
“If he didn’t want to screw you, something’s wrong with him.”
“Mom!” I don’t know if she’s pulling my leg. It’s hard to tell with her sometimes.
“I’m just saying…”
A long silence again. On the television screen, Fox and Pollan have resolved their differences, and they kiss, in the train station.
“He did want to,” I admit, my voice soft. “Screw me, I mean.”
“Oh? He told you?”
“I felt it—him. When I was on his lap.”
“While you were kissing?”
“Yeah.”
“How did it feel?” It wasn’t a prying question. There is genuine curiosity in her voice. And love.
“Good. Felt very good. And scary. Like… like things are just on the verge of veering out of control but you don’t really mind.”
“Yeah, love feels that way.”
I’m not sure it’s love, but I’m also not sure she’s talking about me either.
“You sleepy?” she asks as the show ends.
“Not really.”
“Feel like making some pancakes and some eggnog and watch something else?”
“It’s three in the morning.”
“So? You got anywhere you need to be tomorrow morning?”
“No…” I guess the IHOP date is canceled.
“Well then. You’re the one who didn’t want to leave your poor old lonely mother alone on Christmas Eve.”
I make a stab-to-the-heart motion. “Fine,” I say, as I stand up and offer her a hand. “One condition though.”
“Oh?”
“We watch some Buffy next.”
Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 2)
(Christmas 2007)
It’s way past two in the morning when Laura drops me off at home. It was a kind thing for her to do—my house is out of the way, out of town, isolated. And December snow in this part of Maine can get pretty treacherous. But Laura’s a good driver, and I had no other way to get home because cabs are few and far between at this time of the night and they hate coming so far out.
Laura didn’t drink at the party. She’s sixteen, she loves to have fun, but she’s also the most responsible girl I know. It’s a weird mix, but one I’m grateful for. I tried to be as good as she was, and only had two shots the whole evening. Then I nursed a piña colada for much of the night. That’s the trick, it seems: if you’re holding a glass, people don’t bug you to get something else. Especially if they’re pretty hammered themselves.
My name is Jennifer Hansen, and it’s Christmas Eve—well, by now, it’s really Christmas Day—and I’m coming back home after what I consider a very successful party, my first real one. It was a Christmas party, though everyone made it a point to avoid calling it that explicitly. Christmas parties are dorky, of course, the sort of things kids like, or parents who work in an office and whine about everything and everyone while they figure out what to get for “their fucking Yankee swap.” (Direct quote from Laura’s mother, I swear. The woman is a hoot and a half.)
It was a glorious party. Lots of fun folks from school—the good crowd, the fun crowd, the almost-but-not-quite popular crowd—were there. And Sebastian was there. Sebastian, nearly six and a half feet tall and skinny as a bone, and smart and funny and a boy that maybe just maybe might like me. And a hell of a kisser, too, I discovered. I blush as I think back to the half hour we spent with me sitting on his lap in the lounge chair, and my blush is half from the memory and half from the biting cold.
Behind me, Laura honks as she navigates my driveway and heads back to her own place.
I go inside. Winter jacket off, boots off, and I’m back in my knit black dress Mom convinced me to wear if I really “wanted to snag that boy I wanted” even though I’m not used to wearing stuff that isn’t denim. I did put on pantyhose though—not only because of the cold, but also because I couldn’t make it too easy for those pesky boys and their wandering hands. Not that it kept Sebastian away, of course.
There’s that heat again that spreads throughout my body at the memory of Sebastian’s hands on me, sliding up my sensitive thighs as I sat on his lap in that lounge chair, kissing softly, my skin on fire. Laura teased me that I was acting like a slut—she’s one to talk. She lost her virginity two years ago, doing it with her brother’s best friend while vacationing. She said it was good but not great. That her dildo felt much better. She’s been fucking around ever since though, and none the worse for wear. The only thing she doesn’t do is oral; she says that taking a boy’s dick in your mouth is one of the most intimate things you can do, because it’s a gift, done purely for the boy’s pleasure.
I’m in no rush myself. Still a virgin at sixteen. I like my fingers a lot, too. But that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy a boy’s hands on me. Sebastian’s hands. I can’t help but imagine what it’ll feel like when I lie down in my bed later on—that bed with the nice winter flannel sheets, the kind that warm up in no time—when I slide my hand into the waistband of my pajamas, on my fuzzy little peach, finding it all wet with anticipation, picturing Sebastian’s hand in its place, tickling me, rubbing me, fucking me. I’m going to come so easily that I’m practically shaking already.
Maybe I won’t even put on my pajamas. Maybe I’ll just lie on the bed in my dress, and pull it about and slide my hand beneath my pantyhose and imagine I’m still at the party, with Sebastian taking liberties with me, touching me—oh yes, that’ll do it.
That’s when I notice that the television is on in the living room, the sound a simple murmur in the background. Peeking around the corner, I see the shadows it casts on the hallway wall.
I shake my head. For once, I’ll be able to reprimand Mom about leaving the television on. I’m usually the culprit. Not that it’s really my fault—it’s just so much part of the background sometimes, just white noise, that I forget it’s even on. Then again, maybe I’m the one who left it on this time as well. Maybe it’s been on all night, entertaining the Christmas tree and the elves.
My mom’s gone off to her own Christmas party, with her new boyfriend, Luke or Luca or something like that. Nice guy. Body of a Greek god, the kind that artists like my mother die to get a chance to sculpt or paint. Which is how Mom met him: posing for one of her sculpture classes at the local community college.
We went our separate way her and I this Christmas Eve. First time ever. She was stressed about it. I admit, it felt weird, but also exciting. A bit of an adventure. A big step into the world of—let me say it—adulthood. That we both had parties to get to was the excuse: me with my friends, her with an overnighter at Luke/Luca’s place with some of his friends. My party was also supposed to be an overnighter, but to be honest, I was getting pretty tired of it by the end, and the gang seemed ready to go on for several more hours. So when Laura told me she had to go, I hitched a ride.
Mom and I are supposed to meet at IHOP tomorrow morning for a late breakfast. Luke/Luca knows the owner, and we can beat the predictable line.
I’m fantasizing about what sort of pancakes I’m going to have as I go in to shut the television.
“Hi sweetie. How was your party?”
I nearly jump out of my skin! In the dark, on the couch, barely illuminated by the glow of the screen, is my mom—a glass of wine in her hand, her feet up on the coffee table. She’s in her dressing gown.
“Mom! Jesus! You scared the shit out of me!”
“Language, young lady.”
“Well, excuse me, but you just gave me a heart attack—that should cut me just a tiny bit of slack!”
She shrugs. “Sorry. I thought you heard the TV.”
I look at her, taking in the scene. I can’t tell you how I know, but she’s been here all evening, I can tell. She didn’t go out. No party for Mom.
I drop down on the couch beside her. On the large television screen, our one decadent luxury, almost larger than life, I spot Michael J. Fox in his old eighties sitcom, Family Ties. I know it well, somewhat unfortunately, because it’s one of my mom’s favorite series. That, and Golden Girls. She has all the DVDs, some in duplicate. I prefer Fox in Spin City myself.
Mom only goes through a Family Ties binge for one reason.
“How was the party?” she asks.
“Party was good.” I snuggle up next to her and she accepts me because she’s my mom and she’ll always accept me that way and there’s never been any question about it. I have to remind myself regularly not to take it for granted. “Kick-ass beer pong tournament.”
She turns her eyes on me, trying to gauge how much I drank. I grin after a long pause. “Don’t worry. I watched a Terminator marathon with Laura and folks in the living room.”
“All three? Or is it four now?”
“I dropped off after the second.”
Mom nods knowingly. “Second was the best.” She takes a sip of her wine. White. Sparkling. Our New Year’s Eve bottle, I’m guessing. Shit.
“Oh yeah,” I second. “That music…” On cue, we both thump the theme from Terminator 2, that industrial drum beat that sticks in your head like nothing else. Then we chuckle. I snuggle up closer.
On the television screen, Michael J. Fox is having an argument with what will turn out to be his first girl on the show, Tracy Pollan. I’ve always preferred the other one, the brunette, Courtney Cox, pre-Friends. I’ve always thought she was prettier. And smart. Probably because I’m a brunette myself, and not too dumb.
“That’s the episode where they get together, right? They go to this school dance and they kiss and she runs away and then she’s catching a train to go and marry her boyfriend and Alex drives all night to catch her before her train arrives to tell her that he loves her?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
“Super hokey. Like gag-me hokey. I mean, come on!”
“My daughter the romantic.”
“That’s not romantic, it’s… sentimental. At best. And cheaply so, too. I mean, at least have him jump on the train that’s just leaving only to discover that she stayed at the station hoping he would come by and stop her and poof, you’ve got room for a lot more development. This is… too easy.”
“Sometimes easy is good.”
“But it doesn’t make for satisfying storytelling.”
“My daughter the critic.”
“Hey, if you didn’t want a smart daughter, you shouldn’t have raised me as one.”
“I didn’t do anything but try to hang on tight as you became wonderful all by yourself.” There is something in her voice, and I don’t say a thing as I stay there against her.
We are silent for a while. On the screen, Michael J. Fox is at the college party—which looks so much dorkier than the one I’ve just come back from it’s actually pretty funny—looking forlorn. That haunting song is playing in the background—What did you think I would do at this moment? I love that song. It’s also fucking sentimental. But I don’t care. Just don’t tell my mom. She’d never let me live it down.
We listen to the song. At least I do. I don’t know what my mom is thinking, but I listen to her heartbeat.
Tracy Pollan runs away. The song ends.
“Mom, what happened?” My voice is low, and I wonder if she even heard me. Then I feel the shrug more than I hear her words.
“Nothing.”
“Mom, you spent Christmas Eve by yourself.” It was not a question.
“I wasn’t by myself, I had the Keatons.” The Keatons. That ideal through-thick-and-thin family. My mom’s an incredibly well-adjusted divorced woman who’s not looking for a long-term partner because she thinks all men are fundamentally scum, except when she’s down, and then she likes to compare her life to idealized Hollywood versions. A recipe for disaster, that.
“Mom?” My voice gets harder. I don’t like this. She should not have been alone. Not on Christmas Eve.
She shrugs again. “Didn’t work out with Lucas. We’re at… different stages. We want different things.” She answers the question I do not want to ask. “I let him down easy two days ago.”
At least she’s the one who broke it off.
“And you didn’t tell me because…?”
A long silence. “Did you snag that boy you wanted to snag? What was his name?”
“Sebastian—you know full well his name’s Sebastian—and don’t try to change the subject.”
“I’m not changing the subject. You wanted to know why I didn’t tell you? Because you wouldn’t have gone to that party. And I can tell you did snag that Sebastian boy. Like he had any chance at all. You used protection, right?”
“Mom!” I slap her arm. “I did not sleep with him! We kissed! That’s all! And you’re damn right I wouldn’t have gone to that stupid party if I knew you’d be spending Christmas Eve here all alone moping over reruns.”
“First off, watch your language. Second I wasn’t moping. I was just hanging out and watching some good television.”
“And getting drunk.”
“Not drunk. Buzzed, maybe. Celebrating my new-found freedom.”
“I should have been here with you.”
“Not your call to make. You’ve been talking about that party for the past two weeks. That party, and that Sebastian. I wasn’t going to take that away from you because I’m too picky about my male companions.”
“Well, that wasn’t your call to make either.”
She shrugs. “Next time, we’ll use the eight ball, okay? I wanted my only daughter happy. I won’t be convinced that it’s a bad thing. And don’t worry, I’m fine. Beside, a bit of sadness isn’t bad once in a while. It’s inspiring.” She nods towards a sketchbook on the coffee table. “I got a few ideas for the Spring Expo.”
“You know I don’t like that self-sacrificing crap.”
“It’s romantic,” mom said with a small smile.
“No it’s not. That’s also sentimental.”
“Not the ending you’d have written?”
“Definitely not.” I lean back against her, close my eyes. “Let’s see. You’ve have gone to a club, one that throws a big Christmas bash with gaudy costumes and you’d have been wearing one of those super sexy Mrs. Claus costumes and you’d have met a nice man dressed as an elf or a reindeer and you’d have laughed and chatted the whole night and he would have loved the fact that you’re an artist and he would have asked you all sorts of questions about it and he would not even have been bored when you told him how cubism was such a revelation to the world and how Dali didn’t know what he was talking about it and it wouldn’t have been until you crawled back here that you would have even noticed that you still didn’t know anything about him since he only wanted to talk about you and how wonderful and talented you were and all you knew was that he was kind and warm and loving and also a hunk in that nondescript and subtle way and that he had slipped you his phone number before putting you in a cab while still gallantly staring one last time at your legs to let you know that he found you sexy as hell but that he was too gentlemanly to take advantage of you then but that he hoped you would want to sleep with him even though he was not twenty any more and didn’t model for artists in the region.”
Mom is silent for a long while. “Who’s sentimental now?” she asked in a voice that was choked up a little bit.
I choose not to answer, and she hugs me tight. I sink into that hug as if I were a kid again.
On the television screen, Michael J. Fox was lamenting having missed Tracy Pollan at the train station, not knowing she was in the restrooms.
“So how was Sebastian?” Mom asks, and I can detect a smile in her voice, and it sounds like a genuine smile, and it’s not until much later than I realize how wonderful it made me feel to know that I pulled her out of her melancholy mood.
“He’s a great kisser,” I reply after some hesitation.
“That’s good to hear. A man with a good tongue is a prize to be cherished.”
“Mom!” I blush as I pick up her double-entendre, which I know is fully intended. She gets raunchy when she’s had wine.
“Did you really not sleep with him?”
“Mom! What do you think I am? Some sort of slut?”
“No. A sixteen-year old girl with a raging libido, a young healthy body, and a dress tight enough to make any hetero boy drool.”
“You chose that dress for me!”
“Because it fits you like a goddess. What’s wrong with that Sebastian boy anyway?”
“What?”
“If he didn’t want to screw you, something’s wrong with him.”
“Mom!” I don’t know if she’s pulling my leg. It’s hard to tell with her sometimes.
“I’m just saying…”
A long silence again. On the television screen, Fox and Pollan have resolved their differences, and they kiss, in the train station.
“He did want to,” I admit, my voice soft. “Screw me, I mean.”
“Oh? He told you?”
“I felt it—him. When I was on his lap.”
“While you were kissing?”
“Yeah.”
“How did it feel?” It wasn’t a prying question. There is genuine curiosity in her voice. And love.
“Good. Felt very good. And scary. Like… like things are just on the verge of veering out of control but you don’t really mind.”
“Yeah, love feels that way.”
I’m not sure it’s love, but I’m also not sure she’s talking about me either.
“You sleepy?” she asks as the show ends.
“Not really.”
“Feel like making some pancakes and some eggnog and watch something else?”
“It’s three in the morning.”
“So? You got anywhere you need to be tomorrow morning?”
“No…” I guess the IHOP date is canceled.
“Well then. You’re the one who didn’t want to leave your poor old lonely mother alone on Christmas Eve.”
I make a stab-to-the-heart motion. “Fine,” I say, as I stand up and offer her a hand. “One condition though.”
“Oh?”
“We watch some Buffy next.”
Thursday, December 25, 2014
New Story: Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 1)
Merry Christmas to all of you that celebrate it, and Happy Holidays to everyone else.
I have a The Adjusters Christmas Special for you this year. Three parts, pushed out over the next few days. Starting tonight. Enjoy.
Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 1)
(Christmas 2002)
Daniel Malcolm, all of twelve years old, was watching television, waiting for his mother to finish getting ready.
They were going to the family Christmas Eve at Aunt Selma’s, and he was ambivalent about it.
He liked his Aunt Selma, he liked his cousins, he liked opening gifts. He liked Christmas, because he was a kid, and every kid likes Christmas.
But Christmas also reminded him of his father, who had loved the Holiday season, and anything that reminded him of his father made him sad.
Not sad in a cry-your-eyes-out way, but that sadness that hooked in the pit of one’s stomach and shifted everything from colorful to gray.
The television was set on a channel running through old seventies and eighties sitcoms—there was nothing else playing on Christmas Eve but that and Christmas specials, the good old ones and the weird new ones.
In the corner of the living room stood the Christmas tree, heavy with the familiar decorations that he always remembered. This year, Gerald and his son Sam had helped put them up. It was a natural tree, and its fir smell permeated the room, making it impossible to ignore.
He could hear his mother moving about in the bathroom, and Gerald in the kitchen arguing with his son about something that Daniel cared nothing about.
The television was showing an old sitcom from the eighties, Family Ties. Daniel enjoyed it. He had caught a few episodes already, and while a lot of it went over his head—they kept talking about old stuff he knew nothing about—who was Reagan—he understood the bickering between the sibling and the love between the parents and everyone. He watched it rapturously.
He tried not to think about Gerald in the kitchen. Gerald was his mother’s boyfriend. They had met earlier that year at the hospital where his mother worked. He was also a doctor, though not a surgeon like his mother. He was old, he was a dad, and he was divorced. Which meant that his wife had left him. Or that he had left his wife. Daniel was not sure, and he did not want to ask. His son, Sam, was younger than Daniel, and a complete brat.
On the television, the brother in the family, Alex, was hanging out at his school with a pretty blonde girl, and they were doing grown up stuff. It was not as interesting as usual—he preferred the episodes where Alex and his sister argued. Those were funny.
He suppresses a groan when Sam, small, bushy dark hair, thick glasses on his nose, stomped into the room and jumped on the couch next to Daniel. “What’cha watchin’?”
“Just a show.”
“Looks old.”
“It is.”
Sam fidgeted for a few minutes, while on the screen the brother Alex was hanging out with his new blonde friend. She was pretty, Daniel observed the more he looked at her. Long blonde hair, a friendly smile. He had just started to notice that girls were, well, maybe slightly more interesting than they had been before.
“I’d bone her,” Sam said suddenly, and Daniel was astonished. He was not entirely sure what boning was, but it had to do with sex, he knew, and he was pretty sure that Sam had no idea what he was saying.
“What?”
“The girl. I’d bone her.”
“What are you talking about?”
Sam was bouncing in place, the hyperactive little runt.
“It’s what my dad does to your mom. He bones her. That’s what Frankie says at school.”
“Does not!”
“Does too! She’s a slut, Frankie says. That’s what you do to sluts, you bone them.”
Even though Sam was four years younger than he was, Daniel wanted to punch him. “That’s not true! Take it back!”
He hated how whiny he sounded. He was older than Sam, more mature. Who cared what a little boy barely out of diapers said? “You don’t know nothing. You’re a stupid kid.”
“Slut! Slut! Slut! Boning the slut!” Sam was bouncing on the couch. On the television screen, Alex and the pretty girl were talking.
Daniel reached over and wrapped his arm around Sam’s neck and pulled him down. “Stop it!”
They wrestled for a while, Daniel older and stronger, Sam younger but without any restraint. They fell from the couch, Daniel never letting go, both of them missing the coffee table on their way down. Daniel flipped Sam around and pressed him down against the floor, resisting the impulse to rub his face against the rug. “Take it back!”
“BOYS!” Gerald irrupted into the living room. “Cut it out! Please!”
Daniel let Sam go, and the younger boy crawled away, tears in his eyes. “He started it, dad!” Sam started crying, rubbing his arm and his face.
Daniel grunted, and pressed his back against the couch, staring at the television. On the screen, Alex was at a party, at his school or something.
“Go get cleaned up, Sam,” Gerald said.
“But daaaad…”
“Now.”
Sam stomped off. Gerald watched him go, then stood for a moment before dropping down on the couch. Daniel was still on the ground, stubbornly watching the television set. Alex was talking to the pretty blonde again, at the party.
“I’m sorry about Sam, Daniel,” said Gerald after a while. He always called him Daniel, the way he wanted to be called. Only his father had the right to call him Dan. And he never would again.
Gerald sighed, and from the corner of his eye, Daniel could see that the older man looked tired, for a moment. “Hey, Family Ties,” he said. “I used to love that show. There’s that bit, where Alex completes a thought by… what’s her name? Mallory? She goes ‘It’s like that little voice in my head that says…’ — ‘Man, you can see for miles from here.’ Gets me every time.” He laughed softly to himself. “Pure comedic timing. The guy’s a genius.”
There was a longer pause. “I’m sorry about what Sam said.”
“It’s okay,” Daniel responded quietly.
“No it’s not. But I appreciate your patience with him. And he deserved what he got.” A pause, as they watched the television. Alex and the blonde girl were dancing, and there was music playing in the background, the kind of music that his mother liked, the kind that sometimes put sadness in her eyes.
“He thinks he can get away with stuff. And maybe I’m too soft on him. He thinks I don’t notice, or maybe he does. I don’t know. I’ll talk to him. I’ll make it better. I promise.”
Daniel had no response. He did not care—though at the same time, he did.
Gerald kept talking, his eyes on the television along with Daniel’s. “I can only imagine how hard it is for you, with me and Sam here. I don’t know how to say this. I’m not good at talking about this sort of stuff. But I’m not here to replace your dad, Daniel. And I don’t want to. It’s like no one can replace Shelley.”
On the television screen, Alex and the pretty blonde were kissing, and it made Daniel feel all weird inside.
“And I can’t replace your dad for your mother either, Daniel. I want you to know that. I’m not taking his place.”
Aren’t you? thought Daniel, but he said nothing.
“True love is marvelous,” Gerald continued after watching the screen, as the blonde girl left. Alex looked upset. Daniel did not know why. He had lost the thread of the story. “When you have that, nothing else really matters.”
The way he said it made Daniel pause.
“Do you love her?” he said finally. Whether Gerald expected the question or not, he seemed to take it seriously.
“Your mother is a good woman, Daniel. And I care an awful lot about her. And I think—no, I know—I can do good by her. And I think she can do good by me. But it’s not going to be easy. For any of us. But I’m willing to make an effort. I’m willing to meet you halfway, if you’re on board.”
Daniel remained silent, watching the credits of the show. And listening to Gerald.
“I miss having a family, Daniel. Miss it an awful lot. And I’m hoping you guys are too.” His voice trailed off.
“You’re not going to replace him,” Daniel said in a low voice.
“I couldn’t even if I wanted to. And I don’t want to. I’m my own person. I’ll screw up in wholly distinct ways, believe me.”
“What are you two plotting?” Daniel’s mother stepped into the arch of the living room, decked in a beautiful dress that Daniel had never seen before. And he knew—without understanding how he knew—that she had worn it for Gerald.
“Gosh, you look beautiful,” said Gerald, and his voice conveyed admiration and—yes, love. And Daniel saw the smile light up his mother’s face, as Gerald stood to go and hug her.
Daniel felt that ambivalence again, wanting to like Gerald but hating him at the same time, and he wondered what his dad—his real dad, the only dad he ever wanted—would have thought about all of this were he still alive, how he would have reacted.
And as he watched his mother and Gerald hug and kiss, he knew. As his mother looked at Daniel with a tentative smile on her face, her eyes almost expectant, waiting for a reaction from him, he knew exactly what his dad would have said.
She’s happy. How bad can it be?
And if his mom was happy, who was he to destroy her world? He smiled at her, and her own smile beamed back at him with the strength of all the Christmas stars.
And in the living room of their house, there was a moment of happiness. A moment where Christmas for the first time in a long time felt like Christmas.
For a moment, Daniel’s world was whole.
Which did not make him miss his future stepbrother miming an obscene gesture looking at his mom and Gerald. For a moment, Daniel was happy. His revenge on the little runt would wait.
I have a The Adjusters Christmas Special for you this year. Three parts, pushed out over the next few days. Starting tonight. Enjoy.
Ghosts of Christmas Past (Part 1)
(Christmas 2002)
Daniel Malcolm, all of twelve years old, was watching television, waiting for his mother to finish getting ready.
They were going to the family Christmas Eve at Aunt Selma’s, and he was ambivalent about it.
He liked his Aunt Selma, he liked his cousins, he liked opening gifts. He liked Christmas, because he was a kid, and every kid likes Christmas.
But Christmas also reminded him of his father, who had loved the Holiday season, and anything that reminded him of his father made him sad.
Not sad in a cry-your-eyes-out way, but that sadness that hooked in the pit of one’s stomach and shifted everything from colorful to gray.
The television was set on a channel running through old seventies and eighties sitcoms—there was nothing else playing on Christmas Eve but that and Christmas specials, the good old ones and the weird new ones.
In the corner of the living room stood the Christmas tree, heavy with the familiar decorations that he always remembered. This year, Gerald and his son Sam had helped put them up. It was a natural tree, and its fir smell permeated the room, making it impossible to ignore.
He could hear his mother moving about in the bathroom, and Gerald in the kitchen arguing with his son about something that Daniel cared nothing about.
The television was showing an old sitcom from the eighties, Family Ties. Daniel enjoyed it. He had caught a few episodes already, and while a lot of it went over his head—they kept talking about old stuff he knew nothing about—who was Reagan—he understood the bickering between the sibling and the love between the parents and everyone. He watched it rapturously.
He tried not to think about Gerald in the kitchen. Gerald was his mother’s boyfriend. They had met earlier that year at the hospital where his mother worked. He was also a doctor, though not a surgeon like his mother. He was old, he was a dad, and he was divorced. Which meant that his wife had left him. Or that he had left his wife. Daniel was not sure, and he did not want to ask. His son, Sam, was younger than Daniel, and a complete brat.
On the television, the brother in the family, Alex, was hanging out at his school with a pretty blonde girl, and they were doing grown up stuff. It was not as interesting as usual—he preferred the episodes where Alex and his sister argued. Those were funny.
He suppresses a groan when Sam, small, bushy dark hair, thick glasses on his nose, stomped into the room and jumped on the couch next to Daniel. “What’cha watchin’?”
“Just a show.”
“Looks old.”
“It is.”
Sam fidgeted for a few minutes, while on the screen the brother Alex was hanging out with his new blonde friend. She was pretty, Daniel observed the more he looked at her. Long blonde hair, a friendly smile. He had just started to notice that girls were, well, maybe slightly more interesting than they had been before.
“I’d bone her,” Sam said suddenly, and Daniel was astonished. He was not entirely sure what boning was, but it had to do with sex, he knew, and he was pretty sure that Sam had no idea what he was saying.
“What?”
“The girl. I’d bone her.”
“What are you talking about?”
Sam was bouncing in place, the hyperactive little runt.
“It’s what my dad does to your mom. He bones her. That’s what Frankie says at school.”
“Does not!”
“Does too! She’s a slut, Frankie says. That’s what you do to sluts, you bone them.”
Even though Sam was four years younger than he was, Daniel wanted to punch him. “That’s not true! Take it back!”
He hated how whiny he sounded. He was older than Sam, more mature. Who cared what a little boy barely out of diapers said? “You don’t know nothing. You’re a stupid kid.”
“Slut! Slut! Slut! Boning the slut!” Sam was bouncing on the couch. On the television screen, Alex and the pretty girl were talking.
Daniel reached over and wrapped his arm around Sam’s neck and pulled him down. “Stop it!”
They wrestled for a while, Daniel older and stronger, Sam younger but without any restraint. They fell from the couch, Daniel never letting go, both of them missing the coffee table on their way down. Daniel flipped Sam around and pressed him down against the floor, resisting the impulse to rub his face against the rug. “Take it back!”
“BOYS!” Gerald irrupted into the living room. “Cut it out! Please!”
Daniel let Sam go, and the younger boy crawled away, tears in his eyes. “He started it, dad!” Sam started crying, rubbing his arm and his face.
Daniel grunted, and pressed his back against the couch, staring at the television. On the screen, Alex was at a party, at his school or something.
“Go get cleaned up, Sam,” Gerald said.
“But daaaad…”
“Now.”
Sam stomped off. Gerald watched him go, then stood for a moment before dropping down on the couch. Daniel was still on the ground, stubbornly watching the television set. Alex was talking to the pretty blonde again, at the party.
“I’m sorry about Sam, Daniel,” said Gerald after a while. He always called him Daniel, the way he wanted to be called. Only his father had the right to call him Dan. And he never would again.
Gerald sighed, and from the corner of his eye, Daniel could see that the older man looked tired, for a moment. “Hey, Family Ties,” he said. “I used to love that show. There’s that bit, where Alex completes a thought by… what’s her name? Mallory? She goes ‘It’s like that little voice in my head that says…’ — ‘Man, you can see for miles from here.’ Gets me every time.” He laughed softly to himself. “Pure comedic timing. The guy’s a genius.”
There was a longer pause. “I’m sorry about what Sam said.”
“It’s okay,” Daniel responded quietly.
“No it’s not. But I appreciate your patience with him. And he deserved what he got.” A pause, as they watched the television. Alex and the blonde girl were dancing, and there was music playing in the background, the kind of music that his mother liked, the kind that sometimes put sadness in her eyes.
“He thinks he can get away with stuff. And maybe I’m too soft on him. He thinks I don’t notice, or maybe he does. I don’t know. I’ll talk to him. I’ll make it better. I promise.”
Daniel had no response. He did not care—though at the same time, he did.
Gerald kept talking, his eyes on the television along with Daniel’s. “I can only imagine how hard it is for you, with me and Sam here. I don’t know how to say this. I’m not good at talking about this sort of stuff. But I’m not here to replace your dad, Daniel. And I don’t want to. It’s like no one can replace Shelley.”
On the television screen, Alex and the pretty blonde were kissing, and it made Daniel feel all weird inside.
“And I can’t replace your dad for your mother either, Daniel. I want you to know that. I’m not taking his place.”
Aren’t you? thought Daniel, but he said nothing.
“True love is marvelous,” Gerald continued after watching the screen, as the blonde girl left. Alex looked upset. Daniel did not know why. He had lost the thread of the story. “When you have that, nothing else really matters.”
The way he said it made Daniel pause.
“Do you love her?” he said finally. Whether Gerald expected the question or not, he seemed to take it seriously.
“Your mother is a good woman, Daniel. And I care an awful lot about her. And I think—no, I know—I can do good by her. And I think she can do good by me. But it’s not going to be easy. For any of us. But I’m willing to make an effort. I’m willing to meet you halfway, if you’re on board.”
Daniel remained silent, watching the credits of the show. And listening to Gerald.
“I miss having a family, Daniel. Miss it an awful lot. And I’m hoping you guys are too.” His voice trailed off.
“You’re not going to replace him,” Daniel said in a low voice.
“I couldn’t even if I wanted to. And I don’t want to. I’m my own person. I’ll screw up in wholly distinct ways, believe me.”
“What are you two plotting?” Daniel’s mother stepped into the arch of the living room, decked in a beautiful dress that Daniel had never seen before. And he knew—without understanding how he knew—that she had worn it for Gerald.
“Gosh, you look beautiful,” said Gerald, and his voice conveyed admiration and—yes, love. And Daniel saw the smile light up his mother’s face, as Gerald stood to go and hug her.
Daniel felt that ambivalence again, wanting to like Gerald but hating him at the same time, and he wondered what his dad—his real dad, the only dad he ever wanted—would have thought about all of this were he still alive, how he would have reacted.
And as he watched his mother and Gerald hug and kiss, he knew. As his mother looked at Daniel with a tentative smile on her face, her eyes almost expectant, waiting for a reaction from him, he knew exactly what his dad would have said.
She’s happy. How bad can it be?
And if his mom was happy, who was he to destroy her world? He smiled at her, and her own smile beamed back at him with the strength of all the Christmas stars.
And in the living room of their house, there was a moment of happiness. A moment where Christmas for the first time in a long time felt like Christmas.
For a moment, Daniel’s world was whole.
Which did not make him miss his future stepbrother miming an obscene gesture looking at his mom and Gerald. For a moment, Daniel was happy. His revenge on the little runt would wait.
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Interactive Smut
Writing Journal: Still progressing on The Adjusters #57. The Holidays will give me enough time to finish it off, hopefully.
A few links that I've been meaning to share with you all.
A TADS3 game by Lost Trout, Office Harassment: “Your co-worker Heather is so kind-hearted and meek that everyone takes advantage of her. You want to protect her, but maybe you are the one she needs to be protected from.” You can find interpreters here. The story reminds me very much of In The News, one of my favorite Pamela stories.
A Twine game that was posted in the 2014 AIF Minicomp, also by Lost Trout: Amy the Slut. Can you help Lance score with Amy? To do that, you'll need to break her. Very sparse, but effective, at least on an intellectual level. It helps if you have the imagination to fill in the blanks.
There's another game that I've greatly enjoyed, by GoblinBoy, called Tesliss Equation, which you can find here. You're in high school, and you get up to rather wacky adventures. The game is definitely not what it seems, and exceedingly well done narratively.
A few links that I've been meaning to share with you all.
A TADS3 game by Lost Trout, Office Harassment: “Your co-worker Heather is so kind-hearted and meek that everyone takes advantage of her. You want to protect her, but maybe you are the one she needs to be protected from.” You can find interpreters here. The story reminds me very much of In The News, one of my favorite Pamela stories.
A Twine game that was posted in the 2014 AIF Minicomp, also by Lost Trout: Amy the Slut. Can you help Lance score with Amy? To do that, you'll need to break her. Very sparse, but effective, at least on an intellectual level. It helps if you have the imagination to fill in the blanks.
There's another game that I've greatly enjoyed, by GoblinBoy, called Tesliss Equation, which you can find here. You're in high school, and you get up to rather wacky adventures. The game is definitely not what it seems, and exceedingly well done narratively.
Sunday, December 14, 2014
Still Alive
Writing Journal: Plugging away on The Adjusters #57. Turns out to be a difficult one to write, even though there isn't much to plot. Four scenes, all pretty straightforward. I probably just haven't got a good handle on the character yet.
I haven't been hanging out here much. I'm sorry about that. But I figure that between hanging out and being social, and getting writing done, you all prefer me doing the latter.
I'm completely disorganized lately. Too much to do. So instead of crafting nice well thought-out posts (ha!) I'll just be offloading some of the stuff I've been meaning to post without worrying too much about format.
So let me start by pointing out that SelectaCorp has been posting some new stuff: not only is the Kimberly story line done, but the lastest, Arcana 37 (screenshots) is pretty sweet.
Oh, and watch Marina Jamieson in Mine. Pretty submission done right.
I haven't been hanging out here much. I'm sorry about that. But I figure that between hanging out and being social, and getting writing done, you all prefer me doing the latter.
I'm completely disorganized lately. Too much to do. So instead of crafting nice well thought-out posts (ha!) I'll just be offloading some of the stuff I've been meaning to post without worrying too much about format.
So let me start by pointing out that SelectaCorp has been posting some new stuff: not only is the Kimberly story line done, but the lastest, Arcana 37 (screenshots) is pretty sweet.
Oh, and watch Marina Jamieson in Mine. Pretty submission done right.
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