Just Another Christmas Story

It’s Christmas in 3 days.

The thought disgusts him, maddens him beyond comprehension. All that red and white would flash in his face again. Those utterly idiotic children would come rapping at his door, annoying him to hell and back. Those stupid lights around the city would remain on all night, keeping him up. For obvious and absolutely justified reasons, the lights are the most

devilish things about Christmas.

You know when there’s something you really want to forget and you can’t, because it just keeps jumping up and screaming, “LOSER!” in your face? That’s what the lights do. They are constantly flashing reminders of his most unpleasant memories. The tree isn’t so bad. Without the lights, it is decent enough. In fact, he has one in his

house, which he used to decorate with his.....

Oh, it is bad. VERY, VERY BAD.

He tears the tree apart; the ugly crackers falling to the ground, limp, lifeless, no spark left in them. It is eerie how much they represent his eyes.

And the worst thing...................oh, he dares not say it. Oh no, he wouldn’t...-

“GIFTS!”

A 5-year-old’s shrill scream echoes somewhere in his neighborhood. His fists clench and he grinds his teeth. He seals his eyes shut.

The gifts.....................the pompous, useless, meaningless Christmas gifts. He hates them. He hates the red-gold and chequered gift wraps, he hates the bloody ribbon tied oh so fashionably atop them, he hates what is inside them, he hates those who receive them, those who give them. He hates himself for hating everything in his life. But is it his fault?

Of course. Of course, it is.

“Bad boys never get Christmas presents, Ethan!”

A soft, mellow, lost voice chimes in his ears. It sounds distant and muffled, as if somebody was speaking underwater.

He used to be a good boy, you know. He too used to get Christmas gifts. Loads of them, brought by Santa himself. But something happened then. He stopped getting them 2 years ago. Because that old, wrinkled, bearded oaf Santa decided that he was a bad boy. That he wasn’t good enough. Not for Christmas presents, not for love, not for happiness.

He didn’t just stop getting gifts, he lost most of what he had. Life was all he had left now, and he was NOT a proud possessor of it. All because he was a bad boy. So be it.

The clock ticks. The time is 00:01.

Huh.

It’s Christmas in 2 days.

I hate this. Thinks the orphaned delinquent as he sits in front of the glass window, overlooking

the Christmas lights starting to blink into life all over New York City.