A Vampire's Christmas Carol (6 page)

“Lord, thank you for bringing us all together
again this holy day. Thank you for the gift of your son given to us
on this same day so many years ago. Thank you for the gift of love
and family and food you’ve graced us with and the many other
benefits you’ve given us this year. And, Lord, we remember the one
person who should be here with us this day, but isn’t. We’ll never
forget Michael and can only hope that he is with you in paradise
this day. Amen.”

There was such sadness in Pop’s voice, even
after all these years, it felt like something tearing inside
him.

“Who is Michael?” one of the children
asked.

“He was your uncle, your father’s brother,”
Pop said. “He disappeared on Christmas Eve fifteen years ago and we
don’t know what ever happened to him. No one has heard from
him.”

“Wow! You think he might have decided to run
away or something?”

Pop shook his head. “He was planning to ask
his young lady to marry him. We know he left his boarding house to
go to her home that evening. But he never arrived. We can only
guess he was set on by robbers and they hid his…hid him somewhere.
I suppose we’ll never know now.”

“Cool. A mystery!”

Pop smiled sadly and Michael could almost
read his thoughts. The children had never known him, so they had no
particular interest in or feeling for him. Why should they? They
barely understood death and tragedy yet, and that was as it should
be.

“We’ll grow up to be detectives,” the boy
promised. “And we’ll solve the mystery of what became of him.”

“Yeah,” one of the others chimed in. “Like in
those stories you read to us about Sherlock Holmes.”

* * * * *

“They didn’t, of course,” Michael said. “They
forgot all about it and went on with their lives. I’ve kept half an
eye on them and their descendants all these years. Some of them
still live in the old family place.”

He sighed and shook his head. The motion
continued as a nasty shaking that spread through him and lasted a
couple of minutes before he got control of it.

“I couldn’t stand to think Mom and Pop would
die not knowing anything about me. One night, shortly before Pop
died, I snuck into the house and into his bedroom. My mother was
there with him, sitting beside the bed. I stayed in the shadows in
the room and they thought I was a ghost. I told them I was okay,
that I’d been attacked that night in Atlanta and killed. I let them
think I was a spirit, come to ease Pop’s last hours. I couldn’t
bear for them to know the truth. They’d be horrified. Fortunately,
because I can move so quickly, I was able to come and go without
them realizing I just ran in and out. I didn’t stay long. I don’t
even know if it made them feel better or worse.”

His lips curled in a wry twist. “I’m sure
they’re in heaven, so I guess they know the truth now. I wonder
what they think.”

The clock tolled three o’clock.

Michael shrugged then, and a wry, sad smile
spread across his face. “I guess I’ll find out shortly. Just a few
more hours to dawn.” Another series of tremors shook him, and
flashes of red showed in his eyes. It took him longer to get
control again. He shut his eyes in concentration and kept as still
as he could manage for several long minutes. Finally he drew in a
long breath and opened his eyes again. “I’ve talked enough about
myself and probably depressed you half to death.”

His deep blue eyes held a world of shadows
and trouble when he looked at her, but no hints of red for the
moment. “Help me make it through the rest of this.” His voice shook
just a little. “Distract me. Tell me about your family. Your most
memorable Christmas.”

Carol stared at him for a moment, wondering
if she should go lock herself in the room upstairs. But he wanted
her help. Needed it. She couldn’t find it in her to refuse.

When he asked about memorable Christmases,
one came immediately to mind. She laughed as she recalled it.
“Well, the one I remember best wasn’t exactly your postcard pretty
sort of Christmas. In fact, we call it ‘The Year Christmas Fell
Apart’. “

His lips quirked in a grin. “Did it actually
fall apart? Literally?”

“Pretty much. You have to understand that my
family isn’t your picture postcard sort of family to begin with.
I’m the middle one of three kids. I have a flaky older sister, an
annoyingly brainy younger brother and a pair of eccentric parents.
The year Christmas fell apart was about five years ago. I was in
college at the time, but home for the holidays. By then, my sister
Laura was married and had two small children, a three-year-old
toddler, Matthew, and the baby, Sally. Her husband was in the
military, deployed overseas. She missed him and worried about him,
and sometimes she would lose track of where the toddler was.

“Anyway, some things don’t change much. My
mother bakes up a storm before Christmas too—cookies, sweet breads,
rolls. Unfortunately she’s not very good at it. She’s kind of
forgetful and easily distracted, especially when she’s working on a
project. She’s a game designer—does scripts for video games.
Sometimes she’ll have an idea while she’s got something in the oven
and just goes ‘to jot it down’, and the next thing you know, you
can smell it burning all over the house.

“Anyway, this particular year, Laura’s kids
were all over the place. My mother burned at least three pans of
cookies and cooked a loaf of banana bread so hard it could double
as a paving stone. I tried to help out as much as I could, but I
kind of had my hands full too, since I had to do all my shopping
and wrapping as well—and shopping and wrapping for my dad, since he
won’t venture near a retail place in the month of December. Or just
about any other month either, unless the place sells electric
trains.

“Trains are his hobby, his passion, and
December is when he really puts it on display. Remember when it was
all the rage to set up a train set under the Christmas tree?”

Michael shrugged. “Not really.”

“Well it was,” Carol said. “In the fifties or
sixties, I think. My dad never quit. In fact, his under-the-tree
layouts have gotten bigger and more elaborate each year. It now
takes up almost a third of the living room. So, anyway, the day
before Christmas I go out to do some last-minute shopping, with a
pretty long list for both my dad and myself, plus a couple of
requests from my sister. I’m gone most of the day and get back
right at supper time. I don’t know how to explain to you what it’s
like to go shopping the day before Christmas. Trying to find a
parking place, the crowds, people pushing and shoving to get
things, empty shelves, long, long lines at the checkouts… Anyway, I
was pretty frazzled by the time I got finished.”

A tight smile curled his lips. “I’ve seen
movies. I have some idea.”

“By the time I got back to the house, I
wasn’t in a great mood, but the chaos at the shopping center didn’t
begin to prepare me for what I found at home. I got there right in
time for the show.”

Chapter
5

Carol smelled cookies baking the moment she
struggled in the door, trying to hold onto three plastic bags in
each hand. The noise hit her at about the same time. Yells, cries
from the adults, screeches from the kids and a sound that explained
some things and mystified her even more at the same time. A series
of barks.

She glanced into the living room where her
father leaned over the tracks of his train layout with a bemused
look on his face. Everyone else was down the hall, attempting to
squeeze into the guest bedroom. Three-year-old Matthew toddled on
his own toward them. Squeals, shouts and several voices yelling
directions continued back there, along with more sharp barks. The
baby bawled her own demand for attention.

“Who got the dog?” Carol asked.

“Laura decided Matt was ready for a puppy.”
Her father’s dry tone told her exactly what he though about Matt’s
readiness.

“She’s kind of lonely without Mark. Maybe she
wanted the company.”

Her father shook his head. “Can’t keep up
with her own kids. Don’t see how she’s going to manage a dog
too.”

“Maybe it’ll help her learn a bit more
responsibility.”

“You think a dog will, when the—“

The action down the hall took a sudden,
dramatic turn, when a small, fast-moving mop of brown fur rushed
out of the guest room door, neatly dodging several hands stretched
out to grab him, and raced toward them on four short, madly pumping
legs. He nearly knocked down poor Matthew as he barreled along, but
the child just giggled, recovered his balance and turned around to
follow.

The dog hopped up onto the raised platform
her dad used for his trains and raced across it, scattering pieces
of track not yet tacked down, train cars, plastic buildings, light
poles and even a few unfortunate miniature people as he scampered
across. By a major miracle, he missed the Christmas tree that sat
in the center of the train layout. It shook a bit, dropping a few
strands of tinsel across the tracks, but remained upright. The
barrel roller gizmo her father had bought the previous year was
less fortunate. It tumbled completely off the wooden support onto
the rug under the dog’s feet.

Her father shot to his feet, using a word he
almost never used in the presence of his family.

“Daniel Prescott!” Her mother might forget to
take the cookies out of the oven, but she had great hearing,
especially for those words. “The children!”

“Sorry, Jan,” he said to her mother, who was
rushing back toward them along the hall. Matthew had already
toddled past, chasing the puppy, but at least he went around the
train platform rather than across it. The dog charged into the
dining room and on through to the kitchen, tongue hanging out and
eyes bright. Carol could almost swear he was smiling. Her mother,
her brother and Laura raced that way, passing Matthew again. They
were halfway through the dining room when the dog charged back out
of the kitchen, running as fast as his stubby little legs could
manage, ears flapping and tail wagging. He went through the dining
room on the other side of the table to avoid his pursuers.

Once again he almost bowled over Matthew as
he ran back into the living room. Far from being bothered, the
child turned and followed, giggling loudly.

Her father had just begun to put the track
back together and right the overturned buildings when the dog
hopped up onto the platform again and charged across it. “Oh, he—”
He bit off the curse, but swatted at the dog, who veered around
him.

The swat was a bad idea. In swerving to avoid
it, the dog crashed into the trunk of the Christmas tree right
where the lowest, thickest branch joined it. He bounced off and,
undaunted, chugged across the platform, jumped off the other side
and raced down the hall toward the bedrooms.

In his wake, the tree stand tipped and the
whole Douglas Fir wobbled. Carol and her father both grabbed at it.
Each got hold of a branch and managed to keep it upright.

Until Matthew, following the dog more
precisely this time, climbed up onto the platform and toddled
through already scattered train cars, miniature buildings and
people. He almost stepped on one of the engines, missed it and
began to teeter himself. Carol and her father both reached out to
prevent him from taking a nasty fall, letting go of the tree.

They each got a hand on one of the toddler’s
arms and steadied him. Bereft of support, though, the tree wobbled
and fell over on top of them. She heard Matthew laughing, so
presumably he’d wasn’t hurt.

A large branch hit her back and knocked her
to her knees. A corner of one of the freight cars poked into her
hand and something else bit into her shin. Prickly branches sat on
her shoulders, her head and one large one rested against her left
elbow. Pine needles tickled her nose. Plastic icicles dripped down
her face and clung to her clothes. Colored glass balls rolled down
the tree and plopped on her before continuing their death plunge
onto the wood platform. A candy cane slid down the front of her
sweater. The smell of pine surrounded her.

“Damnation.” Pine needles dropped into her
mouth as if to punish her for the profanity. She spat them out
again.

“Carol, not in front of the kids,” her mother
shouted, followed by, “Oh no! Oh my goodness, what happened?”

“Laura,” Carol yelled, “Come get your son
before he does any more damage.” Which was a little unfair, but not
much. “Jason, Mom, get this blinking tree off us.”

Her father was equally entangled in the
fragrant greenery. When he wriggled, trying to get the needles out
of his eyes, it shook the tree even more. A few more ornaments fell
off and plopped against the wood. Amazingly, some of them landed
intact and rolled off the platform onto the floor.

Jason and her mother heaved the tree up and
off them. Carol turned and lent a hand to getting it set upright
and making sure it was stable in the stand. More pine needles
dripped out of her hair each time she moved her head. A few had
caught in her sweater and poked her through it.

Laura picked up her rambunctious son and
managed to snag the equally enthusiastic puppy in her other arm as
it ran back by. She disappeared into the guest bedroom with her
giggling child tucked in one arm and the yipping puppy in the
other, leaving behind the destruction they’d wrought.

Carol, Jason and their father gathered up the
undamaged ornaments and returned them to the tree while her mother
got a broom and dustpan to sweep up the shards of those that hadn’t
survived.

They hadn’t quite finished cleaning that up
when the smoke detector outside the kitchen began to scream a
warning. Carol looked up, startled. She’d been so involved in the
chase and the tree that she hadn’t really noticed the smell of
smoke. Besides, they were all used to her mother burning things, so
it didn’t always register.