Deck The Halls With Brand New Stories: Ho Ho Holiday Anthology

The Tree

This story was contributed by elfordalley

 "What the hell are you doing here on Christmas Eve?" Hansen laughed, slapping the bar and pulling up a stool next to his old friend.

Andy nodded. He leaned back and downed the suds at the bottom of the bottle. The bartender dropped the next bottle as she passed by. Andy gestured thanks with the new bottle and took a drink.

The place, simply called The Loft, was quiet. No one was seated at the tables, instead a handful were resting elbows and heads on the walnut bar, bathed in almost gentle neon lights. Despite the name, Andy had yet to see anyone ascend the black spiral staircase to the actual loft portion. The TV sat at the far end of the bar. A few regulars circled it to watch the game. Andy hardly visited the place outside of the holidays.

"Well," Andy said. He coughed. "Wife and kiddos aren't coming back until tomorrow from her mother's. I had a late shift, so I couldn't join 'em. I don't like to be at the house alone. Not on Christmas Eve."

Hansen scratched at scraggly patches of hair on his neck. "You're gonna get snowed in. Coming down like hell out there. Haven't seen a storm like this-"

"In five years," Andy said. "I remember the last one."

"That one was hell. Knocked out the power in two counties, had me on three back-to-back shifts trying to get the lights on. Surprised no one froze to death."

The chill shook Andy. He took another drink.

"You alright? Momma would say you look like someone walked over your grave," Hansen said.

"You believe in ghosts, Hansen?" Andy asked.

"Never seen one, but I don't rule it out I guess." Hansen shrugged. "You seen one?"

"Five years ago," Andy said. He took a deep drink, taking down as much of the bottle as he could. He nodded and started his story.

* * *

"Gramma wouldn't like this," Theo said. He pulled on his boots, struggling to move in his heavy winter coat. Even at six, he'd heard the stories, and the one lesson they imparted: Never enter the woods on Weatheral Creek on Christmas Eve, and especially not when snow falls.

Outside for the first time in nearly ten years, snow was actually falling. The weather app said to expect light dustings, with the potential for a quarter-inch. A record for this corner of North Texas.

"Well, we don't have to tell Gramma," Andy said. "But we do have to get a tree."

Courtney rolled her eyes. She pulled her coat from the closet by the front door. "Well, we could already have a tree, you know."

"Hey, it's my year." Andy said. In his family, the tradition was to put up a tree on Christmas Eve, not an hour before. Courtney compromised with him early in their marriage, alternating years so she could indulge her family's tradition of setting up the tree within a day or two of Halloween.

Throughout his childhood, they'd had artificial trees. But this year, he wanted to get his own. He wanted to cut it down himself, drag it home, and set it up in the living room. The nearest neighbor lived about three miles away. Aside from the field their pet goats grazed in around the house, they were shrouded entirely by a deep forest, a wall of green and brown encircling their property, with only the thin line of their driveway cutting through and leading to the three-bedroom farmhouse they'd bought years before. The house sat just a few miles from where he grew up, a house in a constant state of restoration and repair. Two stories and an L-shaped porch, bright white with yellow trim, kept on life support through a maxed out Home Depot credit card.