THE WAY IT WENT DOWN: LAST CHRISTMAS (Patreon)

She doesn't know who I am when the door first opens, but it comes to her. Hi, yeah, it's Gary, I work with Bob? No, I don't know where Bob is. Yes, I know it's Christmas but...could I come in and could we talk for a second? She's dressed in faux-Elf pajamas, a Santa hat, and huge, furry slippers.

Her bland smile is replaced for a moment by a single crease in the middle of her forehead which tells me a lot. She really doesn't know where Bob is. That she probably doesn't know anything. Still, it's all I've got now that Bob is dead and the book wasn't at the office.

I guess technically you could argue I killed Bob, but that's unimportant now. If you knew why, you'd have done it too, I'm sure.

The house is the kind of wreck you have when you have children but you still care what people think. The worst of the mess is no doubt nearby, and shovelled into closets as needed. The rest just lays about; bikes and frisbees and shoes stacked at the door. The living room is a sea of wrapping paper and opened boxes. No children visible which is a relief. Christmas morning has come and gone, and they are upstairs doing what children do.

Nancy or Nan or Naomi, whatever — BOB'S WIFE — brings me a cup of something which I never touch, and she's talking but it all sounds like gibberish that somehow went by too fast to be understood. Like a kid pretending to speak a foreign language.

"...but that was hours ago, and he's not picking up."

And Bob, I think, is dead now...I look at my watch...three hours and change.

I'm about to ask her about it when I realize it's hard to start the sentence without her name which I don't really know. So I say, "listen, I'm here because Bob is held up at the office, and he sent me to pick up a book... Do you know the book he's been working on?"

"But I don't understand why he isn't picking up," she says and then shouts something to some muttered comment that drifts down from upstairs. "It's Gary!"

When I shot Bob and when he fell to the ground and gasped like a grounded fish, screensavers tracked across the screens that read first SOLEMN, and then CORRUPT and it all made some sort of sense. While I asked him where it was, the fluid that kept him here spilled out in little spurts and turned the grey rug black in creeping waves. I never touched him. I never went too near, and I had to back up after he stopped moving or get blood all over my shoes.

"You shouldn't have told me about it, Bob," is all I said to him in the end, but I'm fairly certain he was gone already.

"But yeah, I know the book," she says suddenly, and I sit up straight.

"Can you show me where it is? He needs it at the office and then he can...escape."

She drinks from her cup in a manner which tells me she doesn't trust me.

"You know what, I'm going to try him one more time," and she's up and in the kitchen before I can even process what was said. My hand is on a pistol I checked just outside in the car. It's fully loaded. Reloaded.

Then, the kid is there. Hulking and 13 or 14, with hair in his face, wearing pajamas, staring at me from the stairs. BOB'S WIFE is on the phone, and it's me and the kid.

"Hey Gary," he says. I don't know his name, but we played softball once when he was half this size.

"Hey," I say, trying not to let the feelings out onto my face.

"Do you know where dad is at?" he asks.

"No," I answer, honestly. Not anymore.

Then she's back.

"You know what Gary, I'm not comfortable without talking to Bob..." she says, and standing, she's telling me to stand. She's telling me we're done. But we're not done.

"That's why he sent me, Naomi," and I know I got her name wrong by the look on her face.

The next few seconds are loud and disturbing, so I do my best just to act them out and not pay too much attention. But it ends like this.

Just inside the door, and the base of the steps, the kid is dying, shot twice. I want to tell him something as he drains into some other place, I want to say "you die just like your dad!" but I don't.

His mom, not Naomi, who began shrieking at me, and whose voice reached incredible registers before I silenced it forever, is sprayed all over the living room and kitchenette. Her face gone. The room stinks of gun-smoke and RINGS with the gunshots.

I take aim at the stairs, waiting for the other kid, who is nothing but a vague idea in my mind. A...girl...perhaps. But no one comes down. The ringing becomes a whine and my hearing is dull and flat and muddy.

I search the house. First, the basement and Bob's office. A computer, locked, some notes on the Necronomicon manuscript, but none of the rituals. But then, to the side, completely ignored and somehow overlooked is a metal mesh holder filled with pencils and pens. I dump the pens out and it is very heavy. It has the dull glint and the heft of gold. I look at it under the lights and see the imperfections in the process. Still, this is now almost a pound of gold.

Imagine uttering twenty-six words to change any metal to gold. Imagine what you could do. Imagine what you would do.

No need to imagine. No need. We're past the fantasy phase. We're in it.

Then, I search the ground floor. By that time, the boy is dead. Finally, I creep upstairs with the gun in front of me, ready to shoot anyone I find, but all that is there are a boy and girl's room, empty, and a bathroom.

Then the doorbell.

When I put my face to the peephole in the foyer that smells like copper and gunfire, I see three people. An elderly couple, and someone behind them whose appearance screams "brother-in-law". They're holding presents and talking to one another, wondering what the fuck is going on. Soon, they'll start poking heads in windows. Soon, they will know.

I check the pistol, undo the lock, and put the smile on my face.

I'll have to be quick.