The Christmas Figure is Unmoved
written by: Karen Walker
He stands in my bedroom, in the doorway to the balcony.
Startling, but not surprising. There’s never a gift.
The December wind heralds the figure.
Damien liked the bedroom cold.
I hear a great thud.
We once fell hard for each other.
The bright white light behind him is from another dimension, no doubt Christmas lights he’s, yet again, forgotten to turn off.
***
In the nightmare, I’m being chased by the voice of the figure.
Frantic to find a hole, I scurry along the walls of my bedroom. There’s nowhere to run or hide.
Squeak, squeak. Squeak-scream. Scream.
My nose twitches. I have whiskers and a thick tail.
He whispers, “Are you sorry, Philippa?”
A word or two of regret, and he’d reward me with a festive cheese tray: mozzarella balls and Cheddar puffs, baked Brie.
“Come closer. Tell me.”
I do so love cheese.
“Good,” the figure says. “Good wife. Stand right there.”
Then, snap. Strangle. Gush. Blackness. Silent night.
***
What a bloody wet dream. I’m soaking the carpet with stains that’ll never come out.
I drag the rat trap to where he stands.
His face in black shadow, I cannot find his lips.
The trap has crushed me below the waist. Fortunately, my beautiful breasts are intact. I reveal them to him.
Damien enjoyed breasts.
The Christmas figure is unmoved.
***
What happens next is like directing a holiday horror movie and starring in it, too.
Insane, although I feel quite lucid.
Poor lost me stops at a manor house on the moors to ask directions. There’s a Krampus wreath on the door. I know I should run, but do not.
A man with an axe appears, says, “Welcome, my damsel-in-distress. Are you lonely?”
Oh, that cut-glass accent. The slicked-back hair and dimple. Those green eyes. He’s classy.
And rich, too. Just look at this ritzy haunt.
Long story short, I slaughter him before he does me. Chop, chop, chop with his own axe.
Flopping on the floor of the golden drawing room where he and I had waltzed, his luscious lips profess love for me. They ask to come into my dreams.
Obsessed with lips, I am.
“Sure,” I shout.
Then, second thoughts. The figure comes. Would it be cheating if the axeman also came, if only in bits?
I wasn’t the one who cheated.
***
By definition, the subject of a premonition dream must actually occur.
I fear it.
What happens is the police come on the third Monday in January, the saddest and most investigative day of the year.
They call out, “Mrs. Philippa Gould?”
Poe barks, snarls.
“Mrs. Gould, we must speak to you.”
They knock on the front door.
Poe goes mad and bangs into the hall table, sending my antique nativity scene and Damien’s urn crashing to the floor.
I am, I dream, annoyed about the table, and worried the police questioning will shock my pet.
Darling Poe doesn’t know.
***
Whenever he comes, I make notes on the bedroom wall with a red Sharpie.
A summary follows.
It’s always 1:37 a.m. I had glanced at the clock that night.
It’s always snowing and blowing, just as it was that night.
I always have an ungodly headache. It’s murder.
***
In my false awakening, the figure does what Damien never did.
The phantasm—fancy word; he deserves it—kisses me awake. I feel exquisite.
There’s a sprig of mistletoe over my head.
Kiss. “Darling, what would you like for breakfast?” Kiss. Kiss.
He rises from the bed and floats to the balcony door. A lovely change from what usually visits, he’s ripped as in romance novel ripped. Naked and magnificent.
His hand on the drapes, he turns back and asks me, “Ready for the light?”
“No,” I murmur. “Not yet.”
The bright white switches on. Piercing the drapes and shining into my eyes and soul, police flashlights demand to know what’s happened.
***
Once—only once—it was a healing dream, and the figure came to me as an empath.
I hurled everything I had.
“Did she think you were funny? Clever?”
“Did she start singing Frosty The Snowman like that—’… with a corncob pipe and a butt and a nose…'”
“What did I ever see in you?”
I felt no better.
***
What happens is the figure falls longer and more dramatically than Damien fell.
My balcony now overlooks eternity instead of the condo parking lot.
Once out over the railing into the bright white, I finally behold his face. His lying mouth is a perfect O. His long arms windmill.
Damien did not hold me when our Christmas tree toppled and crushed the angel topper I was.
Eventually, he stops fighting gravity and surrenders as he plummets, sprawling in the air the way Damien did in bed.
Cruel how he’d throw little Poe to the floor.
***
Before impact, terrible black wings erupt from my back and tear my nightie. I dive like a Christmas falcon.
Suddenly, we are side by side as we were at the altar, and should’ve been on New Year’s Eve everlasting.
I swoop under Damien, but decide not to catch him.
Instead, I perform acrobatic loop-the-loops, sure to impress.
Away I soar. Up, up. I alight on my balcony.
The Devil now wishes my fantastical wings returned. I neatly fold them and write a jolly note in red. “Thanks a lot. See you soon. Happy Holidays. XOXO.”
I stand, a figure in the doorway.
Poe is snoring on the bed.
Downstairs, the police are knocking and knocking.
- The Christmas Figure is Unmoved - December 1, 2025
- Sounds of Thank You - December 22, 2024
- Greg - December 1, 2022
