Dreaming of a Lost Christmas
by Jeffrey Scott Holland

Edward Potts walked into the den and placed the cup of coffee next to his mail on the small table. He left the room again and, in a few minutes, returned with a tray of food. He was careful not to spill it as he settled into the chair next to the table and reclined into a comfortable position.

It had been a long day at the office. He worked for an advertising agency in Atlanta, and one of his clients had been unhappy with one of his ads and asked him to do it over. Finally, after a long discussion, he convinced them to let it wait until after the holidays.

Once he got home to his two-story house located in the suburbs of the overpopulated city, he quickly slipped into some comfortable clothes and made supper. Now he just wanted to eat and read his paper before retiring for the evening.

He was about six feet tall and had sandy, brown hair neatly parted on one side. Blonde whiskers cropped from his face from not having shaved in a couple of days. He had been letting himself go lately; and, though he was only thirty years old, this week he could have passed for thirty-nine or forty.

As he rested the tray on his lap, his nose caught a whiff of steam rising from his supper. He took a bite of the beef stew and then reached over and pulled a red envelope from the bottom of the stack of letters. As he read the return address, tears rushed to his eyes.

It was from Ricky and Janet Davis...her parents. He closed his eyes tightly for a moment to try and stop them from burning so badly. After a moment, he opened them again, wedged his finger into the corner of the envelope, and ripped it open. He slowly removed the card which read, "Thinking About You This Holiday Season." When he opened the card, a picture of an elderly couple fell into his lap. He picked it up and looked at it. They looked so happy and satisfied with each other, it made his eyes water up again. Inside the card was the handwritten message, "Please come and spend Christmas with us this year. We can't bare to think of you all alone for the holidays again."

He seriously considered it for a moment but then decided that he did not want anyone to try and cheer him up. All he wanted was to spend Christmas with Alicia; and if he could not do that physically, he would do it mentally. He would spend the holidays alone thinking of her and how she died on Christmas Eve two years ago when her car hit a patch of ice and left the road.

He envied his in-laws because, unlike them, he did not have anyone to grow old with. He was weakened by the thought of dying cold and alone.

When he realized he was staring blankly into the fireplace, he took another bite of his already cold stew. He had been doing that a lot lately. He would start thinking about Alicia, and before he would realize it, several minutes would have elapsed.

Disgusted, he shoved the spoon back into the bowl and set it aside. He picked up the coffee and sipped it slowly. It had cooled to just the temperature he liked it.

As he drank the coffee, he programmed the CD player to play depressing Christmas songs, starting out with Elvis Presley singing "Blue Christmas".

He set the cup on the table, and then he laid his recliner back and fell asleep thinking thoughts of the wonderful times he and Alicia had shared together.

The next morning cold chills ran up his body, as he woke to an inactive fireplace. Once he was fully awake, he called his in-laws to thank them for, and decline, the invitation.

Janet said, "Please spend Christmas with us! We will come there if you want us to!"

He politely refused, "Thank you, but I'm okay! Really! I just don't feel like being cheerful right now. I just want to spend some time off alone."

After making sure he would be all right, she hung up.

He did not have to work today because it was the twenty-third of December, and the office was closed until the twenty-seventh for the holidays. He had slept later than he had planned. So as soon as he ate breakfast, he took a shower and shaved.

He felt lonely in the big two-story house; and even though he preferred being alone if he couldn't have Alicia, he needed to socialize with someone. He was beginning to regret not going to his in-laws but decided to remedy the problem by getting out of the house and driving into Atlanta. He dressed, put on his overcoat, and left. After picking up a paper and a cigar, he decided to go for a drive and smoke. Alicia would never let him smoke in the house, and he continued to respect her wishes. He cracked a window, lit his cigar, and pulled out onto the road. In a few minutes, he began to fantasize, once again, about the life they had shared together.

He reached the other side of town before finally snapping back to reality. As he turned the car around to go back, he saw a billboard that sported an ad he had designed four years prior. It had been developed for a chain of fried chicken restaurants, and they had decided to rerun the ad this Christmas. It showed a family sitting around a table while the mother brought in a large plate covered with Jimbo's Fried Chicken. Across the top of the advertisement was "Share this Christmas with the ones you love most!"

He should have been flattered that they liked the ad enough to run it again, but instead, tears streamed down his face, as he realized how miserable he was without Alicia. He could not handle the way he felt inside any longer. The pain was worse than any that he could imagine, and no medicine could make it go away. He needed to talk to his therapist, but he was out of town, and he really did not care too much for the doctor who was filling in for him. He felt like driving off of a cliff, and had there been one around at that moment, he probably would have.

The sun was setting somewhere behind the thick coverage of clouds by the time he returned home. After taking off his coat and shoes, he went upstairs to the bedroom and pulled out every picture of Alicia he could find.

Sitting on the bed, he came across one showing the two of them in front of a Christmas tree with presents spread all around them. It was the last picture she had made. They had used it on their greeting cards the Christmas she died. He outlined the curves of her body with his finger and noticed her big brown eyes. They showed so much affection for him. Her straight, dark brown hair ran past her shoulders, and he remembered feeling how silky soft it had been the day they took the picture. He fell back onto his pillow, closed his eyes, and envisioned how she used to cuddle up next to him on the couch in front of the fireplace.