When he was younger, every year after the wee hours of his annual Christmas Eve debauchery, your great grandad Charles would take us kids out to the fountain. We'd follow him, with his daydream gaze and ballroom stagger testifying to an inhuman indulgence of eggnog and vicodin, to the garden out back. Despite his inherent charm and intoxicated holiday spirit, we always noticed an aura of abstract malice in his bloodshot eyes and messy grin.
I still have nightmares about Christmas and the facade of Charles’ sloppy face, barely concealing a savage cruelty somewhere in an engorged, black abyss.
All of us kids would trudge to the fountain in the center of the garden with a sickening dread. It was always in the early morning, we were always exhausted, but Charles would bait us with his usual spiel. “We have to punish the naughty or Santa won't come.”
A burlap feed sack was always propped up against the antique stone of the fountain. Charles would open a stained leather satchel and pass around long sharpened knives. “Inside this bag” he would mutter, “is the devil. The very devil who killed Jesus Christ himself.”
And in a sudden frenzy, Charles would brandish the bullwhip.
The leather would sing against our backs until we sunk the knives into the sack.
Every Christmas we walked back to the house, bruised, cut and weeping. The fountain would run crimson at our flank, and Charles would disappear into the underbrush to prepare the burial.
On Christmas morning, we would listen to the adults share the sad news of another missing child.
Charles was always distraught.
This story has my vote. Nice Job! Justin
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