Free Year's End: 14 Tales of Holiday Horror by J. Alan Hartman

Christmas-tree scent. Ray looked to Keith for a final decision. Even in the near-darkness, the young man’s pain was unmistakable. “I’ve got to go,” he said. “I’ll curse myself all the way, though. Being alone and thinking about my past…” he shook his head. “I hope I can find some peace.”
    Ray peered into the trees as Keith stepped forward. He could follow the boy further, try to comfort him, but the border of this silent forest made him catch his breath and stop. As promised, Keith resumed his loud self-recrimination: “God, what kind of imbecile are you, can’t even control yourself…” But in seconds—too soon—his yells faded to eerie quiet. Ray couldn’t hear so much as the crunch of snow under Keith’s boots. The drops of sweat on his back flash-froze to an icy web.
    Ray’s watch beeped: almost time for the midnight fireworks. He wouldn’t set them off this year. Soon a new day would dawn. Would it be safe then to enter the strange woods, search for the people who’d walked in but not out? I pushed the button and started this whole thing. I have to try to fix it.
    The new year came with a sudden silence. Ray hadn’t realized how loud the screaming from the field had been until it ended. He turned to look. The dark figures on blankets stopped in place. Soon they began moving again, but in slow motion, rising to stand, hugging their children, talking again.
    Relief swept into Ray’s lungs. The weight of his father’s rage lifted from his shoulders. They’ll be okay.
    The people in the woods, though… All still dark and quiet. He gulped.
    One careful step into the forest. Ray looked down. More footprints, no surprise. On and on, dodging tree trunks. A few minutes in, he stopped. Bent to touch one icy shoe print. S maller than the ones before? Three-quarters the size.
    A hundred more footsteps. At least there’s moonlight. The snow reflected everything the sky gave.
    He scanned the ground, then knelt closer. Shoe prints, less than half the size of his own. His breath stalled. No children came in.
    Walking faster. Smaller, smaller, smaller prints. Then tiny hands and feet like a baby had crawled. Then gone. Not a single print but his own.
    Where are those people? Had they left, risen up? No, that’s silly . I don’t believe in those crazy things. But the snow here was so fresh, untainted. Maybe they’d given up their bodies and memories to start over. He paused. Would I have done the same?
    He felt in his jacket pocket for his house key. It’s time to go home . He turned to follow his path back. Then stopped fast. Smooth, untouched snow reached from his shoes, as far as he could see.

The Story of Myrtle Roady
    George Seaton
    Myrtle Roady took a toy
    Drank some rum
    And ate a boy
    Myrtle Roady stole a curl
    Drank some rum
    Then ate the girl
    On December 31, 1882, Hiram Clop, a fair-haired boy of seven who’d already broken one leg of the hand-fashioned wooden horse his daddy had given him for Christmas, carried the cherished albeit lamed steed he’d named Fury to the tent that covered the odiferous hole fifty yards from the pine-framed and canvas-walled and roofed structure he knew as his home. His mamma and daddy had told him to hurry-up his business, as the New Year’s Eve celebration would soon commence in the large communal tent down the road, and “You still gotta change your clothes, Hi.” He pulled the flap open, smelled the odor that always aroused his druthers to just step off into what was now, at almost eight o’clock in the evening, the blackly-hued scrub either side of the path where he could just squat, do what he needed to do and then run back to the warmth of the single-burner iron stove that centered their unfinished house. He’d been admonished to be civilized, though, by his mamma who’d caught him more than once, “…actin’ like a savage,” and that “…decent white men use the privy.” And he did, stepping under the flap, keeping hold of Fury in his