Free Carol for Another Christmas by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough

floor in froths of net and silk to reemerge as little white tables surrounded by matching chairs. The sales desk lengthened and acquired a number of spigots and other accoutrements Scooge was less familiar with. Teenaged Monica was behind the counter, her hair pulled back into a high tail, her form clad in a blue dress with a white apron. Two uniformed policemen approached the counter.
    â€œHi, Jerry. Hi, Mike,” she greeted them. “Having your usual?”
    â€œMonica, honey, you better come out from behind there and have a seat,” the one she’d addressed as Jerry said to her. “We’ve got some bad news about your parents.”
    â€œWhat?” she asked, fairly vaulting over the counter in her haste to get to the bearers of the news. “What about them?”
    The policeman named Mike sat her down. “I’m afraid there was an accident, Monica.”
    â€œAccident?”
    â€œA pileup on the highway. The impact must have killed them at once. I’m sure they didn’t suffer.”
    â€œS-suffer? What about Doug?”
    â€œYour brother was in the backseat, and he was unharmed. He’s being taken care of.”
    â€œOh, okay then,” she said. “So what can I get you?” She stood up and started back around the corner again as if they had merely been passing the time of day.
    â€œMonica—”
    â€œBlack for you, Jerry, right? And . . .” Then she passed out right there on top of the Neopolitan ice cream carton, her right hand smashing a stack of sugar cones to the floor as she slipped off the carton and fell the rest of the way, crunching the cones into the linoleum.
    â€œI did not!” Monica said to Scrooge. “I’d never do anything so weak and irresponsible. As I recall it, I worked the rest of my shift and then collected Doug and we made funeral arrangements.”
    Suddenly, from out of nowhere, an obnoxious buzzer gave a resounding flatulent noise that split the ice cream parlor down the middle. Where the floor had once been, a message that seemed to come from hell now burned in bright red letters: “Incorrect File Name or Pathway: Abort? Retry? Fail?”
    â€œIt’s Doug!” she said, and yelled to the letters, “Now hear this, Brother dear! I remember that day as well as you do. Jerry and Mike came and told me about Mom and Dad and I asked about you and they said you were safe and then I went to get Jerry’s coffee and I . . . I . . . I’m pretty sure I finished out the shift. Actually . . .”
    The red lights glowed so brightly that Monica and Scrooge were temporarily surrounded by a blaze of red. After a few moments, it twilighted into pink, then golden, and finally, objects and people began to appear within the golden light. Young Monica, still in uniform, sat up on a couch. The policemen and three other women were in the room. Young Doug, now about thirteen, sat dry-eyed under an unlit Christmas tree, playing with a collection of wires and switches, as intent upon them as if he were rebuilding his family.
    Wind rattled the windows and stirred the curtains as the girl sat up. “Where am I?” she demanded.
    â€œWe’re Mr. and Mrs. Christie. Your brother has been staying with us since the—accident, Monica. You’re welcome to stay here, too.”
    â€œWhy should I? We have a home.”
    â€œNo, we don’t,” Douglas said. “Mother and Dad rented our house. Nobody’s going to rent us a house.”
    â€œMy word, did you have to go to the workhouse?” Scrooge asked. “Is that how you became as you are?” He would have endorsed such a plan in his earlier days, but since that first haunted Christmas, the very idea filled him with dread.
    But the young Monica had turned angrily to her brother.
    â€œWanna bet?” she said. “I’m nearly twenty. I have a job. I can get another one. I have savings. They’ll rent it to us,