Free The Christmas Pig: A Very Kinky Christmas by Kinky Friedman

masterpiece?”
    “Benjamin, it will be a masterpiece. You are a genius, Benjamin dear! How could it be anything other than a masterpiece if it’s painted by your fine and talented hand?”
    “That’s so nice of you to tell me that, Valerie,” said the boy, practically blushing.
    “I’ve never told anyone that before,” said Valerie.
    Benjamin found the lamb asleep in the hay. He set down the lantern and gently carried the little fellow to a location closer to the light. Soon the artist was back at his easel and his favorite art critic was standing beside him watching him work.
    “His fleece is definitely not white as snow,” Valerie observed.
    “It will be when I get through,” said Benjamin.
    Sure enough, not only was the painted lamb an almost incandescent white, but his eyes, which looked slightly dull and glazed, had also been rendered quite differently on the canvas. Benjamin had duly provided the painted lamb with a suitably adoring gaze.
    “You’re not just a genius,” said Valerie, shaking her head slowly from side to side. “You’re a miracle worker.”
    “Valerie, you’re too kind.”
    “Don’t think I’m trying to flatter you, Benjamin, because I’m not. I’m merely stating that your work thus far is quite remarkable. Far from sanitizing these animals or covering up their faults, you’ve brought out the best in them. You’ve transformed them with an artist’s eye and a Christian heart into how God intended them to be.”
    “Valerie, I don’t think I could get through these long nights without your help and encouragement. You’re the best friend I’ve ever had.”
    “Good,” said the pig. “Then remember, when you paint me, my left profile is my best.”
    “I’ll remember,” said Benjamin, as he put away his paints.
    “So tomorrow it’s my turn?” asked Valerie hopefully.
    “We’ll see,” said Benjamin.

Chapter Sixteen
The Rooster
    T HE FOLLOWING NIGHT things finally came to a head. Perhaps all the nocturnal work had put a strain on both of them. The dreaded deadline had been foremost in Benjamin’s mind but in Valerie’s heart there had begun to form a definite feeling that she was being left out. Indeed, the boy felt sad to see her preening herself in the lantern light. She was a very beautiful pig, Benjamin had to admit. And he told her so. But the knife went in deeper and deeper when she saw that he was painting the rooster. At last, Valerie could no longer restrain her true feelings.
    “I can’t believe you’d do this, Benjamin,” she said, in a voice filled with hurt. “Picking that scraggly, annoying rooster over me.”
    The rooster’s name was Hitchcock and he had to be painted. Time, Benjamin well knew, was running out. Nonetheless, the boy set down his brush. Hitchcock remained where he was, asleep on a rafter. At least he wasn’t going anywhere.
    “Valerie,” said Benjamin, in a voice he’d intended to sound grown-up but had come out seemingly tinged with guilt. “Valerie, you’re my friend. You’re the last pig in the world I’d want to hurt. The last person, too.”
    But Valerie had already gone back to the pigpen and Benjamin could only hear muffled snuffling noises in the darkness. Benjamin pulled the quilt around him in the cold night, grabbed a lantern, and headed in the direction of the sound. At first, he could not quite identify the rather subdued snuffling noises. He had, of course, never heard a pig cry.
    In the lives of all pigs and all ten-year-old boys, there comes a day of reckoning, even if that day is in the middle of the night. As gently as possible, in his innate analytical fashion, the boy with the unvarnished eyes told his friend the unvarnished truth. Placing the lantern on the railing, he leaned against the pigsty and spoke softly but clearly.
    “The painting the king has commissioned me to create must be a traditional nativity scene, artistically excellent, historically correct, and biblically accurate down to the last