Free Crappy Christmas by Rebecca Hillary

Crappy Christmas
    When you think about all the Christmases you have when you’re a child, all the magic and mystery of it all, you have to wonder when exactly it turns into the worst time of the year. Sometimes it’s having kids, sometimes it’s losing your job, and sometimes it’s just because absolutely everything that can go wrong does. Sort of like “Merry Murphy’s Law, loser!”
    Carrie Smith had it all; two adorable but extremely annoying children, a gorgeous husband with a drinking problem, and she’d just been made redundant from the company she’d worked for since she left school. Thirty-five years old and no qualifications other than a couple of A-levels, and no money to get any qualifications she would need because her husband had a drinking problem and couldn’t hold down a job. Working at the corner store was only enough to keep food on the table, and her redundancy pay wasn’t going to last forever.
    “How’s the job hunt going, honey?” Simon was so sweet in the morning, before he got a drink in him and turned into a gibbering idiot.
    “It would be a lot easier if I wasn’t already working.” Carrie pulled the boys’ bowls from the table and dropped them into the washing up bowl. “Would it really be such a hardship for you to not have a drink a couple of days a week? Just enough for you to get a couple of shifts at the sports centre.”
    “Why would I want to do that? If I was working at the sports centre, I wouldn’t have time to spend with the boys.”
    “You’re barely spending time with them now, Si.”
    “You’re a real downer sometimes, you know that?” Simon pushed his own bowl away and slammed his fist down on the table. “I take it I’m taking the boys to school?”
    “Don’t bother. I’ll take them and then head to work. Just do me a favour and at least look like you’re making an effort. Tidy the house up a bit.”
    “Whatever.”
    Carrie gazed at her husband from across the kitchen and sighed. He was still attractive, if a little rough around the edges, but he had an attitude hat often made her cringe. He hadn’t always been like that. He’d been made redundant two years previously and taken to drinking heavily when he couldn’t walk straight into another job. He’d had a few jobs in the meantime, but his drinking meant that he never passed the probationary period. Getting repeatedly canned before even finishing a trial at the job meant that he was more inclined to drink, so everything had snowballed.
    “I’ll get something in for dinner from work if you like. Save you having to cook.” She managed a half-smile, if only to diffuse the stress-level in the room before the boys got back downstairs.
    “If you like.” He shrugged noncommittally, but as he turned away she could see a smile cross his face as well.
    “Come on boys!” Carrie shouted up the stairs. “I’ve got to get a move on so I’m not late for work!”
    The twins almost fell over each other in their haste to get downstairs, but still rushed into the kitchen to give their dad a big hug apiece before they left. Carrie rounded them up and pushed them out to the car, grabbing their bags from the hallway as she passed, almost without thinking. Dropping them off at school was quick and painless, and she was at work five minutes before the start of her shift, so she had time to make herself a cup of coffee.
    “You’re looking well, Carrie.” Tom leaned against the counter as Carrie served the old woman who lived at the end of her road, Mrs Cowling. “And you too, Mrs Cowling. How’s Mr Cowling this morning?”
    “His hip’s playing him up, but he’s not one to complain.” It seems the Cowlings were never ones to complain about anything. Their only son had died a year ago, and they didn’t even complain then. “It’s the Christmas do at the bingo tonight, so that should cheer him up. You should come along, Carrie. It would do you good to get out of the house.”
    “I’ll certainly think