Carol for Another Christmas (18 page)

They were young, and not so daunted as he would have been, but they all looked ready for the knacker to take them to the glue yard by the time they regained the sidewalk outside of the store through which they had originally entered.

“Well done, my friends, well done,” Scrooge said, applauding.

“Good thing someone still has the oomph left to clap,” Sheryl said. “You see why people don't look forward to Christmas so much now, Eb?”

“Surely a Christmas so hard-won must be all the sweeter?” Scrooge asked with more optimism than he actually felt was called for.

“Easy for you to say, since you could fly,” Sheryl said. “Don't suppose it occured to you to let us fly, too.”

“We couldn't have tried taking off and landing in that crowd without standing on someone else's head,” Phillip pointed out.

“Well, to paraphrase Tiny Tim, God bless you, every one,” Scrooge said, trying to buck them up.

“Yeah, well, tiptoe through the tulips to you, too, bud,” Sheryl said.

They managed to get through the rest of the program with only a little more difficulty. Two purse snatchings and an attempted carjacking in the parking lot were foiled by security officers, which added interest to the journey. As soon as they found their vehicle again and Curtis started it, they were whisked back to the little office and the young people were neatly ejected from the program. They seemed none the worse for wear and quite relieved and happy to be back, bearing none of the merchandise they had gathered with such difficulty.

Scrooge cleared his throat. “An intriguing diversion, my friends, but the point is not for you to show me why you have just cause to dislike Christmas, as you seem to believe, but for me to convince your employer that she should regard it with more favor. Therefore, I believe it's time to move on to a different guise, if I'm to use my own experience as a model. Something stern and implacable. My own Christmas Future was, of course, death himself.”

“Trite,” John said, yawning to stress his point. “Ste reotypical. Conventional.”

“But scary,” Curtis said. “You gotta admit it's scary.”

“What's like death only more with it, more now, more happening, you know?” Melody asked.

Sheryl shrugged. “All that occurs to me is taxes. And Monica's been there and done that.”

“Yeah,” Harald said. “She's done unto others already okay, but has she had it done unto her?”

“I like it. I like it a lot,” Curtis said.

Phillip was grinning from ear to ear. Which was unfortunate since he had just picked up a piece of cold pizza and was chewing it, even as he grinned.

“Scrooge, baby, I believe the most effective thing would be if you examined the wonderful world of cross-dressing; don't you think, folks?” Sheryl asked. The others nodded.

Once the morph was complete, they spent several hilarious moments giving Scrooge pointers on how to act more like their employer, but Scrooge discouraged this. It reminded him uncomfortably of how his nephew had mocked him at that long-ago Christmas party. Instead, he enlisted the assistance of one of them in a new scheme to jar the heiress to Databanks from her complacency.

Fourteen

Monica Banks stood regarding Monica Banks with an expression of distaste and barely concealed hostility. “For heaven's sake, Miss Banks, please get up and face this in a professional manner. Your account has come due. It is time to face the consequences. No need to make this any more difficult than it need be by delaying the process further.”

Scrooge had spoken these same words, inserting different names, many times before, and found that he had no problem imitating the professional de meanor of Monica Banks, IRS agent, so credibly that even Monica Banks, computer firm CEO, could not tell the difference. She looked extremely confused and disoriented.

Once David had helped morph Scrooge so that he physically and vocally resembled Monica Banks as she had been in her former role, he had slipped into Monica's apartment and pressed the enter button on her computer, and by holding on to the couch when he pressed, had entered both himself and Monica, as well as the apartment, into the program. Then he had morphed himself into an ageless, faceless, conservatively dressed federal enforcement agent so he could, incognito, accompany Monica and Scrooge.

“Excuse me,” the Monica on the couch said. “Do you have an appointment? I was expecting someone else. I was told that the Spirit of Christmas Future was going to be paying me a visit.”

“Precisely,” Monica in the business suit, with the clipboard, accompanied by the looming agent with handcuffs, said impatiently. “Come along, now. It won't look good on your record if you stall.”

“I'm not stalling,” Monica said, getting to her feet and, this time, forewarned by previous experiences, prudently slipping into sheepskin-lined moccasins and a heavy sweater. “It's just—well, you're me.”

“Don't think that gives you any special privileges,” the spirit said sternly. “There's an account to be settled, and I'm the best one for the job precisely because I never take prisoners, so to speak. Come on.”

Despite the spirit's claim that she never took prisoners, she motioned to the enforcement officer, who clasped the handcuffs, locking one cuff on each Monica, so the pair appeared to be Siamese twins joined at the wrist. Then the spirit whisked the Databanks heiress through the door without bothering to open it, took to the air like Wonder Woman in a far less alluring than usual power suit and sensible shoes, while Monica trailed in her wake. Once beyond the Databanks campus, the spirit circled like a vulture over the city, apparently deliberating where would be the best place to begin horrifying her double into having a merry Christmas.

Monica really had only the spirit's word for it that they were in Christmas Future. Seattle looked much the same as it had in her earlier encounter. The same star at the top of the Bon Marche, the same flags, the same red and green lights on the Space Needle, the same white lights in the trees, the same horse carriages at Westlake, the same garlands at Pioneer Square, the same Christmas ships out on Elliot Bay.

“Spirit,” she said, “This, uh—audit you're conducting. It's only of estimated returns for the future, isn't it? Things are changeable. I have already formed some plans as regards the little Timmons girl that may significantly alter my debit and credit columns in the future.”

“Miss Banks, what you wish to do or do not wish to do in the future is none of my concern. My concern is only with demonstrating to you the consequences of your actions to date, extrapolated to their most logical nth degree and decimal points to the millionth place. I must tell you that in all surveys conducted, the chances of a woman of your advanced years significantly altering her personality and behavior are almost nil.” Where Scrooge got this information, he had no idea, but it seemed like the right thing to say. Perhaps the Program Manager also provided his supernaturally enhanced morph with a bit of jargon to add verisimilitude to his present persona.

“Can't teach an old dog new tricks, huh?” Monica asked. “If you believe that, why not let me stumble on my merry way instead of showing me all of these people and events? I know you, Monica. If you didn't think it would make a difference, you wouldn't waste your time.”

Monica the spirit looked down her glasses at Monica the mortal. “That remains to be seen,” the spirit said. “Now then, what do you suggest we see first?”

“I want to see the Timmons girl.”

“I'm afraid that won't be possible,” the spirit said in Monica's own clipped, official voice.

“What do you mean that won't be possible? I
can
do something for this child. This is a bright and perceptive child, an intelligent child, and she deserves the chance I can give her. I demand to speak to your superior. I demand . . .”

Then they were once more inside the Timmons apartment. The table was set, and an origami tree, smashed and messy and stained around the edges, made a centerpiece. The only straight chair in the room was vacant.

The broken television had been replaced and occupied the space opposite the table. Noah and Jamie stared into it, watching
National Lampoon's Christmas
while Brianna plopped the tuna-and-noodle casserole on the table. “Daddy, Jamie, come to the table. Tiffany and her husband are going to be here soon.”

Monica turned to the spirit. “Is that all? Tina's mother got married. That's why she's not there. Right? You had me going there—”

“What do you care?” her own mouth asked her coldly. “The brat helped trick you. She violated rules. See the unemployment papers lying on the television? They have Noah Timmons's name on them. He's out of a job.”

“I wasn't going to fire him!” Monica protested, but the door to the apartment swung open then and Tiffany entered, trailed by a man sporting very shiny white shoes and matching belt, several gold chains that glinted among his thick, dark chest hairs, a silk shirt in a Western pattern. He had a bored look on his face. Tiffany was pregnant, and her face and ankles were bloated, though her wrists looked bony and her skin sallow and lifeless. Faint yellow marks on her arms, old bruises, gave her an unhealthy, mottled look.

Her father tore himself away from the television and rose to hug her. “Baby, there you are. We were afraid you wouldn't make it.”

“We can't stay, Daddy. Louie and I got a dinner date with his business associates. Anyway, you know how I get here. I can't hardly stand to see her little chair . . .” And she began crying.

“Dammit, Tiffany, I told you if we came over here you'd start in again,” her husband said, hauling her roughly out of the room. “We'll see ya, Pop. Merry Christmas.”

“Get me out of here this instant,” Monica told the spirit. “I can't stand to see the chair, either. Or that horrible man. Or this hideous apartment. It seemed so homey before, but now it's just—” She shivered. “Sordid. Tawdry. Depressing. What's wrong with Jamie? Even for a kid watching TV he looks—well, maybe he's stoned. I guess so. Why doesn't Noah notice? What's Brianna so mad about? And why don't any of them seem to notice that Tiffany's husband obviously is mistreating her? I thought this was the family values portion of your program. What's wrong with these people? Do they think Tina would like them this way?”

“You're in such a fine position to judge others, aren't you?” the ghost said nastily. “At least they're not out making other people miserable for the holidays.”

“What I do or don't do has no bearing on their situation,” Monica said, though she suspected the point was arguable. “I told you I'll change, but you don't believe me, in spite of what I've been through with the three of you spirits. Give me a break. Show me something a little more upbeat.”

The miserable apartment melted away to be replaced by a large room with a sweeping view of the bay and people in beautiful, casually dressy attire chatting, eating, and drinking, admiring the objets d'art and listening to a string quartet playing discreet Christmas carols.

“Is this more like it?” the spirit asked.

Monica nodded warily. She realized the wariness was appropriate when she heard Senator Johansen's voice rise above the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to propose a toast to our mutual benefactress, Monica Banks.”

There were low murmurs and the clinking of glasses. Near the ghost, a red-haired man who looked familiar said, “I wonder what Money Banks would say if she knew the senator publicly considered her a benefactress after he helped break Databanks.”

“I don't know, but I can't say that in the end she did me any harm,” said the woman, someone who looked a bit like Sheryl, only older, richer, and more sophisticated. “If she hadn't fired me, I'd never have gone on to form my own company.”

Then there was no mistaking it. The second man in the group was definitely that Dave guy from marketing. He certainly looked propserous and pleased with himself. “Yeah, well, I'd have never joined up with Harald and Miriam in merchandising their little invention nobody thought would amount to anything. Did I tell you that Melody and I have to buy a second house in California now just so we can keep up with the telemarketing end of things?”

“Yeah, but it was me she did the biggest favor,” Sheryl said. “If she hadn't booted my butt out, I'd have still been there holding on to my stocks when the feds came and took it all away.”

Monica looked back at the spirit. “T-took it all away? How? Why?”

“I don't have that information immediately accessible, but wasn't Senator Johansen your attorney before he went into politics, and didn't his firm continue to deal with your tax problems, etcetera?”