The Master (6 page)

“No, it's not that bad, but the fracture . . .”

“Get the operating room ready.”

“It's all prepared, and I've placed a call to Dr. Roberts.” The nurse hurried after him. “He'll be here in ten minutes. Um . . . Doctor, there is one other thing. You asked me to remind you about Christmas shopping.”

“You already have. Several times, in fact.” Actually, he hadn't said anything except to ask the staff
not
to mention Christmas shopping in his presence until the Thanksgiving leftovers were gone; it seemed indecent to even consider Christmas before December. But that time was past, and he couldn't expect those who had made caretaking a profession to ignore what they saw as his weakness, so Nick added politely: “Thank you.”

“Yes, but, Doctor, it's after twelve now—that means it's Christmas Eve. You actually have to do your shopping
today
. There's no putting it off any longer.”

“Christmas Eve?” Suddenly Dr. Anthony looked more cheerful, and Nurse Gwynn noticed how attractive he was. “Why, so it is.”

“You're happy about going to see your family?” the nurse asked naively as she handed him the patient's chart.

“Don't be ridiculous.” Dr. Anthony pushed through the curtain around the bed in room three. “Christmas Eve means that we only have one more week of this stupid holiday madness. Eight days from now we can go back to normal, reasonable emergencies, like car accidents and gunshot wounds.”

Nicholas didn't see, but the nurse wrinkled her nose at him and stuck out her tongue. The patient in the bed was in less pain now that the drugs were kicking in and managed a small laugh at her act of rebellion.

“I'm glad to see you are in high spirits, Mr. Anderson,” Nick said gently as he examined the compound fracture. A bone was protruding from the skin in two places. “We're going to get you fixed up. It won't be too bad. As my grandmother always said, you'll be as good as new in two shakes of a lamb's tail.”

“Son,” Mr. Anderson answered, looking down at his leg, “I don't mean to be impolite, but your grandma must have either been nuts or a damned liar.”

“I'll check on Dr. Roberts's ETA,” the nurse said, backing out of the room.

There was something wrong with the mall's Santa Claus; Jeff was sure of it. He'd been watching— actually, spying—on him for a long time, and he was pretty certain that Santa was
a vampire
. Vamps weren't supposed to be out during the day, and Jeff hadn't actually seen Santa put the bite on anyone, but there was something really weird about the guy, something that made him nervous and more than a little afraid.

Jeff rested his borrowed binoculars on the rim of the tub that held the bushy plant he was hiding behind; they were good ones and they were getting awfully heavy. His knees hurt from squatting, too, but he was too fascinated to leave. Nothing like this had ever happened to him when he'd lived in Long Beach.

Of course, everyone knew that the real Santa was busy at the North Pole and had to send elf helpers to the malls. Jeff supposed that elves could be a little strange sometimes, but this elf Santa had a really weird mouth; he could see it plainly up there. It was too big, and it seemed like there was way too much tongue inside—and the tongue was kind of green on the top and kind of black on the bottom. Also, the skin under the too-small beard was awfully pale and shiny. It looked like egg whites that hadn't been cooked enough—just how vamp skin would look, because they could never go out in the sun. And sometimes the contact in Santa's left eye would slip and Jeff would get a glimpse of what looked like a yellow eye underneath. People, even elf people, didn't have yellow eyes. Just cats and maybe lizards. And vampires. Or maybe vampires' eyes were red. That detail eluded him.

But what was weirdest of all was that nobody else seemed to notice anything wrong with the elf Santa. That's what had clinched the deal for Jeff: Yellow eyes or red, only a vampire could put the whammy on a whole crowd of people and make them go blind and stupid.

Jeff pulled back again and looked at the watch on his wrist, which had been a birthday gift from his grandpa. His mom said he was too young to have a watch, but he had sort of learned how to use it. He had a little while yet before he had to leave. He didn't have to be back at the arcade until the little hand was on the four and the big hand was on the twelve, but he did need to be back by then and playing video games, otherwise Ee-Em, his mom's new boyfriend, would be mad. He would probably be mad anyway, since Jeff had taken the binoculars without asking. They were his real dad's binoculars, but Ee-Em thought everything in the house belonged to him now.

Jeff didn't like Ee-Em. He was pretty sure that he was
a terrorist
like the ones on TV. He and his best friend, Matt, had talked it over and decided that that was what Ee-Em was. Jeff really wished that Matt was there right now so they could talk about this Santa thing. Matt was almost seven and watched a lot more TV than Jeff did, and he knew a lot more things. He could probably tell right away if Santa was some kind of a vampire or just a really weird elf.

Jeff put his eyes back to the binoculars.

Man! One thing was sure, though he wanted to defy Ee-Em and visit with Santa—mostly to ask him to bring Christmas to their house, even though Ee-Em said they couldn't have it anymore—he sure wouldn't be doing it today. He'd have to wait until he came to the mall with Grandpa tomorrow. Maybe the other Santa would be back then. And if he wasn't, maybe Jeff would write a letter to the real Santa at the North Pole. Grandpa would help him— or Matt. Matt would be better, because he would understand about the vampire, and the real Santa really should know what was going on here.

Suddenly, the bad Santa's eyes turned Jeff's way— just like he had heard what Jeff was thinking. They blazed brightly, a wicked yellow light shining right through the contacts.

Hello, Jeff,
a deep, scary voice said.
Such a smart, observant little boy. Wanna come play?

The boy gasped and scrambled away from the shrubs. He almost dropped his binoculars as he fled, not even realizing that he was running away from the arcade, where his mother would be waiting. In the back of his mind, he heard laughter, and that scared him more than anything.  

 

Nicholas Anthony knew what they called him behind his back, but he was with the original Scrooge on this one; if he hadn't taken a Hippocratic oath, he'd want to see those drunken holiday bozos boiled in plum pudding and buried with a stake of holly through their hearts.

Every year it was the same. The world was rational until Thanksgiving, and then, sometime late on that Thursday night, Christmas rolled into every town in America and set up shop, hanging tacky decorations where they were most likely to hurt people that passed by. Gold tinsel, fake metallic trees, twinkle lights—showgirls' costumes weren't half so gaudy. And everywhere he went carolers were shouting at him to deck the halls and to have a silent night. As if there were any halls left to deck. Even the restrooms at the hospital were draped in garlands and blinking lights. And as for finding anyplace that was silent . . . ha! Even in the bathroom, it was impossible to escape the jingle bells they insisted on piping in with the
seasonal
music.

And what about those bell-ringers? Nick believed in charity, but these fake Santas who lurked about the town's superstore seemed sinister to him, chasing people with their torturous bells, which pierced eardrums like metal spikes. He was certain that some permanent hearing loss had to be suffered by everyone who came within twenty feet of them, and he'd come to view them with as much enthusiasm as he would witches hovering over cauldrons of poison. On bad days, he had to wonder if they were part of some governmental experiment in brainwashing, a test to see how quickly the civilian population could be broken. On good days—well, there were no good days in December.

But in this feeling of distaste, he was apparently alone. Why didn't the rest of the world see that almost everything connected to this now artificial holiday was potentially dangerous? Maybe he should try to get on “Oprah” or “Larry King.” Hospitals collected statistics, and last year there had been over four thousand emergency room visits related to accidents with Christmas lights alone. Even things as seemingly innocuous as Christmas cards could hurt people. Postmen's sacks were twice as heavy as usual, leading to strained muscles and sprains when they fell on icy walkways. One woman had been infected with a insatiable need to send Christmas cards, and after licking seven hundred of them had been rushed to the hospital for treatment of a dangerous glue allergy.

Kissing under the mistletoe? A surefine way to spread flu and cold germs! And he had personally treated four cases of strained neck muscles acquired while trying to fit overly large Christmas trees into too-small tree stands.

And then there was all the food and drink! Leaving aside alcohol-related injuries, the nation's collective cholesterol count shot through the roof every December. Twenty-one million gallons of artery-clogging gravy were slurped up. Twenty-five million pounds of chocolate were eaten in the United States alone. And then there was the eggnog. It wasn't all bad like his grandmother's; he'd had some with Chivas Regal that could be habit-forming. But it wasn't
good
for the body. And then there was the final abomination—five million pounds of sugar-ridden fruitcake were consumed every year. And people didn't even like fruitcake! They had to be noshing out of boredom with their relatives, or else seasonal depression. If people were smart, they'd take the time off work and, instead of going home to family they despised, they'd spend it with people they really liked.

And what about those crushed by Christmas merchandise? Thousands were injured and even killed every year when temporary employees got onboard forklifts and started messing about with stacks of furniture. He had personally treated a pair of sisters crushed by a falling sofa.

Then there were pellet guns. It was hard to believe, but some parents still got them for their kids. And they were always amazed when, yes, the kids did shoot eyes out.

Nick's mind suddenly veered toward his worst Christmas memory of all, the disaster that had happened while he and his friends, David and Jason, were still in college. They had stayed at school that year, determined to enjoy the holidays for once by avoiding crazy, unpleasant or missing family. And they had almost succeeded, too. They had chipped in and bought a tree—decorative but tasteful and restrained, with a reasonable number of lights that did not have frayed cords. They'd had eggnog. They'd even had “The Chipmunks Christmas Album” to strike the right, festive mood.

But on Christmas Eve, instead of being visited by the Christmas angel bearing light and goodwill, the dark spirit of food poisoning had come around— probably from the eggnog Jason made. Eggnog! It was a wonder Nick still drank it. Only Dave was spared, and he'd had his own trauma that night, what with being dumped by the love his life and finding out his father was dying.

Vomiting and heartbreak would have been enough to make the holiday memorable, but there'd been a city-wide power outage, too, caused by frozen power lines being downed by accumulations of ice. The ensuing lack of heat had frozen the water in all the toilet bowls in the deserted dorms, and many of the porcelain receptacles had shattered. It had been a long five days and nights that led to a lot of expensive repairs and much business for the local infirmary.

That had been the last time Nick attempted to celebrate the holiday.

He shook his head. In spite of that Christmas, he, Dave and Jason had all remained friends. They had, in fact, grown closer. And he would call his buddies—after the holidays. Neither of them would be thrilled with getting a ring right now, not even from him. They'd be too busy fighting off unwanted fruitcakes from relatives and friends who just didn't understand that some people didn't feel the same Christmas magic as everyone else.

George Bernard Shaw had called Christmas “a cruel, gluttonous subject,” and he was right. It was both.

Not everyone feels that way, Nick. It isn't all commercialism and drunken stupidity. Have you forgotten about the whole peace-on-earth thing?

“Bah, humbug. What peace?” Nick said to the annoying reflection in his sideview mirror. It was with him almost constantly these days—always eating something sweet and sticky, too. And it liked to talk. The first time he'd seen it was early one morning when he stumbled into the bathroom; He had been still enough in the realm of sleep to make the mistake of addressing it, of asking who and what it was.

Ghost is as good a word as any, the apparition had replied. Or revenant. I like to think of myself as a spirit messenger sent from your older, wiser soul. Calling myself a “spiritual visitation” is a bit over the top, I admit, but you've no one but yourself to blame for my being here. You have gotten so far removed from your spirit that normal messages sent through dreams just won't do. Nick, my boy, you live in a world of plenty, but your soul and emotions are starving to death. It is time to release your spirit from its imprisonment and join the feast of life. This will be hard for both of us—you've always needed observable truth to convince you of things. But this time you are going to have to take a certain amount on faith.

Faith—yeah, right. Nick had rolled his eyes and gone back to bed, dismissing the conversation as a very weird dream brought on by a combination of too much on-the-job tinsel and exhaustion.

But the ghost had still been there when he got up an hour later. And it had remained with him ever since, chiding and cajoling and eating in turn.

Reminded of things gluttonous, Nick looked at the basket in the backseat of his car and wondered for the tenth time what to do with it. It was lovely to have won—primarily because he never won anything, and it suggested that maybe his luck was about to change—but who in his family would actually enjoy a radio-controlled car, a teddy bear with a wardrobe of twenty-five dresses or a rather juvenile heart-shaped diamond pendant? None of it suited his family's tastes. If he offered his nose-pierced niece a teddy, she'd look at him like he'd sprouted a second head. And as for the three pounds of white chocolate snowmen . . . Nick shuddered. His analretentive brother-in-law, the dentist, would pitch a fit if Nick gave it to either his teenaged anorexic daughter or son; it had taken forever to torture their teeth into perfection.