“I know I told you to die,”

Maria said, pulling her bathrobe tighter around herself,

but not before I saw a hint of her diaper’s waistband above the top of her pajama pants,

“But I didn’t mean for you to do it on my back porch, Devlin.”

 

“What?” I glanced around, somewhat surprised to find snowflakes dancing through the moonlight all around, piling up quickly.

It was the kind of snow that I always wished for,

the kind that could make the next day,

Christmas day, like some beautiful storybook.

I had never gotten that wish before.

perhaps having lived in Florida until just a few months before had something to do with that.

“Oh, I’m fine.”

“I’m thrilled,” Maria sighed. “Why the hell are you here?”

Even though I had gone to her house with one very clear purpose,

something I knew was right, and that I probably should have done long ago,

now that the time to actually do it was upon me,

I could feel the words crumbling on my tongue.

 

How did I phrase it?

What could I say to possibly make up for everything I’d done, and said, already?

“Why don’t you come back when you decide?”

Maria shook her head, backing further into the doorway.

“Or better yet, why don’t you go tell someone who actually cares about what you think?”

“I’m sorry!”

I blurted out, those two simple words somehow busting the flood gates of my mind wide open.

“I’m so sorry about everything! I know I was horrible, but…”

“Yes, you were,”

she interrupted, her voice colder than the air outside,

which I was finally beginning to feel.

“You have no idea…”

“No, I do!” I nodded quickly. “I know what I put you through now, and I’m…”

“Sorry? Yeah, sure.

You just had some big personal revelation, huh?”

She shook her head.

“Do you honestly think I’m going to fall for this?”

“But I did!”

I reached for her hand, only to have her pull it away.

“This is going to sound crazy, I know, but you have to listen to me…”

 

It had all started earlier that night, after my big brother, got “home”,

though, to him anyway, it could hardly be called that since he had never been there before;

I was still barely able to think of it as home, and I’d been living there almost six months.

At any rate, the tree was all trimmed, there was a pair of stockings, marked Ashley and Cheyenne, hanging at the fireplace, and we’d both opened our traditional one present, in honor of Christmas Eve.

I’d gone to bed.

However I wasn’t quite asleep,

I was just drifting happily in that space right at the edge of consciousness, nimbly dodging dreams of sugarplums.

It was pretty easy since I can’t honestly say I know what a sugarplum actually is

I was in favor of listening to the strangely comforting sound of the twin symphonies of snoring coming from dad and Ash.

I can’t say I had anything in particular on my mind.

Having said that though, I was, at least a little, probably still being amused by the fortune I’d gotten the night before when I’d gone to China Garden with Laurell and Ivy.

“An alien of some sort will be appearing to you shortly!”,

It had claimed, and was, for whatever reason, much funnier at the time.

Still, I had, of course, shown it to Ash when he came in.

I told him he was certainly the fulfillment of this most astute of prophecies.

I don’t put any real stock in that sort of thing, or astrology even, no matter how fun they can be to read from time to time.

However, this time it stuck with me. Seeing as I also don’t believe in aliens, I can’t really say why.

“You’d better get to sleep,” a voice said suddenly, plunging me back into full awareness.

“It’s Christmas in just a few hours.

Do you still get up at 3 to go look at the tree?”

“Holy Jesus!” I shouted in response, flinging my blankets aside and starting to roll out of bed before my brain registered a pair of facts.

First, that there was a strange shadow at the foot of my bed, which seemed to be the source of the voice, and second, that the shape had just been propelled across the room.

I allowed myself a moment or two to calm down before continuing to stand.

Detouring over to my desk to grab my vase, dumping out the fake roses I kept to brighten up my room a little,

Then moving over to the shape’s landing spot.

“What are you?” I asked, as civilly as I could manage while holding a hunk of glass over it threateningly.

The shape stood, on four legs, shook itself off before looking up at me calmly, clearly not thinking of me as dangerous.

“Nice to see you, too, Cheyenne.”

It’s wings shook a bit, too, as if clearing themselves of dust from the floor.

Then the shape sat and slowly began to lick its front paw so that it could then use it to clean behind its large, triangular ears.

“Fido?” I whispered, blinking. “Is that you?”

“Of course it is,” she said, sounding none too amused.

“Oh, I keep forgetting how horrid humans are with their eyes.

Maybe this will help.”

She shook her head, and a tiny halo appeared above it, raining light down on her tiny, calico body.

“Is that better?”

I knelt down, setting down the vase to reach out, almost brushing against her fur, but stopping just short.

“But…”

“Yes, I’m quite aware of my status, as far as life or, in my case, lack of it, goes,” she told me.

“I’m also aware that, last time you saw me, I couldn’t speak, so please don’t bother to bring that up, either.”

“But…” It sounded just as stupid the second time around.

“Tell yourself you’re imagining all this if that will help,” she shook her head, starting to walk around me.

“I can assure you you’re not, but then, I’d likely say the same thing if I were a hallucination, so I may not be completely trustworthy.”

“Or I’m not, since this is all coming from my head,”

I countered, happy to have finally found something less monosyllabic to contribute.

“I just don’t know what in the world made me think of you, after all this time.”

“It’s good to know you forgot about me so readily,” she huffed.

“Glad to have made such an impact on your life.”

“I was, like, eight,” I shrugged.

“You were nine,” she corrected me.

“And at least you were broken up at the time.

I guess that silly fish was enough to help you get over your grief and forget about me.”

She was right,

I suppose; my young mind,

previously so enamored with my pretty kitty, had quickly moved on to other things,

blocking out that particular bit of early trauma associated with her death.

However, I had other things on my mind than agreeing with her.

“What are you doing here?

Are you my guardian angel or something?”

“What? No, don’t be ridiculous.

I’m just doing you a favor, this once, because you weren’t half bad, as people go.

You know, back when you remembered I existed…”

“Well, it’s nice to see you, I guess, whether it means I’m losing it or not, but I’m not sure how that works as a favor.”

“Oh, the favor’s not me,” she said with a little, knowing smile, the kind only a cat can do right.

“I’m just here to tell you it’s on its way.

I’ve got three acquaintances coming tonight, to help you out with a little problem.”

“Acquaintances?”

Though, I guess if a cat can come back as an angel, she might as well have friends, too.

“So they all have to come tonight?

Honestly, I’m kinda tired, and…”

“Yes, they have to come tonight,” she interrupted me irritably.

“After Halloween, Christmas Eve is pretty much the easiest time for us less-than-physical manifestations to…

Well, manifest.

At least to people who aren’t kids.

I thought about bringing them by on Halloween, but I thought that maybe you’d do the right thing by yourself.”

“The right thing?”

“That’s what this whole thing is about.

The others will show you more.

I’m pretty much just here to tell you that you’re gonna want to pay attention.”

“Why?”

I got the distinct impression that, if she could, she would have rolled her eyes about then.

“Are you going through that phase again?

Really?

Just trust me on this, okay?

We’re all trying to help you out.

If I could explain it all to you now, I would, but it just isn’t that easy.”

“Yeah, but…”

She glanced upwards, in the direction of my clock.

“Damn, I have to go.

Listen, the first one should be by at midnight.

The second will get here at one, and the last ought to make it by two.”

She shook herself again, and her wings started to spread out, as light poured from them as well.

“Wait!” I begged. “I still don’t understand…”

“You will,” she assured me.

“It was nice to see you again, Cheyenne.”

Then there was a bright flash of light, and Fido was gone.

“Goodbye,” I said, a second too late.

Typical, I thought.

She always had been the impatient sort, even as cats go.

After staring at the space where she’d been for a moment or two, I turned to follow her last gaze, towards my clock, sitting on my bedside table, reading eleven fifty-eight, in bright yellow numbers.

“Man, I must’ve eaten too much,” I muttered to myself.

I’d never actually had that sort of thing lead to weird dreams before, but I had heard that such a thing was possible.

I’d always kind of assumed it was an old wives’ tale.

I’d been wrong before.

Still, there was an easy way to find out for sure that I was either still hallucinating, or that I wasn’t.

I stood back up, set the vase back on my desk, though I didn’t bother trying to put the flowers back in it.

I turned back to the clock, which had helpfully changed to eleven fifty-nine.

I walked over to my bed, sat right on the edge, and stared into the face of the clock, waiting.

My eyes seemed somehow drawn into the blank space surrounded by the yellow sticks that made up the top of the number 9.

I allowed myself to slump down a little, getting closer, staring deeper and deeper into the darkness, only vaguely aware of the light around it until that light suddenly exploded outwards.

I jumped back a little with a blink, which gave me enough time and clarity to see that the 9 had changed to a zero.

I noticed that it was still getting bigger.

I scrambled back on my bed, somewhat hindered by the pile of blankets, still sitting where they’d been thrown earlier.

As the number grew too large to be contained by the clock, and so, naturally, broke loose, to hang in front of it instead.

Finally, it settled on a size, which was, honestly, a bit of a relief, as I was beginning to wonder if it wasn’t going to wind up growing larger than my whole room.

Once it had stopped, it hovered there for a moment, and then something came flying – or, rather, swimming, though in the air.

Once it had made it’s way free, the zero quickly turned, so that only one of its sides was visible, and retreated back into the clock, making it 12:01.

“Dr. Fishenstein?”

I don’t know why I was so surprised, considering my first encounter of the night, but even so, I have to say I was glad I was sitting down when I recognized the goldfish floating in front of me.

“Hello, dear,” he bubbled – literally, as he didn’t actually speak, but rather bubbles came from his mouth, with his words written on them.

They were a bit hard to read from time to time, since they had a habit of spinning, and, eventually, popping, as bubbles do, but I got the hang of it pretty quickly.

“What are you doing here?”

“Did Fido not get here yet? I swear, cats…”

His little mouth was puckering quite rapidly, so I decided I should probably calm him down.

“No, she was here,” I assured him.

“She just didn’t actually explain anything to me.”

“Well, what did you expect?

Cats aren’t exactly known for giving straight answers, are they?”

“And fish aren’t known for their long attention spans, either,” I shot back, my pride feeling strangely wounded.

I guess I shouldn’t have expected something I’d named after a monster, or rather, the creator of a monster, to be the nicest person… thing.

“I am a doctor,” he pointed out.

“But, at any rate, I’m here to show you a few things.”

I waited, but after the clock changed to 12:03, I realized that was all he was planning on saying. “Like…?”

“Things from your past,” he expanded. “Important things.”

“I’m pretty sure I haven’t done anything important.”

“Are you a doctor?” he asked, bubbles suddenly sporting tiny spikes.

“They’re things which you will soon recognize the importance of.

Or not.

They’re things you need to see again, at any rate.

Now, we’ve wasted enough time already, so come along.”

There was a flicker of motion, but he had to repeat it before I recognized it as him holding one of his flippers out.

“Do I have to?” I asked with an apprehensive shudder.

“Your skin always felt freaky…”

“They’re scales, not skin,” he informed me as if that made any real difference.

“Come along.”

I still hesitated, so he sighed, the first real noise I’d heard from him, and swam over to me, brushing up against my hand.

I could feel my skin crawl, even before the top of the 4 opened up and swallowed us whole in a flash of yellow light.

If I’d had time to consciously think, I probably would have advised myself to endure Dr. Fishenstein’s slimy touch until we got to wherever he was taking me, but we got there before I had the chance.

I pulled my hand away from him, wiping it on my pajama pants.

“We didn’t have time for me to change into some real clothes?”

“Nobody will be seeing you but me,” he told me.

“That’s not really the point…”

I trailed off to try to disguise the fact that I wasn’t entirely sure what the point actually was, taking the time to look around.

We were standing in the middle of a department store, one I had a vague recollection of, I think from when we were living in Oregon.

“Just wait,” he said, “and see.”