A Hacked-Up Holiday Massacre: Halloween Is Going to Be Jealous

HUNG WITH CARE

by Ty Schwamberger

The newly fallen snow crunched under his black boots as he walked towards the next house. This one wasn’t quite as nice looking as the previous residence he had visited, but he was sure there would still be some nice little boys, or maybe even girls, that had been good enough all year to deserve a bountiful helping of Christmas presents. He disappeared for a moment behind a large pine tree nestled beside the house and paused. He looked through the pointy, green needles of the tree and out into the street.

Not a creature is stirring… He smiled and then continued on his way.

Ducking into a deep shadow by the side of the house, he rose up on his tiptoes and looked through the snow covered window. No, it wasn’t real snow. He could tell that easily enough. It had come from one of those aerosol spray cans that contained that fake, white sticky stuff that clung to windows during the season of ever-lasting joy. At first it was hard for him to see in, so he took one mitted-hand off the big, red sack he was carrying on his back and gently placed it upon the window. He slid his hand back and forth a few times until the condensation on the outside of the window disappeared and he was able to gaze inside.

The stockings are hung by the chimney with care… He then repeated the next line, silently this time, deep inside his soul, then smiled. God, did he love this time of year.

As he pushed the window up into its frame, smiled, and wondered if it was a Christmas miracle that this particular house’s window hadn’t been secured as all the others. Not that it really mattered; by chimney, by magic key through the front door, or climbing through an unlocked window he had never been denied getting into a house on the Eve of the most wondrous day of the year.

He flung the heavy sack off his back and tossed it through the open window.

He then pushed himself up and onto the window sill, then followed the sack full of goodies into the nice, warm house.

AFTER STRUGGLING TO PICK his rotund self up off the floor, he huffed a few times, and went to the open window and dropped it back into place. He wasn’t sure why he did it, but then reached up and slid the lock into place. He then turned around and took a nice, long look around the cozy living room.

The first thing he noticed was that the fireplace still had some glowing embers. He slowly walked over, bent down, and stuck his still-mitted hands under the hearth. Even though the fire wasn’t roaring anymore with hot delight, it still provided enough warmth to seep through the heavy, black gloves and reach his almost-frostbit hands.

After all, it had been a hell of a long night already and just the thought that he was really just getting started made him feel exhausted. But, this was his chosen profession, one he had made many, many years ago, so he felt like cold or no cold, it was his duty to carry out what he promised himself oh so long ago.

After crouching by the almost-dead fire for a few minutes, he slowly stood up and stretched his red, fur covered arms over his stocking-covered head. He then turned around and took a long look at the rest of the room. The decorations included: snowmen, igloos, polar bears, angels, and even a figurine of himself. Santa. His belly shook like a bowl full of jelly, but he didn’t make a sound. He couldn’t. Oh, no.

Not with the children nestled all snug in their beds…

He smiled, again. Then hoped against hope his hunch was right.

Leaving his already full sack on the floor, he proceeded out of the living room, towards the staircase leading upstairs to the family’s bedrooms, but not before picking up a gingerbread cookie from a Christmas tree plate, and biting the little man’s head off.

He wanted to laugh through his cookie filled teeth, but knew he couldn’t.

He didn’t want to wake anyone, especially the parents…

Who had just settled their brains for a long winter’s nap.

The word ‘nap’ made him laugh, again, but this time he couldn’t keep it in.

As pieces of cookie flew out of his snapping jaws and hit his boots, he started up the stairs.

He paused for a moment at the top, pulling out a long, curved knife from the sheath buckled to his wide, black belt and then started down the dark hallway.

His first stop was the parent’s room.

Then, no matter if they had been good or bad, it was off to the kid’s room to slice and dice them and make himself all glad.

“JERRY…JERRY. WAKE UP. I think I heard something.”

The balding father rolled over onto his back, stifled a last snore and mumbled, “Huh. What. What did you say, dear?”

“I said, I think I heard something, or someone, downstairs.”

“Ah geez, Helen. It’s probably just the long limbs of the pine hitting the side of the house. I promise, first thing tomorrow morning after the kids have opened their presents that I’ll bundle up and finally go out there and cut a few limbs back, okay? Now, please, let me get some more sleep. You know as well as I do that the kids will be up at the ass-crack of dawn and running in here to jump on the bed to wake us up.” Then, still half asleep, the husband and father rolled back onto his side and started snoring again.

The wife and mother mumbled, “But…” then stopped from saying anything else. Sure, her husband was a kind and loving man but even he had his limits. Especially if she woke him in the middle of the night, like she often did, for a noise that she ‘heard’ downstairs or outside the house. Each and every time in the past that she had nagged until he had gotten out of bed and went downstairs or out into the cold to investigate—it turned up nothing. So, this time, since it was Christmas Eve and all, she decided to keep her mouth shut.

After deciding not to bother her husband any longer, she lay back down onto her pillow and closed her eyes. She was about to drift off when she heard something, again, closer this time than before. For the life of her it had sounded like it was coming from the hallway outside their bedroom door. Helen knew she if she didn’t have her husband take a look, pissed as he might get, she would never be able to fall back asleep and it would ruin her chances of being rested enough for a day full of opening presents, the kids running this way and that around the house while playing with their multitude of new toys, or cooking their annual Christmas Day feast. Finally, after thinking about it for another minute or two, and ‘hearing’ another sound out in the hallway, she rolled onto her left side, placed a hand on her husband’s shoulder and gave it a soft shake.

He rustled in his sleep but didn’t wake.

She leaned over, knowing one sure fire way to stir him whether he was sleeping or just acting dead, and started to nibble on his ear. Just as she expected, he let out a soft, low moan.

“Hummm… Well, now. I think I can be persuaded to get up for something like this, dear.” He then rolled onto his back again and reached for Helen’s…

He heard the creaking of the bedroom door being opened.

“Damn kids,” he mumbled, giving his wife a quick kiss and then quickly sitting up in bed. Through the dark, he said in a deep voice, “I told you kids to stay in bed, if nothing else, until the sun is above the horizon.” He paused, looking at the clock on his nightstand and seeing it wasn’t even 3:00 am, yet. He then turned back to the fully-opened door and shouted, “Hey! What did I tell you damn kids, huh? I told you to…”

His words were cut short as a sharp blade was quickly and precisely drawn across his neck. Blood spurted onto his attacker and his wife.

Helen began to scream, but it was only for a moment, as a giant shadow suddenly leapt through the air, smashing on top of her, making the air in her lungs burst out.

Helen lay under the rotund man and thrashed this way and that. She felt something poke in between her legs, but the thoughts of being raped quickly dissipated as she felt something cold and sharp against the side of her neck. She wanted to scream, again, but the large man had already placed a large, smothering glove over her mouth. Finally, not that she wanted to, but knowing she had to, she opened her eyes…

And said to herself, Oh my God, it must be St. Nick!

Helen started to repeat a line in the famous poem over and over again to herself, Now dash away! Dash away!

Above, she saw Santa start laughing. Then he said, “Dash away all!”

Then he slashed Helen’s throat and her fright was never more.

He then sawed off both the husband and wife’s hands, stuffed them into the deep pockets of his big, red coat and walked out of the room, gently shutting the door behind him.

WALKING DOWN THE HALL towards the sleeping girls’ room, his eyes twinkled with delight and he could feel his dimples, his cheeks full with merry. And, yes, his cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry, but that was from the blood that had splattered upon his face from Helen and Jerry (not that he knew or even cared to know their names). As he wiped the dripping knife blade off on his fur covered right leg, he brought up his other arm and mopped up his face. He smiled, again, knowing he had just done the world some justice—teaching people, especially the ones that acted like good model citizens, with their expensive cars and homes (not that this particular family had either of those luxuries, but that really didn’t matter in his faltering mind at this point), when they were anything but. Besides, he was St. Nick, Santa Claus, goddammit, and it was his job to check off on his list who was naughty or nice.

Coming up to the girls’ room, he slid the now clean, shiny blade back into the sheath on his belt and then slowly reached out with the same hand and grasped the doorknob. He gave it a quick wiggle back and forth, making sure the door was indeed unlocked, then twisted it all the way to the left and slowly eased the door inward. He then tiptoed into the dark room, shutting the door behind him.

DRESSED IN HIS TRADITIONAL holiday garb, he stood at the side of the girls’ bunk beds, his head throbbing with naughty images and his mouth watering with want. No, he wasn’t a pedophile, never even had the slightest inkling to be one. What he wanted, craved, more than anything was to teach all the bad boys and girls in the world, more realistically the city he resided in, that no bad deed goes unpunished. Especially when it was supposed to be the season of giving and all he ever felt like the world ever gave him every Christmas was a lump of coal in his stocking. But not this Christmas. Oh, no. This Christmas, he was going to show the world; house by house, adult by adult, child by child, that this old St. Nick was someone to not be fucked with any longer.

HE TOOK CARE OF the first girl, the one on the top bunk, with one quick slash of his knife. Blood squirted from her carotid onto his face, changing his snow, white beard into crimson and mess. It was quick and painless and she didn’t scream. The blood from the girl ran down his chin to the end of the beard’s now tangled mess and down the front of his plump belly.

He smiled and chuckled to himself as he started to saw off the little girl’s hands, knowing she would never open another Christmas present ever again.

AFTER STUFFING ANOTHER SET of hands into his pockets, he leaned down close to the older of the two girls and took a good look. If he had to guess, he’d say she was probably either a senior in high school or a freshman in college, home for winter break. At first he got so close to her face that he felt the tip of the girl’s cold nose against his. He lifted his head away a bit so they weren’t touching any longer and then took his free, left hand, and slowly pulled the heated blanket off her body, piling it down by her feet.

Even though she was the older of the two girls, she was still dressed from neck to toe in long, green pajamas. He tried to think of the name of the new blanket-like invention where you could literally have your entire body zipped inside a blanket, but at this very moment the name escaped him. But, it didn’t matter. Not really. It would soon be off her, anyway. Then he would show her how people in the world, rich, spoiled people like her, always treated people like him.

The true outcasts, the little people, the elves of society.

EVEN THOUGH SHE WAS way past the age of believing in Santa Claus, Crystal had dreams of sugar plums dancing in her head as she slept. Sure, she kept up with the myth of Santa for her little sister, Susie, but she definitely didn’t believe any more. But, in her dream world, where everything was always perfect, Santa did exist and he brought her, not a shiny sled or a new Barbie doll with long, golden locks, but the hot stud quarterback on her college’s football team—and he was all tied up in a red bow just for her. She had the wet dream of waking up Christmas morning and seeing that Santa had delivered her ultimate present, Jake, and he was waiting for her, only her, under her parents’ Christmas tree. She would run over to him, throwing her little sister out of the way, and tackle him like a linebacker, wanting to plant his ass into the ground. Then, suddenly she was naked, except for a red stocking hat with a big, white fluffy ball at its end, and it kept hitting her in the sides of the face as she rode him like a reindeer wearing a saddle.

As Crystal climaxed, she awoke.

At first the room was too dark for her eyes, but soon they adjusted to the dim light from the moon coming in through the curtained window.

Then she saw a man, a big man dressed all in red, leaning down only inches from her face. He looked like Santa, but since she didn’t believe in St. Nick, she knew it wasn’t the real McCoy. Besides, she didn’t see a stump of a pipe held tight in his teeth nor the smoke that would be coming from it encircling his head like a wreath.

Her eyes shot open wide and she tried to scream. But, her cries of terror were cut off by the big man slamming a big, mitted hand down upon her face. She shook her head back and forth but it was no use. She tried to kick her legs this way and that but they wouldn’t move. She was stuck. Done for. And she didn’t know what to do. She wasn’t sure if it was the holiday spirit or a never-dying love in her heart, but all she cared about right now was to know her sister was okay. She didn’t care what Santa, not that this fat man was the real deal, did or didn’t do to her, as long as Susie was safe. Crystal wanted to ask, to beg, for ‘Santa’ to tell her that he hadn’t harmed Susie, but she had no way of doing so. The fact of the matter was, if the big man kept the pressure over her mouth and nose any longer, she was going to pass out and then she’d have no idea what ever happened to Susie, or even her parents for that matter, because the man would probably end up raping and killing her somewhere outside on top of a pile of cold, white snow. She could picture in her head the man raping her, then slipping a long, cold blade deep within her belly, until she couldn’t plead or beg at all.

Crystal closed her eyes and waited for death. She knew she was done for and there was no reason to fight someone so much bigger, stronger than her, so she just gave up. Crystal then felt a lone tear form in the corner of her closed, right eye, and felt it then run off her face, onto her pillow.

Then the pressure from the big man’s hand disappeared.

After what seemed like forever, Crystal slowly opened her eyes and noticed that the big man was now gone like the last wisp of smoke from a snuffed candle.

She quickly climbed out of bed to check on her little sister.

And that’s when she let out a blood-curdling scream.

HE WAS ALREADY LOADING up gifts from under the twinkling tree and stuffing them into his already full sack when he heard a scream coming from upstairs.

Now I’ve got something to dread. He knew he should have finished the girl off, just like he had done to her parents and sister, but there was just something about her that he couldn’t bring himself to slice and dice her like all the others tonight. As he continued to load the last of the presents into the already bulging sack, he felt a stir in his heart. Something strange was happening, though he couldn’t quite put a finger on it, nor did he have the time to do so.

The pounding of footsteps from above and another scream made him turn his head with a jerk towards the staircase. Yes, she would be coming downstairs next and that would probably mean she would run to the phone and call the police. He definitely didn’t need that. Oh, no. Not on a night like tonight—the Eve of the happiest day of the year.

Jerking the rope on the sack to close it, he hurried over to the fireplace. He heard the girl start down the stairs and knew he had to work fast.

He pulled the knife from his belt with his right hand and reached under his heavy coat with his left. He pulled six nails off a chain that was hanging around his neck and placed them pointed end into his mouth. He looked through the near-darkness to the staircase and saw a blur jump from the third to last step, turn, and then race to the back of the house, towards the kitchen where he assumed the phone was located.

He quickly dug his free hand into his soggy, left pocket, and pulled out the first of the six hands he had stuffed inside.

As he heard the girl start screaming, presumably into the phone to the police, he pointed the handle side of the knife away from him, and used it to start hammering each hand to the mantle of the fireplace.

As he worked, he repeated the line he had said earlier, but changing the words a bit this time.

The hands are hung by the chimney with care…in hopes that folks from everywhere far and wide will know that Christmas is the time to die! He laughed.

He then raced to the window and threw up the sash and leaped into the night and was ready to run away fast…

When something that felt like a sheet of snow coming from the roof smashed him to the ground.

Suddenly, he was being pounded in the sides and back of his head by big, heavy fists. He was pinned to the ground by a great mass and the blows started to rock his head and jaw back and forth. He felt teeth begin to crack and his jaw begin to bust as the onslaught continued, the bones in his head felt like they were going to turn to dust.

CRYSTAL WAS WRAPPED IN a large, Christmas tree covered blanket as the first of several police cruisers and other emergency personnel pulled up in front of the house and came running towards her. All at once they began shouting, “Did you see where he went?”, “Are you okay, miss?”, “What the hell happened here?” and the like and then they started to go about their business.

When she was finished being treated by one very calm, and very good looking young EMT, she heard something coming from above—on the roof. Her heart began to pound in her chest, as she jumped off the porch and ran into the front yard screaming, “He’s up there. He’s on the roof. I hear him…I hear him, damnit!”

With a crime scene to secure, a killer on the loose, and a growing crowd of neighbors coming out of their homes to see what was going on, no one seemed to be paying Crystal any attention.

But then, Crystal noticed two things at once—a figure on the ground outside her living room window, lying in the middle of a large patch of blood soaked snow, and a large, red figure standing up on the roof, waving to her.

She lifted her hand from underneath the blanket to do the same, but quickly put it back under. She didn’t want people to see her ‘waving to someone on the roof’ and think she was crazy, especially since that was probably what they were already thinking with her family being slaughtered and all. Besides, with everything that did happen she might very well be going crazy and seeing imaginary people, Santa Claus of all things, up on the roof.

Crystal then thought she heard a clatter on the roof and a shout into the night.

But, that was just another piece of the myth that she would keep inside, nice and tight, for the rest of her life.