Red Christmas

Becca Madsen

Her maroon Chateau Margaux swirled around in Anne’s glass as she laid back on her pristine snow white couch. There was a soccer match playing on Channel 4, a news segment on Channel 7, a droll holiday themed romantic comedy on Channel 10. The colors from each lit up her brown eyes, dull and flat from a long day, as she clicked through them all. She eventually settled for a Yule Log recording. Soft crackles and pops filled the room and yet Anne felt no warmth, no comfort from the artificial flames.

She took a long sip of her drink and rolled her head towards the massive sheet of glass windows to her right. Across the street, between fat flurries floating down, she glimpsed tree lights illuminating the windows. Her office had a Christmas tree. Brought in by her sycophant assistant, it had been bleeding needles all over her carpet for weeks now.

One of the apartments across the way had people mingling in and out of the window. A Christmas party perhaps. She snorted and took another sip, almost draining the glass to its dregs.

Sick of watching their laughter and gorging, Anne removed herself from the couch and trudged toward the kitchen. The click of the stove and the whoosh of the gas filled the dead air. Anne leaned against the marble island, occasionally stirring. She stepped back to grab a bowl and hissed suddenly. Her fingers grabbed her left heel to see blood turning the tan stocking red. Because there was a piece of glass stuck in her foot.

She tried to forget why, why there was glass on her floor, but the memories fought tooth and nail to the forefront of her memory.

"Christopher, you won’t believe what the defendant tried to pull today!” called Anne, a laugh breaking from her red lips.

She took off her heels and placed them in a rack beside the door, dropping off her briefcase and jacket on hooks above.

“Christopher?” she yelled into the vast expanse of their new apartment, perfectly situated in Manhattan.

Maybe he missed the train, she thought, giggling at the memory of him chasing the L train after they went out for lunch one day in the spring. She made her way into their bedroom and stopped when reached the threshold. Their room was empty. Or half empty. All of his things were completely gone. On her nightstand sat an envelope with ‘Anne’ scrawled on the front. Quickly, praying it was all some sick joke, she ripped open the pristine, white envelope.

Her eyes scanned those words and just went numb. Her eyes glazed with tears that never fell and the spark inside her died, utterly extinguished by him.

She didn’t remember leaving the room, ‘the’ not ‘their’ because nothing would ever be ‘theirs’ again. She didn’t remember stumbling into the kitchen or the cold bite of the tiles on her feet. She only remembered seeing his face in that photo.

A stupid photo of them laughing together years ago. His eyes taunted her, his stupid grin provoked her. He was laughing at her. Anne’s hands shot forward, she grabbed the frame and slammed into the ground. The glass shattered and scattered instantly. The fragments had barely stopped skitting across the floor before Anne collapsed on the ground in sobs.

Anne caught a glimpse of her reflection in the door of her fridge, haggard face, limp hair, dull eyes. It didn’t look like her, so she looked away.

Even with the pain from the memory, cutting as deep as any knife, and the pain from the cut, still welling blood, she felt nothing. Silently, she pulled out the shard, discarded the ruined stockings, refilled her glass to the brim and sat back down on her couch.

And just stared and stared at the snow outside her window, as the flurries gave way to a tempest of ice and wind.