Although I know I’m lucky, being ninety-five still sucks. Sure I still have my wits about me and I manage perfectly well in this little house. But I’m lonely. Not the not seeing people sort of lonely, the watching all your friends die sort.

Last night I dreamed of my beloved Alfie. He’s been gone thirty years now, and I don’t know why I asked him what he thought of the skinny bag of bones I’ve become. 

He grinned and hugged me. 

“You always were a bag of bones…”

And that’s the most comfort I’ve had since he died.

©️jj 2018

Hannah hung the children’s stockings on the extreme ends of the mantelshelf away from the heat of the fire. Emily and Robert looked at her with shining eyes. 
“Yes,” she said, “Santa will be here tonight.”
“Will he bring Daddy home?”
Hannah knelt on the floor between her four-year-old twins and hugged them.
“I shouldn’t think he has room for daddies on his sleigh. But at least we do know your daddy is safe and he will be home soon.”
This seemed to satisfy the small ones and they drank their bedtime milk in blissful quiet. Milk consumed they climbed down from the table and went to kiss their grandfather goodnight. He bent and touched their downy cheeks.
“You go to bed now and dream of Santa.”
They took their mother’s hands and she led them to their bedroom, tucking them in and kissing them lovingly.
“Goodnight my loves.”
“Goodnight Mummy.”
Hannah put some more peat on the fire and settled the fire guard securely before slipping out of the room. The tired children were already asleep as she gently shut the door.

Downstairs, her father-in-law had left his fireside chair and she wondered where he might have gone. She didn’t have time to speculate, though, as he came out of his office with his hands full of clumsily wrapped knobbly parcels. He smiled the smile that was so like his son’s that it brought a lump to Hannah’s throat.
“Stocking fillers.”
Hannah took two already bulging striped woollen stockings from a high cupboard in the wall. The old man grinned.
“How long have you been saving stuff, girl?”
“Months. You?”
“Not so long. I just called in some favours.”
They sat at the table and finished stuffing the stockings in companionable quiet. With the job completed, Hannah replaced the empty stockings with their bounteous counterparts. She stood back  hugging her elbows.
“Don’t fret girl. Think of it this way. This’ll be your last Christmas without him.”
“It will. I just miss him.”
The old man cleared his throat, and when he spoke his voice was thick with suppressed emotion.
“Aye. I miss the useless bugger too.” 

Hannah didn’t know what to say, so she moved over to the other end of the room where the big kettle sat on the back of the Rayburn. She moved the kettle onto the hotplate.
“Cocoa?”
“I might have got something better than that,” he got up and headed back to his office returning with a brown bottle in one calloused hand. “Whisky,” he said conspiratorially. “I reckon you and me deserve a Christmas Eve dram. Get the glasses girl.”
Hannah needed no second telling, getting a couple of heavy glasses from the dresser. “Toddy?” she asked. “we’ve got sugar.”
He nodded and poured whisky with a lavish hand.
Drinks made, they returned to the fireside and sat sipping their drinks. The big kitchen was cozy and Hannah put her slippered feet on the fire guard. She sighed a contented little sigh. The old man reached over and patted her shoulder.
“Tired, girl?”
“A bit.”
“You take your drink to bed with you then. I’ll lock up.”
Hannah gave him a grateful smile and took her drink upstairs. She stood in her bedroom window for a minute looking out over the village street where the rolling fog was so thick that she almost thought she could probably walk on it. Not a night to be out at all. She pulled the curtains and made ready for bed quickly, before jumping between the sheets to enjoy the rare luxury of a hot toddy.  Once the delicious drink was finished she snuggled down into the soft warmth of her lonely bed.

She wasn’t sure what time of the night or morning it was when she woke up to the feeling of cold feet tangled with hers and rough stubble on the back of her neck.
“Rob Newisham,” she said, sleepily, “will you get to your own side of the bloody bed.” Then she woke up fully. “Rob? Rob. Is it really you?”
She heard a longed for laugh and turned into the arms of the husband she hadn’t seen for more than three years. 
“Merry Christmas, love,” he said. Then he bent his head to kiss her and Hannah thought perhaps Santa was real after all. 

Jane Jago 2018

I dream this night
Of snowflakes white
And frost that bites
I smell the smell
Of pine as well
Whereat I dwell
In my mind’s eye
The Christmas pie
Goes dancing by
I dream today
Of games to play
And words to say
Oh Christmas Muse
Whose shiny shoes
Give one the blues
I dream of thee
Incessantly
Along with Street of Quality.

Moonbeam Farquhar Metheringham IV

As soon as she saw the richly caparisoned camels, she knew their brief respite was over.

Even as she gifted the old men her serene smile, Magdala knew what must happen now. Yusuf knew it too, and he began the well-rehearsed process of packing while the venerable ones pontificated.

The moment the bright cavalcade was out of sight, she tied the babe in his sling at her breast, and turned her blue cloak inside out to show the plain brown of its lining.

They walked out into the frozen night, leaving the unsuitable gifts glittering in the warm straw.

©️jj 2018

It was cozy in the cottage with the curtains pulled tightly against the cold night and the fire burning brightly. With the little ones tucked up in bed, Martha and Joe had leisure to fill three brightly coloured knitted socks with Yuletide bounty. Joe’s big hands were as gentle and careful with the tiny presents as if he held his children newborn again.
“It still amazes me how you managed to cram three babes in there,” he said, and rubbed Martha’s stomach affectionately.
“Me too,” but her smile was rueful and he caught the edges of pain in her eyes.
He put down the presents and the sock and went to kneel beside his wife’s chair.
“Why do you worry heart of my heart?”
“We know there will be no more babies. And… A man needs sons.”
He drew her close and kissed her cheeks and eyelids.
“This man needs his Martha, and his three beautiful daughters.”
She looked into his face for a long moment then rested her forehead against the breadth of his shoulder.
“Have you never thought that another woman could have given you sons?”
“No,” he said gently. “No more than you’ve thought that the man your father chose for you to marry could have afforded to dress you in silk and buy the toy mouseys your babies fell in love with at the Yuletide Fair.”
Martha thought about that then touched one small hand to her husband’s bearded cheek. She shuddered as if at a sad memory.
“You are right. I have never thought like that. Since I was a little girl I knew I would wed you and none other. And I am the happiest of wives. But not everybody is like us, and when I saw the man Da wanted me to marry raise his fist to his poor downtrodden little wife at the Fair I could have cried for the pity of her.”
Joe looked sombre. “Aye it looks very bad. The men talked about it in the forge after the Fair closed. Sadly, we can do nothing about him unless she asks. Which she won’t. Did you think him a violent man when you refused him?”
“I never thought him anything but not my Joe.”
This earned her a tender kiss, before they went back to packing the socks with those gifts they had saved all year to buy. They had finished their joyful task and Joe was busy heating a stoup of spiced ale when there came an almost shy tap on the door. The dogs did no more than open their eyes slightly, which meant they were unconcerned.
Martha went to the door and opened it to find her own father, a man who had not spoken a word to her since the day she married against his will, standing outside in the sifting snow. She raised her brows.
“I had not thought to see you on my doorstep. Is aught amiss?”
Her father reddened and shuffled his feet looking for all the world like a schoolboy caught in a neighbour’s orchard. Martha laughed.
“Since you are here you’d best come in.”
He came into the warmth, carefully wiping his boots on the rag rug. Joe handed him a mug of mulled ale and he sipped it.
“Martha,” he said in a very quiet voice. “I think I’ve come to apologise.”
“You think?”
He folded his lips, and for a moment it looked as if his pride would keep him silent, but then he shook his head.
“No. I know I’ve come to apologise and see if I can set things right between us…”
“It’s been four years Da. Why now?”
“Because four years is too long to nurse my stubbornness. Because there isn’t a day goes by when I don’t miss you. Because you won’t let your Mam help you out with a bit of money now and again. Because I want to know my grandbabies. Because…” He spread his hands in a gesture of defeat before ploughing on. “As your Mam and I walked to the fair I told her I was ready to forgive you if you would only say you were sorry for defying me.”
Martha made a spluttering noise and Joe laid a hand on her shoulder.
“Let the man finish,” he said quietly.
Father spoke on in a voice roughened by some strong emotion. “Your Mam laughed at me. Said you had nothing to be sorry for. Said if I wanted to be your father again it was for me to admit I was wrong. I wasn’t going to do it. Not even when I saw you surrounded by your daughters and it felt as if my heart was being pulled from my chest. No. I wasn’t going to say I was wrong. Then I saw him. I saw the man I wanted to give you to, and I saw his wife. I saw the shadows in her eyes. I saw the bruises on her face. And I saw that it could have been  you.” He looked Martha directly in the face. “I’m sorry, love. I was wrong and you were right. Joe may not have wealth, but I see how he loves you. Can you forgive a stubborn old fool?”
Martha said nothing, but she opened wide her arms and her father embraced her with tenderness and longing, and hope of forgiveness.
It was some while before father and daughter got themselves together enough to speak, and even then there was some little constraint as each remembered the harsh words they had used to  the other. Joe smiled down on them from his great height.
“Will you come and see the little ones after church tomorrow?”
“We would love that. Mother and me would truly love that. But now I must go home, before I disgrace myself with unmanly tears.”
He kissed Martha and wrung Joe’s hand before taking something from his capacious pockets and putting it on the scrubbed wood of the table.
“For my granddaughters.”
Then he ducked his head and all but ran from the warmth of the cottage kitchen out onto the snowy street.
Martha sat at the table, rendered silent by disbelief.
Joe went to her side and she turned her face into the warm flannel of his shirt. He held her gently.
“Let’s just drink our ale and talk about this in the morning.”
Martha nodded gratefully.
They climbed the stairs together. At the top Martha turned to look back into the firelit kitchen, where three little socks hung on the mantel – only each one now had a coveted toy mousey right at the very top.

©️Jane Jago 2018

He took the tiny baby home wrapped in his coat. She was all but drowned and blue with the cold. But he had to try. Fortunately his wife had plenty of milk for two babies, and the sort of nature that mothers everything.

It was months before they traced her family, and the lord who fathered her requested that they keep her a while…

Sixteen years later somebody remembered her and a knight rode in on a tall horse. 

Three days later he rode away.

But he came back. In time to claim her and the child in her belly.

©️jj 2018

The name’s Nero, Sam Nero. Private eye and augmented android. Me and my holographic sidekick, Sugar, operate out of an office on the fifty-fifth level of The Last City. We do okay. But some days are a bit bumpier than others…

If you missed the first instalments you can catch up here.

I heard the staccato snap of high heels crossing the floor and Katie’s hand sneaked into mine.
“If I asked nicely, would you lend me a shooter, Sam?”
“What happened to your little stingy gun, babe?”
“Had to lose it when I shot some kid through the leg.”
I laughed. “Taking liberties was he?”
She nodded. “Now. About that shooter.”
“No. I’m not lending you heat so you can shoot your daddy. No matter how pissed off you are.”
Her laughter was lazy, and throaty, and warm.
“I wasn’t really going to shoot him. Just wanted to scare the cold bastard as much as he scared me.”
“Fair enough. But the answer is still no.”
“Spoilsport.”
She left hold of my hand and I heard her walking back to daddy, only this time her footfalls didn’t sound so all-fired mad.

Myk put a big hand on my shoulder and I turned to see a smile in his eyes. He signed “good work,” and we fist-bumped.

We carried on looking at the trees as they speared their way into the ‘sky’ until the voices behind us finally wound down. I turned to see Katie Scarlett with her arms around her father and her face buried in his shoulder.
“Not crying, I hope. You’ll mess your face up good if you are.”
“Nope. Not cryin’ just settlin’.”

O’Halleran motioned to a big table that looked as if it might have been made of real tree wood, and we all took seats. There was a bottle in the middle of the table, and a tray of crystal glasses the like of which I didn’t think I had ever seen before. Katie Scarlett poured ten-year-old bourbon with a lavish hand.
“And now,” she fixed me with a steely gaze, “I think Mister Nero has some explaining to do.”
Zig signed something to her, but the moves were so quick and so subtle that I didn’t catch any of it. Whatever it was brought red flags of embarrassment to her cheeks, and she cast down her eyes.
“Sorry Sam. Uncalled for.”
I handed around my best good old boy grin.
“No worries, babe. And I do have some explaining.”
I touched my wrist unit and Sugar appeared in the vacant chair at the foot of the table. O’Halleran licked his lips, and that riled me.
“A little respect, now, or we walk.”
He glared at me for a long moment, and opened his mouth to say who knew what, but Katie Scarlett forestalled him.
“Manners Daddy. Sugar may only be a hologram, but she is still entitled to be treated respectfully.”
The big man subsided and I nodded to Sugar.
“We are here,” she spoke briskly and not at all in her usual breathy little girl voice, “to talk about why anybody might find it worth their while to poison Mister O’Halleran’s mind against Sam and Katie Scarlett. I have some information that might clear things up a bit.”
As soon as she stopped speaking a short movie played itself out on the white wall opposite her chair. It was night and two figures walked along an unfamiliar street. The woman was wrapped around the man like a morning glory vine, and they stopped under a convenient street lamp for a bit of canoodling. The man’s hands were all over the woman, and as she lifted her face to be kissed Katie Scarlett’s features were revealed. Then the man turned his head.

For an instant Katie Scarlett stared, then she sprung up from her seat like a vengeful goddess.

She’s fast, but I’m faster and I was on my feet in time to catch the clawing hands and hold her away from me as she kicked and screamed. It took her a goodish while to recognise that she was getting nowhere, and soon as she started running down I transferred both of her wrists to one hand and used the other to lift her chin.
I made my voice hard.
“Katie Scarlett, you need to stop acting like a baby and just listen to me. You’re all over snot and you’re making an exhibition of yourself. Capiche?”
For a long moment her reaction hung in the balance, then I felt the tension leave her body. I handed her my handkerchief and she blew her nose firmly. She made to hand the crumpled square of linen back, with the ghost of her three cornered smile hovering above her lips.
“You keep it babe.”
“Thank you most to death, Sam. But who? That’s not me? Isn’t you either is it?”
“No. It isn’t either one of us.”
“Will somebody please explain,” Mister Aitch sounded both bemused and dangerous.
“It’s simple, if you think instead of reacting,” Sugar’s icy tones acted like a douche of cold water. “Somebody, somewhere spent a lot of money setting Sam and Katie up. You wanna know who?”
“Oh. I want to know all right.” The big man looked at his daughter. “You gonna forgive me?”
She gave him the cold eye for a moment, then smiled a sad smile. “I guess I gotta. I almost believed it was me myself.”
Sugar watched them tolerantly for a while before bringing the meeting back to order.
“At first Sam and I thought the security camera footage was completely faked, but we were wrong. That camera saw what we saw. So how was it done?”
The picture on the wall grew bigger as it zoomed in and focussed on the man’s hands. At first it blurred and shook, before steadying and sharpening.
Katie caught on before her father.
“Why, it’s a droid.”
Mister Aitch stared at the wall.
“So it is. And a pretty darned expensive one.”
Katie shrugged. “It’s good, but they can never get the fingernails quite right.”
I found myself looking at my own hands, then I dragged my gaze away to find Sugar smiling at me. I smiled back and dropped her the ghost of a wink.

Mister Aitch leaned his elbows on the table.
“What else you got to tell me?”
I took over.
“What about who made the droid and who paid him to make it?”
“Now you are talking.”
I signed to Myk, who left the room walking quietly.
Katie quirked an eyebrow at me, and I showed her my blandest face.

To be continued…

©️Jane Jago 2018

You can find the first Sam Nero story in Dust Publishing's anthology The Last City together with other stories about his fellow Citizens...

“She won’t divorce him.”

“Why would she?”

Ella stamped her foot. “Because I want to marry him.”

“So have at least ten other girls.”

“But I’m different.”

Father looked up and snorted. “You had better not be sleeping with him.”

It was Ella’s turn to snort. “What kind of a fool do you think I am?”

Mother’s raised eyebrow was enough to silence the brothers.

It almost goes without saying that he pretty soon found someone who wasn’t so careful of her virtue. If Ella shed a tear nobody saw, but she did send flowers and chocolates to his wife.

©️jj 2018

It was just past midnight, though the sky seemed extra dark
And all the little steam engines were gathered in the park
Then something broke the silence with a rattle and a creak
The oldest engine cleared his tubes, and he began to speak

“There are not many nights”, he said, “when we are gathered near
So I would tell a tale if you might have the will to hear”
The wheezing and the whistling was no louder than a breeze
And yet a tiny engine whispered, “Will you tell us please?”

“It happened very long ago, my father’s father’s story
When Owen Owen rode the rails to fame and shining glory
He was just an engine, and his livery quite worn
He pulled the ore from down the mine and worked from night to morn

But then one day in winter, he was give a big surprise
His driver and an engineer they fitted him with eyes
Clear and shining brass they were and bright to light the way
And driver said they made the mine as bright as any day

What Owen engine thought of them was never very clear
But those bright eyes they lit the miners way throughout the year
For two days every winter the pit was put to bed
And Owen Owen engine was left peaceful in his shed

He quite enjoyed the rest he felt his heavy toil had bought
And closing down his brassy eyes he sat in happy thought
Until one night when all around the fog was thick and yellow
His rest was interrupted by a fat and jolly fellow

‘Owen Owen’, said the man, ‘I’ve come to ask your aid
I’ve toys to take to children but the reindeer are afraid
They cannot see through this thick murk and fear to break their legs
Will you help us out dear chap? Or do I have to beg?’

And Owen Owen smiled a smile as wide as wide could be
‘Open up the shed’ he said, ‘that’s just the job for me’
And so it came about upon that darkling winter’s night
That Owen Owen guided Santa with his eyes so bright.”

And every engine in the park gave a quiet beep
Before they closed their iron minds and tumbled back to sleep.

©️jane jago 2018