Christmas Special (part three)

©2011 David Jasmin-Green

Sleigh bells are you listening,
on the Loaf snow is glistening,
a beautiful sight,
you're bollocksed tonight,
walking in a winter wonderland.

“This is getting seriously weird,” Ian mumbled. “Whoever's singing that crapulous song doesn't know the lyrics. Maybe they're too wrecked to remember, what with it being Christmas Eve, or maybe I simply misheard; I'm not sure which, and I can't say I give a toss. The important thing is that music means people, and people mean warmth and shelter and safety. How the hell do I explain that I was lost for an hour or more on a big but by no means enormous field surrounded by the sorry scab of suburbia? I guess I don't have to - I just follow the music, figure out where I am and make my way home.
Mum and dad will be sitting by the fire all snug and warm. They're probably watching some ancient, over-sentimental, dreadfully acted black and white film, and they're almost certainly drinking tea and stuffing their faces with sausage rolls and mince pies and Quality Streets, the jammy bastards. It doesn't sound right, calling your elderly parents jammy bastards, but who gives a flying fuck?
Hang on, I'm not lost, am I? I mustn't even think that, because it's not psychologically encouraging. I can't be lost, I'm just a little disoriented - I'm not the first person to get temporarily disoriented in a blizzard, and I certainly won't be the last.” Ian trudged on, stopping and listening whenever necessary and occasionally altering direction slightly, but suddenly the singing seemed to be coming from an entirely different direction.

Gone away is the bluebird,
Christmas Eve brings a new turd,
he hums a shite song
as he struggles along
walking in a winter wonderland.

“It's the wind – it's the friggingd wind!” he groaned as the truth dawned on him. “The wind is disguising the source of the sound and warping the words in an attempt to deceive me. It's trying to bugger up my judgement, it's inadvertently or perhaps quite purposefully trying to bloody kill me.” he changed direction again and determinedly headed towards the music, but if anything it seemed to be getting fainter.

In the meadow we can build a snowman,
then pretend that he is Ian James.

“Who are you?” a voice interrupted from his rear, and in the very same instant the singing abruptly stopped. The voice definitely came from close by, but when he turned around there was nobody there. “Who are you?” the voice repeated loud and clear from the opposite direction, but when Ian swivelled around there still wasn't a soul in sight.
“Is this some sort of sick joke?” he said, because the situation didn't make the slightest bit of sense - the visibility was poor, but not that poor.
“I said who the fuck are you!” the voice roared from directly behind Ian, and this time when he turned around the Scotsman was standing a couple of feet away, the one that he had spoken to by the bus station.
“You frightened the shit out of me, you crazy old fool!” Ian yelled. “What the hell are you doing wandering around in the middle of the Sugar Loaf during a bloody blizzard?”
“I might ahsk the same of you, laddie,” the old man replied, taking a deep swig from a bottle of whisky that he deftly whipped out of an inner pocket of his greatcoat and replaced as soon as he had finished. “Aah, thash better,” he sighed. “Thash wettened ma dried out whistle and whetted ma tired old tongue. I happen to belong here, Jimmy. I'm a mote in the eye of God's shtorm, I'm blizzard born and bred and blizzard borne and wed. But you don't belong here - you belong in the warm, comfortable, carefree world of mortals. Now why would you choose to leave such a perfect place on Chrishmas Eve of all nights?”
“I'm sorry, but you're talking in riddles, and I have no idea what you mean,” Ian said. “I chose to leave the pub, not the bloody world.”
“Why did you choose to leave the company and shafety of others on what's traditionally the most important festival of human companionship?” the old man said, stepping closer and poking Ian rather brutally in the chest. “Think carefully before you answer, laddie, 'cos your reply is exceedingly important.”
“I don't know,” Ian said. “I just felt dreadfully depressed all of a sudden, and I couldn't stand the hubbub any more. I had to get away, I had an overwhelming desire to go home.”
“Aah,” the Scotsman said. “That explainsh it, then. You were called, and if you were called and your name is on the devil's guest list I'm afraid I cannae do anything to help you.”
“Hang on,” Ian said. “I think we've got crossed lines. No one called me, OK? I was having a few beers down the Dog in a Dicky Bow with my pals, and as I told you, all of a sudden I had an overwhelming desire to get out of the place. I didn't even know it was snowing until I got outside, which doesn't make sense – surely someone would have mentioned it. I made my way to the bus station, which is where you told me that the buses had been cancelled, remember? And then I walked down Keale lane and cut across the Sugar Loaf via Delaney close. The strange thing is that now I'm on the Sugar Loaf I can't seem to get off it..... I need to find my way to Hannaman road, and then I'll be more or less home and dry. I don't suppose you could point me in the right direction, because I'm well and truly lost.”
“We're all losht, laddie,” the Scotsman said. “Everyone called by the blizzard is losht, so you might as well forget all about home. I cannae place the roads you mentioned, and I know nothing about any bus shtation. And if you and I have met before I'm afraid I really dunnae remember it. Perhaps I was drunk – I do like a wee dram every now and again, so that ishn't a total impossibility.....”
'Shit, he's as pissed as a fart,' Ian thought. 'Either that or he's a complete nutter.' “Look,” he said, trying to remain patient. “I think you instinctively know your way around however drunk you are or whatever you say to the contrary. I just need you to point me in the direction of streets and houses and shit – anywhere where there are people will do. That's all I ask of you.”
“There are no trappings of shivilisation for many, many miles in any direction, laddie,” the man replied with a vacant expression in his eyes. “You've been whisked off to a very shpecial nowhere by the blizzard – you're in the eye of the shtorm, and all that exists here is the blizzard and you. Soon you'll cease to exist as an individual, soon you'll dwindle away and die with your eyes wide open, gazing into eternity as you freeze solid, and then you'll be nothing more than fodder for the hungry denizens of Fimbulwinter. But rest assured, there are much worse things than dying from exposhure that might befall you out here.....” Ian started to interrupt, but the man placed his filthy fingers over his lips.
“There are no streets lights and houshes and people to save you,” the old timer continued, “so you might as well abandon all hope of rescue. There are no signs of habitation at all out here, except of course for the Ishe Palace, but you don't wannae go there – you mustn't go anywhere near that wicked place however tempting its promises. Lemme give you a friendly tip, Jimmy. When you hear the mushic that the slaughter-man who calls that place home uses to lure cattle to his door turn around and run t'other way. Once you're a safe distance away walk 'till you drop, or if you want the eashy way out lie down in the snow and submit to the everlasting cold – that's the only advice I can give you. Aye, there's nothing here for you. Even I am illushory, believe it or not.”
“Right,” Ian said. “So you're a figment of my imagination, or maybe a ghostie. Woooooooooh!, I suppose if I were to touch you my hand would go straight through you.”
“Quite probably,” the Scotsman said. “I cannae shay for certain, Jimmy, because no one's ever tried it before – most folk just scream and run when we reach this part of the conversation. If you've a mind to indulge in a wee experiment for your own elushidation feel free – you have my exshplicit permission.....”
After a moment's hesitation Ian did just that. He was so sure that the old man was full of shit that he made a determined lunge for his scrawny arm, but to his astonishment there was nothing solid to grab hold of - he distinctly saw his hand travel through the black greatcoat and close on fresh air, and then he overbalanced and landed on his arse in the wet snow. When he looked up a second or two later the Scotsman had vanished, and he was sitting on his lonesome in the middle of the winter wilderness listening to the low whistle of the wind.

Before very long the singing resumed in the distance. Ian was cold and wet; even his underwear was sodden now and he was thoroughly pissed off, so at first he tried to ignore the soft, enticing voice that warped the lyrics of that shitty seasonal song to its own inscrutable ends. The ghost had advised him to avoid the music at all costs - the music was dangerous, the old man implied, and if the owner of the voice managed to catch you it would do something far nastier than freeze you to death. Yes, Ian admitted that he had had a conversation with a ghost – two conversations, in fact. Though every scrap of his mind wanted to deny it he couldn't do that, because he knew what he had witnessed. That didn't necessarily mean that the spectral Scotsman had told him the Gospel truth, of course. It was far more likely that the music was drifting across the Sugar Loaf from some nearby house where a Christmas party was in full swing. “That's right,” Ian muttered to himself. “I've been wandering around in circles and I'm just a few hundred yards from safety, from salvation.” The wind was getting colder, he told himself - either that or the blizzard was leaching out what little warmth remained in his innards, and he knew that he had to get under cover soon.

Later on we'll conspire
as we cringe by the fire,
to face so afraid
our plans now unmade,
walking in a winter wonderland.

On Sugar Loaf we can build a snowman
and dress him up as Ian the icy clown,
we'll have lots of fun with mister snowman
until some evil bastard knocks him down.