Christmas Inspirations

By Sherry Chamblee

From an emu rebellion to the adventures of a cat lady and a comic book geek, these short stories will warm your heart and keep you smiling.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sherry Chamblee
• Release date: Mar 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393358640

Sherry Chamblee

Sherry Chamblee can also be found on Facebook at www.facebook.com/authorsherrychamblee.   Christian Books in Multiple Genres, Join Christian Indie Author ~ Readers Group on Facebook. Opportunities for free books and giveaways. https://www.facebook.com/groups/291215317668431/

Book preview

Barely Christmas

The Other Side

Christmas Fears devotional

A Home for the Holidays (or Emu Wars)

The Geek and a Cat Lady

These four stories are very short flash fiction or novelettes. They may in the future be developed into full-length stories, but I hope you enjoy them in their current form for now.

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Barely Christmas

HE SAT ON THE EDGE of an old chair, opening a Christmas present from a former coworker, a friend. He wasn't actually looking at what he was doing though. The bright wrapping tore under his fingers with so little effort, a tear reaching ahead of his finger almost as if the paper wanted to be destroyed to reveal its hidden treasure. He felt no excitement.

For some, holidays were joyful, peaceful moments filled with laughter and love. For others they were painful, bitter memories racing to outdo each other as instruments of torture upon the mind of the person they belonged to. He was somewhere in between these extremes - a blank spot.

He barely felt Christmas at all this year.  Well-meaning coworkers had come by two weeks earlier and strung red, blue, green, and white lights all over everything they could think of in the front yard, the display lighting up the night sky to match the displays in his neighbors' yards. They'd festooned his door with wreaths, then tacked garland above the archways, along his mantel, and along the tops of a couple side tables in the living room just for good measure. It had all cheered his heart for a moment, but once the friends were gone, the uplift went with them.

Now it was just something else gathering dust.

A knock sounded at the door, and his eyes flicked to the window where he saw a knit-hat-covered head bobbing outside. No face was visible, but he levered himself up anyway. No sense leaving someone standing outside in the cold for long.

When he opened the door, he stopped and stared for a moment.

Sinead... you're here.

Hi Dad, the young woman standing on the porch said brightly, reaching up to wrap her arms around his neck. Pulling back a little, she noticed the confusion in his eyes. I left you a message that we were coming a couple days ago. Didn't you get it?

He'd stopped listening to voicemails lately, so he shook his head. Why explain? She was here now. That's all that mattered.

Three kids wrapped in layers of down-filled coats and woolen hats and scarves bounced into the entryway, filling the room with noise. The oldest boy smiled and hugged his left arm, the middle boy grabbed his other arm and yelled, Grandpa! The youngest, Sinead's only girl, locked her arms around his ankles and squealed, stomping her booted feet on the floor. He nearly toppled over in their exuberance, but his daughter's arms held him up.

Matias, how've you been? Sinead's husband grinned and clapped him on the back, completing the feeling of being encircled by family.

Grant, good to see you, he said, stopping before emotion took over.

Later, after they'd brought their luggage inside, fed the kids something to keep them from rummaging randomly through his fridge, and determined where everyone would be sleeping that night, Sinead took his hands in hers and sat down next to him on the couch.

Dad, I told you we had a surprise for you, but I suppose if you didn't listen to the voicemail, then this is all a surprise.

He breathed in deep. Maybe she was pregnant with baby four? Maybe Grant had gotten a promotion, or they were going on a special trip? Maybe, and his heart skipped a beat at the thought, they were moving even farther away from him. He was alone too much already.

The tears started to form in his eyes. Unlike his usual lack of emotional display as a younger man, the feelings tended to spill out of his face easier these days.

"No