Happy Holidays

By A. Zed

Wanda the witch didn't like the leprechaun who had moved into the closet where they were stored between holiday seasons.  Paddy was able to convince the humans that his magic was lucky, not sinister.   Wanda wasn't so sure about that.   

 

Before the year was through, Wanda would come to have a new appreciation for her fellow figurine in their Omaha home.  If she survived the holidays, that is.

 

A short story of holiday suspense, inspired by the passing of the seasons.

• Language: English
• Publisher: A. Zed
• Release date: Jul 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201239435

A. Zed

A. Zed is an enthusiastic vegetarian living in Portland, Oregon. As a child of a librarian, the author was raised to love books and currently frequents the Holgate, Mid-county and Belmont branches of the Multnomah County Library.

Book preview

Disclaimer

This is a work of fiction .  No figurines were harmed in the creation of this story.

Dedication

This story is dedicated to Carolyn, who is the best at finding four-leaf clovers.

Spring

She didn’t know how he did it.  He’d managed to convince the masses that the magic associated with his ephemeral rainbows, elusive gold pots, and rare shamrocks was luck – happy, a blessing, nothing sinister.

She had no such luck.  She’d never been able to market herself or her magic that way.  Then again, she hadn’t questioned it before Paddy came along.  Being seen as a wicked old hag was just natural.  But when Paddy arrived, she started to reassess the whole order of the holiday world.

He’d been a recent addition to the stable of holiday décor stored in the closet, an ever-diversifying collection always threatening to spill out into additional storage boxes.  The whole Christmas entourage had been relocated to bins in the garage years earlier. 

During the ten months of the year that the witch had to cohabitate with the leprechaun, when neither was performing their designated decorative duties on the front stoop, Wanda found herself starting to loathe the green little elf. 

Not an elf, he’d miff at Snowman when the icy fellow sloshed a greeting.  That frozen lush couldn’t handle the liquor he pilfered from the cabinet just outside the closet.  Drunk Snowman would start to melt and weep, seeping onto the carpets and flags nearby.  The leprechaun only egged him on, because he was happy for a swig at the bottle, too. 

In fact, the witch was almost offended on behalf of his kin, that this leprechaun leaned so deeply into the cliches of his identity: his accent so heavy, his reliance on cutesy sayings as he cozied up to Little Bo Peep and the lady turkey, Jill.  He said he was always up to party and down to luck.  He acted like an eager recruit on pledge week. 

He was young, Wanda reminded herself.  He didn’t have the benefit of years, like herself.  She’d been old by the time she was opened from her package, of course, made that way at the factory.  Maybe that was just how he was made, too.  But she’d also inhabited their particular closet longer than the Irish pipsqueak. 

Why was magic in springtime joyful, while magic in autumn was a curse?  She considered their contrasts:

Leprechaun magic: Luck.  Playful.  Promises riches.  Passes as quickly as spring flowers. Just a tease.

Witch magic: Scary.  Cloaked in night.  Old ladies are scary?  Ugly?

There was also the question of timing: Paddy came out as the days lengthened and flowers returned,