Holidays Afar: #minithology

By N.D. Gray, Elizabeth Knollston, Heidi Moone and 2 more

WHAT SECRETS WILL COME TO LIGHT?

Bonfires, twinkling strands, candles, and sunrise. Buried at the heart of many celebrations we find fire. The longing of the human heart for light to see by, that we may understand. That we may know others and ourselves. That we might escape the shadows. 

 

These five stories are spun from strands of familiar celebrations into wonderful strangeness. They are about light and shadow. Family and what we inherit. Wishes coming true, though you may regret that they do.

 

NOT ALL CANDLES SHOULD BE LIT. NOT ALL WISHES SHOULD BE WISHED.

 

Experience the magic of holidays afar in these five science fiction and fantasy stories by Heidi Moone, Elizabeth Knollston, N.D. Gray, Karli Stites, and Tracy Eire.

• Language: English
• Publisher: 3 Feathers Publishing
• Release date: Dec 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9781947344150

Book preview

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

STORY ONE–FUEL FOR BONFIRES

STORY TWO—WHEN THE SUN STANDS STILL

STORY THREE—THE FINAL HOUR

STORY FOUR—WISH

STORY FIVE—THE STOLEN MOTHER

COMING SOON

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

COPYRIGHT

INTRODUCTION

Regardless of the time of year, or what the cause of celebration, holidays fill us with anticipation.

Whether it is an intimate affair celebrated among soft candles and thematic decor or the cheerful chaos of a riotous family reunion, preparations for a holiday may take days. Weeks. Months, even. Planning, delegating responsibilities. Creating delicious food and delightful and entertainments. All in a swirl of exhilarating countdown time.

The holidays we celebrate and the traditions we follow as part of those celebrations are as diverse as we are. Colorful and vibrant. Thoughtful and introspective. Holidays reveal our hearts. They are often celebrations of light in some form or another, even subconsciously. And light, or its absence, plays a part in most of the stories you will find here.

In this #minithology, we have written about holidays fantastical in detail but familiar in form. Celebrations which are far from the typical. The mundane. The ordinary.

As children, our storytellers in this volume most loved Christmas, Thanksgiving, and Halloween. As adults, they have taken moments from their favorite holidays and spun them out into new shapes, transported them other times and strange places. We view these fictional festivities through the eyes of characters discovering personal truths, opening up familial secrets, and growing their wings, so to speak. Each character faces the opportunity to open their hearts and allowing the light of celebration in, even if that light is accompanied by shadow.

Pour yourself a favorite drink, light a candle, and join us on our holidays afar.

ND Gray

November 2021

Camp Verde, AZ

STORY ONE

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If Heidi Moone could create an international holiday, it would be We Saved the Earth from Us Day, wherein we’ve cleaned our oceans, saved our forests, ... and preserved rich, people-free habitats for the animals and plants we share this tiny little planet with.

She goes on to say, If I could create that holiday, it would mean we’d done something meaningful for all the life we’re currently aware of...

Hard pressed to pin down a particular favorite holiday memory, she finally chooses the annual watching of the 1951 A Christmas Carol, starring Alistair Sim. She watched this every year with her grandfather, and because of limited channel options, they were at the mercy of the television station as to whether or not they saw it in color or black and white.

Being at the mercy of others is something her main character understands. Called from a self-made life in Toronto to her hometown, where she must deal with her aunt’s estate, Tabby Willow is immediately swamped with familial expectations.

While juggling presumptive friends and family members, she discovers her late aunt was more than she had appeared to be. Attempting to unravel the mystery, Tabby encounters a familiar stranger on Bonfire Night, and everything changes.

Tabby Willow had only been back in Storm’s Port since the second of November.

As home towns went, it was probably not that impressive. Tabby had been happy enough as a child, because the town had enough to keep the interest of the young and carefree.

But now, as she rolled out of bed and keenly felt the lack of heat in her former great-aunt’s house, it occurred to Tabby that climbing over endless mossy rocks, splashing in the cold rivers and dubious ocean, and climbing cliffs on the Northern Peninsula wouldn’t be too enticing, now that she was thirty-one, and tired in the mornings, even without the time zone difference between Toronto and the Island.

Tabby didn’t want to have adventures anymore.

She didn’t want to find pirate treasure, or any lost, mysterious Viking ruins, or one of the Seven Cities. She didn’t want to find the fairies—though all the children knew the fairies lived in the hills ‘up back’ of the town. They always worried that the miners at Hard Knock might accidentally tunnel into their forbidden underworld someday, and all of them would vanish, never to be seen again.

But the adult Tabby was keenly aware that reality had caused the mine to close down instead. No fairies needed.

The phone on the side-table in the front room was ringing, and idly, Tabby wondered who was paying for that.

She supposed she was, considering the past couple of weeks.

In slippers, teeth pressed firmly together, Tabby reached the kitchen and started a fire going in the wood stove there.

The house being a good hundred years old meant that some of the more modern conveniences had been somewhat shoehorned into existence. Her great-aunt Tildy had never been keen on oil heat, and electricity was expensive and inconstant in Storm’s Port, clinging as half the town did to the side of a cliff.

Around the port-side, in the lee, there would be breaks in the wind, but at some point in a storm, a line would go down, and it went down for leeward and windward alike.

Tabby’s hands had forgotten nothing of starting a fire in a cold stove in her six years away from Newfoundland. She had the thing lit, and was feeding the sulky curl of flame bits of bark, in almost no time flat. Soon, Tildy’s fat little kettle, blackened from the bottom with so much use, was smugly burbling to itself on the burner.

The house itself would take longer to warm up. Absently, Tabby put some beach rocks on the side of the large stove to begin heating up.

Not that she was going to go back to bed, but if she did indulge herself with a little more sleep, the rocks would be more than a comfort.

And then the phone began to ring with a more strident sound, and Tabby, still sans tea, bundled over to sit down at the little bench and pick up the phone.

Hi mum, she said, already feeling tired.

Why didn’t you pick up sooner?

The accusatory voice was, indeed, her mother.

I didn’t want to, Tabby said bluntly. In discussions with her therapist leading up to the return trip, honesty and boundaries had been mentioned, thoroughly discussed, and even role-played.

Well I’ve never heard anything so foolish. I was going to send Clay up along to see if you was dead.

Clay’s in school, Tabby noted. It’s Thursday.

Clay’s wherever he feels like being, her mother sniffed. And anyone who’d stayed at home would know the truth of that.

I didn’t stay here, I went to Ontario, Tabby agreed. Why did you call?

To find out how things are going, her mother began, and Tabby leaned her head against the olive-green wallpaper that was in this room, wallpaper that was absolutely older than her.

They’re fine, she said. Thank-you for your concern.

Don’t be up to that with me, her mother said, her tone tart. I’ll stop by in a bit. I daresay you’ll appreciate the help.

That’s okay, Tabby said. It’s going well, and Aunt Tildy had asked me to do it. I’d prefer you not stop by.

There was blessed silence on the other end of the line for a moment, as her mother weighed unpleasant options.

Because Tabby wouldn’t, in fact. let her mother in if she happened to show up. And if Tabby did that, there would be a holy scandal in Storm’s Port as hadn’t been seen in many a year.

The tongues that wagged about that would wag, probably, down through the generations. Every resident of the town today would be long dead and gone, and Tabby Willow’s slight toward her mother, Agnes Willow, would still be brought up in the town gossip.

And while Tabby no longer felt the keen sting of that, she was fully aware that her mother couldn’t be more different.

I’ll be by for lunch, with Rachel and Eva, Agnes said then, her voice hard. Please try to be civil.

Ah, hardball. Could Tabby really keep out both her sisters?

Mom, I’m happy right now focusing on the work on my own, but I already told you that I’d be seeing you tomorrow at Ray’s bonfire. Let’s look forward to that, and not have everyone drop in on me when I’m working, and I won’t have time to be a good hostess.

We don’t need a hostess, we’re not fancy like mainlanders, her mother snapped.

I’ve said what I want, and I would like you to respect that, Tabby said. I am busy with the house today, I’ll see you tomorrow evening, and everything’s fine. Is there anything else you’d like to talk about? The kettle’s on the stove and I don’t want it to boil over.

Go then, since that’s all you care about, her mother said, her voice ominous, threatening, like clouds over the water.

After hanging up the phone, Tabby did some breathing exercises to keep anxiety at bay, and she tried to fix one thing in her mind: That she, Tabby Willows, had successfully thwarted her mother coming over and incessantly fussing at her for probably an entire day.

Surely, Agnes would make her daughter pay dearly for it.

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By mid-afternoon she’d had to deal with over a dozen phone calls from family demanding to know how she could talk to her mother like that, and had turned away almost two dozen people from her aunt’s front door.

Yes, it was hard to carve out your own space for yourself in small-town Newfoundland. People didn’t tell you about that when you were practicing ‘healthy boundaries’ in your shrink’s office.

Of course, Tabby had known. She had been kind, but firm to everyone.

Aunt Noreen, I’m in a particular place in organizing Tildy’s things, and I’ll need you to come back later. What about next Tuesday at four?

My ducky, we don’t make appointments in this town, we drop by when the mood strikes, Noreen, who was not actually Tabby’s aunt, drew her coat together a little indignantly. Your mother had said you were being standoffish, and I must say, it’s a disappointment.

Thank-you for letting me know your feelings, Tabby nodded. I find it disappointing that I asked my mother to respect my desire to see her tomorrow at the bonfire, and it’s also disappointing that she’s chosen to spread gossip about that through the town because she doesn’t like my boundaries.

I never! And Noreen turned on her heel and stalked off. Indignant royalty couldn’t have been any more outraged than Noreen Gathers that blustery November day.

Yes, aunt Tildy, my homecoming will be short and sweet, Tabby announced to absolutely no one, because she hadn’t let a soul into the house.

She’d even stopped off in Deer Lake, and gotten a new door knob and lock, with a key, on the drive home.

This wasn’t to replace her aunt’s door lock. It was to actually install a lock in the first place. Which she’d done, using power tools, because she’d known what was going to happen.

By nightfall, word had ‘gotten around’ that there was a lock on Tildy’s door.

And her mother had called again.

Tabby, I raised you to be a good girl, her mother began without prelude.

In what way have I been bad today? Tabby asked as she sipped on some caffeine-free tea (also picked up in Deer Lake), and looked at the contents of her