Page 2 of Happy Krampus Xmas & the Meet Not Cute
“Because you were the worst,” Ash states.
“I’m the reason Santa has a naughty list.” I nod with a proud, melancholic smile, fingering the little, ball-shaped urn pendant hanging around my neck. Gabe’s most meaningful present because it holds a pinch of my gran’s ashes in it. “So much that Krampus took a wicked liking toward my cunning self anddecided to screw with me every year during this very month,” I finish.
“Why?” Michael asks.
“His fun. My curse,” I reply, making a disgusted face at a couple of women passing by, gleefully humming a bloody Christmas song. Thank the Lord, the mall is about to close, only very few people left.
“You’re an idiot,” Ash snorts out, the crass heathen.
“Why do you think he’d do that?” Ren sounds incredulous.
“I sort of summoned him when I was around ten. Ollie and I found a Ouija board.” I take a long sip from my smoothie. We actually found it in the principal’s office. He had a file cabinet at school filled with confiscated stuff from students. I wanted to get my mother of pearl compact mirror back. And I did. The Ouija board was compensation for the emotional distress I suffered.
“Summoned him,” Ren echoes my words slowly, while checking out a woman’s ass.
“Bullshit,” Ash coughs—notinto his fist. He has a new tattoo on his neck and a couple along his arms. His blond hair falls too long on his forehead as he flips it with a quick motion of his head.
I shrug seamlessly. “It’s not hogwash. I was a kid who wanted to meet a real demon and his name was the first one that popped inside my head. Now he comes every December and enjoys fucking my life up, the bellend.”
“Fucking up how?”
“My initiation for one! Kidnapping a maggot should go smoothly with all the tech Rami has equipped us with.”
“I heard the donor’s meeting at the marina was quite…rough.” Ren is trying hard not to laugh. I’m tempted to lift up his glasses, grab his wavy blond hair and punch him right in the face.
“At least he was dead when the shark went at him,” Michael adds.
“I wanted to kill the bloody maggot, not witness him get stabbed in the eye with a speargun,” I grumble.
“The next donor suffered,” Raph drily says.
“Not by my hand. He got electrocuted on his own Christmas tree just before I injected him with the sedative. And the worst thing? He smelled like barbecue. I’ll never eat grilled meat again!” I state before giving my burger a bite. Okay, starting tomorrow.I’ll be absolutely disgusted tomorrow.
“Really? Like barbecue, you wacko?” Ash scoffs.
“Smelled like teriyaki meatballs,” I clarify.
“The faultyChristmas lights on the tree could be Krampus’s style.” Ren makes a ghostly voice when he utters the demon’s name. “But the speargun? It’s all a big, fat coincidence.”
“The red and green speargun’s brand name was on the side of the barrel: Dark Twin!”
“You’re overthinking this,” Raph feels the need to once again give his dull insights.
“Third donor? I almost got shot in the arse before that reindeer statue smashed him to the ground. I’m still in almost mourning of my arse! The one after that? She choked on a piece of candycane. I mean, who does that? I should’ve shoved it down her throat,” I mutter angrily. “I refuse to be Wile E. Coyote!” My fist falls down on the table.
“The cartoon?” Michael covers his full mouth as he talks.
“Every plan I make keeps blowing up in my face. I’m a hot, curly Wile E. Coyote.”
“So, in Wile style, just try again,” Raph says matter-of-factly.
“It’s all in your head,” Ren states.
“In the past, a bloke wearing a Santa hat barfed on my brand-new, stupendous, blue velvet hand-embroidered slingback heels, ruining them forever. I was almost run over by a car when I tripped on some Xmas street decorations. A tray filled with gingerbread man cookies fell on my head from the third-floor window of a building while I was walking back home. A dog wearing elf ears sank his teeth into my coat, making me fall face-first into a filthy puddle of…apple juice—at least that’s what I still tell myself to this day. I burned both my eyebrows and half a tablecloth with a spicy Christmas candle. A frozen turkey was thrown at my head during a supermarket brawl between two surprisingly energetic grandmas. A wreath slid?—”
“That’s enough. We got the fucking gist. You’re a disaster about to happen,” Ash grumbles, dramatically pushing his chair further away from mine.
“Krampus time is horrific!” I cry.
