Part 1 (1/2)
The Gift of Christmas Past.
Lynn Kurland.
Prologue.
”DAMES,” BRUNO SAID, with a regretful shake of his head. ”Whatcha gonna do wit 'em?”
Sir Maximillian Sweetums swished his tail twice, settled himself more comfortably on his cloud, and admitted to himself that he quite had to agree with his companion-as indelicately put as the sentiment had been.
”Ah, dear Bruno,” Sir Sweetums said, ”there's the rub. Women don't like to be 'done with.' Especially The Abigail. A most forthright and in-dependent spirit, she is.”
”It ain't like you ain't tried, Boss,” Bruno offered. ”Before you, uh, I mean while you was still, uh-”
Sir Sweetums held up his well-manicured white paw to spare the blus.h.i.+ng bulldog further embarra.s.sment.
”Yes, I understand.” It was very impolite to mention to a feline that his nine lives were up, but Sir Sweetums overlooked the faux pas. After all, he'd lived his turns to the fullest, using his considerable wits and wiles to their best advantage.
He'd had a different charge during each of his nine lives, and he'd seen eight of those mortal charges successfully settled. It was Number Nine who had, and continued, to elude his superior matchmaking skills. The Abigail. He'd tried, oh, how he'd tried.
He'd made an unmentionable deposit into the toolbox of a less-than-
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desirable handyman The Abigail had taken a fancy to. He'd leaped off the back of the couch over an insufferable attorney, s.n.a.t.c.hing the man's hair-piece and wresting it to the ground. Snags in gabardine trousers, blood-curdling yowls, sneak attacks from the bushes-they had served only to keep the undesirables from The Abigail. But a suitor to suit? Sir Sweet-urns wrinkled his aristocratic nose disdainfully. Nary a one, dear reader, nary a one!
That was before. Two years into his post-ninth life and subsequent Guardian Feline a.s.sociation members.h.i.+p, Sir Sweetums had found the Right One for The Abigail.
Now it was just a question of bringing them together.
”Hey, Boss, uh, is you ready to go yet?”
Sir Sweetums tucked a bit of stray fur behind his left ear. ”Yes, my friend, I believe the time has come. You saw to the details?”
”Yeah, Boss. Dat movie's on right now. Only how come dey don't have no parts for no Guardian Animals in dat one?”
”Perhaps The Capra was allergic.”
A thoughtful expression descended onto the bulldog's pudgy face. ”Yeah,” he said, nodding slowly. ”Maybe dat's it.” He looked up at Sir Sweetums and snapped to attention when he saw the feline was poised to jump. ”Anyting' else, Boss, befores you go? Some Tenda Viddles? A sawsah of haf n' haf?”
Sir Sweetums was already leaping down athletically from the cloud. ”No time, dear Bruno,” he called back. ”We mustn't keep Fate waiting any longer!”
”Good luck, Boss! You's gonna need it,” Bruno added, in an under-tone. ”Dames,” he said, with a slow shake of his head. ”Whatcha gonna do wit 'em?”
Chapter One.
IT WASN'T A wonderful life.
Abigail Moira Garrett stood on the bridge and stared down into the murky waters below her. She couldn't even find a decently rus.h.i.+ng river to throw herself into. The best she could do was Murphy's Pond and the lit-tle one-lane bridge that arched over the narrow end of it. Instead of meet-ing her end in a torrent of water, she'd probably do no better than strangle herself in the marshy weeds below. It was indicative of how her life had been going lately.
It had all started last Monday. Her power had gone off during the night, causing her to sleep until ten A.M. The phone call from her boss had been what had woken her. He'd told her not to bother coming in. Ever.
If only it had stopped there. But it hadn't. And why? Because she'd uttered the words, ”It can't get any worse than this.” Those were magical words, guaranteed to prove the utterer wrong, words that drew every con-trary force in the universe to zero in on the speaker with single-minded in-tensity.
Tuesday she'd been informed that because of a glitch in the system, it would take several weeks to collect unemployment.
Wednesday she'd been informed that she wouldn't be getting any un-employment because her Social Security number didn't exist. If she wanted to take it up with the Social Security office, their number was . . .
Thursday, her landlord had told her he wanted her out. Being be-
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tween jobs, she had now become a freeloader and he wasn't taking any chances on her. Chest pains had begun that night.
On Friday her fiance, whom she had always considered boyishly charming, boyishly mannered, and boyishly handsome, had left her a note telling her that since she no longer had a job and wouldn't be able to sup-port him in the style to which he wanted to become accustomed after they married, he was moving on to greener pastures. To the woman in the apartment next door, to be exact.
And now, on top of everything else, Christmas was three days away. Christmas was meant to be spent with family, basking in the glow of friends.h.i.+p, food, and hearthfire. All she had to bask in was the odor of sweat socks that permeated her apartment, despite her attempts to dispel it. She had no family, no hopes for posterity anytime soon and, most espe-cially, no cat.
She dragged her sleeve across her eyes. This was her second catless Christmas. She should have been used to it by now, but she wasn't. Just how was one to make the acquaintance of Sir Maximillian Sweetums, live with him for ten years, then be expected to live without him? One day he'd been there and the next, poof, he'd been gone. She'd cried for days, looked for weeks, hoped for months. But no Sir Sweetums.
And now that darned movie had just made matters worse. She had watched George Bailey lose it all, then regain it in the most Christma.s.sy, heartfelt of ways. It certainly had been a wonderful life for him. All watch-ing it had done for her was make her realize just exactly what she didn't have. Good grief, she didn't even have a Social Security number anymore!
She stepped up on the first rung of the railing and stared down into the placid waters. All right, now was the time to get ahold of herself and make a few decisions. She had no intentions of jumping-not that she would have done herself much harm anyway. Well, short of getting stran-gled in Mr. Murphy's weeds, that is. No, she had come to face death and figure out just what it was she had to live for.
She threw out her hands as a gust of wind unbalanced her. Okay, so maybe this was a little drastic, but she was a Garrett and Garretts never did things by halves. That's what her father had always told her and she 7 had taken it to heart. Her dad ought to have known. He'd fallen off Mt. Everest at age seventy.
She stared out over the placid pond and contemplated her situation. So, she'd lost her job. She didn't like typing for a living and she hated fetching her boss coffee. She would find something else. And her apart-ment was hazardous to her sense of smell. She could do better.
Her fiance Brett could be replaced as well. What did she need with a perpetual Peter Pan who had three times as many clothes as she did, wore gallons of cologne, and deep down in his boyish heart of hearts was certain she should be supporting him while he found himself? Maybe she'd look for a different kind of guy this time, one who didn't mind working and wouldn't hog all her closet s.p.a.ce. She crossed her heart as she made her vow. No one who dresses better, smells nicer, or works less than I do.
So maybe her life was in the toilet. At least she was still in the bowl, not flushed out on her way to the sewer. She could go on for another few days.
Oh, but Sir Sweetums. Abby swayed on the railing, s.h.i.+vering. He was irreplaceable. Even after two years, she still felt his loss. Who was she supposed to talk to now while she gardened in that little plot downstairs? Who would greet her at the end of each day with a meow that said, ”and just where have you been, Miss? I positively demand your attention!” Who would wake her up in the morning with dignified pats on her cheek with his soft paw?
Meow!
Abby gasped as she saw something take a swan dive into the pond. She climbed up to the top of the railing for a better look. That had to have been a cat. It had definitely meowed and those headlights had most cer-tainly highlighted a tail.
Headlights? A very large truck traveling at an unsafe speed rumbled over the one-lane bridge, leaving behind a hefty gust of wind. Abby made windmill-like motions with her arms as she fought to keep herself bal-anced on that skinny railing.
”Hey, I wasn't through sorting out my life!” she exclaimed, fighting the air.