Make Christmas Great Again SCC2016

Here's my submission for SCARIEST CHRISTMAS CAROL (SCC2016) and my first post in the Short Stories forum. I started this about two hours ago and wrote it straight through. Also, I didn't proofread it. My apologies in advance for any glaring errors.

Make Christmas Great Again

Returning from the fridge, Terry plopped on the tattered old gray couch and popped the top on the third course of Christmas breakfast. Grinning, he held the can out toward the television's screen in a toast.

"This Bud's for you Sean."

The man on the television smiled. Terry beamed back. It had been weeks since his fiance of five years had run off with a trucker she'd met working the late shift at Waffle House but Terry had barely noticed her absence. He'd been riding a high since November and though he sometimes missed the food she'd often bring home, he sure as hell didn't miss her constant nagging. He knew he'd have the last laugh. The jobs were coming back and when he got his, the very first thing he planned on doing was buying a sweet ass Charger. Chicks dig cars.

Terry's eyes lost focus and glazed as he day dreamed about himself doing donuts in the Waffle House parking lot, new chick — hotter chick — in the passenger seat, arm out the window and middle finger in the air. He smiled and nodded his head to the sounds of Metallica playing in his head.

Feet from where he slouched, rocking out in revenge-filled reverie, there came a squeak and then a triplet of authoritative knocks that rattled the trailer's front door in its frame. Cop knock. Terry lurched forward, his eyes darting side to side as he scanned the room for paraphernalia.

Shiiiit, the ashtray.

Terry sprang to his feet and lifted the cushion. Grabbing the ashtray from the coffee table, he poured the contents into the couch his cousin Randy had helped him retrieve from a nearby curb some years prior. He remembered to breathe again. Face hot and flushed, he brushed the ashes from his t-shirt as he stepped toward the door.

Terry's nicotine stained fingers clenched the knob and he began to twist. Steeling himself for the impending encounter, he pulled open the door. No one. He pushed open the screenless door and peeked out in time to see the rear of the delivery truck as it drove off. Closing his eyes, he exhaled slowly and ran his fingers through his hair. Pheeeew. Terry looked down and on the step below sat a small nondescript cardboard box with a white shipping label on its top. His heart raced.

F******ck, yeah!

Snatching up the box, Terry flung the door shut and practically leapt back to the couch. He sat for several moments with the package in his hands, savoring the anticipation. He set the package on his knees and digging his dirt encrusted nails under the flaps, he ripped the package apart with a grunt, tearing it to shreds like a pro wrestler casting off his t-shirt to bear his shaved chest to the camera.

And there it was — in his lap — the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. His bottom lip quivered. His brow furrowed. Overwhelmed with emotion, his eyes brimmed and then spilled over as Terry began to cry quite freely and unashamed. Unleashed, tears of the sweetest joy streamed down his cheeks, saturating his auburn stache.

He sat there crying and staring at it for some time. Though he'd seen ones just like it countless times before, the hat cradled atop his knees was no less a vision to behold. Just like Santa's, it was the red and white of candy canes, Coca-Cola cans, the stripes of the American flag and of freedom itself. It seemed to pulse, radiating goodness, hope and pure awesomeness.

With one hand, Terry smoothed the lank hair on the top of his head, pulling it down flat against the scalp in the party section of his mullet. The other hand lifted the cap and placed it down upon his head. As he pulled the cap down snug, it was as though it locked mechanically into place and with contacts now aligned and touching, his entire body was electrified.

Terry floated to his feet.

He felt profoundly changed — changed in a way he'd expected to feel when he was baptized at the age of fifteen in the crick behind the old church. Terry had accepted his savior, he was born again and this time, he wasn't just born cool, he was reborn a super-frickin-badass. Like a half-man, half-panther, Terry strode down the hall into the bathroom.

Looking in the mirror of the plastic medicine cabinet, he turned his head to one side and then to the other before locking eyes with his reflection. As he stared into his own soul, he was struck with amazing visions of the future. His future. The Charger. The Girl. The Waffle House. His chest expanded and he was filled with pride. At his sides, his disproportionately small hands clenched into fists of red hot patriotism. Terry pounded his chest several times and randomly uttered the phrase, "The South Will Rise Again."

The sound of a familiar chant began to call out to him from the living room. He turned and stepped out into the hall. As though trapped in a tractor beam, Terry was pulled down the hall as the level of the chant rose and the words became clear.

"U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!"

Terry blinked, and as if by magic, he was once again seated on the wretched, dirty old busted couch. He fumbled blindly for the remote, finding it and turning the volume up without once taking his eyes off the televsion. He stared raptly at the television as the lying media's cameras did what they would never dare do before — they pannned across the vast crowd. It was the largest crowd Terry had ever seen.

Like NASCAR times ten he thought. It's a God-darn Christimas-frickin-miracle. It's really happening. We're making America great again.

The cameras turned back to a platform in the middle of a sea of red hats. Sean Hannity smiled broadly and began to speak.

"Welcome back to Sean Hannity Presents, Make Christmas Great Again. The movement — I mean moment — we've all been waiting for has arrived. It brings me great pleasure to present to you, real America, the greatest President-elect in the history of the world, Donald J Trump."

President-elect Trump, an unhealthy orange even in late Decemeber, sauntered across the stage and the two men shook hands to the cheers of the crowd.

"President-elect Trump, so glad to have you here with us. I hear you have a very special Christmas announcement?"

A podium slid up from the bowels of the stage and to either side of the podium, a pair of enormous transparent teleprompters. As the President-elect made his way to the podium, the hundreds of thousands of hat wearing supporters went wild. After sniffling bigly, Trump began to speak.

"You're such a beautiful crowd. Really. I've seen the greatest crowds and this — this crowd tops them all folks. Believe me. Biggest crowd in the history of the world. Tremendous crowd. Everyone is saying it. I don't want to name any names because you know I don't like the media but that's what they all said. They said that. It must be true, right?"

Trump paused. Raising his hand to shield his eyes, he scanned the mass of supporters and smiled slyly.

"It's time to make America great again folks. I mean that. I really do. We're going to make America again and we're not going to wait until January folks. We're going to do it right now."

Trump appeared to manipulate something on the top of the podium. The teleprompters spun around and the crowd fell silent as a sequence of strobing patterns were revealed to them. Some oohed and others ahhhed. Several of the more high strung fainted. And then, a man wearing olive green cargo pants and a hunting vest climbed the steps to the platform, carrying with him a guitar.

The man slung the strap over his shoulder. Trump handed him a cord which he plugged into the guitar. He began to play.

Ted Nugent played like he hadn't played since the 80's when you could still get the good stuff. Terry immediately recognized he song — Cat Scratch Fever — but something about it was different, wrong. The pitch of the guitar rose steadily and as it rose, Terry felt the cap begin to vibrate. Soon the sound eminating from the television was an unbearable shriek piercing his skull. Terry began to panic. He tried to reach for the television remote and found his hands, his arms, his head — his entire body — was paralyzed.

The cap was vibrating furiously but it did not budge. It had fused itself to his head. Terry's body began to shake violently, uncontrollably. White hot blasts of pain exploded throughout his body. In his mind, he screamed and screamed and screamed. Had he not been blind in the final moments of his life, Terry would have seen on his television, a crowd of hundreds of thousands of hat wearers, convulsing wildly on the ground.

The music ended and with it, the vibrations. Terry's broken jaw at last unclenched and a thick froth poured past his lips. As the life drained from him, Terry heard Trump speak one final line.

"You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in."

Excellent work!

a reply to: theantediluvian

Really I don't know what to make about this whole Trump/Hillary debacle but...I do know that I thoroughly enjoyed your story and if the current political _________(insert word of choice here) inspired you to write then hooray.

Here's my first submission for SCARIEST CHRISTMAS CAROL (SCC2016) and my first post in the Short Stories forum. I started this about two hours ago and wrote it straight through. Also I didn't proofread it. My apologies in advance for any glaring errors.

It's a fine first entry in the SS forum, IMO, and perhaps you will feel inclined to write more stories in the future.

I've not had an opportunity to read many of the entries for the contest yet but, I have a feeling there will be a lot of competition this time around.

a reply to: EmmanuelGoldstein

Thank you! Glad you enjoyed it!

a reply to: TNMockingbird

Thanks! I read AugustusMasonicus's submission and I was inspired to post one of my own. I hadn't written any stories of any sort in a long time and it was a lot of fun. I'm going to read through some of the others now.

a reply to: theantediluvian

Your a hell of a writer iluvian!

*puts his hat in the drawer*

Great piece of fiction sir!

Don't forget to link it in the contest thread stating non writer status and this is your official entry.

a reply to: Indigent

Thank you. I had forgotten to do any of that.

a reply to: JinMI

Thank you very much! I'm honored and very glad that you enjoyed it.

a reply to: theantediluvian

Dude, phenomenal. Really great use of description.


And I like how you worked in a reference to film that bugged my out as a kid.

I used to see a bumper sticker on pick-ups that said "Bad to the Bone". You need to get you one of those! lol. But, I love you anyway.

Although your story is the only one I've read so far, I gave you a flag because NONE of them could be any scarier than this.

Angelina

a reply to: AugustusMasonicus

a reply to: angeldoll

Lol. Thank you! Thank you!

originally posted by: theantediluvian

Yeah, that was it. Silver Shamrock was creepy as hell.

a reply to: theantediluvian

Brilliant!

Loved it.

a reply to: Kali74

Thank you!

originally posted by: Hazardous1408
Loved it.

Thought you might enjoy it!

[insert here a really intelligent sounding comment that hopefully makes me look like a really thoughtful person for everyone else to see]

Honestly though, this was pretty great. You have a talent!

s&f!

a reply to: geezlouise

Thanks!