Among the many things I love about the holidays are the stories we all bring to the table. In that spirit, I’m happy that when my friend and bestselling author Martin Crosbie asked for victims volunteers to contribute a Christmas-themed blog for a 12 Blogs of Christmas event, I stuck my little hand in the air. And boy, there will be some terrific writers in this lineup. Starting tomorrow and going until Christmas, I’ll be posting a bit about each author and their holiday stories. I hope you enjoy the contributions of the following authors and check out their websites (I’m gathering links as fast as I can!) so you can learn more about them.
- December 14: RJ Crayton
- December 15: Jamie Lee Scott
- December 16: Heather Haley
- December 17: Jennifer Ellis
- December 18: Helga Zeiner
- December 19: (me!)
- December 20: M.L. Gardner
- December 21: Roberta Kagan
- December 22: Sarah Lane
- December 23: Dianne Greenlay
- December 24: Wendy McClelland
- December 25: Martin Crosbie
To whet your appetite, here’s a very short Christmas story I wrote this week during JD Mader’s #2minutesgo flash fiction fiesta and sewing circle. Loads of fine, fine authors contributing to this weekly writing party, too.
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He pinged onto her GPS screen; she put the hot toddies on the burner to warm and made herself comfortable in the recliner by the window to wait for him. She’d been thinking. She’d been thinking for months. Every year, he went out a little less enthusiastically. Every year, he returned more broken than ever. Grateful, yes, for what he’d been charged with, but she could see the toll it had taken. The stoop in his back, the lines around his eyes that were oh-so-merry, the color drained from the lips that were red as a cherry. When she heard the distant tinkle of sleigh bells, she eased out of the chair and filled two mugs, grinding nutmeg atop her secret potion that each year proved less effective at restoring his strength—even though secretly she’d been upping the dosage since that Kardashian woman tried to get her claws into him. Finally, the door opened. His shoulders drooped; his lovely suit was smeared with chimney ash, and the round, rosy cheeks had faded to a dull, pinkish-gray. With a deep breath, she brought the beverages into the living room and said, “Honey, it’s time. I want to move to Florida.”
Laurie Boris 
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