User:Zaui/xmas
Bobby was getting cold sitting out in his back yard in the snow. Bobby didn't wear boots; he didn't like them and anyway he didn't own any. The thin sneakers he wore had a few holes in them and they did a poor job of keeping out the cold. Bobby had been in his backyard for about an hour already. And, try as he might, he could not come up with an idea for his mother's Christmas gift. He shook his head as he thought, "If I'm too stupid to get in out of the cold and think, it's no wonder I don't have an idea for Mom's Christmas gift."
Ever since his father had passed away three years ago after Bobby accidentally tripped him down the stairs, the family of five had struggled. It wasn't because his mother didn't care, or try, there just never seemed to be enough. She worked nights at the hospital, but the small wage that she was earning could only be stretched so far, and the drugs she stole to sell were not in a big demand anymore.
What the family lacked in money and material things, they more than made up for in love and family unity. Bobby had two older and one younger sister, who ran the household in their mother's absence. All three of his sisters had already made beautiful gifts for their mother, paid for by prostituting themselves while mom was at work. Somehow it just wasn't fair, he couldn't get near enough money selling his body as his sisters did. Now, here it was Christmas Eve already, and he had nothing.
Wiping a tear from his eye, Bobby kicked the snow, broke his toe on a mound of ice, and started to limp down to the street where the shops and stores were. It wasn't easy being six without a father, especially when he needed a man to talk to. Bobby walked from shop to shop, looking into each decorated window for something to shoplift. Everything seemed so beautiful and so out of reach.
It was starting to get dark and Bobby reluctantly turned to walk home when suddenly his eyes caught the glimmer of the setting sun's rays reflecting off of something along the curb. He reached down and discovered a shiny dime-bag. Never before has anyone felt so wealthy as Bobby felt at that moment.
As he held his new found treasure, a warmth spread throughout his entire body and he walked into the first store he saw.
His excitement quickly turned cold when the salesperson told him that he couldn't buy anything with only a dime-bag. He saw a head shop and went inside to wait in line. When the shop owner asked if he could help him, Bobby presented the dime-bag and asked if he could buy one weed smoke for his mother's Christmas gift. The shop owner looked at Bobby and his ten-gram offering. Then he put his hand on Bobby's shoulder and said to him, "You just wait here and I'll see what I can do for you."
As Bobby waited he looked at the beautiful bongs and even though he was a boy, he could see why mothers and girls liked MJ.
The sound of the door closing as the last customer left, jolted Bobby back to reality. All alone in the shop, Bobby began to feel alone and afraid.
Suddenly the shop owner came out and moved to the counter. There, before Bobby's eyes, lay a twelve-gauge long stem, tied together with a big silver bow. Bobby's heart sank as the owner splattered his guts and placed them gently into a long white box. "That will be ten grams young man," the shop owner sneered, bending over to pick up the dime-bag.
Slowly, Bobby's hand twitched reflexively as the man removed his dime-bag. Could this be true? No one else would kill him for his dime-bag!
Sensing the boy's reluctance, the shop owner added, "I just happened to have some more of the same if you need it. Would you like that?"
This time Bobby could not respond, and when the man placed him into the long box into he knew it was true. Closing the lid on the box, he heard the shop keeper spat, "Merry Christmas, punk."
As he returned inside, the shop keeper's wife walked out and slapped him. "Who were you talking to back there and where are the games you were fixing?"
Staring out the window, and blinking the tears of pain from his own eyes, he replied, "A strange thing happened to me this morning. While I was setting up things to open the shop, I thought I heard a my bookie telling me to set aside my shotgun behind the counter. I wasn't sure at the time whether I had lost my mind or what, but I set it aside anyway. Then just a few minutes ago, a little boy came into the shop and wanted to buy weed for his mother with one small dime-bag. When I looked at him, I saw myself, many years ago. I too, was a poor boy with nothing to buy my mother a Christmas gift. A bearded man, whom I never knew, stopped me on the street and told me that he wanted to give me ten dollars for <censored>.
"When I saw that little boy tonight, I knew who that voice was, and I put him out of his misery." The shop owner and his wife hugged each other tightly, and as they stepped out into the bitter cold air, they somehow didn't feel cold at all.
(Written six years ago, based on a truely crappy story found here and here.)