Angels From the Realm of Glory

Sarah Holloway

My sister Mavis and I throw an annual party the weekend before Christmas. This year, for once, we were ready on time, but nobody showed up. An hour after the party was supposed to start, we could think of nothing to do. We sat in the wingback chairs, sipping eggnog and waiting for headlights to come down the drive.

At 10:00, Mavis surprised me by hurling her mug of Christmas cheer into the fire and clomping upstairs, leaving me to put the food away and turn off the lights. Old Mavis had some gumption in her, after all! I wrapped the pigs-in-a-blanket in foil and placed the blue cheese dip and the meatballs with grape jelly into Tupperware containers. I wasn’t upset about the party, but I am the older, wiser sister.

The next morning, I wondered if something was up. No one called with regrets. I phoned our niece and our nephews, but the ringing was endless. Never even got an answering machine. That was the first time I wondered if we were dead but didn’t know it. Laurie and her brothers will inherit everything Mavis and I have, which is rather a lot, and I’d always believed they loved us, too. No way they would ignore our party without good reason. It was very confusing.

On Christmas Eve, I stood on the front porch watching snowfall. I loved how the night looked socked in with silvery snow clouds, a spooky kind of Christmas. I’ve heard Death called a comedian, but I wondered whether it’s really an obnoxious guest who arrived early for a holiday party. Everybody knows the hostess yearned for a little more time to make things right. In a perfect world, I would have told Laurie about the stock certificates I’d squirreled away. I never did trust a banker.

“I’m still upset about the party, Pauline,” Mavis said when I woke her Christmas morning. She’d spent a lot of time in bed, flat on her back, arms crossed over her chest. I coaxed her to get up and dress. I even excavated her jingle-bell earrings from the imbroglio of her dresser drawer. “Tradition!” I sang, holding them out to her. Our father loved bellowing that lyric å la Tevye in Fiddler on holidays.

We had worshipped at the First Methodist Church on Christmas morning all our lives. We didn’t pass another car on the way to town. No light shone through the stained glass onto the drifting snow. Placerville was dark.

“Huh,” Mavis said, interweaving her fingers. “Here’s the church, here’s the steeple. Open the door, but where are all the people?”I was pleased to see her take an interest.

I noticed our tires left no tracks as the snow wafted from a ghostly sky. Heaven or hell? I leaned towards hell if I’d got only my silly sister to keep me company, but it sure was pretty. Call me shallow, but the way the snow lay like lace on the canopy of tree branches lifted my spirits.

“Mavis, dear, let’s make snow angels,” I suggested.

“How in the world could old ladies like us fall onto the ground without getting hurt, Pauline? I’m not interested in breaking another hip,” Mavis said.

“You said, ‘How in the world? ‘ But you see, I don’t think we’re there anymore.

We walked into the deep snow outside the church, holding hands.

“Ready, set, go!” We leaned backward and began to fall. We kept falling. As far as I know, we’re falling still, hooting and hollering like children as we go.

Sarah Holloway lives with her husband and lots of books in Savannah, GA. Her recent work appears in SmokeLong Quarterly‘s blog, Roi Fainéant, Emerge Literary Journal, and SugarSugarSalt Magazine. Her work was shortlisted for SmokeLong Quarterly’s Summer 2023 fiction prize. You can follow her @Sarah31405 on Twitter and @sarahholloway.bsky.social on BlueSky.