Last Christmas at the End of Time

The winter air seeped through the rubble to gnaw at Eva’s skin. From above she could hear the tinkling of picks chewing through stone, of machines scraping concrete away. How alike to shoveling snow, she thought. Those above had been working since the earthquake to exhume the buried. For five days she tried digging from below in a bid to meet them, and when the broken concrete would no longer move, she shouted up to the rescuers, so they would know that a family was still waiting to be saved. On the morning of the sixth day, their water ran out, along with her strength, so this, their seventh day beneath the rubble, Eva mouthed a prayer instead. Then she decided it was time to celebrate.

Eva pulled her two children close, shielding them from the cold, and gave them each a box, wrapped in bright greens and jolly reds, topped each with a shimmering golden bow.

That evening, strewn about the broken hotel garage, lay the remains of the family’s holiday festivities. Christmas was still three days away, but it was good to bend the rules once in a while. Her twins opened their gifts early, salvaged from the trunk of their car, miraculously unharmed, and they decorated their space, as they always did during the season. Her son fashioned reeds of dead grass and wire into a Christmas wreath, and her daughter found a wet patch of clay, using the red mud to scribble a festive tree with a sparkling star on the concrete wall.

The children gorged themselves on what remained of their food, one piece of molding bread and a tin of dried fish; a last holiday feast fit for her little queen and her little king. Eva herself didn’t eat when they offered her some. “It’s all right,” she smiled, “I’m not hungry.” She tended to her children' s bandages, blew out their candle, and tucked them into their corpse of a car to sleep.

The ruined parking deck had been their home for a week, but now it had nothing left to give. And still those above would dig, and dig, and dig ever more. But they were too far. They would be too late.

“Heaven can wait,” she whispered her children slept. “It can wait another day.” Certain they were asleep and would not hear,she wandered as far as she was able, clutched her coat at her mouth and screamed until her throat was raw, and the scabs ripped from her fingertips.

Off in the distance, where darkness laid its claim, came the sound of footsteps descending from the crushed lobby above. And then a man’s voice. “I can hear you. The walls are thin here,” it said.

It was a voice Eva knew well.

She pulled herself up to stand, placing herself between the voice and her children, her eyes fighting to pierce the veil of darkness. Fumbling in the black, she found their melted candle from the parking spot that was their dinner table. Eva sparked her lighter, watching the burgeoning flame come to life.

Before her emerged the form of her husband, no longer emaciated from cancer. He had plump, friendly cheeks and fine, weathered skin. He was the man of twenty years ago when they met at a friend’s holiday gathering, returned to her now, at the end of all things. “Merry Christmas, Eva,” the voice said. “It’s good to see you again,” and he extended his hand.

“You took his face,” she said icily.

“Kind faces make for kind collections. I have been busy in this place.”

“You will collect nothing from us tonight.”

Her husband’s face flickered in the candlelight. “Heaven waits for no man.”

So close to death, the walls between them were thin indeed. It was as though Eva could hear the voice’s very thoughts. “I’m not a man, and you will wait.”

The face of her departed husband laughed, but his tone was not one of mockery. “You are stubborn, Eva. You cling so tightly to life.”

“I have my reasons.” She glanced at her sleeping children. “You are cruel.”

“I do what must be done.”

“And you are cruel for doing it!” Eva shouted. “What chance did they have? Who are you to take them so young?”

The form that took her husband’s shape circled ever closer. Eva took a step back, then another. Then another and another, until her back met the car where her children slept, and she would retreat no further. “Leave us alone,” she said.

Her husband’s shape stopped, an arm’s length away.

Eva stepped towards the figure, close enough to embrace him. “Please. Heaven can wait. Jules always said that, even when he was dying.”

“I still took your husband,” the voice replied. “As I will take you.” His eyes flitted over Eva’s shoulder. “As I will take them.” He fixed his gaze back on Eva. “All who live are given time. Yours is spent.”

The concrete above their heads shuddered, releasing a cloud of plaster dust that flurried about them like snow. Eva stared back into the figure’s empty eyes. He got all the details correct, even the little mote that made one appear lighter than the other. But then she looked closer, and could see what was wrong. There was no joy in his smile. No pleasure in his heart. No sense of any emotion at all. Only emptiness.

Until she saw that there wasn’t.

“They shouldn’t die here,” Eva spoke plainly. “I’ll give anything to keep them alive.”

Her husband’s voice softened as he spoke. “I haven’t come to upset you. I’ve come to help you, and your children.” He looked up, where past the stone and shattered glass, those above still tirelessly worked. “It is hopeless, Eva. They will never reach you in time. End this needless suffering, for their sake. I can take you all tonight, gently, while you sleep.”

Eva stepped against the form, pulling her husband’s shape into her arms. Holding him, she felt only cold. “No. Not yet.” She drew his eyes to her sleeping children, huddled beside each other for warmth.

Her husband’s frigid cheek kissed her own. And then the voice spoke softly, “They were never meant for this world.”

Eva whispered in his ear. “The doctors said it was hopeless. But here they are.” She embraced the shape of her husband then, with all the strength she had. “I miss him, every day. They do, too. We all want to see him again.” Her voice began to quiver. “But not yet. It’s too soon. They have so much left to do.”

“You are not first to try to bargain with me,” he said, and guided her hands away.

Another shudder from above. Another flurry of plaster fell to the ground. The candle wavered, but recovered when stillness returned. Eva took the voice’s hand, drawing him close to look at the painted tree on the lifeless gray wall, and lifted the wreath made of wire and grass. “I suppose I’m not.” Eva winced, her parched lips splitting as she spoke. Her husband’s shape helped her sit down on the pavement.

He lowered himself to sit across from her. “There will be no pain when you join me,” he said, placing a cold hand upon her. “I promise you that much. There will be no more pain for any of you.”

Eva drew her arms to her chest. “Must they die so young?”

The voice wavered. “Existence does not offer any explanations.”

“I don’t need an explanation,” she said, pulling herself to sit up tall. “You heard me, when I called to you. You came to speak with me, and for that I thank you. All I need is your answer to my question, and I have the rest of my life to wait for it. Tell me what I have to do to save my family.”

The voice did not speak right away. “I am not as cruel as you imagine.” He took the wreath from Eva’s slackening grip. “All life comes from death, as death must follow life. From your bodies and your spirits, the seeds of the new are sown.” In his hands the wreath suddenly bloomed, a vibrant tangle of ivy and berries, bursting with aromas of firewood and celebration. “In your last moments, I will create a paradise for you. In your mind’s eye, your children would be with you. Your husband would breathe again. You will be whole, you will be happy. Let me take all of you, tonight, and you will be a family once more.” He returned the wreath to Eva. When he released his grip, it was shriveled grass and old wire once more, and it fell to pieces in her hand. “It would last an eternity.”

“It would not be real.” Eva looked down at the broken wreath. “You have Jules’s face, but you aren’t him. Bend the rules, just this one time.”

The figure said nothing.

Eva swallowed. “I’m asking too much, aren’t I?”

He looked about the room with discerning eyes. “Only death remains here now. There is nothing in this place I can give to sustain you.” He lowered his gaze. “I’m sorry, Eva.”

The air stilled within her.

“I cannot save you.”

Eva sniffled, not able to bear looking at her husband’s face. She felt her his form do the same. After a moment she turned back to the light, to the man sitting across from her, and held out her hand. “Maybe you can’t give anything…” she said, choking out her words. “But I can.”

Jules’s shape looked up to her at once.

“If you let them live…” Eva drew a sharp, stinging breath, “…I will go with you. You can use my spirit to sow new life, but my body, that I’ll give to them. Promise me this,” she said with growing resolve, “promise you’ll let them live.”

“Eva-”

“It’s too soon for them.” She looked over to the ruddy tree drawn on the wall. “They deserve a full life, one filled with happiness, with love. Promise me you’ll give that to them.” Her eyes were weary, and she blinked for long enough to dream. When she opened her eyes, she found his hand slipped into her own.

“You asked for my answer.”

“I did,” Eva replied, bowing her head. “Will I be enough for them?”

He pulled himself up to stand. “Only death remains here…” his voice trailed off. “But, I have others to collect, ones ready to pass on. When I am finished, I will return to this place, in three more days.” Jules’s form looked over to the slumbering twins, and for a moment, in the wavering candlelight, he seemed to her to be alive once more. “What you offer will be enough, Eva,” he smiled. “They will live. Their happiness, however, is up to them, as it has always been.” He paused, softening his gentle features. “They will have their chance.”

Eva looked up at her husband’s form, unmolested by the falling detritus, or the dust, or the cold, knowing what she had to do. “Then I accept.”

Without a word, the figure slipped from her grasp, turned and faded into the shadows through which her eyes could not see.

“Merry Christmas, Eva. I’ll see you soon.”

Eva drifted, not quite sleeping, not quite awake. The sounds of excavation overhead continued long into the night, past the break of dawn. Her children slept, and she did not wake them. She pulled herself over to their car, finding a shard of metal poking through the rubble like a knife. Lifting her sleeve, she drew her arm across the makeshift blade until she bled, then brought it to the mouths of her children. She roused them only enough to suckle in half-sleep, as they did when they were young. They drew nourishment from her wound where she unwrapped her flesh, drinking the gift of life, and beside her, their candle withered and died.

Three days had passed when a hail of debris fell upon their car on Christmas morning. Eva opened her eyes to see her triumph, the chests of her children, still rising, still falling, lit by a ray of sun that fell across their bodies. For a moment, she saw her husband's face in the mask of the firefighter breaking through the rubble. But that was only an illusion. The man wrenched the car open, and she once more felt the warmth of sunlight on her cheek, as they began to pull her children from the wreckage.

“Heaven can wait,” she said to them, and then she closed her eyes forever.