by E. F. Mulder
After cleaning himself up with his pants, Gideon dug through the satchel he carried back and forth to work. He always brought a change of clothes, snacks, and some blank sheets for composing, along with the song he’d been working on forever.
“No one has ever seen this before, Prissy. No one’s ever heard it…except you, of course. I can’t believe I left it in the songbook. God! I’m so…careless.”
The end of the couch near Priscilla was cold now against Gideon’s sweaty, naked skin. He sat forward some, and brought the music to his chest.
“Rudy saw it…just for a second or two. He read it. Maybe we could have sung it together…had we been alone.”
Gideon picked up his guitar and started to strum. The holiday months—November and December—that was the time he always seemed to find his way back to the song. After tuning up a bit, he cleared his throat and began to softly sing.
“Strolling beside you, looking up into your eyes. Walking behind you, every one of your steps makes two of mine…”
It was as far as he could get before he started to cry.
“No wonder it’s never going to be finished. I’m a mess,” Gideon told Priscilla. “A crazy mess. How did I get from that to…this?” He made a sweep of the shoe wall half an arm’s length away. “What if…what if Rudy calls the cops? Who will take care of you? What will Mom, Dad, Beth, and Curtis think? You all need me as much as I need you.”
Gideon stood.
“New tradition.”
He went to the small closet in the living room.
“We usually wait until Christmas Eve for this, but…”
On the top shelf were six Christmas stockings.
“New home, new tradition. We’ll hang yours first.”
Priscilla’s was a baby sock, a red one, on which Gideon had written her name in tiny little letters with a gold paint marker just before Thanksgiving. Next to hers went Gideon’s. He hung them on the curtain rod above the window that looked out onto the fire escape and the alley below. Beth’s was next, then Curtis’s, their mother’s, and lastly their father’s. Gideon touched the toe.
“I hope Beth and Curtis like their gifts.”
Gideon had picked up two teddy bears at the same thrift shop from which he used to get shoes.
“I never know quite what to get for them. I hope they’re not too…Well, it’s okay to be a kid again on Christmas, right? Even if…”
The yawn that came could not be suppressed.
“I’ll have to finish getting everything ready before…” Another yawn came. “Before the big day.”
Gideon was customizing the toys to make them extra special.
“Think we can get some sleep, Prissy?”
Carrying her bowl in the crook of his elbow, he stopped again at the stockings.
“We’ll all be together on Christmas as always. I love you, Mom and Dad. Love you, too, Beth and Curtis. Hope you’re having sweet dreams. Say good night, Prissy.”
* * * *
The next forty-eight hours passed like a million, but finally, The Funn Family shoes were back up on the auction block. Bidding was open for ten days. Ten fucking days. Still, Gideon hoped to have them by Christmas—if he could talk the seller into throwing in expedited shipping for gratis. “I can barely afford the shoes,” he said aloud, posting the first bid of ten bucks, the minimum amount set by the current owner, “let alone Fed Ex rates.”
BuyBay on the laptop, shower, BuyBay on the tablet, singing dressed as Elvis, BuyBay on the phone, more singing, BuyBay on the laptop again, bed, and dreams about BuyBay—that was Gideon’s schedule over the next week. He even stopped to check his phone partway through grocery shopping the morning after payday.
Item 348-91B
Current bid: $33. 50 from SpeckledTuxedoMama
“What the hell kind of name is that?”
A woman who walked by looked at Gideon funny.
“Just talking to myself.” The crazier one seemed, the more people left them alone. Sometimes Gideon wanted nothing more than that.
He tried to attach the SpeckledTuxedoMama handle to Rudy somehow.
“He looked like the type to own a tux instead of renting one, that’s for sure.” He kept his dialogue in his head this time. “There were speckles of gold in his green eyes.” Gideon remembered Rudy’s eyes fondly, how expressive they were while singing carols. “Maybe the Mama part is a gender switch thing to throw me off. Maybe he doesn’t want me to know he’s bidding against me.”
Gideon tapped the screen.
“Jerk.”
He placed a bid for $33.51.
Gideon figured he could send his credit card company a hundred bucks when he got his next check from Brett. That would make it only two or three days late. It wouldn’t affect the shoe bid either way, since payment wasn’t due until after Christmas anyway. He was still working with the same $148 from before. Once all his other bills had been paid this time around—rent, utilities, and cable as well as Capital One—he had enough left for a pretty good grocery shop. Checking his phone six more times in the forty minutes it took to go up one aisle and down the next, he was pleased to end up with a pretty full cart, and more so to see that the bidding hadn’t gone up anymore. “Sweet! I might even have a little left to buy something more for everyone else.”
“Excuse me,” the checkout boy said.
He was young, still a teenager most likely, with blond hair, blue eyes and braces. His nametag read Kurt.
“Nothing,” Gideon said. “Hey. My brother’s name is Curt. Curt with a C, not a K. Curtis…actually.”
“Cool.” The kid kept scanning groceries.
“You kind of look like him.”
“Neat.”
“At a different age.”
The boy just smiled.
“He’ll be coming for Christmas.” Gideon kept babbling, babbling, and bagging. “Do you get to be home for Christmas?”
“Nah. Home’s back east. Can’t afford it. I’m stuck here.”
“Oh. Bummer.”
“$119. 73,” the kid said. “Unless you have coupons.”
“Oh. No.”
Yet another pang of guilt rolled around in Gideon’s gut. Buying something for himself—the shoes—when there were people in the world more in need, people who couldn’t be with their families for Christmas, it didn’t seem right.
“Would you like to donate your change to the local food pantry?” Kurt asked.
“Sure,” Gideon said. He wished he could donate more than twenty-seven cents. He did. He threw in a five dollar bill.
“Thank you. It all really helps.”
He also wished he could toss in a plane ticket for Kurt. “Have a nice day, Kurt. And merry Christmas.”
“You, too.”
There was a box out in front of the exit for the food pantry as well. It was huge, wrapped in Christmas paper—little blond-haired angels flying around on a midnight blue background. It had probably taken the entire roll. The little cherubs were quite gleeful, with their mouths open wide as if singing. Each of their fluffy, white wings was posed slightly different, and golden music notes floated all around them. One of them had a green red, and gold plaid robe.
“Hmm, hmm, hmm. Hmm, hmm, hmm. Oh.”
The box was empty.
“That’s sad.”
Gideon dropped six bags into it.
“Christmas dinner will be a little skimpy this year, Prissy,” he said at home. It didn’t take long to unpack the two bags he was left with. “But I got enough cranberries for crafting and a pie.” Gideon figured cranberry pie would make a good breakfast for Christmas week, if he couldn’t do more shopping. Tips were usually good on New Year’s Eve according to Brett, even at a dive bar like Elvis’s Vegas Sing-Along, as people who found themselves unable to get into any of the better spots came in out of desperation. “People get drunk a lot faster on New Year’s Eve, too,” he’d said, “which leads to greater generosity.”
After the briefest of stops on Ru
dy’s Facebook page to see if he had a cat, a snake, a bird, or maybe even a fish named Speckles, Gideon checked on the shoes again.
“Shit.”
The latest bid was up to $55. There were three of them scrimmaging now. Someone called BulldozerDiva11 had gotten in on the bidding war.
“I wonder if she’s Rudy, too.” Gideon tapped the back of his phone, waiting for the offer to rise. “Jingle Bells” was on his mind again.
Tap, tap, tap. Tap-tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap, tap, “open sleigh.” He stopped. “Though why wouldn’t he just bid a thousand bucks and get it over with?”
Since Gideon knew Priscilla wouldn’t answer, he offered one up to himself.
“Because he likes the game, that’s why. The back and forth, the competition, the thrust and parry, the serve and volley.”
Priscilla did answer sort of. She made bubbles, probably goldfish for “shut up.”
It was a contest, and Gideon was a BuyBay aficionado. All through the night on day eight, as the other two parties launched into a full-on monetary back and forth, the price inched up and up, fifty cents or a dollar at a time. Though it wasn’t easy, Gideon sat on his hands. A third interested party would only create a panic, and make the bids go even higher.
Over the course of his shift down at the bar that night, he kept an eye on two things—the tip jar and BuyBay. Unfortunately, the bid amount was climbing a lot faster than the money in the large, novelty brandy snifter on the piano. The Elvis’s Vegas Sing-Along regulars were a lot of things, sweet, protective, lovable, supportive, and nosy.
“You’re not a monk, Gideon,” Eileen had recently said. “It’s time you find someone to sleep with other than a goldfish.”
“Priscilla doesn’t sleep with me. I hate waterbeds.”
Crickets.
Gideon had once figured his sense of humor was his best trait. If he didn’t even have that going for him, what hope was there?
“You’re talented,” Denise had offered, as if he’d asked aloud. “Just sing for a guy…any guy…and he’ll whip it out right there.”
Aww, sweet romance. Rudy almost had.
Anyway, as good as the Elvis’s patrons were at friendship, that was how lousy they were as customers. They didn’t buy many drinks and didn’t tip much for the ones they did order. It was more about company than anything else, a group of misfits, like those toys in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, the train with the square wheels, the cowboy who rode an ostrich, the bird that swam, the Charlie in the box, and the doll who…
What was her problem? Gideon couldn’t recall.
Basically, everyone who hung out at Elvis’s Vegas Sing-Along had nowhere else to go. That was how Gideon ended up working there. He’d found the place a few days after arriving in town from Oregon, and would go in most nights to sing. When the original Elvis quit, and he fit in the costume—barely—Gideon was offered the job on the spot, and the apartment upstairs for a very reasonable monthly amount. As small as it was, it was better than his car, which had barely made it down to Nevada in the first place.
By the time the bar closed at 2:30 A.M. there was six bucks in the tip glass and a couple of chocolate kisses in green and red foil. The candy was delicious, and the cash would pay for a can of fish food for Priscilla’s stocking and maybe a plant to replace the one Gideon had put in a “safe place” he still couldn’t remember.
The cost of the shoes was up to $84.01 when Gideon finally hit the pillow in the wee hours of the morning on December 22nd. “One more day—less than,” he said, smacking his lips, fighting gritty eyes and a foggy mind. He’d been dueling with SpeckledTuxedoMama throughout the night. BulldozerDiva had apparently lost interest.
TuxedoMama had posted $78 sometime during “All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth.” Gideon had put up $78.01 right after, gritting his. SpeckledTuxedoMama had answered that with $79 while Gideon sang “Santa Baby.” Apparently, he or she only liked even dollar amounts. Still, Gideon had responded to that with a one cent raise again.
Back and forth they’d gone, until SpeckledTuxedoMama let Gideon’s last bid sit unchallenged for two whole hours.
“It’ll all be over at 9:59 tonight. Priss-priss. Seventeen long hours away.”
Gideon’s plan was to wait and raise the bid later in the evening, if SpeckledTuxedoMama made a higher one later in the day. He could go up to $148 again. As long as Rudy—or whoever—didn’t go higher than $147.99 before 9:58, Gideon would be okay. He didn’t want to wait until the very last second this time, just in case. Hopefully the third dude or woman would still be lying low. Maybe she’d even dropped out. “I’ll check when I wake up. How high can it go in four hours? Three. I’ll only sleep three.”
Gideon slept more than five.
“Frick!” Grabbing for his laptop, he ignored his bladder and growling tummy. “Priorities, Prissy.”
He pulled up his BuyBay account and clicked over to the shoes. “Ninety-nine dollars! Damn it!” Gideon took a breath. “That’s okay. We got it. Only twelve hours to go.” Thankfully, bidding usually calmed significantly during normal people’s waking hours. Perhaps work and life got in the way, or maybe guilty BuyBay shoppers came on in the middle of the night in order to hide their actions from a spouse or partner. “No judgement from you, huh, Priscilla?”
Though Gideon barely pulled himself away from the computer all day, he picked up the guitar at one point and added a verse to his composition. Once again, distraction was a gift in itself.
“Not bad.”
He’d reached back to a time right after those few nights in jail, when he’d taken his life in a better direction.
“Still pretty sad, though.”
Eventually, it was time for work again. More importantly, only an hour and a half remained on the BuyBay Funn Family shoe auction page. Gideon asked Brett to keep an eye on his phone while the Elvis’s Sing-Along gang sang through Christmas classics, plus a few impromptu melodies someone would shout out as a request.
“Bid’s at $101, Giddy-Up,” Brett said about 9:20.
“Offer $102 in ten.”
“You got it, buddy.”
“Wait.” Gideon thought a moment. “Let me just check…Taking five,” he said to the holiday crowd, reaching for his phone.
Gideon headed out into the parking lot. He wanted to check his credit card account, just to be sure. Even though payment wasn’t due until after Christmas, it was about that time in the month when the statement would be sent out. The company would then reduce what he had to spend by the minimum payment amount due, leaving only…
“Oh.”
Available Credit: $12.04.
There it was in black and white.
“Fuck.”
The calendar had screwed him over, the fact that bidding had to be restarted and had been set to go until December 22nd, the day his credit card account flipped for the month.
“If only it had ended yesterday.” Gideon kicked at the gravel in the parking lot. “Well, Prissy, that’s that. No shoes for me.”
Sometimes Gideon talked to Priscilla even when she wasn’t there. Maybe he was one of those nuts Rudy had spoken about.
“You make your next bid?” Stefan asked when Gideon went back inside. Stefan looked just like the construction worker in The Village People, always in jeans and a tight white undershirt. He was a nurse, and really cool. Everyone was so invested.
“Yup. Still in it.” There was no point making them all as miserable as he was, Gideon figured.
Chapter 5
Gideon did his best to get through the next couple of days. He still had Christmas to look forward to, and he was going to try hard to make it merry. He went back to the grocery store on his way to work December 24th.
“Kurt, hey. Working late tonight.”
“Hi?” Kurt posed it just like that, as a question. “Oh yeah.” Then it dawned on him. “You. Thanks for all the groceries the other day.”
“Oh. You’re welcome. How’d you know?”
“Ah. Sorry you have to work Christmas Eve.”
“Nothing better to do.”
The can of fish food, the plastic plant, and the angel wrapping paper like that on the food donation box came to $12.87.
“Oh.” Gideon didn’t have that much. “Umm. You know what…not the paper.”
“Not the paper?”
“No. Sorry.”
In general, Gideon thought wrapping paper was a huge waste of money. Sure, unwrapping gifts was fun. At least it was back when he was a kid. As an adult, Gideon felt the cost of gift wrap was exorbitant, outdone only by Christmas cards that cost five bucks a piece!
“No problem, sir. I need the void card!” Kurt hollered.
“It’s really pretty paper. I…I wish I could get it.” Gideon was having trouble opening the plastic bag with the store’s horseshoe logo on the front and the words Season’s Greetings. It was all stuck together—static cling—and refused to cooperate. “I just don’t have that many gifts to wrap.”
“No problem, sir. I need the void card!” Kurt shouted even louder across the busy store.
“You don’t have to keep calling me sir. Call me Gideon…or Gid. Gideon can be tough.”
Kurt’s brows shot up.
“Probably not at your age. Hey, if…if you don’t have anything to do when you’re done here…you know, since you’re not going home…I work at this place called Elvis’s Vegas Sing-Along Bar. Have you heard of it?”
“No.”
“Oh. Well…we…we sing, and I play the piano. It’s a lot of fun. Maybe you can come by.”
Kurt swiped the card once a girl with red and green Christmas hair brought it over. “$8.14, please.”
“Credit card,” Gideon said. “You’re over twenty-one, right?”
“Huh?”
“Twenty-one…drinking age…?”
“Yeah. Just.”
Gideon still had his doubts, but he went on. “Cool. Well, it’d be nice if you came by.”
“As, like, a date?”
“No.” Gideon shook his head hard enough to create a breeze that made nearby tinsel quiver. “God! No!”
“Oh.” Kurt took the bag and got it open with no trouble at all. “I’m not gay. I’d…I’d come if I was.”