A Christmas Cage

By DesDownUnder

Copyright © 2007 By DesDownUnder. All rights reserved.

Copyright for this story is held by the author known as DesDownUnder at ddunder@adam.com.au. Personal one-off copies are permitted for private, non-commercial use. Any copying or use of this story or any portion of it that renders anyone monetary gain or profit in any form is prohibited without written permission of the author. My thanks to Blue for his encouragement and friendship.

Edited by Blue from Codey’s World - adblue@codeysworld.com

See more poems and stories by DesDownUnder at Codey’s World: http://www.codeysworld.org/desdownunder/.

 

She was so awake. It was the day before Christmas and she had a thousand things to do. Why had she left everything to the last minute? Every Christmas it was the same. Zabrina Cage worked long hours, right up to the day before Christmas and then finally had to rush around to get everything done.

She got out of bed and went to her bathroom. She changed her mind went back to her bedroom door and opened it. She had made a habit of closing it in case she overheard her son and his friend in bed again. She had heard them that first night some three months ago, when they came home late from the movies. Her son, her illegitimate son, was having a relationship with another boy.

She told herself it did not matter. She was almost not surprised. What else could go wrong for her?

It was eighteen years ago that her boyfriend had gotten her pregnant and then left her; left her alone to fend for herself. He ran off and she never heard from him again leaving her holding a baby boy that she had never wanted. Despite that she had worked hard and built up a business that provided a nice income for her and the kid, as she thought of him. Of course, she never wasted money on him, only buying the essentials he needed for school. She was hardly the best mother in the world, but she fed and clothed him; gave him everything, except the one thing he needed.

 

“Robert!” she yelled from her now open bedroom door. She never acknowledged her son’s friend. It was like he wasn’t there as far she was concerned. “Robert, it is time to get up.”

Robert and his friend Jim were asleep in bed.

“Does she have to yell like that? What time is it, Bobby?” Robert insisted on being called Bobby. He hated being called Robert, but he could not stop his mother from using the name she had given him.

“It’s seven a.m. I have to get up, sorry Jim, but you know I have to do what she wants. It is the only way I can get to go to college.”

He leant over his boyfriend and kissed him on the lips.

“What are you doing today?”

“Waiting for you to finish with her of course. Have you spoken to her about tomorrow yet?”

“No, Jim, I haven’t.” Bobby looked guilty as he made his confession. Jim wanted him to spend Christmas Day with him. He had his own flat a few streets away and longed to spend an entire day with his friend. The two boys had been able to spend time together but never alone for an entire day. Bobby’s mother had always seen to that, even though she never ever said anything to him.

“Robert!” yelled his mother yet again.

“Robert,” mimicked Jim, “mother calls. Why does she call you Robert? Everyone calls you Bobby.”

“That’s why. She knows I prefer Bobby, so she calls me Robert. Now get out of bed and I’ll give you a call as soon as I can.”

The boys showered and dressed. Jim left and Bobby went into the kitchen. His breakfast was waiting for him on the bar where they had all their meals. The perfectly good dining room was never used.

“Hurry up and eat, Robert, I need to be out of here in ten minutes.” She said.

 “Yes, Zabrina,” He said. He was not being disrespectful calling his mother by her first name. She had insisted on it. She did not want to think of herself as a mother, at all.

Fifteen minutes later he was at his mother’s shop. Zabrina’s Flower Shop.

“Now Robert I want you to sweep the floor and then tidy the store room. I must be able to see the stock. Then you will need to enter the deliveries into the computer. They should arrive by eleven.”

They worked hard all day serving lots of customers while Bobby made the deliveries.

“Zabrina?”

‘What?” She snapped at him.

“I was wondering if I, err….”

“What is it? I don’t have all day. I have to get home and do the accounts.”

“Well, tomorrow is Christmas and I was wondering if I could, I could….”

“Spend it with what’s his name, I suppose. Is that what you want to ask?”

“Yes, please. It is only one day.” He said.

“What about the shop? Who is going to take care of the plants?”

“It’s Christmas, Mom.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Sorry.”

She looked at him and for a moment felt a twinge of motherhood rearing its ugly head and for some unknown reason she relented as she looked into his eyes. “Oh okay, I’ll see to it, but you have to mop the work room before you leave tonight, do you hear me?”

“Yes, I’ll do that.”

“Alright then, you can go,” she said with a slight hesitation, which did not go unnoticed by Bobby.

“But will you be okay?” he asked his mother, suddenly feeling some sorrow at the thought of her being alone on Christmas Day.

“You don’t need to worry about me. It is just another day as far as I am concerned. But you have a good day with your friend, and mind you are early on the day after.”

“I will, and Zabrina?” She turned and looked at him.

“Merry Christmas, Mum, ho, ho, ho!”

Bobby turned and ran into the work room. His mother sighed and grimaced as she left the shop, mumbling to herself, “Merry Xmas, stuff and nonsense…Ho, Ho, Hokum.”

Zabrina smiled to herself as she walked home. She could have asked Bobby to drive her, but she didn’t want to waste the extra petrol. As she walked along the street, she saw a kitten in a pet shop. She stopped to look at it, wondering what its fate would be when it was no longer cute.  She had never noticed the pet shop before. She looked up at the sign over the awning, Shop of Christmas Pets, it read. How peculiar that anyone would open a pet shop just for Christmas.

Suddenly a man appeared at the door. He was a thin man with a pale complexion. Zabrina looked at him. She thought he was vaguely familiar, but dismissed it until he spoke.

“Hello, Zabrina,” he said.

“Marty,” she replied, “Is that you?”

“Come inside,” he commanded as he turned and held the door open for her.

Zabrina walked into the shop and was amazed to see it was empty except for rows of cages along each wall.

“It is you, isn’t it, Marty?”

“Yes, Zabrina, it is. I have wanted to talk to you for so long, but they wouldn’t let me.”

“They?” she questioned, “Who are ‘they,’ and what happened to you? You disappeared without telling me.”

“I know I should have told you, I would have let you know, but I only was offered this job here recently and thought, hoped I would run into you. I can’t go further than the awning over the door.”

“Oh, you’re not making sense, Marty, but then you never were much good at making sense. All you ever wanted was to….”

“All I ever wanted was to make money and having to look after you and the baby, I could never have made anything, not that I did, my greed was my undoing.”

“What on Earth are you talking about, Marty? What about this pet store with all its empty cages? You must be doing quite well if you have sold all your stock of cats and dogs. Do you have birds too?”

“No, birds aren’t meant to be in cages, Zabrina. The cats and dogs get set free in their new homes but birds are in kept in cages. But the cages are not empty because I have sold the stock. The cages represent each year I never celebrated Christmas.”

“You are mad,” said Zabrina.

“Yes, maybe I was mad, but I see things differently now. See all those cages over there?” Marty said as he pointed to a wall of cages with locks on them. “Each of them was a Christmas I missed with you and Bobby.”

Zabrina was a little afraid. She began to think that Marty might have escaped from a mental institution, but she couldn’t work out how he would have a shop.

“What about those cages over there? They have locks on them, are they yours too?” she asked.

“No, those are the cages of your Christmases; all the ones you missed sharing with other people. Before you ask, these cages along the other walls are unlocked. They are the cages of Christmases yet to come.

Zabrina was really becoming frightened by Marty’s words. She started to edge her way towards the door. “And what about the kitten in the window?” she said, looking at Marty.

“The kitten is waiting to see if it has a home this Christmas or not.”

“Marty, Can I call someone for you? I think you need help,” said Zabrina.

“Zabrina, I am not the one who needs help. I am beyond help. This is the only thing I have ever done to help you or anyone but myself. I am trying to show you that your life is going to be an empty cage unless you open up your heart to the ones who love you. I didn’t and it has left me terribly alone.”

Zabrina swayed a little with the intensity of all that was happening. She could hardly believe any of this was real, let alone happening to her. Marty saw she did not believe him. He gestured with his hands towards the door.

“Look, Zabrina, if you do not want to save yourself, then look to see how your miserable life will affect others.”

The door to the pet shop flew open and a small figure of a young man staggered in. He fell to the floor. He was shaking and shuddering, blood stains around his mouth, his eyes vacant, lifeless and glazed. His skin was pale grey.

Zabrina looked. Marty grabbed her by the arm. “Look, Zabrina, do you know who this is?”

 “No,” she said, “I have never seen him before.”

“Look again,” asked Marty.

“No, I don’t think I know him”

“Zabrina, please,” pleaded Martin, “please for our son’s sake, come; look once more upon the face of this boy.”

Zabrina approached the figure lying on the floorboards of the shop. She noticed how cold he was. The wind had whistled through the spaces between the wooden planks. An icy wind flowed in the door that hung icicles on the boy’s clothes.

“Is it? Yes, it is Robert’s friend, Jim. But what is he doing here?”

“He will die, Zabrina. He will die because you will drive him away by ignoring our son’s love for this boy.”

“I wouldn’t do that, I have never stopped Robert from being with him.”

“But you never make him welcome either. You never accepted our son or his friend, you just ignore them in the hope their love will go away. And it will if you do not see what you are becoming. This boy is who he loves,” said Marty as he pointed to the figure on the floor. “This boy loves our son and if you drive him away he will die. He will fall ill and die from a broken heart. Need I tell you what that will do to Bobby?”

Marty raised his hands again towards the door.

“Stop!” cried Zabrina, “Don’t show me, just tell me what I have to do.”

“I cannot tell you, Zabrina, you must work out what is right and do it. Look to see me no more,” said Marty as the body of the youth grew paler and faded away as Marty himself seemed to diminish as a snow white light began to fill the room.

Zabrina heard the kitten meowing and rushed to pick it up.

The sunlight streamed through Zabrina’s bedroom window, but it was the sound of a kitten mewing that had awoken her. Quickly she rushed to the window and opened it. She saw the next door neighbour’s boy riding his new bicycle he must have got for Christmas.

“You there, boy,” she called out.

“Me, ma’am?” he called back.

“Yes, you, what day is it?”

“Today?”

“Yes, today, what is it?”

“Why it is Christmas Day of course.”

“Thank you,” she said, “and boy? Merry Christmas to you.”

She looked at the clock, it was nine am. She would have to hurry. Quickly, she rang Robert on his mobile phone.

 

“What did she want? I suppose you have to rush home or to her shop,” said Jim.

“No,” said Bobby, “She wants us to meet her out front as soon as we can. She wants to take us to lunch for Christmas.”

“Us?’ asked Jim.

“Yes, both of us, and….”

“And?”

“…And she called me Bobby.”

 

I am happy to tell you all that Jim did not fall ill and he and Bobby are still together.

The kitten has grown into a beautiful cat that sleeps with them both on the foot of their bed in Zabrina’s house.

Zabrina eventually found Marty’s grave and she still doesn’t understand all that happened that night in the Christmas Shop of Pets, but she makes sure to celebrate the spirit of Christmas every day she lives.

It was Jim who summed it up for her when, on that Christmas Day with his arms around Bobby, he said, “Thank you for accepting us Zabrina, Now if only everyone else would do the same.”

The cat purred contently on top of the bed, not a locked cage to be seen anywhere.