Deck These Halls in Gasoline [Wraith]
Christmas rolls up again on cracked tires and bald hope, the calendar drunk on red circles and fake holly bleeding across the month,Stores already played the carols since October and my nerves went threadbare somewhere between “silent night” and the fifteenth limited-time sale stunt,Bells from the church up the road pound out that cheerfully grim little melody about goodwill and peace while the parking lot hosts three fistfights and a fender bender,I watch from the apartment window with a chipped mug of something that pretends to be cocoa and warms like liquid regret, laughing under my breath at every brave holiday offender.
Inside my place the lights hang crooked and half-dead across the wall like a string of blinking lies that ran out of battery and just refused to admit defeat,One side flickers like a seizure warning, the other side stays dark as if it knows better than to advertise that anything here might still feel complete,I duct-taped a plastic wreath to the door because the nail fell out two years ago and I never fixed it, call it ambiance, call it budget-friendly, call it a cry for help,The bow hangs like a noose rearranged for fashion, and every time the hallway door slams, the whole thing jumps like it wants to throw itself off the shelf.
A replay of childhood piles in through the cracks while the radiator hisses like an annoyed snake that got hired as seasonal heating,My head drags me back to that crooked little house where December sounded like clinking liquor bottles and the TV screaming,The tree leaned in the corner like it already knew it would be blamed for everything when the string of lights shorted and the breaker snapped the room into dark,Dad shouting about “ruined Christmas” with a bottle in his fist and mom whispering apologies to the ornaments as if they were godparents to every buried spark.
We had those glossy catalogs stacked on the table, every toy circled in marker like we were ordering a reality that never made it into stock,I wrote “dear Santa” letters asking for small stupid miracles like a normal dinner or a night without the sound of fists hitting doors like a cheap knock,The jingle of bells on TV fought with the jangle of keys thrown against walls in the next room, and the whole house smelled like pine, burnt dinner, and stale fear,I learned early that “Christmas cheer” meant don’t say the wrong thing, don’t breathe too loud, don’t ask why the presents look smaller every year.
These days the ghosts have better timing; they come dressed in LED halos and ugly sweaters, carrying casserole dishes and unresolved trauma,Office parties that feel like low-budget exorcisms where everyone pretends the dress code and a grab bag will cleanse the sins of drama,We stand in circles with plastic cups while the boss in the reindeer tie brags about family ski trips and charitable donations that make his tax guy smile,Someone plays that pop star cover of a classic carol, bright and desperate, and I swear I see a shadow slip between the cubicles, humming along with a sharper style.
The elevator down to the lobby smells like wet boots, canned pine air freshener, and something metallic that no one wants to identify,There’s a fake tree standing in the corner with ornaments so glossy they reflect my face ten times, each reflection a different version of “try,”Underneath sit neatly wrapped boxes filled with nothing but corporate swag and crumbs of validation, each tag written in the same rushed scrawl,I catch a flicker in the mirrored surface of a red ball and for a breathless second my own eyes look back at me from a year when I still believed in it all.
Outside, the city tries hard to look cheerful but the snow has turned gray along the gutters, churned up by traffic and half-hearted steps,A street Santa rings his bell with the hollow focus of someone who took this gig to forget the rest of his mess, threadbare coat, nicotine breath, shaking hands and cigarette burns etched into his neck like faded steps,Kids rush past with sticky hands and candy canes, their laughter bright and sharp and wild enough to make the air feel temporarily less heavy,Behind them, a teenager stares at a glass window filled with expensive gifts, cheeks raw from the wind, eyes already learning that some winters are petty.
I pass a house on my walk home where the decoration strategy clearly involved a dare and too much caffeine over several nights in a row,Every inch of the roof strapped with lights that pulse in sync to some loud anthem about angels while an inflatable Santa teeters like he might blow,The yard nativity glows in plastic holiness, Mary gazing serenely at a baby that looks factory-molded, Joseph standing guard like an exhausted warehouse clerk on overtime,Yet if you look past the lights into the second-story window, you catch silhouettes pacing, arms flung wide, small storms brewing that never rhyme.
Back inside my building, Mrs. Aquino down the hall hums carols while burning cookies again, smoke drifting under her door like sarcastic incense,She invites me in for the annual ritual of “taste this and lie,” her eyes glittering with mischief and tiredness, the kitchen a battlefield of sugar and nonsense,We laugh until we cough and she jokes that if hell exists it probably hosts an eternal bake sale where everything is burnt and you still have to pretend it’s great,I tell her if hell exists it likely mirrors this holiday pretty closely, just crank the music, remove the exit signs, and lock the gate.
Later, alone, the apartment shrinks to just me and the low hum of decorations trying to sell me the idea of warmth,I sit cross-legged under my stubborn little tree, its branches too sparse, its ornaments too mismatched, its personality leaning north of most,In the quiet, the past drags a chair up and sits beside me, wearing a Santa hat and that smirk that always made me want to break something and kiss it after,Every messed-up December slumps down in front of me like a drunk uncle, telling the same stories with more ghosts in the laughter.
The bells from the church toll midnight, each note sinking into my chest like cold coins dropped into a collection plate shaped like a rib cage,Where’s the light, I ask the ceiling, not expecting an answer from peeling paint and water stains that mark every argument and age,It feels buried somewhere far under the floorboards of this month, deep under tinsel and retail and grief dressed up in glitter sale tags,Every prayer feels like junk mail stuffed back into the envelope, returned to sender, stamped with “insufficient faith” in red flags.
This is the part where the old stories promise redemption, where the star appears, where the angels sing and everything suddenly aligns,My version plays different: jingle ghosts drift down the hallway with plastic bags from the discount store, humming off-key in crude yet clever lines,They pull up every bad memory like old carpet, shaking dust and broken ornaments across my floor while grinning with cracked teeth,I tell them they’re late, they shrug and say traffic in the afterlife is murder around December, and ask if I still remember how to grit my teeth.
We circle the tree, my ghosts and me, like kids at a sleepover who discovered the ouija board and went a little too far,Each spirit carries some holiday that ripped, some year that split, some quiet Christmas where my heart sat in the corner like an unplugged star,They talk about the time I almost ended it all on a bitter December night, phone in one hand, half-written goodbye in the other,How the ringtone from a friend who refused to give up on me cut through the darkest verse of some carol and dragged me back into this clutter.
“Christmas hell,” I name it out loud, not as a complaint but as a genre, a category, a playlist made of blood and bells and cheap whisky and half-meant cheer,This season that magnifies every empty chair at the table, every lover that walked, every family fracture that never quite healed, every wish that never got near,Yet, even here, in the worst version of the holiday, there is a curl of warmth like cigarette smoke from a window opened three inches,A neighbor knocking to offer leftovers, a kid downstairs leaving paper snowflakes taped to every door, small blessings that stick like stitches.
Maybe this is the joke winter plays, dressing up torment in fairy lights, making misery wear a Santa hat and cracked red lipstick,Making us sit together in living rooms that smell like cinnamon and resentment until someone finally says sorry or flips out and that coin lands either soft or sick,In this twisted little tradition I light a candle not for saints or miracles but for everyone stuck in the back pew of this holiday, scanning the exits,I watch the wax run like tears through mascara, thick and stubborn, while outside the bells keep hammering out hope for those who still want to believe in credits.
I raise my mug to the invisible crowd of survivors who drag themselves through December with teeth clenched and hearts patched with tape,To the ones who set boundaries like barbed wire around their sanity, who say no to blood relatives and yes to chosen family in whatever shape,To the kid inside me that still looks for stars through storm clouds and keeps a secret list of small good things even when everything feels wrecked,We are the congregation of scorched carolers, singing off-key in the alley behind the church, rewriting the lyrics to something honest and incorrect.
In my own cracked liturgy I bless the midnight laundromat where strangers share dryer sheets and trauma under humming fluorescent hum,The diner that never closes, where the waitresses refill coffee without question for sad-eyed regulars who tip like they’re buying absolution from their own numb,The stray cat that curls up outside my window on Christmas night as if guarding my foolish little heart from one more ambush,And my stubborn pulse that keeps knocking, patient and rude, on the walls of my chest, refusing to leave town even when the forecast screams slush.
Somewhere in the static of carols and commercials, a rougher hymn crawls through, my own private chorus, not holy, not neat,It tells me this season can be both graveyard and cradle, both haunted hallway and shelter from an even colder street,Christmas hell, yes, but within it a kind of crooked sanctuary built from people who know the dark and still offer you a chair,A holiday carved out of survival, not perfection, where the only true miracle is that you’re still here breathing frosty air.
Christmas rolls up again on cracked tires and bald hope, the calendar drunk on red circles and fake holly bleeding across the month,Stores already played the carols since October and my nerves went threadbare somewhere between “silent night” and the fifteenth limited-time sale stunt,Bells from the church up the road pound out that cheerfully grim little melody about goodwill and peace while the parking lot hosts three fistfights and a fender bender,I watch from the apartment window with a chipped mug of something that pretends to be cocoa and warms like liquid regret, laughing under my breath at every brave holiday offender.
Inside my place the lights hang crooked and half-dead across the wall like a string of blinking lies that ran out of battery and just refused to admit defeat,One side flickers like a seizure warning, the other side stays dark as if it knows better than to advertise that anything here might still feel complete,I duct-taped a plastic wreath to the door because the nail fell out two years ago and I never fixed it, call it ambiance, call it budget-friendly, call it a cry for help,The bow hangs like a noose rearranged for fashion, and every time the hallway door slams, the whole thing jumps like it wants to throw itself off the shelf.
A replay of childhood piles in through the cracks while the radiator hisses like an annoyed snake that got hired as seasonal heating,My head drags me back to that crooked little house where December sounded like clinking liquor bottles and the TV screaming,The tree leaned in the corner like it already knew it would be blamed for everything when the string of lights shorted and the breaker snapped the room into dark,Dad shouting about “ruined Christmas” with a bottle in his fist and mom whispering apologies to the ornaments as if they were godparents to every buried spark.
We had those glossy catalogs stacked on the table, every toy circled in marker like we were ordering a reality that never made it into stock,I wrote “dear Santa” letters asking for small stupid miracles like a normal dinner or a night without the sound of fists hitting doors like a cheap knock,The jingle of bells on TV fought with the jangle of keys thrown against walls in the next room, and the whole house smelled like pine, burnt dinner, and stale fear,I learned early that “Christmas cheer” meant don’t say the wrong thing, don’t breathe too loud, don’t ask why the presents look smaller every year.
These days the ghosts have better timing; they come dressed in LED halos and ugly sweaters, carrying casserole dishes and unresolved trauma,Office parties that feel like low-budget exorcisms where everyone pretends the dress code and a grab bag will cleanse the sins of drama,We stand in circles with plastic cups while the boss in the reindeer tie brags about family ski trips and charitable donations that make his tax guy smile,Someone plays that pop star cover of a classic carol, bright and desperate, and I swear I see a shadow slip between the cubicles, humming along with a sharper style.
The elevator down to the lobby smells like wet boots, canned pine air freshener, and something metallic that no one wants to identify,There’s a fake tree standing in the corner with ornaments so glossy they reflect my face ten times, each reflection a different version of “try,”Underneath sit neatly wrapped boxes filled with nothing but corporate swag and crumbs of validation, each tag written in the same rushed scrawl,I catch a flicker in the mirrored surface of a red ball and for a breathless second my own eyes look back at me from a year when I still believed in it all.
Outside, the city tries hard to look cheerful but the snow has turned gray along the gutters, churned up by traffic and half-hearted steps,A street Santa rings his bell with the hollow focus of someone who took this gig to forget the rest of his mess, threadbare coat, nicotine breath, shaking hands and cigarette burns etched into his neck like faded steps,Kids rush past with sticky hands and candy canes, their laughter bright and sharp and wild enough to make the air feel temporarily less heavy,Behind them, a teenager stares at a glass window filled with expensive gifts, cheeks raw from the wind, eyes already learning that some winters are petty.
I pass a house on my walk home where the decoration strategy clearly involved a dare and too much caffeine over several nights in a row,Every inch of the roof strapped with lights that pulse in sync to some loud anthem about angels while an inflatable Santa teeters like he might blow,The yard nativity glows in plastic holiness, Mary gazing serenely at a baby that looks factory-molded, Joseph standing guard like an exhausted warehouse clerk on overtime,Yet if you look past the lights into the second-story window, you catch silhouettes pacing, arms flung wide, small storms brewing that never rhyme.
Back inside my building, Mrs. Aquino down the hall hums carols while burning cookies again, smoke drifting under her door like sarcastic incense,She invites me in for the annual ritual of “taste this and lie,” her eyes glittering with mischief and tiredness, the kitchen a battlefield of sugar and nonsense,We laugh until we cough and she jokes that if hell exists it probably hosts an eternal bake sale where everything is burnt and you still have to pretend it’s great,I tell her if hell exists it likely mirrors this holiday pretty closely, just crank the music, remove the exit signs, and lock the gate.
Later, alone, the apartment shrinks to just me and the low hum of decorations trying to sell me the idea of warmth,I sit cross-legged under my stubborn little tree, its branches too sparse, its ornaments too mismatched, its personality leaning north of most,In the quiet, the past drags a chair up and sits beside me, wearing a Santa hat and that smirk that always made me want to break something and kiss it after,Every messed-up December slumps down in front of me like a drunk uncle, telling the same stories with more ghosts in the laughter.
The bells from the church toll midnight, each note sinking into my chest like cold coins dropped into a collection plate shaped like a rib cage,Where’s the light, I ask the ceiling, not expecting an answer from peeling paint and water stains that mark every argument and age,It feels buried somewhere far under the floorboards of this month, deep under tinsel and retail and grief dressed up in glitter sale tags,Every prayer feels like junk mail stuffed back into the envelope, returned to sender, stamped with “insufficient faith” in red flags.
This is the part where the old stories promise redemption, where the star appears, where the angels sing and everything suddenly aligns,My version plays different: jingle ghosts drift down the hallway with plastic bags from the discount store, humming off-key in crude yet clever lines,They pull up every bad memory like old carpet, shaking dust and broken ornaments across my floor while grinning with cracked teeth,I tell them they’re late, they shrug and say traffic in the afterlife is murder around December, and ask if I still remember how to grit my teeth.
We circle the tree, my ghosts and me, like kids at a sleepover who discovered the ouija board and went a little too far,Each spirit carries some holiday that ripped, some year that split, some quiet Christmas where my heart sat in the corner like an unplugged star,They talk about the time I almost ended it all on a bitter December night, phone in one hand, half-written goodbye in the other,How the ringtone from a friend who refused to give up on me cut through the darkest verse of some carol and dragged me back into this clutter.
“Christmas hell,” I name it out loud, not as a complaint but as a genre, a category, a playlist made of blood and bells and cheap whisky and half-meant cheer,This season that magnifies every empty chair at the table, every lover that walked, every family fracture that never quite healed, every wish that never got near,Yet, even here, in the worst version of the holiday, there is a curl of warmth like cigarette smoke from a window opened three inches,A neighbor knocking to offer leftovers, a kid downstairs leaving paper snowflakes taped to every door, small blessings that stick like stitches.
Maybe this is the joke winter plays, dressing up torment in fairy lights, making misery wear a Santa hat and cracked red lipstick,Making us sit together in living rooms that smell like cinnamon and resentment until someone finally says sorry or flips out and that coin lands either soft or sick,In this twisted little tradition I light a candle not for saints or miracles but for everyone stuck in the back pew of this holiday, scanning the exits,I watch the wax run like tears through mascara, thick and stubborn, while outside the bells keep hammering out hope for those who still want to believe in credits.
I raise my mug to the invisible crowd of survivors who drag themselves through December with teeth clenched and hearts patched with tape,To the ones who set boundaries like barbed wire around their sanity, who say no to blood relatives and yes to chosen family in whatever shape,To the kid inside me that still looks for stars through storm clouds and keeps a secret list of small good things even when everything feels wrecked,We are the congregation of scorched carolers, singing off-key in the alley behind the church, rewriting the lyrics to something honest and incorrect.
In my own cracked liturgy I bless the midnight laundromat where strangers share dryer sheets and trauma under humming fluorescent hum,The diner that never closes, where the waitresses refill coffee without question for sad-eyed regulars who tip like they’re buying absolution from their own numb,The stray cat that curls up outside my window on Christmas night as if guarding my foolish little heart from one more ambush,And my stubborn pulse that keeps knocking, patient and rude, on the walls of my chest, refusing to leave town even when the forecast screams slush.
Somewhere in the static of carols and commercials, a rougher hymn crawls through, my own private chorus, not holy, not neat,It tells me this season can be both graveyard and cradle, both haunted hallway and shelter from an even colder street,Christmas hell, yes, but within it a kind of crooked sanctuary built from people who know the dark and still offer you a chair,A holiday carved out of survival, not perfection, where the only true miracle is that you’re still here breathing frosty air.