30 Nov Kiss Me ‘Neath the Mistletoe

“Look darling, isn’t the snow beautiful tonight?”

She said nothing, simply remaining stiff in the aged wooden chair. He smiled and continued to sip from his mug of hot chocolate. He found her cold, silent demeanor adorable, one of a number of things he had come to find irresistible about her.

She just sat there, staring with an expression of permanent fright back at him from in front of the window. Behind her, he could see the white specs as they fell in a slow, soothing flurry. He looked up at the ancient grandfather clock:

11:30 p.m.

He smiled and whispered to her, “Not much longer now, my sweet Delilah.” He got up and made his way to the blaze in the hearth. He began pouring himself some more of the piping hot cocoa before looking back to the window, meeting gaze once more into her faded baby blue eyes. “Why don’t you have a mug, my love?”

Still, only silence served to answer his offer. He softly grunted in amusement before then closing the top of the kettle. He took another sip as he continued to watch her. God, how she looks so beautiful.

Delilah, the sole warmth of his heart, sitting silent and peaceful on the old chair of antique mahogany, shrouded in the old white gown he he’d seen on her since first setting eyes on her. He always thought it made her look akin to the paintings of the Virgin Mary herself. God, If only he were a painter, he would sometimes think, he’d create a masterpiece from this scene alone to rival Dali or Davincii. If he were a writer, he’d craft a tale with more potent emotion than even Poe at his most dreary or bleak.

As the snow continued to fall outside, he could feel the air in the small den area become colder, even if just ever so slightly. “Why don’t you come sit with me by the fire,” He said as he started to stoke the blaze in the furnace until the heat from its dance upon the oak kindling returned. Still, she merely sat in her chair in front of the window. With a warm smile, he sat down his mug of hot chocolate and went over to the window.

“Here,” he said as he began trying to push the chair from behind over to the hearth, “Allow me”. About two or three feet from the hearth, Delilah began to slump forward until she’d fallen from her chair. “Oh dear,” he exclaimed, chuckling. He shivered again, feeling the unnatural chill pervade the room around. “Come now, Delilah, there’s no need to be upset. It’ll all come together soon” Fixing her back upright, he continued to push the chair the rest of the way to the hearth. “Now, isn’t that much better, Dear?”

She was still as silent as ever, yet her face could say both everything and nothing at the same time. Her eyes glinted with the reflective glow of the flame’s wild dance, which served to also illuminate the rest of her pale, distraught face. Even as it looked now, defined in much of its morbid detail by the flames, he still felt hopelessly entranced by her face. He checked the clock again before rummaging around in his shirt pocket;

11:40.

From his shirt pocket, he produced a small, wilted mistletoe.

He sighed, the grim cloud of reality accentuating itself to him once again. He’d come to both look forward to, as well as dread this night; Christmas Eve. It wasn’t quite time yet. Soon, it would all be over, but not yet.

Attempting to void this cloud from his mind, He stuffed the small mistletoe back into his pocket and walked over to the table beside the window and placed one of the untitled records onto the phonograph and placed the needle onto its third track. It was one of his favorite tunes that began playing, though, for his own reasons unknown, he could never remember the name of the composition or its composer. “Would you care to dance to pass the time, my love?”

He walked over to the chair and took her soft, cold hand before shifting her to her feet. Now standing before him, the cloud of anxiety tightened its grip on him. “You look beautiful, my dearest Delilah,” he said with a shaking voice. He could hear her voice resonate distantly within the back of his mind, sounding as though it were echoing from the peak of a mountain.

”In life or in death, I will always have your heart, Arthur. And my kiss will be the sole warmth of your body, your heart, and your soul.”

Slowly, carefully, he began to shuffle around the room with her limply hanging in his arms. He tried, of course, to keep her braced upright against his chest, to no effect. In spite of this, though, he merely waltzed on with her, still smiling warmly to her. The longer he stared into those two stiff, oceanic hued irises, the more those horrible, maddening memories returned to him.

Memories of that first fateful night he lost himself to the lust for his dearest Delilah. The night that would spell the beginning of his own undoing. He could almost see it now, in every exact detail, looking into her cold, frozen eyes; the long walk down the icy road, the night sky, the gas-lighted lamps that stood to sparsely pepper the white blanketed ground with their dim glows.

***

It was deathly cold that night, only just over a month to the day before now, and he was walking alone from another evening toiling at the local market. He had made this very same walk many a night before, but this was different for him. How, he could not have then known exactly. Nevertheless, something had changed in an almost supernatural manner in his mind that night.

It had become very late when he saw her for the first time. There, by the streetlamp, she stood, shrouded in a dress as white as the very snow. And, oh, those eyes, those baby-blue eyes that immediately seized him and kept him spellbound. He felt a sense of tranquil warmth spread throughout his body with the image of that first shy smile she gave him when she saw him. That smile of fragile innocence, and yet, of a cunning nature. He saw that she was trying to hang something from the top of the post when he began to approach her.

When he drew near, he could see that it was a mistletoe that she was attempting to hang, the very same one he now kept in his pocket as he danced on. “H-hello there”, he greeted, “Is it not just a tad early for these?” She responded with that same playfully sly grin and replied, “The heart doesn’t lie, and my heart tells me that the time is just right.”

“The time for what”, he asked, confused. She giggled, “The time for one’s heart to be warmed by a lover’s kiss.”

He wasn’t quite sure what she meant, but he somehow felt she was right. He could see she was struggling to hang the mistletoe. “Here, may I?” She gave him that softly sweet smile and handed him the mistletoe.

He then hung it from the top of the gas-fueled street lamp, “There we are, hung where you and all others can see”.

Her smile widened as she chuckled. “You know what they say”, she asked him in a balmy, almost seductive tone. He looked to her, intrigued. “The mistletoe is deadly if you eat it, but the kiss is even deadlier if you mean it.”

He laughed before losing himself once again into her eyes. Even as cold as it’d become, he felt an extreme sense of warmth pass through him. It was as though he were next to a bonfire, and he even began to unfasten his winter garbs. Before he could do or say anything, she placed a slim, tender hand upon his chest. Instantly, a cavalcade of emotions ran down in a torrential downpour inside of him.

Suddenly, all perception of the world around him was lost. He continued to lose more of himself into her eyes, those light baby-blue whirlpools.

“What’s your name?”

He said nothing. He could only barely perceive the sound of her voice.

“What is your name, sir?”

Still transfixed in her stare, he gibbered out, “Um… A-Ar-Arthur.” She smiled and continued to caress his chest tenderly, now working her hands up and around his neck. She looked up to the mistletoe and then back to him, her grin growing.

“Will you kiss me, Arthur,” she cooed, “Kiss me ‘neath the mistletoe?”

His body began to act before his mind would register their actions. Slowly, he began to lean down to her, his eyes feeling heavier and heavier with each inch. Finally, their lips met and he felt as though he was locked in an angel’s embrace. She would break the union first, turning away to leave with no words except to say, “I’ll be waiting for you, love.”

He stood frozen, still spellbound. Eventually, his stupor broke and he found himself stupefied, unaware of where he was or what had happened. In that moment, only one thing was certain: he was extremely cold.

Such would remain the case for the remainder of the eve. It was that night, curled under his comforter that he would see her face again. He would hear her voice again; the ever so seductive sound,

“Kiss me, Arthur, kiss me ‘neath the mistletoe”.

Such feverish infatuation, mixed triflingly with the deathly cold, robbed him utterly of sleep that night and well into the coming morning. And this would carry on for the rest of that week until, eventually, he no longer saw her in his dreams. Her face and her voice had faded into little more than an obscure set of features and sounds he never could quite put together.

That was, until that Sunday evening when he was once again returning home from the market, passing by that very same streetlamp. And, as if expectantly, there she stood again by the streetlamp with mistletoe hanging from its top, shrouded in her same white gown, beckoning him to her with those eyes. And there it was again, that warmth that spread through his body, the earth that had felt entirely absent since that night for reasons he could never place.

“I knew you’d come”, she said, bearing that same seductive smile from before. He froze, trapped once again in her stare. Absently, he began to trudge towards her. When he reached her, she once more unfastened his garbs and began caressing his chest. He could only stand and watch her, his mind completely blank.

“My God, Arthur, you’re so cold!” Her voice, while still sultry and smooth, took on an almost motherly tone when she spoke. Indeed, he felt like a child again, warmed by her preternatural touch. “Let me warm you with a kiss?”

Again, her hands slithered up from his chest and around his neck and he instinctively lowered himself again to meet her lips. And again did the overpowering heat inside him flare. She would break away again, and again he would be left alone by the streetlamp with only a fragmented sense of recollection of what had transpired. That night, too, resulted in restlessness.

That night, writhing in his bed, Arthur would dream; dream of snow, of the gas lamp, of her beautiful eyes, her beautiful face,

of the mistletoe…

The Mistletoe!

”Deadly if you eat it… deadlier if you mean it…”

He could take it no more, he had to find this woman, this elusive temptress. Throwing on his heaviest winter garbs, he set out amid the bitter cold night air. The year’s snowfall had began to rain down earlier that afternoon and had by then formed into a thick, white blanket upon the ground. Slowly, he staggered through the snow until he came once more upon the streetlamp. His legs were unable to hold themselves up any longer and he fell to his knees in front of it, the mistletoe hanging down, jeering at him.

His sight began to blur as with each fleeting, labored breath. The winter air had done its damage, and now he would feel its bitter touch slowly pluck the life from him. First, he would lose any feeling he had in nearly every part of his body. Next, he would feel the ice slowly form over his eyes, shutting him out from his sight. Just before the vicious winter would have him, however, he began to see the vague outline of a figure gliding towards him.

He, of course, couldn’t distinguish any definition from the figure, outside of the apparently human outline. The approaching figure almost seemed to blend with the surrounding snow. Only the long, crimson hair braided around the figure’s neck gave him clarity.

It was her!

Or was it? As the figure approached closer, he began to notice more and more details that differentiated it from the dame he so feverishly sought. This new woman, while very similar in many of her features to the other, had much more pale, almost desiccated skin. Had he still the feeling in his body, Arthur would’ve began sprinting for dear life.

He could only lie and wait for this gruesome specter to have her way with him. He could feel his heart thunder and quake against his chest with every inch she gracefully floated across the snow. He wanted desperately to at least close his eyes, sparing himself the sight of whatever horror he would face at her whims when she finally reached him.

She froze before him, staring down to him with eyes that were only a faded resemblance of the baby blue gems he’d been entranced by. The specter knelt down to him and placed its pale, bony index finger on his lips. To his amazement, the specter’s finger wasn’t cold or frigid as he would’ve expected from one who looked as gravely as she. Rather, he felt the wave of heat begin to pervade him again.

She then seized, cupped his chin in her frail hands and leaned in to kiss him. Instantly, all feeling returned to his limbs. He then stood up as he watched the specter turn to leave.

“Wait,” he exclaimed.

She stopped and turned her pale, dead face to him once more.

“Who are you?”

She turned slowly before rushing to him in a startlingly fluid motion that was too quick for him to perceive. She was upon him again, and taking him firmly by the throat, said   into his ear in almost too soft a whisper, “I am Delilah. I am the warmth of your heart, the blazing fire in your chest that you can never again live without…”

With that, she released him and he watched her vanish far into the horizon before he could even blink.

Just as before, he was left alone and bewildered, unable to remember what had just happened or why he’d even come. The only thing he was able to remember were fragments of a face, the face of a beautiful woman, as well as the face of a ghastly corpse. Along with this, Arthur could hear a soft, rasping whisper swim through his mind. The voice was, of course, utterly indeterminate, without any sort of identity or definition to its origin.

”A kiss from my lips will now and always be what keeps thy heart warm and beating, lest it submit to a cold, bitter end.”

That night was when his dreams of her first became vivid and clear. He saw her again, standing amid the snow, giving him that same dubious smile indicative of sinful desire. And looking upon this face, he fell helplessly into her whims and slowly walked to her. The snow began to flurry from above and he could feel the chill begin crippling him again. The temptress extended her hand and curled her finger to beckon him closer.

”Come, will you dance with me, Arthur?”

His pace quickened and his heart raced with both excitement and apprehension until, eventually, he broke into a sprint to her. To him, she seemed so close, and at the same time so far away the further he sprinted. At last, he reached her and was promptly seized into her embrace. And like he was now in his living room with her, they waltzed about amid the white expanse. All the while, his attention was fixed to her radiant smile, augmented by those baby blue irises.

“Kiss me, Arthur”, she crooned to him with that angelic voice.

He closed his eyes and leaned in to her with anticipation. Likewise, she would yield her lips to him and he felt the intensity of the sun burst within him. Gradually, however, he watched in growing fear as her face slowly devolved into that familiarly haunting necrotic visage that plagued his subconscious mind. Aghast, he shoved her away and attempted to flee. Something caught his feet and he fell prostrate into the snow. She was once more upon him, leering down to him with those cold, dead eyes.

She knelt down and reached her hand down to him, clutching something small and frail in her withered hand. Shaking, he looked to see that it was a small mistletoe.

“You’re so cold, Arthur,” she rasped in a ghoulish hiss, ”Come, warm your heart with my lips, love.”

“N-no, no, go away”, he exclaimed as he felt the crippling chill return, once more causing his blood to begin to freeze solid. All throughout his body, he slowly lost all sensations of touch and his eyes started to freeze over again. Her lips opened once more and she spoke, ”You can’t deny me long. Without me, your heart, your soul, will rot in a cold, icy bed.”

As darkness would have him, Arthur watched as the ghost, poising the mistletoe high above them, leaned forward to his right ear and whispered,

”I’ll be waiting, love.”

It was in that instant that he awoke bolt upright with a frightened shriek. For a time, Arthur just sat there, gasping frantically as though he were a fish being held above the water. Eventually, he was able to regain his composure, yet he still felt…wrong.

It was more of an empty sensation, like he’d had something removed from within him. What, how, or why, however, were questions that continued to elude him. But whatever it was, it would cause him to feel perpetually cold for many days and nights to come, regardless of what he wore or how close he would sit by the blazing hearth. One thing did slowly mold into at least a minute certainty to him: one way or another, this strange phenomena presently plaguing him was likely due to some sorcerous whim of this beautiful, yet mysterious dame that dominated his subconscious mind.

Unable to sleep, Arthur pondered how he may be able to rid himself of this apparently strange curse; eventually concluding that, no matter how strong his desire for her was, he would not heed her summons. Such proved to not be as easy as he had thought, however. Every day, from rise until fall of the sun, the phantom chills would menace him without end. Constantly, he felt as though his blood had been turned to solid ice, despite at almost all times wearing his heaviest of garbs.

Arthur would spend most of each following afternoon over those next three and a half weeks huddled next to his hearth, constantly stoking the kindling to draw more heat from it. He would only eat scalding broth and lightly prepared stews with steaming cups of tea or coffee or cocoa. In spite of all of this, still he was always so deathly cold, inside and out. Eventually, on the Monday of the week before now, he ran out of these commodities and was forced to venture out against the wrath of the cold. He had very little money by then, having received word early that past weekend that he’d lost his job at the market due to his seclusion.

Still, he had to find some way to banish the bitter cold that was crippling him. It was as he was trudging through the snowbound streets of the market that, amidst the many folks who’d likewise gathered at the market that evening, his eyes fell upon her. She was standing at the bakery, her luscious crimson braided hair facing out to him hanging down her back. Almost instantly, a nauseating dread flooded through him.

“You need me, Arthur”, he could hear from deep in the pit of his subconscious.

”You need my lips, I can feel it. Come, Arthur, come to the mistletoe. Come hold me and kiss me.”

“NO! NO MORE”, he screamed. Almost all eyes from the present congregation were now fixed to him, frightened and bewildered. Oblivious to the attention he’d garnered, Arthur swiftly bolted to the young woman in front of the bakery, the seductress, the witch!

With startling strength and intensity, he seized her by her shoulders and proceeded to violently shake her.

“What have you done to me”, he barked to her frightened face. Her eyes were wide and afraid, welling to the brim with tears, “Wh-Who-who are you?!”

Though he could see the fear molded onto the young woman’s face, he would not relent.

“What do you want from me, devil?!”

She screamed and struggled frantically to free herself, to no use. Arthur was determined to end this madness that was robbing him of his body, mind, and his very soul. It would end there and *now*, even if it meant the death of him.

“ANSWER ME! WHY HAVE YOU PLAGUED ME LIKE THIS?!”

“Let the lady go”, demanded a nearby bystander in a gruff voice; a broad shouldered man attired in thick animal fur garbs, indicative of woodland residency. Despite his hysterical frenzy, Arthur recognized the man to be none other than McDowell, the town’s lumberjack.

“She’s a witch”, Arthur exclaimed to the crowd as McDowell pried him away from the distressed woman and began dragging him out of the market square.

“She’s afflicted me with some form of curse! Please, you must believe me, she’s trying to rob me of my soul!” The crowd merely looked upon him with disgust and shame. Though, as he was being forcefully towed away, he thought — no, he swore he could see the young woman’s shocked face twist into one of sinister exultation.

His own flailing against McDowell’s restraint was feeble at best, not impeding his iron grasp in the least. Finally, Arthur was cast face down into the snow. “Stay down, if ye know what be good for ye”, he heard McDowell demand before turning and making his way back to the market square.

Lain in the frigid snow, Arthur’s mind was lost in a maelstrom that bordered on confusion, fear, and pure madness.

Why is she doing this to me? What does she WANT from me? Why don’t they believe me?

Tried as he might, no answers came to him, pushing him further to the edge of complete collapse.

Making the matter worse was that he felt the chill now with more potency than ever. It wasn’t long before he’d succumb to the elements yet again, unconsciousness assuming full control over his mind. And the first image to assault his hollow dream was, of course, her; leering over and jeering; ”In life or in death, your heart will always be mine, Arthur.”

He desperately tried to rid her presence from his mind, to no purpose. Regardless of how much he would try to banish her from thought and memory, he would be met only with her pale, dead face.

“No! Stay away!”

She simply remained, curling a beckoning finger with one hand, the other holding the mistletoe aloft.

“Join me under the mistletoe, Arthur… Come… Come…”

Arthur’s eyes went wide as he saw his body turn to ice. All too soon was he encased in a layer of frigid, unforgiving glacier. He could only watch in perpetual terror as the spectral woman approached him.

”You can’t elude me, Arthur,” teased the specter in its rasping whisper, poising her decayed index finger at his heart, ”Without me, you will only crumble.”

With a light tap of her finger upon his chest, the ice splintered and started to crumble. And helpless, he could only watch horrified while he fell apart. Finally, his body had been reduced to nothing more than shards of glassy ice, only his head remaining whole. Yet, even still, he was forced to watch as the specter picked up his head and, holding that damning mistletoe high above, brought her faded grey lips to meet his.

Arthur awoke again with a scream. Frantically, he patted all over his body to find that he was still whole and the specter was nowhere to be found. Even still, relief wouldn’t find him as he was still menaced by the chill. He could hardly move his limbs and he was profusely trembling from hypothermia. He wanted to cry, both from the crippling madness as well as bitter fear. And he no doubt would’ve done so, had the air not been so cruel with its wintery wrath as to freeze the tears as they welled.

With every minute reserve of strength he would have, Arthur found himself to his feet and began stiffly shambling to his house. It was as he crossed onto that familiar road to his house that he saw her again, walking all alone. Instantly, he could feel the urge again to rush to her and try again to force her to relieve him of whatever spell or curse she cast upon him.

It was this frightful determination, and this alone that seemed to fuel his stride. She didn’t seem to notice him approaching. It was perfect, he thought. He could sneak upon her, ambush her, and be on his way with none the wiser… He would be rid of this curse at last!

Thoughts fell in an avalanche of how he could force her to relieve him his torment. He was prepared to even do the worst if it came to it.

After all… she’s all alone now… it would be so easy, wouldn’t it? Just a quick snap of her fragile little neck, and it’ll all be over…

And that was all he could care about; to finally be rid of this phantasmic witch and her damn accursed mistletoe!

It wasn’t long before he was then upon her. “Witch! I have you now”, he ejaculated venomously. When she turned to him, exposing those all too familiar baby blues that appeared frozen in fright, he knew he had her finally at his mercy. He knew he would finally end this madness.

She quickly tried to hurry into her home and shut out her pursuer, but she was too little too late. Arthur caught the door as it was about to close on him and forced his way inside. When she tried to run to the back of her house, he caught her and rudely threw her to the floor. He was then upon her again with his hands like pythons about her throat, forcing the air from her lungs and commanding her to undo her wicked sorcery.

It was, in more than one way, invigorating. He felt as though he were a wolf and she a cornered sheep. The look of utter fear in her eyes fueled him, now he would bend her to his whim!

“Whatever you’ve done to me, witch, it ends now!”

“I-I-I-Hav-haven’t…”, she choked out, but it was no use; Arthur’s strangulation had by then rendered her speech impotent. Frantically, she claws like an animal at his face, trying to gouge his eyes. Nevertheless Arthur’s wrath was little impeded. In her wild flailing, her arm brushed the nearby drawer, knocking something off. Even amidst his primal state, he was able to see that it was a small, frail mistletoe. “Mistletoe”, he barked with lunatic laughter as he began forcing it down her throat, “deadly if you eat it!”

Slowly, he watched the life leave her eyes. Yes, he knew he’d won now, it’ll all be over…

Just one…

quick…

SNAP

He rose up triumphantly. The adrenaline still coursing through him. He’d done it! It was over! It was all over, the witch was de-.

He stopped. Suddenly, his exultation died and was replaced with another feeling: panic. He looked down again at the woman’s inert body, now with a growing panic.

What have I done? He tried to shake her, desperately hoping that she may yet exhibit life. She did not, and Arthur now felt his head begin to spin. What was he to do? He killed her. He was now a murderer!

The court would have him hanged for sure. He’d be condemned as a cold blooded monster.

But, no… no that wasn’t what happened, was it? She was a Witch, was she not? Had she not wrought misery upon his life? What he did was for the good of his own soul…

Wasn’t it?

In a brief, devastating avalanche, he began to remember her eyes; those hypnotic irises, so wan with fear. All at once, dregs of recrimination and despair caused him to huddle himself into a fetal position, sobbing.

”Arthur…”

He heard the voice only faintly, but enough to recognize it.

“Arthur…”

“N-No… no, that’s not possible,” he stammered. All too soon then did he feel that haunting cold infect his body once more. Crippled once again, he listened in terror as the wraith’s voice appeared to close in around him with its ghastly, rasping hiss.

”In life… or in death… I have your heart… I will keep it warm with me, even in Hell… it will belong to me, and me alone, forever and always…”

Arthur’s body was trembling more violently than ever before now.

“No… No, no, no, you’re dead!”

As if on cue, he saw the woman’s body suddenly bolt upright. Her face was now the very same as that of the specter, with her vibrant blue eyes now forever faded in death.

“Kiss me, Arthur”, she croaked as she began crawling toward him with disjointed motion.

Arthur opened his mouth, yet not a sound was able to be uttered. Only pitiful croaks of fright were sounded before she was upon him, pinning him to the wooden floor. Leering over him, she then began to open her mouth and croak as she painfully regurgitated the mistletoe onto him, now black and withered.

”Come, won’t you kiss me, love”?

Before he could react, her pale dead hands roughly seized his face and her cold lips forced their way to his. This time, the warm sensation from before was not present, only the frigid touch of death and decay. He struggled until finally throwing her off of him. She was sent hurtling into the wall with a crash and she was once again motionless; lifeless. He simply laid on his back, too frightened to move in spite of his spiking adrenaline, gasping frantically for breath.

When he finally looked up, he was met with her dead face, forever chiseled in perpetual fright. Reflexively, he touched his own lips, finding that they still felt as they had before — cracked and chapped as they were from exposure to the unforgiving cold. Still, he had felt her lips…

hadn’t he?

Arthur clutched his head and howled as he began stoving his head into the wooden floor. PLEASE!, his mind screamed, PLEASE, MERCIFUL LORD, MAKE IT END! Eventually he could bring himself to pound the floor no more. And that was when he crawled like an animal to the woman’s battered corpse.

“Why are you doing this to me?!”

This time, there was no answer. She merely stared back to him with stiff, faded eyes. He began shaking her, crying out for an answer. It was when he was again met with only silence that his terrified sobbing devolved into a fit of hysterical laughter. He collapsed onto his back, the corpse held firmly against him, as the laughter soon escalated into wailing cackles of raving madness that echoed throughout the house.

In a morbid way, it was hilarious to him. The utter folly of it all. What began with a simple kiss, had now delved into the black recesses of insanity. He was once a man, respected by the people. He was a well liked market clerk, adored by those he served. Now, he was a madman, a lunatic, and now worst of all, a murderer.

He carried on his demented cheer until his throat was shot and his breaths became labored. Slowly, he could feel the chill again. His mind now gone forever, broken beyond all repair, he unfastened his shirt and trousers before climbing onto her, mounting the withering mistletoe above. If it was him she wanted, she would have him, all of him.

It would be days before reality would finally break through his madness. He sat that night, the Eve of Christmas, staring into her dead eyes. He knew he couldn’t live on like this; a prisoner to the curse of his own madness, to Delilah. The chill’s grasp tightened and crippled him again. That was when it came to him of what he would have to do. He went into the basement of the house and retrieved a bucket of the kerosene meant for the lamps and set about all night dousing every inch of the house with it.

Every wall, every corner in every room was dredged, leaving none to be spared. As he toiled feverishly, her words continued to cycle incessantly and the supernatural chill amplified in its ferocity.

“You need my lips, I can feel it. Come, Arthur, come to the mistletoe…”

Despite this, he didn’t stop until the breaking of the next sunrise when he had finally completed his task. Tonight…, he swore to himself, This will all end tonight!

***

Twelve loud chimes broke Arthur of his mad remiss. It was time. Steadily, he placed Delilah back into her chair and silenced the phonograph. He now felt more deathly cold than ever before. Still, this didn’t deter him. With the last of the kerosene, he doused himself and her before stringing the mistletoe to the ceiling. He then stood her up once more, embracing her to him, before using the poker to cast out a burning log, setting the floors alight.

All too quick did the flame’s dance consume the floors and the walls around them. Even amidst the inferno, however, Arthur still felt none of its warmth. He knew only one thing would. And it would be for the last time.

“Merry Christmas, Delilah,” he said as he held her in an eternal embrace and brought his lips to hers. Even as the flames crept upon them, charring flesh and bone, he did not waiver. He would die with his heart in eternal warmth.

For even in death, she would always be the sole warmth of his heart.