She looked out upon the porch and saw them all coming, there torches flickering in the wind, blinking rapidly, as her heartbeat began to rise. This winter's eve was chilling the marrow in her bones as the wind whipped at her eyelashes peeking out, just a touch, from her leopard skin scarf. Tonight, she had expected someone, but not an entire crowd. She had even taken the trouble to adorn her Russian Sable fur coat. With a pair of black Gucci leather boots, she glared in the wind, at the strangers coming down on her; her heels poised so sharply through the balcony that they seemed to hang over the front entrance of her New England cottage like obsidian stalactites. Those boots went as far up her creamy auburn thighs as any man had ever managed to get on Ms. Gizelle, for she would not let that wretched sex get the best of her.
She stood still, still shivering, in the moonlight; the sky growing brighter with the coming cadre of vivacious men, each with a candle fluttering under their freehand and a red rose tucked, neatly, into their breast pockets. Despite some of the candles having not survived the harshening winds, a cheerful expression remained upon their burning red faces. Their composure was curious as the temperature had to be knocking on the door of freezing, she thought. How could they maintain such a pleasant presence in such wicked weather?
It was twenty or thirty of them, marching up her steep driveway into the salty wind, which blew in from the ocean, across the rocky peninsula, upon where her royal blue cottage stood.
It was once the caretaker's house, owned by a wealthy New England family, who manned a light house, on that jutting expanse of rock, for over a hundred years. She looked back at the ocean and saw how viciously the waves were slamming into the cliffs below.
She felt sorry for these men who were dressed up for the occasion, mostly, because she hadn't expected them, as of yet, there was not a pot of steaming hot chocolate on the stove, nor any miniature marshmallows to be doled out with a petite sterling spoon, which she kept cloistered in the china cabinet, along with other delicate pieces of the house's heritage, untarnished by antiquity. Breaking into the celebratory cabinet had always awakened her senses to the season and purified her thoughts for the coming holiday. When the historic sterling and crystal were out, she knew that the holidays were here.
This year she was determined to quell some of the impulses that beckoned her salacious desires. She was determined to be a good girl this year, to not let naughtiness get the best of her convulsing thoughts, and sensual nightmares.
She was told by Jean Defabre, that is Dr. Defabre, her holistic psychiatrist, that if she could suppress some of her erotic urges this season, she would gather an inner strength, allowing her to live the life she'd always wanted. A life that was free from these hidden desires, which had haunted her subconscious since adolescence.
A resounding knock upon the old oak door from below interrupted her dreaming and she hollered, "I'll be coming right down!" She ran back into her bedroom, grabbing a blouse and a shirt from the closet, because beneath her fur coat, she was wearing nothing, save her midnight blue bra, which was slightly pressed, against her cold hard nipples. She ran down the spiral staircase across the marble foyer and flung the front door open.
The men stood there smiling in Santa hats, arranged so the tallest of them was in the back row, and the shortest in the front, Gizelle recognized some of them from a church she attended occasionally. Simultaneously, they began to sing "We wish you a merry Christmas" and following that tune, they proclaimed, "Hark the harold angels sing." They sung a few more tunes in perfect harmony as she stood in the threshold, smiling, in her sable coat, wishing, she had something more to offer them.
It occurred to Gizelle that her mother had dropped off a tin of homemade cookies yesterday, which she had yet to open. After they had stopped singing, she invited them in and turned on the espresso machine, but not before putting the cookies into a more presentable dish, one she acquired from her china cabinet.
They graciously accepted a chance to retreat from the blistering wind. The gentlemen snuffed out there candles and told her that they were a local barbershop group that was working with charities to spread a bit of holiday cheer.
Jared, one of the young men from her church pulled Ms. Gezelle aside from the chattering group of carolers and asked her if she would be interested in participating in a holiday nativity scene. Jared Akers was a solid young man; tall and lean, with chestnut hair and eager blue eyes. He worked on the Davidson's dairy farm and had moved his way up to coordinating milk trucks and doing most of the marketing for the entire Davidson Dairy Company. Jared mentioned to Gizelle that over at church they were in need of a couple of angels for the nativity scene on Christmas Eve. He doted on her beauty and said that she would be a perfect fit for the part. Gizelle at first declined Jared's offer, saying that she was far from perfect and that Jesus himself, would make a deal with the devil before letting her be an angel, come Christmas time at the church.
"Not at all," Jared said confidently, "Jesus was forgiving, and whatever wrongs you may have done you could surely make them up by helping reenact his birth."
Gizelle thought for a moment about this possibility and a wave of guilt rushed through her as she realized she had not been to church in a while. This might be the precise way to prove to herself and others, that she was indeed a good person, who could focus her inner strengths, and do something charitable, out of the kindness of her heart. "Well, Jared to be honest, I haven't been to church since April for the Easter Service."
"That's not a problem Ms. Gizelle, the congregation would be glad to see you," He said, glancing down beneath her fur coat. "It only takes a few rehearsals and I know you'd make such a lovely angel."
"Oh you've got a bouquet full of sweet talk don't you," Gizelle said coquettishly, shifting her curves with those poignant heals.
"Well what can I say; we'd be honored to have your angelic presence in our nativity scene," Jared contested.
Suddenly, one of the senior ushers from the church, that Gizelle remembered being so kind, in Sunday's past, came sauntering over. "Well hello Ms. Gizelle", Arthur said, after giving her a warm embrace. "How have you been? Is Jared here soliciting your services?"
"Not quite, yet." Gizelle replied. "He wants me to be an angel in the nativity scene on Christmas Eve."
"Oh, well he knows exactly where to look. Yes, there are only so many women available for the part, as you know; it is mostly an older congregation down at St. Martin's." Arthur said earnestly.
"Yes I do remember, so I'll tell you boys what. I'll take the night to think it over and then call you tomorrow."
Jared and Arthur agreed that presently that was as much as they could hope for, so after exchanging numbers with Gizelle and thanking her for the hospitality, the carolers headed out into the perilous cold, as they still had a couple more houses to visit before their night was through. "Thanks again, I hope you can make it." Jared turned and shouted as they departed from her stoop.
"I'll definitely let you know," she called back, smiling as she closed the door. She wondered where her friend Monica was, looking at the Grandfather clock, as it neared nine. She had told Gizelle to expect her around eight. The following morning she tossed and turned as the blinds in her master bedroom were pulled open allowing just a glint of daylight to come pouring through.
