A Christmas Time
By: V. Plut
Tags: Short Story, Fiction, Lit, Time Travel, Christmas

When Henry awoke in the morning, he was still in his chair by the Christmas tree. A light was on in the kitchen and the sun had not come up yet. He picked up his phone to check the time. It was 5 am. He went into the kitchen and began to boil some coffee — he always made it farm style, the way his grandmother had taught him, it was better than what trendy coffee shops could serve up.

He stepped out on to the front porch to check the weather. The snow had stopped and the sky was crystal clear. Orion glimmered and dominated the view above the snowy Pennsylvania hills. Silhouettes of the windmill and the weathervane atop the barn were still — it seemed to Henry that time had stopped in this moment, solely to capture and preserve its beauty for his enjoyment. He had never experienced a more perfect day for painting winter en plein air.

After coffee with toast and eggs, Henry shoveled a narrow path to his jeep and loaded his painting supplies. The snow plows had been through already, so he easily backed on to the road, heading to the little creek with the red barn. By now the hills glowed a soft morning red and Henry smiled at his good fortune and sweet dreams.

It was just as he had imagined — the barn in soft light filtered through transparent clouds just moving in above the creek as it curved down the hill, flowing beneath patches of ice along banks of sparkling snow. Henry could easily put himself in another time here, perhaps 1850 when such a scene would be common on the landscape. He preferred the past when he painted.

The trees cast light bluish shadows across the hill in spite of the thin layer of clouds as Henry set up his pochade and paints. He was never so excited and eager to paint. Conditions were ideal and he had to capture the scene quickly before the next storm rolled in.

His strokes were steady and loose and the painting was nearly finished as the snow began to fall again, but the curve of the creek seemed a little off. It seemed to change each time he got it down and although he was not necessarily trying to be exact to nature, it threw off his vision. At one moment it curved sharply, at another straightened itself out just slightly. Painting outdoors was always a challenge, with light, and sometimes weather, changing and moving constantly, but this phenomenon was unfamiliar to him. It was as if the creek slithered back and forth ever so subtly as he painted.

It had to be a trick of the soft light and falling snow, he thought.

The wind began to pick up now and the snow blew heavily. The storm was coming on quickly and the barn was a faint spot of red through what was now the beginning of blizzard conditions. Henry pulled his painting off the easel — he would come back for the rest of his supplies when he got it safely into the jeep.

He could hear the distant sound of bells as he made his way through the now blinding wall of white.

An Amish farmer stepping up the pace home.

Henry could not find the jeep. He admonished himself for spending too much time on the creek. He wandered aimlessly in the snow, at one point bumping his head into a tree branch. It caught his stocking cap, which came off as the branch scraped across his head. He was beside himself at the situation he’d gotten himself into — he had to admit, he was lost.

This sort of thing could only happen in a Jack London novel, he thought, except that I have the luxury of calling the fire department.

He reached for his cell phone inside his snow suit. A wave of panic filled his thoughts when he reached into an empty pocket. He was absolutely sure he put it deep into a pocket this morning so that the warmth from his body would keep his battery from dying.

I couldn’t have left it at home!

Again he heard the jingling of bells through the howling storm. He could see an outline of dark against the wall of snow. The dark form shifted into a horse pulling a buggy and seemed to emerge from within the heart of the blizzard.

Henry let out the breath he had been holding inside.

So I’ll have a tale to tell beneath the Christmas tree after all, he thought, lost in the snow, rescued by an Amish farmer.

He put up his arm and waved it back and forth, holding tightly to his painting with the other.

A faint “Whoaa!” from within the buggy. The horse clicked to a stop and snorted.

Henry climbed into the buggy still hanging on to his painting, now wet with snow as well as oil. He hoped he might be able salvage it since the oil would be wet for some time.

The driver gave Henry a jovial smile from beneath his broad-brimmed hat. Henry could make out a bush of wide white beard shining in the dark beneath the brim — it moved up and down as he chuckled lightly.

“Your luck brings you to the right moment friend. I don’t normally take this route, but fortune occasionally blows in every direction rather than one. Takes us where we least expect at times.”

“I was out painting and time slipped away from me I guess, got caught in the storm,” said Henry.

The bells about the horses began a light refrain as the old man turned away from Henry without comment and shook the reins. Henry lost consciousness then, the jingling bells and clip of hooves lingering in his mind until it faded into voices.

“He’s had quite a shock Sarah. Drifts in and out. Doesn’t seem to know who he is. Took a great bump and scrape on the head in the blizzard somehow. Plenty of bedrest should see him through. Quite a nice painting he did of the barn at Miller’s Creek though.”

And then the soft, familiar voice of a woman.

“Not sure it was worth going after in a blizzard. Well then, Merry Christmas Doc, we’ll send a buggy for you if anything changes.”