Page 21 of The Nutcracker

“Jim?” I muttered.

“Jordy, thank God you’re alive. How long have you been here? You could have frozen to death in this cold.”

I realized it was daytime.

I realized Jim was pulling off my seatbelt.

I realized he was dragging me out of my crashed car, the head of the lamp post resting against the smashed windshield.

My feet floundered in the snow but I managed to half-walk while Jim half-dragged me over to the icy kerb. There I sat, my head spinning and my limbs quivering, as though the reality of the cold had just set in.

Jim hurried back to his tow-truck and returned with a hipflask and a blanket that smelled like his dog Bandit. I didn’t care. I wrapped it around me and took a swig from his flask, coughing as Jim’s home-brewed whisky went down and started to warm me up.

“There was a deer,” I mumbled, trying to make sense of things, trying to remember what had happened. “There was a deer and I crashed. But I was safe in the store. I think I spent the night in the store.”

“Jordy, you were in the car when I found you. What store are you talking about?”

“That one.” I pointed across Main to the opposite corner to whereThe Nutcrackerwas located.

OnlyThe Nutcrackerwas no longer there.

Instead, all I saw was Mr. Hanover’s old toy store, boarded up and abandoned, just as it had been for so long.

The beautiful red shopfront and the shiny lights and Christmas ornaments that decorated the window were gone, as was the sign above the door that readThe Nutcrackerin gold print.

“But… but it was there. I swear there was a store right there.”

“Of course there is. It’s Mr. Hanover’s old toy shop. It’s been there for decades. Are you telling me you pulled the boards down and stayed in there for the night… then put the boards back up in the morning and crawled back into your car? Jordy I think maybe you hit your head when you crashed. We better get you to the hospital.”

I was confused.

How could I have imagined it when it all seemed so real?

The wish machine.

The gadgets and gizmos.

Curtis.

Then I remembered the items on the train.

The teddy bear.

The chestnuts.

The holly.

“Jordy, did you hear me? I’m taking you to the hospital.”

“No, I’m okay. I’m not hurt. I just need to get home. There’s something I need to do.”

* * *

Jim’s tow truck rumbled slowly through the snow, the chain on the back rattling as we towed my car back to his repair shop. When we arrived he started to unload my car. “Lemme get this unhitched then I’ll give you a ride home. It’ll take me a coupla weeks to get this baby fixed.”

I had already spotted his spare pickup out front of the repair shop. “Say Jim, any chance I could borrow your truck? Not the tow truck. The other one.” I gestured with my thumb toward his pickup.

“So’s long as you don’t crash it into a lamp post, it’s yours.”

---