Chapter 1: The Reindeer Hit the Ground
The crack of plastic hitting frozen grass was the first thing Daniel Mercer heard.
He looked up from the front porch just in time to see his five-foot Christmas reindeer collapse sideways across the lawn.
A woman in a red puffer jacket stood over it, both hands wrapped around the loose anchoring rope.
Karen.
Daniel knew her well enough to recognize the expression on her face: tight lips, narrowed eyes, and the smug certainty of someone who believed she had every right to be doing exactly what she was doing.
She gave the rope one final violent tug.
The reindeer’s plastic frame twisted.
One of its legs snapped.
“What the hell are you doing to my Christmas display?” Daniel shouted.
He hurried down the porch steps.
Karen didn’t retreat.
Instead, she grabbed the collapsed reindeer by its side and began dragging it toward the driveway as though it were an unwanted piece of trash.
Daniel reached her before she got three feet.
He seized the decoration and pulled it back.
“Let go.”
Karen tightened her grip.
“I’m doing what you were warned to do.”
Daniel stared at her.
“Warned by who?”
“You know exactly who.”
“No, Karen. I don’t.”
With a sharp pull, Daniel finally freed the reindeer from her hands. He dragged the damaged decoration behind him and stood between Karen and the rest of the display.
The morning had started quietly. The neighborhood was still wrapped in the pale gray light of December. A few porch lights glowed against the cold. Somewhere down the street, a snow blower rumbled.
Daniel’s hands were shaking.
Not from the cold.
The reindeer had belonged to his late wife, Margaret.
She had bought it during their first Christmas in the house nearly twenty years earlier. Every December, she insisted on putting it in exactly the same place, beside the wooden Santa near the flower bed.
After Margaret died, Daniel had kept the tradition.
His daughter, Emily, had helped him repair the lights the previous weekend.
Karen pointed at the lawn.
“It makes the neighborhood look ridiculous.”
Daniel looked at the broken leg.
“You broke it.”
“It was poorly secured.”
“You pulled it down.”
“It shouldn’t have been there.”
Daniel took a breath.
“Stay away from the rest of my decorations.”
Karen’s eyes moved past him.
Toward the wooden Santa.
Daniel saw it happen.
“No.”
Karen stepped forward.
Daniel blocked her.
She reached around him.
He caught the wooden Santa’s post with one hand just as Karen grabbed its arm.
The decoration rattled violently.
“Don’t touch another damn thing.”
Karen’s face tightened.
For several seconds, neither moved.
Then something strange happened.
Karen stopped struggling.
The anger disappeared from her face.
She looked toward Daniel’s house.
Not at the Christmas lights.
Not at the decorations.
At the house itself.
Her voice dropped.
“You still don’t understand.”
Daniel watched her carefully.
“This isn’t about Christmas.”
She turned her eyes back to him.
“I’m trying to make you leave before you find out why everyone else already did.”
Then she walked away.
Daniel stood beside the damaged reindeer, staring after her.
For the first time that morning, he wasn’t thinking about Christmas.
He was thinking about his house.
And about everyone else.
