It was Christmas Eve, a cold bleak one with biting weather and a dense fog blanketing everything.

Sean Scrooge did not feel the cold weather as he made his way to his office. The cold was always with him but he didn't ever notice it, inside or outside. It had perpetually frozen his still-handsome features, sharpened his prominent nose and stiffened his bearing. He looked much older than he actually was, and his once beautiful green eyes had turned murky, like dead pools.

He sped through the streets that teemed with shoppers, oblivious of the cheery holiday atmosphere. Nobody ever stopped him in the street to exchange aimless pleasantries, but what did Scrooge care? It was the very thing he liked. To edge his way along the crowded paths of life, warning all human sympathy to keep its distance.

He stopped before the door of his investment firm. The sign on the door read 'Scrooge & Marley' but as things were, David Marley had been dead for seven years. It was just that a new sign would cost money and Sean Scrooge was of the firm belief that money would be put to better use where it would spawn more money.

He knocked some snow off the top of the sign with the handle of his old umbrella and walked into his office.

He immediately started bellowing as he caught his employee, Viggo Cratchit, coughing and fiddling with the thermostat of the heating system.

"Cratchit, how many times must I tell you to leave that thing alone? Did you see the heating bill for last month? Do you think the money to pay that grows on trees?"

"But Mr. Scrooge, it's freezing in here, my fingers are so stiff with cold that I can't even write entries in the accounts ledger!"

"They're stiff because you're slow and lazy, and if you were busy doing what you're paid to do you wouldn't even have the time to notice whether it's warm or cold in here. Get down to work, I don't want to hear a sound from you until closing time."

***

"Ok Cratchit, it's time," Scrooge eyed the ancient clock on the wall and nodded to Viggo, eyes glittering in his totally blank face.

Viggo rubbed his tired eyes and closed the ledger, trying to work a kink out of his neck from too much bending over the books. He rose and went to get his threadbare coat from the peg on the wall.

"No Cratchit," Scrooge had risen too and was grabbing Viggo's elbow, "I didn't mean you could go, it's Wednesday evening you know, must I remind you every time ?"
The hand grabbing Viggo's elbow crept up to his shoulder and propelled Viggo back towards the desk.
"Get ready," Scrooge admonished.

'Get ready'? Viggo would have laughed, and not in fun. He was always ready when it came to this, but he always had to pretend, to wait until his employer held him back. Ready, yes, he was ready, as ready as he would ever be for this...
He unbuttoned his pants and tugged them down. He was naked under them, underwear an unnecessary luxury not featured in his budget.

He bent down on the desk, resting his forehead on his crossed arms. He had long since stopped trying to crane his head back to catch a glimpse of Scrooge's face while he fucked him, he had long since stopped hoping for a kiss, a caress, anything other than the quick pounding his arse would get.
No tenderness, no warmth, just being used for relief.

And, despite this, Viggo loved Sean Scrooge so much that he could barely wait for their Wednesday routine to come, and he pined to be the recipient of the only human contact his employer apparently felt a need for. And the muffled groan Scrooge could never hold back as he came always made Viggo come too, pressing his hard cock painfully against the side of the old-fashioned wooden desk.

The scene replayed as usual, but today Viggo found it hard to focus on feeling his treasured only body contact with Scrooge. Today most of his energy and concentration were going into trying to stifle the persistent cough that had been racking him for several days. It took a particularly vicious slam of Scrooge's hips, pushing him into the desk so hard he almost cried out, to focus his senses back and trigger him into coming.

"You may go now Cratchit," were the only words Viggo got, as he wiped himself with a paper hankie and drew his pants up.

He stole a glance at his employer's back and grabbed his coat. As he was about to go out the door, Scrooge called to him again.

"Cratchit, you're forgetting something.."

Viggo turned slowly, hope gleaming in his eyes.

"Here," Scrooge tossed him a bulging linen sack, "It's laundry day, here's my stuff.

The hopeful gleam faded as Viggo caught the sack and made to leave.

"And I imagine you'll be wanting all day off tomorrow," continued Scrooge."

"If it's quite convenient, sir, seeing that it will be Christmas Day."

"It's not convenient at all, but I suppose it must be so. Be here all the earlier the following morning."

"Yes sir, thank you sir."

Still hugging the laundry sack, Viggo opened the door and left.

***

Viggo closed the door of his small, dingy flat.

He sighed. The place was not as freezing as Scrooge & Marley, but somehow he felt warmer there, less alone, even if Scrooge ignored him most of the time and acknowledged his presence only to scold him or to fuck him. At least there he could steal a look at him now and then...

He dropped the bundle of his employer's dirty laundry on the table, filled the sink with hot water and cheap detergent, and started soaking Scrooge's stuff.
As he was about to drop the last dirty shirt into the soapy water, he hesitated. He sunk his face into the fabric and inhaled. It smelled like Scrooge...

His face still hidden in the shirt, Viggo kicked off his shoes and went to curl up on the bed, snuggling under the worn blanket. The shirt balled up under his chin, his nose buried in it, he fell asleep, tired and hungry and filled with longing for someone he could not have, as he was day after day.

***

After a solitary dinner in a run-down pub, Scrooge headed home, to the gloomy suite of rooms that had once belonged to his deceased partner in business and in life, David Marley.

As he was fumbling with the keys, the large knocker on the front door suddenly glowed eerily in the darkness and its shape morphed into Marley's face.

The face had an unearthly livid tinge, but there was no mistaking the blond hair, the full lips and especially the prominent nose, so much like Scrooge's own that when Marley was still alive they'd often been mistaken for brothers.

As Scrooge stared at it, shocked, it suddenly morphed back to its original shape.

Scrooge shook his head, dazed, and went into the house and climbed up to his room. Darkness was cheap and normally Scrooge loved it, but this time he turned on all the lights. And checked every corner, in every cupboard and under every bed.
Satisfied that all was as it should be and blaming the strange vision on overindulgence with food, Scrooge locked himself in his bedroom.

As he was undressing for the night, he heard a deep clanking noise from below, as if someone was dragging a heavy chain up the stairs. The noise reached his door and suddenly a glowing apparition came through the door itself.

Headlights flashed from the street below and Scrooge recognized the ghost - it looked like Marley -
A heavy-looking chain was clasped around his middle and wound around him like a snake. It was made of cash-boxes, ledgers, purses, all wrought in steel.

"Who are you?"

"I am no more; in life I was your business partner and bed companion, David Marley.

"Humbug!" Scrooge cried. "You are merely a slight disorder of the senses, an undigested bit of dinner. I knew I shouldn't have had that extra slice of beef on account of it being Christmas Eve.."

At this the spirit howled and shook its chain with a hideous noise.

"Sean, you must believe in me, you must listen to me, I beg of you! Look, do you see this chain binding me, suffocating me? I forged it myself, during my life. I forged it link by link, day after day, by my own free will. I have been dragging it around for seven years. And it is unbearably heavy, Sean. Yet I have to carry it until God knows when. I am allowed no rest, no peace, just this weight sinking me down and the incessant torture of memory and remorse."

Scrooge trembled and cowered. "I am sorry about this, David. But I can't see why you've come to haunt me and frighten me"

"Fool!" Marley cried. "Can't you see that you are forging such a chain around yourself as well, link by link, day after day? It was permitted that I come to you, to warn you off the path I took, the path you are walking too."

"Speak then David, what is it that I must do to avoid such a fate?" Scrooge asked, still sounding doubtful.

"You have yet a chance and hope of escaping this, of shedding the chain. A chance I begged for and procured for you Sean, because in my own cold, twisted way I loved you, and I realized that only too late. No, don't interrupt me, hear me out, for my time with you is running short. You will be haunted by Three Spirits. "

Sean's countenance fell. "And would they be the chance and hope you spoke of, David?" he asked, his tone disappointed.

"Yes Sean, without their visits there is no hope for you. The Spirits will come to you the next three nights, on the last stroke of midnight. Remember me, my love, as I was and as I am now, for your own sake."

The apparition walked backwards to the window and passed through it, beckoning Scrooge. He followed it to the window and looked out. The air was filled with phantoms, wandering and moaning, every one of them bound in heavy chains like Marley's and wailing in misery.

Scrooge found he could recognize most of them. People he had had business dealings with, business partners, business rivals. They faded, wailing into the mists, and the night became as quiet as it had been when he walked home.

He tried to say 'Humbug!', but the first syllable stuck in his throat.

He was tired, he was confused. He went to bed and fell asleep immediately.

When Scrooge awoke it was totally dark and the chimes of a neighboring church were striking the hour. He listened in astonishment... Twelve! It couldn't be, the clock must be wrong! It had been past two when he'd gone to bed...

He went to the window and rubbed the frost off the windowpane. It was still very cold and very foggy outside, and there was no one about.

Scrooge went back to bed. His sleep had been troubled and the thought of Marley's ghost was bothering him exceedingly. He was mulling over the ghost's warning of a visitation when, surprisingly, the bell tolled twelve a second time, and in that very moment light flashed in the room and Scrooge found himself face to face with an unearthly visitor.

It was a strange figure, not a child and yet not a man, with huge blue eyes, blazing eerily in his smooth face. The man-child held a branch of holly in one hand and summer flowers in the other.

"Are you the Spirit whose coming I was foretold?" Scrooge asked gruffly.

"Yes, I am. I am the Ghost of Christmas Past, of your past Christmases," the spirit answered in soft, gentle voice. "Rise Sean Scrooge, rise and walk with me."

Scrooge wanted to plead that the hour was late and the weather too cold for his night attire, but he had a feeling the ghost wouldn't heed him and so he kept quiet as the spirit took him by the hand and as together they passed through the wall.

The city had vanished entirely and they were standing on an open country road, with fields on either side, leading to a village. It was a clear, cold, winter day..

"Hey! I know this place," Scrooge cried. "I lived here as a boy!"

"Do you remember the way to the village?" the spirit asked.

"Remember it? I could walk it blindfolded!" Scrooge replied cockily.

"Strange then that you had forgotten it for so many years - Let us go on."

They walked along, Scrooge recognizing every gate and tree and cow and calling excitedly by name to a group of merry boys who were playing in the fields and wishing each other a Merry Christmas.

"These are but shadows of the things that have been," said the ghost gently. "They have no awareness of us and cannot hear you. Look, there is the school! It's not quite deserted you know, a solitary child, alone and friendless, is still there."

Scrooge said he was aware of that, his voice sounding a bit strangled, as the ghost led him inside the school to a bare, melancholy room where a lonely boy, who would one day grow up to be Sean Scrooge, sat reading, shivering in the cold.

As they stared at him, the solitary boy seemed to perk up, talking excitedly to himself, but really seeming as if he were surrounded by friends and chatting to them.

"Do you know this boy's friends?" the spirit asked.

"Oh yes, how could I not know the only friends of my childhood," Scrooge replied wistfully. "The hobbit, fleeing with the Ring, and the ranger, the steward, the elf... The pirate captain and the blacksmith's apprentice and the beautiful governor's daughter... These were the friends who were always there for me, waiting for me every time I opened a book, greeting me like a brother... Poor boy!" Scrooge cried, his voice filled with emotion. "I wish..." he muttered, his hand fingering some coins in his pocket, "but it's too late now."

"What is the matter?" the ghost asked him. "Are you feeling sorry for this lonely boy, for yourself?"

"No, that boy somehow managed to get along... I would know. But there was a beggar boy singing Christmas carols in the street last night. I wish I had given him some money, that's all," he sighed, surreptitiously rubbing eyes that looked suspiciously moist.

The ghost smiled thoughtfully and took Scrooge's hand again. "Let us see another Christmas," he said.

The schoolroom swirled and dissolved around them. They were now in the busy street of a city. By the decorations up in the shop windows it was plain to see that it was Christmas here too, but it was evening now, and everything was lit up and cheery.

The ghost stopped before a warehouse door and asked Scrooge if he knew the place.

"Why, yes! It's old Fezziwig's firm. It's where I held my very first job! And look, there is Fezziwig himself," Scrooge cried, pointing to an old man with a lean, crinkled face and kindly blue eyes. "Oh, and there's Craig too, my colleague. He was such a sweet guy, very attached to me, you know!" Scrooge commented, staring fondly at the blue-eyed youth who was working side by side with a much younger and cheerful looking Scrooge.

Just then Fezziwig put down his pen and looked up at the clock, rubbing his hands and laughing merrily.

"Hey, Sean, Craig! It's time, stop working, enough of that for today. It's Christmas Eve! It's time to eat, drink and be merry!"

Two young men eagerly emerged from behind their desks. As Fezziwig's joyous call rang out, a number of other workers gathered in the large room, as food and drink were brought in from a nearby pub whose services he had engaged to arrange this small party.

Scrooge beamed as he watched the merriment, the exchange of friendly jokes and well wishes, the toasts raised to Fezziwig. And he forgot the presence of the ghost until it whispered in his ear: "Such a small matter to make these silly folks so full of happiness and gratitude. Fezziwig only spent a few bucks of your mortal money after all, doesn't the extent of these people's gratitude and enthusiasm seem disproportionate to you?"

"It isn't that, Spirit," Scrooge retorted hotly. "It's the way he had the power of making things easier for us, our job a pleasure or a burden, the way he cared about us as people and not just as employees." He sounded extremely perturbed.

He felt the spirit's stare and turned to hide his face.

"What is the matter?" the spirit inquired.

"Nothing really" Scrooge's reply sounded muffled.

"Something is the matter, I think," the spirit prodded.

"No.. Yes... I wish I could say a few words to my employee, Viggo Cratchit, right now. Actually, there is a lot I wish I could tell him, words that should have been spoken long ago and that I never before realized were in me. I hid them inside me and only poured them silently onto his back, when I should have been speaking them to his face, looking into his eyes."

"Ah well," the ghost commented. "Let us see one Christmas more, my time grows short."

The spirit guided Scrooge to another window and bid him to look inside the dimly lit office.

Scrooge himself was seated behind a cluttered desk. He looked older now, a man in his thirties. His face did not have yet the harsh lines of today, but it had began to bear the first signs of coldness and avarice, and there was a greedy, restless motion in the way his eyes kept darting around the room.

He was not alone. A young man was seated in front of him on the other side of the desk, one hand toying nervously with his dark curls as his chocolate eyes, bright with unshed tears, tried vainly to lock with Scrooge's green ones.

"I see.. You don't care about me anymore. I used to be the most important thing in your life, now a different idol has displaced me, now making money is all that matters to you. Your heart has become a safe-box and only gold has a place in it. When we made our promise to each other..."

"Orli, stop it," Scrooge interrupted. "Our contract was an old one. It was made when we were both poor and content to be so and only remotely dreaming that one day our fortunes in life might improve. Through hard work I have managed to change my situation, that brings with it different commitments, different priorities. You are being childish and impractical in thinking I can overlook those and go back to being a dreamy, sentimental pauper."

"You were no pauper Sean, you were a kind, loving man with a heart of gold, now you are a cold, ruthless money-making machine seeking to drop me as you would a profitless enterprise," Orli exclaimed.

"I was a clueless boy," Sean retorted impatiently. "And you cannot say that I have ever sought to be released from my bond to you, that I have never done."

"Not in words maybe, but you have been doing it every day - with your changed nature, with your ignoring me, with your lack of love," Orli replied, his voice broken but his tone compassionate. "Tell me Sean, would you seek me out, and court me, and love me if we were to meet now for the first time?" He stared at Sean steadily. "You don't answer, and that is an answer in itself. No, don't speak, don't lie. In a way I wish this breaking up will cause you pain, but I know that the pain, if any, would last only for a very brief time. I know you will dismiss your memory of me, your regret if any, and I will become for you a discarded, useless dream, one of those that make you feel relieved upon waking up, knowing that it was just a dream. Goodbye Sean, may you thrive in the life you have chosen!"

Orli walked round the desk to Sean Scrooge's side and kissed him one last time, his lips moving passionately over Sean's frozen, unresponsive ones. He sighed and stepped back.

Standing in the street by the ghost's side, Scrooge watched as Orli left, his beautiful face streaming with tears. He stared at his younger self seated behind the desk, face a stone mask, hand toying idly with a stack of checkbooks, as if he expected him to rise and run after Orli. But Scrooge knew he would not. He turned to the spirit, wailing like a wounded animal.

"Spirit, show me no more! Take me home, you are torturing me. I cannot face this past, I cannot face the way I have been replaying this past in present times with another man, one I care for and have been using in the most callous and unfeeling manner."

"I told you these were shadows of things that have been in your past," said the ghost, a bright light streaming from his form. "That they are what you made them, so do not blame me for what they are!"

"Leave me then, take me back, haunt me no longer!" Scrooge struggled, as if pinned down by the light coming from the spirit.

He felt exhausted and overcome by an irresistible drowsiness. He blinked and looked around. He was in his own bedroom, alone. He fell upon his bed and sank into a heavy sleep.

Additional cast for this part: Peter Jackson as The Ghost of Christmas Present

It was still dark and silent when Scrooge awoke. As soon as he came to full consciousness the bells of the nearby church started chiming again, as if on cue. He slowly counted as the bell again tolled twelve.

"Why, it's not possible," he thought. "I cannot have slept through a whole day and part of another night, and it cannot be midday, it's too dark!" He scrambled out of bed and groped his way to the window. No help there, it was still very foggy, dark and very cold, and the streets were deserted.

He crept back to bed, his mind puzzling again and again the strange encounters with Marley's Ghost and of the Ghost of Christmas Past. Every time he resolved, after mature consideration, that it had all been a dream. Yet every time some little corner of his mind jeered at him that it had been no dream, that it had all been real.

He was beginning to relax, seeing that there was no other apparition, when a ruddy blazing light began to stream under the door of his bedroom. It was so bright and blinding that somehow he found it more alarming than a dozen ghosts.

Scrooge got up and tiptoed to the door. The moment his hand touched the knob, a strange voice called him by his name and bade Scrooge to join him. Trembling, he obeyed and opened the door.

He looked around, puzzled. It was his own room, the very same room he had just walked out of, no doubt about that, but at the same time it was a totally different room. A surprising transformation had taken place.

The walls and ceiling were hung with greenery, lush with bright glistening berries, holly mistletoe and ivy, making it look like a grove. The chimney-place was blazing with such a cheerful roaring fire as Scrooge's thrifty habits had never allowed. Heaped on the floor, making a throne of sorts, were all sorts of delicacies, from turkeys to suckling-pigs, and plum-puddings, and mince-pies. And oranges, apples, chocolates and candied fruits. On top of this pile sat a fat jolly man bearing a glowing torch shaped like a Horn of Plenty. He wore glasses that twinkled merrily in the reflected light from the fire, and shorts that showed plump hairy legs.

"Come in, Sean Scrooge, come in and know me better. I am the Ghost of Christmas Present," the spirit exclaimed.

Scrooge entered timidly. This spirit had a kindly air but still he was wary of what would come from this visit.

"I have many brothers, and all are out and about tonight, spreading the love of this Christmas, but I have been sent to you so that you may know what the true spirit of Christmas is," the ghost said as he rose from his strange throne.

Scrooge bowed his head. "Spirit, I am ready... Guide me where you will. Last night I went with the other spirit on compulsion, and I learned a lesson I will not easily forget. Tonight I come with you of my own free will."

"Keep hold of my arm then!"

Scrooge did as he was told and the room vanished, the greenery and the food and the blazing hearth disappearing in a vortex of shapes and colors. When the vortex stilled they were standing in the city streets on Christmas morning.

Though the sky was gloomy and misty, the atmosphere was cheerful, with people bustling about, kids snowball fighting and shop windows overflowing with opulence. Church bells called and people flocked to Christmas mass, dressed in their best.

The spirit beamed on all this and often stopped to smile benignly at passers-by and sprinkle them with something from his torch. Every time he did this, the atmosphere of cheerfulness and goodwill seemed to increase.

"Is there some peculiar magic in your torch?" Scrooge inquired curiously.

"There is, my own magic," the spirit replied.

"And you sprinkle it so liberally on everyone? Isn't it valuable?"

"It is because it is very valuable that I sprinkle it so liberally... On everyone, but on poor unhappy people most, because they need it most," the spirit answered, leading Scrooge into an area of the city that looked drab and run down.

The spirit stopped on the threshold of a miserable looking house and blessed it with a very generous sprinkling from his torch. Scrooge peered from behind the spirit's shoulder at the name on the piece of cardboard tagged onto the door. It read 'Viggo Cratchit'.

Scrooge eagerly rushed to the window and looked inside his employee's one-room home. Cratchit was curled on the bed, shivering under a threadbare blanket and hugging something to his chest. Sean watched unblinkingly as Viggo had to shift up from his lying position, his body racked by a fit of coughing that apparently made it hard for him to breathe.

Scrooge's face turned grim as he saw how difficult it was for Viggo's breathing to overcome the spasm and go back to a normal rhythm. And the look turned to something like awe as he saw that what Viggo had been hugging was one of Scrooge's own dirty shirts.

His attention was so totally concentrated on Viggo that he barely noticed the spirit speaking to him.

"Come, we must move on. Time is running and there is many a house my torch needs to light today," the ghost urged.

"Spirit, I beg you, allow me some more moments here. Certainly there are families along this same road you need to visit while I can wait here and think of how I have wronged this man," Scrooge pleaded.

The spirit stared shrewdly at Scrooge, then acquiesced and moved on, leaving him alone in front of Viggo's window.

***

After a while Viggo was able to breathe again, though each gulp of air gave him pain. These frequent bouts of coughing were starting to scare him. Each time they lasted longer and felt worse, as if his lungs were trying to escape from his chest. Each time it became more difficult for him to catch his breath and for his heart to stop pounding.

Worried, he burrowed his face into Scrooge's shirt, panting softly into it, feeling the comforting softness of the worn fabric and the smell of the man he loved. As one hand held the shirt to his face, the other crept slowly down to the waistband of his pants and slid in, palming his cock.

He usually tried as much as possible to avoid indulging himself this way. It only made him feel more keenly his longing for Scrooge, but today he felt so cold and alone and scared he needed to lose himself in a dream of love and pleasure, if only for a few moments.

He worked his cock, his eyes closed and his mind focused on remembering how it felt to have Scrooge inside him, the muffled groan that escaped him in that moment when warmth spilled inside Viggo, the only moment Viggo would feel really warm in his life. And as release came, he called out to Sean, using the name he would never dare use in the presence of his employer.

***

Scrooge watched, stunned, as Viggo pleasured himself while hugging his old shirt and he was even more stunned when he saw Viggo's lips shape his very own name as he came.

When the spirit returned to his side he was deep in thought, musing over a lot of things, some too private for sharing with anyone, others too scary for him to bear alone.

"Spirit," said Scrooge, his voice wavering and filled with anguish, "tell me that Viggo's cough is not serious, that he is not really ill and that he will get better. Please..."

The spirit just shook his head and sighed. "I am the spirit of Christmas Present, I can't tell. These shadows may remain unaltered by the Future, walking to the end of the path they are treading now, or they may take a different path... It is not for me to know."

Scrooge felt his heart wrench at the thought of where Viggo's path might be taking him. He felt a stab thinking of every single time he had accused him of being lazy, of making him spend too much money with overheating the office, of every time he had taken him without a word of love or emotion, not even caring if the pleasure he was taking was shared or not.

As he was struggling with his sense of guilt, the spirit nudged him, calling his attention to a young couple that had emerged from the house next door to knock on Viggo's.

They both watched as they entreated him to join them for Christmas lunch, refusing to take no for an answer when Viggo tried to shy away, saying that surely they could hardly be expected to feed another mouth, what with the coming baby and the woman being out of work due to her pregnancy. But they refused to go away without Viggo and he finally gave in and followed them next door.

The spirit followed them too and solemnly poured a large amount of whatever magic was stored in his torch on their gathering, before leading away a reluctant Scrooge, who was hoarding away in his heart a vision of Viggo's face melting in pleasure and love with his name on his lips, and finding he treasured that more than all his money and gold.

The spirit took Scrooge to visit many a house that night, and wherever they went the spirit left his blessing, making people forget for one day their burden of misery and poverty, and teaching Scrooge what Christmas was.

It was a long night, if it were only a night; but Scrooge had his doubts of this. Somehow the whole Christmas Holidays appeared to be condensed into the space of time they passed together, and while Scrooge remained unaltered in his outward form, the Ghost had grown older.

Scrooge observed this change, but never spoke of it until they left a children's Twelfth Night party, when, looking at the Spirit as they stood together in an open place, he noticed that its hair had turned grey.

"Are spirits' lives so short?'' he asked.

"My life upon this globe is very brief,'' replied the ghost. "It ends tonight at midnight, to start again next Christmas. Hear the bells, my time is drawing near.''

As the bells were chiming, Scrooge looked about him for the ghost, but saw it not. As the last stroke ceased to vibrate, he remembered the prediction of David Marley, and lifting up his eyes, he beheld a solemn Phantom, draped and hooded, coming, like a mist along the ground, towards him.

As the Phantom slowly approached, grave and silent, Scrooge fell down on his knees, for the very air through which this Spirit moved seemed to scatter gloom and mystery.

It was shrouded in a deep black garment which concealed its form and left nothing of it visible, save one outstretched hand and eyes that gleamed yellow within the hood. But for this, it would have been difficult to detach its figure from the darkness by which it was surrounded.

The Spirit's silent, mysterious presence filled Scrooge with dread.

"Am I in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come?'' he asked.

The Spirit did not answer, but pointed onward with its hand.

"You are about to show me shadows of the things that have not happened, but will happen in the time before us,'' Scrooge pursued. "Is that so, Spirit?''

The upper portion of the garment contracted for an instant in its folds, as if the Spirit had inclined its head. That was the only answer Scrooge received.

Although Scrooge was almost familiar with ghostly company by now, the silent shape was so intimidating that his legs faltered, and he found that he could hardly stand when he made to follow it. The Spirit paused a moment, as if observing his condition and giving him time to recover, but the knowledge that those ghostly eyes were fixed on him only increased Scrooge's feeling of horror.

"Ghost of the Future!'' he exclaimed, "I fear you more than any spectre I have seen so far. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be a changed man from what I was, I am prepared to walk with you, and do it with a grateful heart. Will you not speak to me?''

The Spirit gave him no reply, its hand still pointing straight before them.

"Lead on then!'' said Scrooge. "The night is fading fast, and time is precious to me, I know. Lead on, Spirit!''

The Phantom moved away and Scrooge followed in the shadow of its dress.

Once they moved, it felt as if the city had sprung up directly around them. Scrooge surveyed their surroundings… They were in the heart of the City, on the Exchange. Businessmen hurried up and down and conversed in groups, full of self-importance, as Scrooge had often seen them.

The Spirit stopped beside one little knot of men. Observing that its hand was pointed at them, Scrooge got close to listen to their conversation.

"No,'' said a little man with a thick Scottish accent, "I don't know much about it, I only know he's dead. Happened last night, I believe.''

"Why, what was the matter with him?'' asked another. "I thought he'd never die.''

"God knows, Monaghan,'' replied the first, with a yawn.

"What has he done with his money?'' asked a thick-set man.

"I haven't heard, Astin,'' said the little man, yawning again. "Took it with him to the grave, perhaps. He hasn't left it to me. That's all I know.''

The remark was received with a general laugh.

"It's likely to be a very cheap funeral,'' the man continued, "for upon my life I don't know of anybody who will go to it. Suppose we make up a party and volunteer?''

"Well, I'll offer to go, if we all will and if there's a nice bit of lunch to follow. When I come to think of it, it is likely that I was his best friend seeing that once he greeted me in the street!" the man called Astin joked.

The three men strolled away and went to mix with other groups. Scrooge knew these men, but he found their conversation puzzling, and he looked to the Spirit for an explanation.

The Phantom merely glided into another street and pointed its finger to two men passing each other. Scrooge listened in again, thinking that the explanation might lie here.

These men he also knew quite well. They were businessmen too: very wealthy, and of great importance. He had made a point of always standing well in their esteem, as they could be useful to him in his business dealings.

"How are you, Weaving?'' said one.

"How are you, Sinclair?'' returned the other.

"Well!'' said the first. "Old Scratch has got his own at last, did you hear?''

"So I am told,'' returned the second. "Cold, isn't it?''

"Seasonable for Christmas time. Good morning!''

"And good morning to you."

Not another word. That was their meeting, their conversation, and their parting.

Scrooge was at first inclined to be surprised that the Spirit was having him listen in to conversations apparently so trivial, but feeling assured that they must have some hidden purpose, he set himself to ponder what he had heard.

These conversations could scarcely be supposed to concern the death of David Marley, his old partner, for that was Past, and this ghost's province was the Future. Nor could he think of any one immediately connected with himself to whom they could apply. From what he'd heard, however, this man who had died had led his life in such a way that he was not missed now, and that in itself was a moral lesson.

He looked around, expecting his own future self to appear, seeing that the spirit had brought him to the circles where he usually was to be found, but another man stood in the corner he considered his rightful spot and he could not see himself among the businessmen milling around.

In a way he was not surprised, though. He had been revolving in his mind a change of life, and that would mean his future self would not be frequenting these circles anymore. So he thought and hoped that his absence here was a sign of his newborn resolutions having been carried out.

When Scrooge roused himself from his musings, the Phantom was beside him, silent and dark with its hand still outstretched. He felt that the unseen eyes were looking at him keenly. It made him shudder, and feel very cold.

They left the Exchange and moved on to an obscure part of town that Scrooge had never set foot in before, though he knew it by its bad reputation. The streets were dirty and narrow; the shops and houses looked dingy, the people drunken and ugly. The whole quarter reeked with crime, filth and misery.

The ghost led Scrooge to a disreputable-looking shop in which iron scraps and old rags were traded. Sitting in among the wares he dealt in was a grey-haired rascal, his eyes sunken in his long, pasty face.

Scrooge and the Phantom came in just as a care-worn woman with a small bundle slunk into the shop, followed shortly by a wiry man in faded black.

Scrooge listened with fascinated horror to the conversation these two carried on with the keeper of the shop. It was clear from it that the woman had been doing housechores for someone who had died yesterday, most likely the same man they had been talking about in the City, while the man worked for the undertaker.

He watched them as they haggled over the meager spoils they had taken from that unknown man, viewing them with a disgust that could hardly have been greater if they had been demons, fighting over the corpse itself.

"Spirit!'' said Scrooge, shuddering from head to foot. "I see... the case of this unhappy man might be my own. My life is headed to that end right now. Oh God, what is this?'' He recoiled in terror, for the scene had changed, and now he was standing by a bed on which, on a bare mattress, beneath a ragged sheet, laid something covered up.

The room was quite dark, too dark to be observed with any accuracy. Only a pale eerie light fell straight upon the bed, showing the body of a man, abandoned and uncared for.

Scrooge glanced towards the Phantom. Its steady hand was pointing to the head. The cover was so carelessly adjusted that the slightest raising of it would have disclosed the face. He thought of how easy it would be to do so, and longed to do it, but had no more power to lift the veil than to dismiss the ghost at his side.

If this man could talk now, what would be his foremost thoughts, Scrooge wondered. Greed, riches, out-smarting others? These were most likely what had brought him to this lonely end… He lay in a dark empty house, with not a single human being to say that he had been kind and loving and would be sorely missed. There was a sound of gnawing rats beneath the hearth-stone. What they wanted in this room and why they were so restless, Scrooge did not dare to think.

"Spirit!'' he said, "This is a frightening place. In leaving it, I shall not leave its lesson, trust me. Let us go!''

Still the Ghost pointed to the head.

"I understand you,'' Scrooge returned, "and I would do it, if I could. But I have not the power, Spirit, and I cannot bear to think of how cold and pointless this man's life seems now.''

Scrooge turned to the Spirit, as if feeling its gaze.

"Let me see some tenderness connected with a death!'' pleaded Scrooge. "Let me forget this dark chamber, Spirit, though it will be for ever imprinted in my soul.''

The Phantom spread its dark robe before him for a moment, like a wing; when he withdrew it, they were standing in a street already familiar to Scrooge. He looked around and recognized a place he had visited before with another spirit, Viggo Cratchit's house.

He froze, but the spirit gestured to the window, so he went and looked inside. The couple he had seen before inviting Viggo to Christmas lunch was seated on the small couch.

They were quiet, very quiet, still as statues almost. Then the woman started whimpering softly, like a wounded animal.

"Don't, my darling," the man pleaded, holding her close, trying to comfort her. "You know he wouldn't want you to make yourself and the baby sick with crying."

"I know Karl, he was such a gentle, caring soul," she sobbed. "Ah, but I can't help grieving, it's so unfair... it would have taken so very little to help him, to see that he could go to a doctor and pay for the proper treatments. Why, I think that just decent heating and food and thick warm clothing would have been enough to save him..."

There was anger now under the broken sobbing, and the man cradled her in his arms and let her cry, whispering soft comforting nothings even though his own face was also devastated by grief and his eyes brimming with tears.

"Promise me that we will go to visit him often," she said, the words muffled against the man's shoulder, "and that once the little one is born we will take him or her there so that Viggo might see the baby. He longed so much to hold our baby in his arms…"

"We will Miranda, I promise. It is not such a bad place, you'll see, it's quiet and green and restful. I think he will be okay there. And we will never forget him, we will never leave him alone."

Scrooge's face seemed composed as he stepped back from the window, but his eyes were red and swollen and his palms showed ugly crescent marks, the blood welling under them where nails had dug hard into the flesh.

"Spectre,'' he said in a broken voice, "something tells me that our parting moment is near. There is one thing I need to ask of you… Who was that man we saw lying dead?''

The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come nodded, acknowledging the request, and swept him again to the City.

The moment in time seemed different now, though still in the Future. The Spirit went straight on, as in a hurry, until Scrooge, spotting his own office, asked him to stop there a moment, so that he might see what he would be in the days to come.

The Spirit stopped, though its hand remained pointed elsewhere.

Scrooge hastened to the window of his office, and looked in. It was an office still, but not his. The furniture was not the same, and the figure in the chair was not himself.

The Phantom gestured again, urgently, and Scrooge followed it until they reached an iron gate. He paused to look round before entering, wondering where they were.A graveyard.

Here, then, the wretched man whose name he was now to learn, had been buried. The Spirit stood among the graves, and pointed down to one. Scrooge advanced towards it trembling.

"Before I approach that stone to which you point,'' said Scrooge, "answer me one question. Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they just shadows of things that May be?''

Still the ghost pointed to the grave by which it stood.

"Men's choices of action will foreshadow certain ends. If they persevere in these choices the end will be the one expected,'' Scrooge insisted. "But if the chosen behaviors change, the end will change. Say it is so with what you are about to show me!''

The Spirit was immovable as ever.

Scrooge crept towards the grave and read upon the stone of the neglected grave his own name, Sean Scrooge.

"Am I that man who laid upon the bed?'' he cried, falling to his knees.

The finger pointed from the grave to him, and back again.

"No, Spirit! Oh no, no! Spirit," he cried, clutching at its robe, "hear me! I am not the man I was. I will not be the man I must have been. Why show me this, if I am past all hope?''

For the first time the Spirit's hand appeared to shake.

"Good Spirit,'' Scrooge persisted, "I know you pity me, I beg you to intercede for me. Tell me that I may still change these shadows you have shown me, by leading a different life!''

The hand trembled.

"I will honor Christmas in my heart and actions, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall be always within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may wipe away the writing on this stone!''

In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. It sought to free itself, but he was strong in his pleading, and held it tight.

The Spirit though was stronger, and snatched his hand away as its shape seemed to alter under the hood and robe. It shrunk, collapsed, and dwindled down into a bedpost.

Yes!!! Scrooge looked around. The bedpost was his own. The bed was his own. The room was his own. And the happiest news of all was that he was back to his own time, and that meant he still had a life before him, a life in which to make amends...

"I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future!'' Scrooge repeated solemnly, as he scrambled out of bed. "The Spirits of all Three shall always live inside me. Bless you, David Marley! I will always love you for getting me this chance, I thank you on my knees!''

He was bursting with relief and good intentions as he scanned the room, at the same time mentally hugging each of its meager features in reassurance that they were still there - that he was still there - and noting how drab and miserly they looked.

And planning on changes. On choosing new stuff. On choosing it with someone special by his side. On living among it with that someone by his side.

His hands went to rub his eyes, to make sure he was seeing what he was seeing, and he found that his face was wet with tears.
He thought them blessed, cleansing, as he got up, grabbing the first clothes he came upon in his haste to rush out and start undoing what he had wrought in his life so far.

Again he looked around.
"Look, there's the door through which the ghost of David Marley came! There's the wall the Ghost of Christmas Present and myself passed through! There's the window from which I saw the wandering Spirits! It's all right, it's all true, it all happened.''

He rushed to the window laughing giddily, sprung it open and shouted: "A merry Christmas to everybody! A happy New Year to all the world!" And, for a man who had been out of practice for so many years, his was a rich, splendid laugh.

"Hey, I don't know what day of the month it is!'' Scrooge wondered aloud. "I don't know how long I've been away with the Spirits. I don't know anything. I'm quite a baby. Never mind. I don't care. I'd rather be a baby than who I was before..."

The sound of the bells pealing from a myriad of churches distracted him for a moment, until he spotted a boy in Sunday clothes strolling down along the street beneath his window.

"Hello!" Scrooge cried, calling down to the boy. "Will you tell me what's the day today?"

"Eh?'' returned the boy, amazed.

"What's the day?'' repeated Scrooge, with a lot more patience that he would have shown a few days before.

"Today? Why, it's Christmas Day!''

"It's Christmas Day!'' said Scrooge to himself. "I haven 't missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Thanks, kind boy, and a Merry Christmas to you then!''

"And to you sir!'' returned the boy.

"Boy, do you know the grocer on the corner of the street, the one that's always open?'' Scrooge inquired.

"Oh yes sir," replied the lad.

"Bright boy!'' Scrooge exclaimed. "Would you run there for me and tell him to bring here a big hamper with a full Christmas lunch? Tell him I'll pay handsomely, and if you come back with him in less than fifteen minutes I'll reward you handsomely too!''

"I'll take it to Viggo,'' whispered Scrooge to himself once the boy had run off, as he absent-mindedly licked his lip. "He needs to put on some weight, he's too skinny. Maybe we could have Christmas lunch together... But why should he be wanting to have lunch with his grumpy employer when he could be with that nice couple next-door who cares so much about him?"

The moment of dejectedness was dispelled by the arrival of the boy with the grocer...

Hell, he could at least make sure that Viggo had a nice Christmas lunch, even if he didn't seem amenable to sharing it with him and decided instead to share it with his neighbors. That he would soon see, as he would bring the hamper over to Viggo's house himself.

He was hoping to find much in Viggo's eyes, in those eyes he had never before had the courage to look into. He was hoping for a new life - for both of them - to be spent together. But if the spirits had decided differently (and God knew he didn't deserve any mercy), he would settle for a new, better life for Viggo, and just a life of making amends for himself. Each in his own. He would be alone, but with the knowledge that Viggo was alive and well.

No harm in hoping, though.

Scrooge shaved with shaking hands, changed into his best - make that least shabby - clothes and, hamper in hand, went out in the streets.

People were by this time pouring out, as he had seen them while with the Ghost of Christmas Present, and Scrooge regarded every one with a delighted smile. He looked so irresistibly cheerful and pleasant that several passers-by smiled at him and wished him a Merry Christmas.
He smiled to himself as he breathed in deeply of the cold winter air. How could he have always failed to notice before just how wonderful it felt to be alive?

His brisk steps slowed down, though, as they neared Viggo Cratchit's house. He started thinking about what he was going to say to Viggo. He started wondering, for the first time, what Viggo felt for him. With his newly gained insight, he couldn't help wonder why Viggo had allowed him to take him, week after week, why Viggo had always docilely bent down on his desk for him every Wednesday evening.
Did Viggo somehow care for him? Or could it be he felt that was a toll to be paid in order to keep his job?

This idea made Sean Scrooge feel very cold inside. Weird, he thought as he shivered, he'd never realized before just how unpleasant it could be to feel cold... And thinking of the cold made his thoughts slam back into remembering what Viggo's neighbors had said while he and the Spirit of Christmas Yet To Come had been looking at them through the window. It had been the cold that had wasted Viggo away. The cold of the body or the cold of the soul? he asked himself...

The thought made his steps quicken, until he was almost running, not aware anymore of the weight of the hamper clutched in his hand.

He was out of breath when he reached the door of Viggo's house, all thoughts of what he was going to say forgotten in the urgency of seeing Viggo, of making sure Viggo was alive, of needing to take care of Viggo so that he might never feel cold again.

He pounded urgently on the door, until it was opened by a sleepy-looking Viggo, his face showing creases from having used Sean's balled up shirt as a pillow.

"Mr. Scrooge!" Viggo was startled by his employer's unexpected appearance. He shook his head, trying to clear away the fogginess of sleep, wondering what could have caused this morning visit. There was really only one reason that he could see... "I'm sorry sir, if you're here for your laundry it's not ready yet..."

"Fuck the laundry, and don't call me sir," Sean growled frustrated, feeling his old self imprinted in each of Viggo's words, mocking him. He pushed Viggo inside and closed the door, dropping the hamper to the floor.

Sean drank in the sight of Viggo - pale, confused, beautiful ... and most of all alive. He felt something burst within himself and he grabbed Viggo, engulfing him in a rough embrace, holding him as if ever letting him go was not an option.

He felt Viggo tremble in his arms, and realized that his fear and his relief were making his hold too tight, painful almost, and that he was probably scaring Viggo. It took a lot of effort to deliberately relax his grip, to drop his arms and step back.

"Mr. Scrooge!!" Viggo sounded stupefied.

"Don't call me Mr. Scrooge, Viggo, never ever again… please. Call me Sean, I know you can do that. I want to be just Sean to you, forever. Please?"

Viggo nodded, mute and dumbfounded.

Sean looked at him fondly.

"You haven't understood yet, have you?"

Viggo just stared at him, saucer-eyed.

Sean sighed. "All right, Spirits, I've come this far, I can take the last step." His hands went to cradle Viggo's face, gently, bringing him close until they were nose to nose.
"I love you," he said, and then he kissed him.

For a moment Viggo remained absolutely still, holding his breath, then he literally melted in Sean's arms and under Sean's mouth.

Sean felt this, and he was giddy with happiness and relief when he felt Viggo's arms clutch at him frantically, as if he were the only anchor he had in a world that was spinning too fast. When they had to break for air, Viggo's face went to hide in the collar of Sean's coat and Sean found himself grinning foolishly into a mop of silky blond hair.

"I love you Viggo," he repeated, nuzzling Viggo's ear. "Everything will be all right now, just let me love you and take care of you."

Sean felt Viggo nodding against his neck and soft lips on his throat.

"Viggo, please, look at me. There is something I have to ask you, something I need to understand, for my own sake… You know when every Wednesday we… I… well, you know what I mean," Sean blushed. "Why did you let me do that to you, week after week?"

"Why do you think?" Viggo asked, his tone gentle, his eyes meeting Sean's.

"I'd rather not think about that at all… No, that's not fair to you. I'd rather not think about how guilty it makes the person I am now feel," Sean smiled ruefully.

"Don't. You're not to feel guilty Sean, it was my choice. I let you do it because I loved you and I felt that the sex with you would be better than nothing, even if you didn't care about me, even if I was just a body to be used for release. And you always reminded me about our Wednesday evening tryst, even when I played dumb, and that made me feel better, it made me think that in your own way you needed and wanted that as much as I needed and wanted you. You know what was the only thing that really bothered me? It was not being able to see you," Viggo's fingers were tracing Sean's face, as if exploring what he had been denied until now.

"That you loved me then and love me now is a gift way beyond what I deserve. I don't know what instinct made me take you the first time and keep taking you but I couldn't do without you. And I'm yours to look at as long for as you wish. You know, I can understand that, I feel the same way now. So, will you let me? Will you let me take you? Will you let me see your face as I'm inside you? Will you let me see your face as you come with my name on your lips?
I know that's a lot of questions and permissions to ask of you. I hope they may make up for all I took without bothering to ask."

"Sean, you have no idea just how I have longed for that. Please… take me? It would be the best Christmas gift I could have from you, now that I know I have your love."

Sean shrugged off his coat and guided Viggo to the bed.

To both of them every inch of skin uncovered felt like a gift, a surprise never seen before. Sean couldn't get over the beauty of Viggo's chest and he kept petting the hair and the small tight nipples until Viggo thought he would go insane.
And Viggo would not be stopped until he had mapped all of Sean's body with his hands, his lips, his tongue.

Sean's hand stilled Viggo as he was hovering above Sean's cock, lips already parted.

"No my darling, stop. I'd love that, and I'd also love to feel you in my mouth, to find out what you taste like, but it will have to wait until another time. This time I want to be looking into your eyes as we come off together."

Viggo smiled and nodded as Sean pushed him on his back and rose to straddle him until they were groin to groin, their erections butting against each other.

"Together, like this, always," Sean said through clenched teeth, holding their cocks together, rubbing both heads with his thumb so that the leaking fluid intermingled, thinking dazedly how irresistibly silky and hot Viggo felt and wondering how he could have always overlooked touching Viggo while taking him, how he could survived until now without hearing the needy little sounds Viggo was making.

He allowed his thumb a last flick before reluctantly releasing their cocks. He shifted, settling between Viggo's thighs and pushed his knees up and back, his thumbs teasing the sensitive skin along the crease that went from groin to hipbone.

"Viggo, do you have lube?" he asked. Viggo stared uncomprehendingly for a moment, dazed by sensation, then shook his head.

"No Sean, but I have this," he replied, bringing Sean's fingers to his mouth, sucking and slicking them, making him growl with pleasure.

The way Viggo's mouth felt would have been enough to make him come, Sean thought, overwhelmed. He stopped Viggo before it was too late and prepared him as quickly as he dared, trying to turn a deaf ear to Viggo's pleadings to take him directly.

And finally he was inside and Viggo's thighs were gripping his sides hard as green and blue eyes locked onto each other. Viggo's hold on him was so fierce that small rocking movements were all Sean could manage. He shifted a bit until he could get a hand between their bodies to seize Viggo's cock, fingertips and palm alternating until he felt Viggo tighten as his climax hit and he could let go too, stopping all movement to feel the way they pulsed and trembled together, to drink in the expression on Viggo's face and let him see it mirrored in his own.

Sean rolled off Viggo, keeping him in his arms until they were lying side to side, still plastered to each other and panting.

"A merry Christmas, Viggo, and may all our Christmases be spent like this, together and loving each other,'' Sean whispered solemnly against Viggo's lips.

***

And so they were. Scrooge was better than his word.
He was to Viggo all that he could have wished for in a friend and in a lover, and he was to all a changed man.

Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh and didn't heed them. His own heart was filled with love and laughter and that was quite enough for him.

He had no further visits from the Spirits, but he always revered them and it was always said of him that he knew how to keep Christmas well.

May that be truly said of all of us!