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Richard Faria
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He remembered the previous Christmas with Heff. Mexican grass and birdbath martinis, stealing the D_Phi car at a purple passion party, both of them going to the imported manger in the Ramrod, staring for almost half an hour at the yard_high figurines around the crib, listening to the peals of Gregorian celebration from the speakers overhead. One of the shepherds too obviously cross_eyed.
Hey, Heff man, you dig Sebastian?
I what?
The cross_eyed shepherd cat. Behind old Saint Joseph.
Oh yeah. Look at him, he's cross_eyed.
That's poor taste, right?
Who's to say?
He sees double, dig?
Yeah.
He sees two little baby Christ Jesuses.
I'm with you.
Then it's no good.
Yeah?
Two little Jesuses, I mean, Christ, that's a Roman paradox right there.
I'm hip, Paps.
We get rid of one, set the whole thing straight.
Pappadopoulis picking up the plaster statue of the child and tucking it under his parka as if it were a bottle of vintage champagne; the two of them turning casually, ambling out to the illegally parked car. Then sitting with the motor running.
You know what, Heff? The Virgin Mary_Mother dug the whole snatch.
She's hip?
We're in trouble.
Let's get her.
Heff picking up the Virgin's statue back at the manger, returning clumsily to the car, then tripping with a clatter on the steps, the figure flopping into the air, making a bottom_heavy arc, crashing against the stone, its head flying off and rolling down the street.
She lost her cool, Paps man.
Yeah, put it in your pocket.
Driving across the blanketed campus toward Happy Creek, Pappadopoulis fondling the statue of the child, tucking it under the chin, poking his pinky in its navel, feeling its swaddling clothes for poo_poo. Stopping at the bottom of the bridge and strolling across.
Tradition, old Heffalump.
Check. Mustn't collapse the bridge.
They kissed the statues in turn and threw them out into the snowy void, where they fell tumbling against the frozen gorge below. Listening for the sound of impact, two muted crunches.
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