50 Words For Snow - Part One
Roll his body, give him eyes, make him smile for me, give him life…
When Howard woke up, Vince was sitting on the sofa reading NME, curled up against the cushions with a blanket draped over his knees, a length of red tinsel wound around his neck and a white cowboy hat on his head. His feet were huddled together in thin, dirty socks, and he was wearing his Zooniverse jacket over what looked to be several different t-shirts. Howard blinked through his bleary-eyed sleepiness, and squashed his face back into the pillow. The grey, misty light that filtered through the window was a cold one, and since they had no central heating in their cabin the prospect of a warm duvet seemed to be a perfect one. Howard shut his eyes again, hoping Vince hadn’t noticed.
“Morning, Howard.”
It was not to be, apparently. Howard momentarily mourned what would surely have been a long and deep romance with his mattress before sitting up, bracing himself against the winter chill. “You’re up early,” he said. “It’s only…” he glanced at the clock, and his eyes boggled. “Eleven? Bloody hell; we need to feed the animals.”
“Don’t worry; I’ve taken care of it.”
Howard blinked. “What? What time were you up?”
Vince shrugged, suddenly shy. He unfurled the blanket so that it enveloped his whole body, cutting his head off his neck. With the tinsel necklace, he looked like an elf being hung at the North Pole. “Er…nine?”
“Nine? How the hell did you wake up at nine, Vince?”
Vince quirked his shoulders. “I dunno.”
Howard’s eyes widened. “Well…why didn’t you wait for me, you daft sod?”
Vince rolled his eyes and grinned. “You looked sleepy. Anyway, it’s Christmas! You’ve always got to make an exception for Christmas.”
“Why didn’t I guess?” Howard grimaced, and he threw the covers off. The icy cold quickly threaded itself into his skin through the inadequately thin protection his pyjamas provided. “Christy, it’s cold,” he hissed, as his feet hit the frozen floor and the shock of the cold whipped through his veins.
Vince was beginning to unfold his body from its groove in the sofa. “Cup of tea?”
“God, yes. I’m going to have a shower.”
“I wouldn’t bother if I were you,” Vince replied, filling the kettle with water.
“Why not?”
“Well, you won’t believe this,” said Vince, with a laugh of disbelief. “The pumps been turned off, imagine that!”
Howard stood dumbstruck. “So…there’s no hot water?”
“Er…no.”
“I’m going to murder Fossil,” Howard growled. “I’m going to murder him and use his skin as a bathmat.”
“Just as long as the Guardian don’t take you up on it like last time.”
“Shut your mouth, Sparkly Jim. That was a momentary lapse and we both know it.”
Vince raised his eyebrows. “You asked the journalist to get in your wheelbarrow.”
“Yeah, well, my point still stands!” Howard cried, acutely aware that it was difficult to get said point across when wearing stripy blue pyjamas. “Fossil shouldn’t do this to us. We’re barely getting paid overtime as it is.”
“Just look on the bright side, Howard,” replied the mod, pouring the exact ratio of tea:milk into Howard’s brown mug.
“There’s always a bright side for you, isn’t there? You’re made of sunshine. Not me, sir. I’m as dark as a well-preserved fruitcake.”
“You’re definitely a fruitcake,” Vince chuckled. He turned and handed over the steaming beverage and then stopped, holding Howard’s gaze, his blue eyes sparkling. “But there is a bright side. Fossil ain’t here, is he? Neither’s anyone else. We’ve got the whole zoo to ourselves.”
Howard squinted at him. “Actually, that’s a pretty good bright side, now you mention it.”
“Exactly!” Vince grinned. “Who cares if we’re on holiday duty?”
Howard smiled back with an expression that to any casual onlooker would seem related to Scandinavian Lust, but was actually a rarely-used Excitement. “You’re right, Vince. A cold day is no match for Howard Moon, no sir. I’ve been to the Tundra.”
“We’ve been to the Tundra!” Vince protested, but if he was heard, he was ignored.
“I’m a true Man of Action. I’m gonna survive this.”
And with that, he swept off into the bathroom to get changed.
Two vests, one shirt, a jumper and his Zooniverse jacket later, Howard re-emerged from the bathroom. Vince was back on the sofa, re-reading his magazine. Howard rubbed his hands together, and started towards the stove.
“Right. What’s on the menu today, Little Man?”
Vince screwed up his face in concentration. “Turkey and stuffing sandwiches. Er…Mince pies. Mulled wine. Quality Streets.”
“You didn’t think about picking up some vegetables, did you?”
Vince made a face. “Ew, no. Who’d waste money on vegetables on our budget?”
“Fair point well made, sir.”
“Exactly,” Vince said triumphantly, and buried his face back in the magazine. Howard stood in the middle of the room, looking awkward. He wandered over to the radio, and flicked it on.
So here it is, Merry Christmas, everybody’s having-
He turned it back off again. Maybe not. He patted his thigh absent-mindedly, looking around the small hut for a source of entertainment. There were no books that were on offer, at least none that were at all intellectually stimulating. He had issued several complaints to Fossil about the broken TV, but his only response had been an inquiry about his status in the Vietnam War.
Vince looked up from his magazine and smirked. “Bored?”
“Me? No, sir.”
Vince shook his head and pointedly turned back to the magazine.
“Did you remember to change the water in the shrimp tank, Vince?”
The mod didn’t even look up. “Er…nope.”
“Right then,” Howard said, and like a true Man of Action he grabbed his coat off the hook and threw the door open, wincing as a blast of cold air hit him right between the eyes. He took a step outside, and blinked.
“Vince…”
“What?” came the cry from inside. “Can you shut the door; I’m freezing my balls off!”
“What have you done to the zoo?”
For it seemed that, during the early hours of the morning, Father Christmas had visited and vomited tinsel and fairy lights all over every conceivable surface that the zoo had to offer. There were lights surrounding Bollo’s enclosure, mistletoe over the hutch where Technomouse was hibernating and baubles dangling innocently from every tree. Howard rubbed his eyes as he felt his friend casually saunter up behind him.
“Oh, yeah, I decorated,” Vince grinned. “What d’you think?”
“Vince, it looks like Rudolph’s house party gone wrong.”
“Aw, cheers Howard.”
Howard sighed. “I’m not cleaning this up, you know.”
“Relax!” Vince laughed. “It’s genius.”
Howard shook his head and rubbed his hands together. “Right,” he said, and wandered off to clean the fish tanks.
When he returned, Vince had sprawled the food out over their bench. He patted the seat for Howard to sit beside him, bracing the chilled wood. They opened the sandwiches and sat there together, munching away with an air of contemplation.
“You know what, Howard?” said Vince, popping a sweet into his mouth as Jack Cooper eyed them distrustfully from his pen, a Santa hat slipping over his foxy eyes. “I reckon this is one of the best Christmases I’ve had.”
Howard laughed. “You’re joking, Little Man. We’ve got no water, no electricity, and no proper food. How is this possibly one of your best Christmases?”
Vince shrugged. “I dunno. S’just been nice, y’know?”
“I suppose. At least we won’t have to do it again next year.
“Why’s that, then?”
Howard’s eyes glinted. “Let’s just say that Dixon Bainbridge will be receiving a letter from several animal rights groups if we’re put up to it again.”
Vince nodded his head. “Wow…who’s going to do that?”
“That would be me, Vince.”
“Oh. Nice.”
Here's the kitchen - there's your basket; here's the hall - that's where you wait for me…
As he opened the oven, a cloud of smoke rose up to attack him. Howard coughed and spluttered, batting away the smog like an elderly tennis player.
“Howard?”
“What?” Howard spat through the black air in his lungs. Naboo gave him an unimpressed look from the doorway.
“That better not be my magic powder you’re using.”
“No, it’s just smoke, I burnt the bloody potatoes…”
“Oh, well done.”
Howard nearly growled. “Is there something you wanted, sir?”
“Yeah. Have you seen my hookah?”
Howard shook his head. “Er…no. I think Bollo had it.”
“Cheers.”
As the midget Shaman shuffled away, Howard stared at the blackened potatoes in sorrow. Then he sighed, and threw them in the bin. At least the parsnips were salvageable. At least the smoke alarm hadn’t gone off.
“Harold?” came a gruff voice from the doorway.
“It’s Howard!” the Northerner replied, pulling the lid off the pan of boiling carrots.
“No. It Bollo.”
“No, I mean…oh, never mind. What do you want?”
“When food ready? Bollo starving.”
“Oh, Christy…five minutes.”
The gorilla grunted.
“Naboo’s looking for you, you know.” The smoke alarm started to beep. “Oh, f-”
“Howard?”
“What?” Howard swung round to the doorway. Vince was standing there, leaning against the frame, dressed in a black ruffled shirt and a white cowboy hat. His cocky smile was mismatched with the slight wariness in his eyes.
“D’you need a hand?” he said, and Howard deflated like a pink, fleshy, Northern balloon.
“Yes please,” he squeaked. Vince grinned, and sauntered confidently over to the oven. As he walked beneath it, the smoke alarm was silenced as if in awe.
“Right; what can I do?”
“Just take these out to the table,” Howard replied, pouring the carrots into a bowl and handing them over. “I’ve put the knives and forks out too, could you set them for me?”
“Yeah, alright.”
“Thank you, Vince,” said Howard. He was going for sincere but, judging by the look on Vince’s face, had merely come off looking somewhat crazed. He turned back to the oven, and retrieved the Turkey, placing it on a table-top. It was a fine-looking bird, golden and crispy and not at all charred, no sir. He turned back to the fridge and opened it. The Christmas pudding had been placed innocuously next to an identical dessert which had been labeled Naboo’s Hash Pudding DO NOT TOUCH ON PAIN OF DEATH. Howard prayed to everything that ever was and ever would be holy that Bollo hadn’t fucked around with the signs as he took the normal pudding and placed it in the oven to warm up. Then he took a knife, and began to slice up the Turkey.
When he took the food out to the table, Vince had arranged the cutlery into the face of Bryan Ferry.
“Come and get it!” Howard called out. There was silence. Then the gorilla lumbered slowly around the corner.
“Where’s Naboo?” Howard asked.
“He not coming.”
“What? Why?”
“Naboo no celebrate Christmas,” Bollo explained in his trademark broken English. “Christmas clash with Xooberon official day of mourning. Also, Harold ballbag.”
“Right. Cheers, Bollo,” Howard sighed. He gestured to the spread on the table. “Do you want anything to eat?”
Bollo gazed thoughtfully at the food. Then he picked up the bowl of salad, tossed the contents into his mouth, and wandered off.
“Right, then…” said Howard.
Vince appeared once more in the doorway. “Hey, Howard,” he grinned, waving a selection of DVDs in the air. “Wanna watch Colobos?”
Howard stared mournfully at the table, and sighed deeply. “I just wanted a traditional Christmas meal, Vince. Is that too much to ask.”
Vince laid a consoling hand on his shoulder.
“Don’t touch me.”
“Aw, c’mon, not even on Christmas?”
“No, don’t touch me. Don’t ever touch me.”
“Alright…” Vince rolled his eyes affectionately. “Sorry, Howard. But, really. Our flatmates include a talking gorilla and an alien shaman, and then there’s me, and I ain’t hardly the most traditional of people.”
“I suppose.”
“Come on. Let’s watch Colobos. It’s the Christmas special,” said Vince, waving the box temptingly in the air. “A Colobos Christmas Carol?”
“Go on, then.”
Vince beamed triumphantly, and dragged his friend off to the living room.
They sat and watched the Christmas special in silence, Vince with his feet up on the sofa, chewing absentmindedly on a packet of gummy worms as an animated crab with a top hat was chased across the screen by a cloaked ghost. Howard threw a blanket over his knees and watched the lights on the Christmas tree flicker.
“I can’t believe Naboo was cheap enough not to buy us presents.”
“Yeah. You know what he’s like.” Vince laid his head on the arm of the sofa. “Hey, Howard?”
“What is it, Little Man?”
“What would be your ideal Christmas?”
Howard sat back in the chair, and sighed in intellectual contemplation. “My perfect Christmas…ok, got it. I’m in a small log cabin somewhere rural, untouched-”
“How can it be untouched if there’s a cabin there?”
“Shut up. The wind’s whistling around the chimney. Outside it’s bitterly cold, but in here there’s a crackling log fire in the grate. I’ve just eaten a beautiful Christmas dinner, and the candlelight is flickering around the room. Suddenly, there’s a knock at the door-”
“It’s Kodiak Jack!”
“Hush your lips, Vince! No. I open the door, and there’s a beautiful woman standing there, covered in snow. I invite her in. She’s got long, black silky hair and big blue eyes. I pour her a glass of wine, and her clothes sparkle in the light as I take her hand-”
“That’s me, you Muppet!”
Howard nearly choked on the air in the living room. “What? No it isn’t.”
“Yeah it is; that’s clearly me.”
“Vince, this is a woman of elegance and sophistication…”
“Black hair? Blue eyes? Sparkling clothes?”
“Well, there may be some slight…physical resemblance.”
“Don’t worry, Howard,” Vince grinned. “If that’s your perfect Christmas, then you’re halfway there already.”
“But, but…you’re not a woman, Vince!”
Vince didn’t reply to that for a moment.
“Well, that speech made you sound well like a rapist. I wanted your perfect Christmas, not your wank fantasy.”
Howard didn’t know how to reply. But then came a beautiful excuse, as from the kitchen, an alarm began to wail.
“Oh, shit, the pudding!” Howard leapt up and dashed out of the room.
Vince looked down at his hands, and sighed.
Lying in my tent, I can hear your cry echoing round the mountainside; you sound lonely…
There was a branch tapping at his window. Howard could hear it through the thin veil of sleep that lightly dusted his eyelids, and so he pulled the covers over his head and shut his eyes again. It was only when the branch called out, “Howard, let me in, you bumbaclaart, it’s bloody freezing out here!” that he thought maybe it wasn’t a branch after all, and quickly clambered out of bed. He switched on the light, walked over to the window, and threw his curtains open to see his best friend staring back at him.
Through his mop of sandy blonde hair, Vince eyed him up and down with a smirk. “Tweed pyjamas, Howard? Very fetching.”
“What are you doing?” Howard hissed. “It’s three in the morning!”
“Yeah!” Vince grinned, and he brandished a small, brightly wrapped parcel in the air. “Happy Christmas!”
“Christy, Vince, you’re going to fall off!”
“Let me in, then!”
Howard quickly unbolted the window, drawing the frame high so that his tiny mate could clamber in. The bitter wind stung his cheeks as Vince clumsily toppled through the gap and landed unceremoniously on the brown carpet. Howard looked down at him with folded arms, and quickly shut the window again.
“Shut up!” he whispered as Vince tried to stifle his giggles. “Mum and Dad are going to hear you. How did you even get up here?”
“Climbed the drainpipe?” Vince shrugged. He was clad in a leather jacket and skinny jeans - Howard wondered momentarily how anyone could possibly climb a drainpipe one-handed in cowboy boots - but he was shivering ferociously despite his fixed grin.
“Bloody hell, Little Man, you’ll freeze,” said Howard, and he fumbled around for his still-warm duvet. He tugged it off his bed and draped it over Vince’s shoulders. The mod immediately pulled it tightly around him and, crouched on the floor like he was, he looked a little like a homeless person.
“Cheers, Howard,” Vince said. “Hey, look, I brought you a present.”
He waved aloof the small flat package that he had been carrying. It was brightly wrapped in pink tissue paper, adorned with purple ribbon and sparkly glitter that fell like snow and disgraced Howard’s sensible carpet.
“I don’t think Father Christmas has a feather cut,” Howard retorted, but Vince merely pushed the package over towards where he sat opposite.
“Go on, open it.”
Howard opened his mouth, ready to protest that it was three am, and that present opening could wait until a scheduled time in the morning on Christmas Day itself - but then he caught a glimpse of the light sparking in Vince’s comically blue eyes, and the resolve sighed out of him like a pricked balloon. Wordlessly, he reached over and took the parcel from its place on the floor. He stared at it for a few moments, before picking it up and carefully undoing the plastic ribbon, letting it drop to the floor. Then he slid his nails under the skewed cellotape, and lifted up each corner. Vince watched him intently. This was ritualistic, they both knew. Nothing could spoil this moment.
The paper fell away, and Howard sat looking at a placemat. The cork surface had been roughly glossed over with white paint to create a makeshift canvas, and then drawn over with permanent marker. In bright blue pen, rimmed with a thin line of yellow paint, was an odd creature - a small face with huge eyes and curling tendrils, surrounded by small custard-coloured butterflies. The sketch was messy and undignified; so bad it almost flipped into genius, catastrophic and simple and bold and bright and eye-achingly, psychedelically beautiful. Howard flipped it over to see his friend’s messy, uneven writing scrawled in pen across the rough surface, covering the whole sheet with its meandering journey: When I was growing up in the jungle with Bryan Ferry, we lived near a small village famous for inhabiting reams of lemon-yellow butterflies…
Vince bit his lip. “Well? What d’ya think?”
Howard frowned, turning the placemat over in his hands. “Vince, this is…”
“I know it’s not much, really,” the mod replied, running his hands through his hair in the way he did when he was nervous. “I’m just a bit skint, s’all.”
“Vince, it’s lovely,” Howard said, running his hands over the small squiggle of a signature in one corner of the canvas. “Not even. It’s beautiful. It must have taken absolutely ages.”
Vince squirmed in delight. “Go on, then. Where’s my present?”
Howard’s face fell like a flat trumpet solo. “Shit. It’s underneath the tree.”
“You jack of clubs!” Vince grinned cheekily, and he sprung up like a jack without a box. “Come on, then.”
Howard looked back, dumbstruck. “What?”
“I wanna get my present. You got mine; s’only fair.”
“Vince…” Howard pleaded as his friend made his way over to the closed bedroom door. “You can’t go out there, my parents will wake up! I’m not getting grounded just because you fancied trying out your Kate Bush act.”
Vince raised his eyebrows. Then he smirked, teeth shining like spotlights, and opened the door, the light escaping out into the dark hallway.
“Vince…don’t you dare,” Howard whispered sharply. He stood up, tweed pyjamas swishing around his ankles, and held out a warning hand. Vince, seventeen years old and cocky as hell, simply slipped through the gap and out onto the landing. Howard swore under his breath, and slid out after him.
Vince was standing on the top of the stairs, beckoning to him silently. In the darkness, he looked like a fashionable wraith, and his boots made no noise as he tiptoed down the stairs, Howard following after him. The two boys snuck downstairs, Howard wincing against the cold of the wooden floor that shot through the nerves of his feet and the Goosebumps that rose on his arms. He hugged himself to try and keep the cold out. When they rounded the corner, Vince stopped short, and Howard nearly walked into him.
“What’re you doing, you berk?”
“Sorry,” Vince replied. “Just really love your tree.”
The tree was nothing special. It was a small affair, with some scraggly bits of tinsel, some yellow lights and a bewildered looking angel on the top. Even the presents underneath seemed meagre, wrapped in newspaper the traditional Moon way. But Vince’s eyes were nonetheless large and glowing. Howard got down onto his knees, and pulled a small package out from the back, and handed it over to him. Vince opened it eagerly. Like the tree, it was nothing big and extravagant - Howard Moon was not a man to overdo things, no sir - but Vince seemed as pleased with the set of acrylic paints as he would have done with tickets to a Stones concert.
Suddenly, there was a creak from upstairs. Howard’s neck snapped around to look at the upper landing, where a light had been switched on, and footsteps began to shuffle out from the master bedroom.
“Shit, it’s my Mum!” Howard hissed. He grabbed Vince’s cold hand in his, and dragged him swiftly into a corner, clamping a hand over his mouth. Vince’s eyes were large as his Northern friend pushed him into the grasping shadows until they were nearly cheek to cheek. Vince’s breath was hot against his palm, and Howard tried to keep his shallow breathing quiet and even, hoping they wouldn’t be heard. After what seemed like forever, the toilet flushed, and the footsteps returned slowly across the landing again, and the door to the master bedroom squeaked shut. Howard breathed a sigh of relief, and unclamped his hand from Vince’s jaw.
“Shit…” he breathed. “Thank God for that.”
Vince swallowed, and cracked a quiet laugh with a jagged smile. Howard grinned at him, and laughed too, until they were both doubled up with silent coughs of mirth.
“Sorry about that,” Howard said when he had regained his composure. “Least there wasn’t any mistletoe, eh?”
He turned to go back upstairs, and in the darkness, Vince’s cheeks flushed red.
“C’mon,” Howard said, unaware. “You can go back the way you came or they’ll wonder where you are come the morn.”
Vince grimaced. “Yeah, about that…can I stay here for a little bit?”
There was something in Vince’s eyes that made Howard stop for a moment; really stop and consider exactly why his friend had turned up at his bedroom window at three in the morning on a frosty Christmas morning. “What happened, Little Man?”
Vince shuffled his feet. “They said I was a thief, didn’t they? Said I stole that placemat. An’ I mean, I did, that ain’t the problem, but why did they accuse me first? They always accuse me, Howard. So I came ‘ere. You won’t ever do that, will you, Howard? You won’t ever say I did something when I haven’t. Promise me!”
“I promise, Vince,” Howard said hurriedly. “C’mon. Let’s go upstairs.”
They snuck back upstairs and back into Howard’s room. Howard left his duvet pooled on the floor, and Vince only managed to take his cowboy boots off before he collapsed on it, exhausted from his night time excursion. Howard took a blanket out of the cupboard, and lay back down on his bed, covering himself thinly against the chill.
“Night, Howard,” came a small voice from his floor.
“Night, Little Man,” Howard replied, and soon he too was engrossed in the comforting arms of slumber, curled in a ball of deep sleep and welcome to it.
When he woke up, it was nine o clock, his window was open, and Vince was gone.