A Christmas Eve Ghost Story

My attempt at "flash fiction". Meaning exactly 100 hundred words long. Which is perfect for my (look! a squirrel!) attention span. Inspired  by I Saw Lightning Fall. You can go here for the good stories..

The Cat

He awoke with a start. There in the window, silhouetted by the moon, was the cat. It was watching him.

He felt..something....regret?...guilt? Welling up, a swirling cloud of feelings spread about him, crying out to be named. He struggled against them, for they asked him to change. He would not.

He muttered an obscenity and threw the clock  at the beast, missing by inches. The cat did not move- only continued its wordless interrogation.

The sudden chill in the room seemed to come from within him. He could not move.
The cat leaped to the bed and whispered, "Let's go."

Reclaiming the Church Year

From STR:

Sunday begins the season of Advent, and with it a new year in the Church's liturgical calendar....


...That this transition will go unobserved in many Christian churches is regrettable, not because Christianity entails certain holy days of obligation--as St. Paul writes, "One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike"--but because the Church Year provides such a useful framework for the worship life of a Christian.... more