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Hi everyone. Merry Christmas, Merry Holidays or Merry Hannukah!
This is just a short one-off for the holidays. I hope you'll enjoy it!
'Oh Christmas tree':
It was almost Christmas time, and Murdock was in a very good mood.
His jacket and cap were hanging over a vacant chair in the corner of the room. The lanky man had rolled up the sleeves of his flannel shirt and was rummaging through a box of christmas decorations. All day long he had been busy decorating his very own Christmas tree in his room back at the V.A hospital.
It was a big deal for him. He'd never had one of his own before!
There had been a bit of a fuss with the staff of his ward at first. They usually don't allow trees in the rooms of their mental patients. But after a lot of begging and some serious puppy-dog-eyes-sessions (from Murdock), Murdock was finally allowed a tree in his room.
He glanced at it happily with sparkling eyes and a big lopsided grin plastered on his face.
In the meantime, he was half humming, half singing Christmas carols, but with his own lyrics.
A nurse who passed his room thought she heard him sing something that sounded like 'Oh Christmas tree'. But the words were slightly different and sounded like the following.
"Oh A-team men, Oh A-team men,
They're drivin' in a big black van
The co-lo-neeeel, he makes a plan
The bad guys ruuuun, fast as they can…
Oh A-team men, Oh A-team men...humhum-humhum-hum-humhum "
Murdock put down the box and took a few steps backward to look at the result of a hard day's work.
It was a thing of beauty if he may say so himself.
In the middle of his room stood a huge Christmas tree, fully decorated with the most beautiful ornaments you could imagine.
Murdock sighed in delight at the view. Who would have thought he could create something as pretty as this? He'd been cutting out beautiful paper snow stars which he'd hung with strings on every second tree branch. It had made his room a bit messy with all the little snippets of white paper left-overs, but Murdock didn't mind. He treated it as never-melting-snow and thought it was a great addition to the scene in general.
The pilot stepped forward to rearrange some of the sparkly baubles.
It had cost him some trouble to spread them equally over all the tree branches. A few times he had taken them all out to rearrange them again because he wasn't pleased with the result. But this time he got it exactly right.
All the blue baubles and star ornaments were in the top. They were representing the blue sky that he enjoyed so much when flying an aircraft.
There was even a little ornament of a red triplane that Murdock was particularly proud of. Below the blue stuff, he'd hung the green ornaments and some silver and gold garlands representing the trees, roads, and rivers (seen from the sky). And at the bottom of the tree, he hung the yellows and red ornaments. Some of them were birds and he even had a horse, a sheep and a goose for some reason. Those were the old ornaments he inherited from his grandmother. He always handled them with extra care. He also used his granny's handmade tree topper, which was an angel with glimmery golden wings.
Suddenly a thought popped into Murdock's mind.
"Ah, I mustn't forget the most important one!", He told the tree.
The lanky pilot walked to the chair where his jacket was and looked through its pockets whilst whistling 'Deck the halls'. He found a little package, wrapped in paper, and unpacked it.
Out of it came a fragile ornament of black and red glass that was a perfect miniature version of B.A's van. Murdock hung it ceremoniously in the center of his tree
"Yes, that's a lot better, my dear old chap!", he mumbled with his most classy British accent.
There was a knock on his door and a nurse came in with a tray that contained a glass of water and some pills.
"Good evening Mr. Murdock. It's time for your medication before you go to bed. How are you doing today?" Night nurse Angela asked him with a smile on her face
"I am doing Oki and Doki!" Murdock beamed at her while leaping forward to take his meds.
"What do you think of my tree? Ain't it the epitome of elegance?" He asked proudly pointing at the middle of the room while the nurse handed him the pills.
Nurse Angela looked up into the room, paused for a second and then smiled:
"It's gorgeous Mr. Murdock. Though, may I make a small suggestion?"
"Suggest away my dear lady", Murdock said, bowing at her, while taking his pills and a sip of the water.
"Well, maybe it needs a bit more angel hair. You know, like tinsels?" Nurse Angela said with a kind smile.
Murdock scrutinized his tree for a bit longer and then his eyes widened.
"What a great idea!" Murdock exclaimed. "It's exactly what was missing! We can't have a tree without angel hair, can we?".
He leaped to the other side of his room to check his box with decorations for tinsels.
"I'll let you to it then." Nurse Angela said. "Have a good night Mr. Murdock".
Murdock mumbled a goodbye and Angela closed the door behind her.
Soon after, the tree was glimmering and shining like never before with the new angel hair hanging from its branches.
The tree was one big shiny beacon of light, and Murdock was super content with himself while bursting into a new carol that sounded like 'Jingle Bells'.
Though the words were just a tiny bit off:
"Jingle Bling
See him swing
With his jewelry
Oh what fun to see B.A
Swinging on a tree,
OOoohh Jingle Bling
See him swing...etc "
"Nice lyrics, Murdock", a voice suddenly sounded from the other side of the room
The lanky pilot jumped and turned around to see Face behind the bars of his half-opened window.
"Man, don't you sneak up on me like that!", Murdock panted while clutching his forehead. "I hate it when you do that, and oh by the way, you're late!"
Face shrugged while working on the bars with a screwdriver.
"Grab your stuff Murdock, I'm almost done here. B.A already prepared these bars a while ago, so they will come off easily. He is now taking care of the electricity, so you gotta be quick! We got a new mission waiting".
"Yeah sure", Murdock mumbled.
"By the way Face, what do you think of my Christmas tree? Pretty neat huh?"
Face momentarily looked up from his task and into the room.
"Oh, yes, wow. It's great Murdock! I really love all the lights".
"Ha, I'm glad you do, buddy," Murdock beamed proudly while installing his fake Murdock doll on his bed in a sleeping pose and covering it with blankets.
"Those buggers were a hell to entangle though." He added.
"Took me 2 whole hours!".
Suddenly the lights went out and B.A appeared behind the window frame.
Face was just removing the bars to make space for Murdock to climb out.
"Hurry up, sucka!" He barked at the pilot.
"Good to see you too B.A," Murdock grinned.
"Whaddayathink of my Christmas tree, big guy?"
B.A looked inside the room and then at Murdock.
"Ain't no tree in there, fool," he said. "You seein' things again!"
He yanked a heavily protesting Murdock by the collar of his jacket, pulled him through the window, and directed him to the van.
Face quickly followed, shaking his head while the lanky pilot ranted about big angry mudsuckers that were unable to use their imagination.
Soon the A-team was driving off to a new mission under the starry winter sky.
If you listened carefully you could hear someone sing to the tunes of 'Jingle Bells' (though with slightly different lyrics) on top of his lungs, followed by some angry bellowing that sounded like "Shut up fool, I ain't swingin' !" in the distance.
Merry Holidays everybody.
And may your imagination be filled with sparkling Christmas trees as well.
- The End -