Hal lay awake listening to the clock tick. He hadn't slept last night and it seemed to be escaping him yet again tonight. He couldn't stop thinking of Charles and what he had said. Hal didn't believe for a moment that it was real, but there was this tiny part deep down inside of him that was terrified that it actually happened and what he said was actually going to happen. Hal started when the clock began to toll midnight. He counted the chimes and calmed when they finished.

Suddenly his room began to quake. His bed shook as he heard the things off the side table crash to the ground. The lights flickered. The tremors ceased and at the end of his bed stood a small girl dressed in white. Hal blinked his eyes trying to make her go away, but she didn't. Her small Blue eyes stared strait in to his. Hal slowly climbed from his bed without breaking eye contact. He made his way to where she stood. Letting his eyes drop for a moment he noticed her feet didn't touch the ground. She held out a dainty hand to Hal.
"Come with me Henry" a meek voice said to him. He knew it was the girl's voice even though, her lips had never parted.

He took her hand and the world around him softened and vanished into a thin mist. Before he knew it he was standing in the middle of a corridor line with doors. The small spirit girl led Hal to a door that looked very old and tattered, and very familiar to Hal. She motioned for him to open it. He took a deep breath knowing what was on the other side. He placed his hand on the knob and pushed the door open.

On the other side of this door was the brothel where he had grown up. One of the girls entered with a small boy tugging at her hand. That boy was Hal.

"Now you stay here Hal," the girl spoke to the boy in a soft tender voice. "Don't come out, no matter what."

"But its Christmas," the small boy spoke with a grin on his face. "You said I'd be able to be with you on Christmas"

"I know, I did Hal. And you will, as soon as I'm finished. Now stay here, be good" she left the room pulling the door closed behind her.

Young Hal placed his face on the floor and looked through the crack at the bottom of the door. He saw the girl talking to a man. Young Hal knew what would happen next, but he didn't look away and the man began to caress and kiss the girl.

Hal watched himself spy through the crack, but when he remembered what was about to unfold before that poor boy's eyes it was too late.

The girl began to scream. He remembered watching her fight as the man strangled her with his bare hands. Hal desperately wanted to run over and pull his child self from the crack, but the ghost girl who had brought him here held him back.

The child before him screamed and cried but he was helpless to save one of his mothers. One of the other girls threw the door of the room where the young boy cried open. Taking him up in her arms. The open door revealed the blood covered body of the girl he had just watch die. This was the first of the girls to go and the first of the many people Hal would watch die.

Hal looked to the young ghost, with tear stained eyes. "Why have you brought me here?" He scolded. "Who are you and what is this?"

The girl looked into Hal's eyes for a moment and a calmness overwhelmed the seething vampire. "I am the ghost of Christmases Past". Her sweet voice filled Hal's ears. "I have brought you here to help you. Now come along we have somewhere else to be". She led him through the door and with a flash of light they were back in the corridor.

"This time you can pick." She spoke with a small grin on her face.

Hal walked down the corridor and examined the doors. The hall seemed to go on forever. He walked further down trying to find a door with perhaps a better scene on the other side. He stopped at a door and knew this was the one he had to go through. He looked back at the girl. She nodded her head. With a deep breath, he pushed the door open.

What Hal saw before him took him back. This room was dark and dank. In the room were three people, Hal, Charles, and a small girl who was dead and bloody on the floor. Hal was crying as Charles comforted him in a way that only he could.

"Pick your sorry ass up off the floor!" Charles shouted. "She's dead, yes we know. You can't keep crying every time they die." Hal looked up in disgust at Charles. This girl had been different. She screamed. But not in the same way as the others had. The screams that came out of this poor girl's mouth pierced deep into whatever soul he had left. The girl's body was on the floor with her bright blue eyes still open and her face wearing an expression that Hal would see every night when he went to sleep and every morning when he awoke.

"How dare you!" Hal hissed. His tears turning to tears of rage. "How dare you do this to me! You had no right! You should have let me die." Hal lunged for Charles.

Charles took a step side to avoid the angry vampire bolting toward him.
"Don't for get Harry, I warned you of what it would do to you and you still said yes." He paused and let Hal, who and thrown himself into the wall, stand up. Charles calmly approached him. "You begged me, Harry my child."

Hal was now seething rage. He rushed to the other side of the room where a wooden chair lay toppled on the floor. He broke a leg off the chair and gripped it tight in his hand. "You want me to be a heartless monster? Fine." He took a few steps toward Charles. "But be careful what you wish for." Hal was inches from Charles. "You know, I never thanked you."

"Thanked me for what? You were just scolding me for making you a vampire!"

"I never thanked you for showing me how to make my way up in the world." He aimed the broken chair leg at Charles's heart. "Kill or be killed." Hal plunged it in to Charles's chest. "And one more thing," he said glaring into Charles's shocked eyes, "Happy Christmas." He gave the stake a twist and Charles turned to dust right before him. Dropping the stake, Hal ran from the room and didn't look back.

After watching what had just unfolded, Hal was drained. He made his way to the pile of ashes. "He was the best friend I'd ever had." The girl's body still lay on the floor. Hal walked over to in and knelt down beside it. He started to close her eyes but stopped. His heart skipped a beat. Quickly, he shut her eyes and made his way to the door.

Once back in the corridor, Hal to took the hand of the ghost girl in his. "I'm so sorry."

The girl looked at Hal with understanding eyes. She nodded her head. Opening her mouth she spoke, "No, you're not." Her face turned to the expression that had been burned into Hal's mind for 300 years then everything went black.

Hal awoke with a start back in his bed. As he shot up he heard the faintest echo of the girl's voice. "Atleast, not yet."