A Hogswatch Carol

Author's Note: Am back from Christmas busking. Chriek, I ache all over.

Disclaimer: I don't own Susan and her gang, Terry Pratchett does. Insofar as I am concerned, All I Want For Christmas is Mariah Carey's, since I've never heard anyone else sing it.

4. All I Want For Hogswatch

I don't want a lot for Christmas
There is just one thing I need
And I don't care about the presents
Underneath the Christmas tree
I just want you for my own
More than you could ever know
Make my wish come true
All I want for Christmas is you

Susan never failed to observe how much children adored Hogswatch.

As a child, she herself had never had the luxury of celebrating Hogswatch. As an adult, she did not see why she should allow herself it.

School was out early today. Susan stood in the grounds of Frout Academy and watched her students tear past, through the gates, towards the parents waiting to take them home to their Hogswatch dinners and parties. The air fizzled with happiness. Happiness, on an overall, annoyed Susan. It was a family trait.

"Happy Hogswatch, Miss Susan!"

Susan, jolted out of her reverie, looked down. Marisa and Stella Warwick were tugging at her skirt, giving her twin gap-toothed smiles. Susan blinked. "Yes. Happy Hogswatch."

The Warwick twins, oblivious to their teacher's delayed reaction, beamed at her, and then raced off to where their mother was waving to them outside the grounds. Susan stared in the direction they had gone, unseeing.

When the grounds were more or less empty, Susan unfroze from her position by the gates, stepped outside, and began to make her way down the street.

She had nowhere in particular to go – no dinners to attend, no presents to deliver. Susan walked aimlessly through the steadily thickening snowfall. People rushed past her, pulling their coats about them, clutching armfuls of shopping, all in a hurry to get home before sundown. No one gave a second thought to the woman with the black-and-white hair, walking at a slow gait far removed from her normal brisk stride, her face unreadable.

Susan wondered for a moment, if she disappeared on this very spot, whether anyone would have noticed. She decided not to try it out, if only because a positive answer would have been really hard to bear.

She didn't hate Hogswatch. Not per se. It was just that it happened to be meaningless for her, while it was full of meaning for everyone around her. The festive season did not suit her. She had never worn red, or green. She was not one for giving, because she had nothing to give. The only thing she knew how to do was to take. Yet another familiy trait.

Susan let her feet do the navigating, even though she knew perfectly well the route they would take. And so, when she ended up before the ominous sign of Biers, she wasn't at all surprised.

One could say that Biers was a bar with exclusive membership. Being dead was an automatic qualification. For those who didn't have that privilege, your membership depended on your ability to enter it and stay uneaten.

It was no place for a young woman to go. It was where Susan went every Hogswatch.

She sighed, and stepped inside. The stools and the tables were rather more empty than normal. Even the patrons of Biers had families, mostly.

"Same, Igor," she told the misshapen bartender, who gave a lopsided nod and went to pour her drink.

Susan took it without looking at it and drank half of it down. Igor watched her with concern. In Ankh-Morpork, anyone with half a brain looked at their drink before drinking it. You really wanted to know what it was you were downing. The only people who didn't were the ones without half a brain, or the ones who really had something to drown.

"Bad day at work?" he ventured.

Susan blinked, and glanced at him. "No," she said. "Everything's fine."

"Really now," said a voice on her right.

Susan turned to the newcomer, and nearly choked on her drink. She had never really got used to Lobsang's funny habit of suddenly appearing in the weirdest places of her life, like the stationery cupboard in her classroom. He had now materialised on what had been a previously vacant stool, looking slightly sheepish as she glared at him.

Igor made no comment on the man's sudden appearance. You did get all sorts in Biers.

"So this is Biers?" said Lobsang conversationally. "Er. Nice atmosphere."

Susan finished her drink and turned to face him on full. "Lobsang, what are you doing here?"

Lobsang ignored the question. "It is Hogswatchnight, isn't it?"

"Why're you asking me? You're Time, you should know the answer."

"Just checking I'm in the right moment," returned Lobsang petulantly. "Time-travelling's a lot harder than it looks."

"I know," said Susan shortly. "I've tried it."

There was a silence, which did not sound out of place at all in Biers.

Lobsang cleared his throat. "So…are you going anywhere tonight?"

Susan picked up her drink absent-mindedly, then remembered she had finished it. "No. Why?"

Lobsang distractedly picked at an unnatural and non-removable stain on the bartop. "You could come over to my place. For, you know, dinner."

"Your place," enunciated Susan. "And what do your parents say?"

"Oh, they'd be delighted to have you," said Lobsang hurriedly. "I mean, no one comes to visit them except me. And Dad likes you, I can tell."

"So you're taking me to see your parents."

"We could tell them we're dating," suggested Lobsang, and added anxiously, "We are dating, aren't we?"

"Not technically," argued Susan. "Unless your idea of a date is making out in a stationery cupboard."

Lobsang had the grace to look embarassed.

Susan decided to revert to the original topic. "It's not a Hogswatch dinner, is it?"

"It could be if you wanted."

"I'd rather it wasn't, thank you very much."

"Oh good. We've never got around to getting a tree. At least, not a fir tree. We've got a lot of cherry blossoms. So, are you coming?"

Susan stared at him. "Now?"

"Yes, now. Timing really doesn't matter – not to us."

"But I need to – "

"No, you don't. It's very informal. Come on."

Lobsang pulled Susan off the stool and led her towards the door. They were still arguing as they went.

Igor went over mechanically to clear the empty glasses, and suddenly realised that Susan had omitted to pay him for the drink. Which was out of character for her. Susan always paid for her drinks.

He limped outside and glanced around. Two pairs of snowy footprints trailed down the snow on the pavement and abruptly stopped in the middle of nowhere. He saw that much before they were trampled by the next wave of pedestrians.

Igor went back inside, shaking his head. Hopefully she'd remember to pay up later. Hogswatch affected people in funny ways.

End.