A Hogswatch Carol
Author's Note: Me, I swear I will swear off romance. From one of my most avoided genres it has become common staple in my one-shots, which is truly annoying in its maudlin extreme. This is the third romance in a row. No more, I say, no more. I will die of sweetness first.
Disclaimer: I don't own the Post Office, its staff and its associates. I do not own the Twelve Days of Christmas, though I do wish I did. There'd be so much to give.
5. My True Love Gave To Me
On the first day of ChristmasMy true love gave to me
A patridge in a pear tree
Smoke curled into the grey skies of winter, steadily tamped down by the falling snow.
Despite the fact that she was standing next to a wall, the woman's posture was ramrod-straight. She stood apart, one severe grey figure in the midst of a brightly-clad crowd, the pinhead amidst the gilt wrapping, the pip within the fruit. Ignoring the pedestrains skirting her warily, she took a deep drag on the cigarette and blew a mouthful of pungent smoke into the cold air.
A golem with the uniform of the post office painted on it stamped by. In honour of the season, the post office golems had had an extra band of red and green painted over their clay shoulders, and a sprig of holly fixed atop their heads. It had, slung over its shoulder, a mountainous pile of cards and parcelled gifts, but walked as if it was carrying nothing.
"Good Evening, Miss Dearheart," it said. "Happy Hogswatch To You."
"Same to you, Anvil 23," returned she, and accompanied the remark with an exhalation of smoke.
The golem tramped on, stopping at the corner house and fishing in the sack with a huge hand. Miss Dearheart turned abruptly and started off in the opposite direction, her high heels sinking through an inch of snow to strike the cobblestones below with the sound of a hammer on nails. Cigarette ash littered the hollows of her heelprints.
A group of carollers accosted her at the street turning and, in the good old tradition of Ankh-Morpork buskers, began to chorus their songs in the most ghastly rendition possible, in the hope of being paid money to go away.
Miss Dearheart turned and gave them the Look.
When she turned the corner and clicked off down the next street, she left behind a group of shellshocked urchins. All of them later swore off carolling, and one of them retained an irrational fear of cigarette smoke for the rest of his childhood.
Miss Dearheart, supremely unconcerned for the welfare of street urchins, reached the part where the road opened up and terminated before the open city gates.
There was a crowd gathered upon the square before the gates. There was a tense muttering in the air. Miss Dearheart took up position at the edge of the crowd, back parallel to the wall, hand, mouth and cigarette working together in a mechanically perfect rhythm. She didn't look at the gate, not at the gate in particular. She just looked through the hazy film of smoke and watched nothing especially much.
The muttering of the crowd increased, and the sharper-eyed ones could spot, in the distance, a small black dot that grew swiftly larger as it approached the city gates.
When the dot became a coach, the cheering started, and spread, and grew louder. By the time the blue-and-gold Mail Coach tore through the gates and skidded to a halt before the waiting crowd, the cheering was roaring like a tropical monsoon.
The coach doors were flung open, and a man wearing a bewinged golden hat stepped out, raised his arms grandly and bowed. The cheering, if aurally possible, intensified. Then like the coach, the cheering screeched to a stop, because the Postmaster was speaking, and it was clear to all of them that you wouldn't want to miss a word of whatever the Postmaster was saying.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he was saying, "treasured patrons! The Post Office brings to you – your Hogswatch mail from Genua!"
The crowd applauded its appreciation, but fell silent as he raised his hand. "No holds barred, my friends, no holds barred. These are horses that have ridden non-stop! This mail is so fresh, that some of the stamps haven't even dried yet!"
The crowd laughed.
"In accordance to our motto, ladies and gentlemen: Rain or shine, no mail gets left behind. Once again, we deliver!"
The crowd cheered wildly. Their orator bowed again, and then stepped back as the mixed employees of the Post Office, both humans and golems in the uniform of the postman, rushed forwards to drag the mail sacks out and take them to their headquarters, where they would be redistributed and delivered to homes across the twin cities. The crowd dispersed, mostly hoping to get back home just in time to receive their mail.
The Postmaster sighted through the rapidly thinning crowd and recognised the familiar sight of a figure on the edge of the crowd, from which a thin tendril of smoke issued. He saluted.
Miss Dearheart took a last drag from the quickly crumbling cigarette and tossed the stub into the snow. Then she strode into the crowd, and the two of them met halfway.
"So, Mr. Lipwig," she said coolly. "Again you deliver."
"As always, my dear Spike. " Moist inclined his head. "As always." Then his solemn mood changed. "Come on, your present's in the coach."
Miss Dearheart allowed herself the thinnest of smiles as Moist seized her by the wrist and dragged her down to the coach, which he climbed into. There was the sound of rummaging, and Moist emerged with a box, which he handed to her. Miss Dearheart took it without a word and opened it.
There was a silence of bated breath. Then Miss Dearheart said, in an odd voice, "Well."
"Genuine snakeskin stilettos, Genuan handcrafted," elucidated Moist anxiously. "They're six-inch heels. Say you like them."
Miss Dearheart quirked an eyebrow at him. "Well, much as I hate to encourage you – I'm afraid I have to agree."
Moist beamed. "Which leads up to my second point. Same question as last month, Spike." In one deft motion he drew a matchbox from his coat pocket and struck a match. "Will you let me the one who holds your ashtray and lights your cigarettes for the rest of our lives?"
In a complex series of hand motions, a cigarette appeared between Miss Dearheart's fingers, and she lit it on the match flame. "Same answer as last month, I fear. But," she added after taking a drag, "in lieu of the circumstances I will consider your proposal for slightly longer than I did last time."
Moist grinned. "Well, that's an improvement, I must say. Although I can't help wondering, after having asked this a record fifteen times, when you are going to give in."
Miss Dearheart blew a smoke ring at him. "When I get tired of keeping you waiting."
"Answered like a true Dearheart," sighed Moist. "I wasn't expecting much else. Well, let's celebrate, shall we? It's Hogswatch, after all."
"Where?" inquired Miss Dearheart.
"Ladies' choice, of course."
"And if I said 'Les Fois Hereux?'"
"Again?" Moist laughed. "Then we'd go to 'Les Fois Hereux'. I'm perfectly willing to get someone rich to pay for us."
"Kidding. Let's go to a bar somewhere. I want a drink."
"Anything you say, Spike, anything you say."
They set off, their voices receding down the street. The snow renewed its fall, completely burying a cold cigarette butt. And all over Ankh-Morpork, a million people reached into their mailboxes and opened their Hogswatch mail.
End.