Toaster had always enjoyed Christmas mornings. There was nothing so special as the early morning hours, when the house was still asleep, and Santa had been and gone. The quiet dark played host to the soft glitter of blue and gold or red and green lights and the spread of wrapped gifts resting at the base of the tree. Often in the past she dared to leave her counter to gaze up through the tree boughs with their adornments, just admiring the sweet portrait of peace.
Even now, as she lay stretched out under the tree, a blanket wrapped around her to ward off the winter chill, she savored the quiet delights of an early Christmas morning; her first Christmas as a human. There were no presents under the tree this year; she and Kirby had been agreed on that point. The money they pooled together had all but been spent on rent for the house and their needed furnishings. That was enough Christmas delight.
"To start with," she had promised herself out of Kirby's hearing. Perhaps Christmas was the least of Kirby's concerns, but she knew it was more than just a nice day. Christmas was a celebration of change; of life. For her, it was a chance to celebrate everything she and Kirby had decided on.
And it wasn't just the two of them anymore. She smiled as the sounds of snoring from the second bedroom. Lampy, Radio, and Blanky had come just days before, their arrival as welcome presents as ever. What would life be like now! What new adventures they would all have together! Already she had been delighted to watch them try their human forms for the first time. She felt more like a mother, as Chris was to Robbie, watching and coaxing them through their first human experiences.
"More like stopping them from damaging themselves," Kirby grumbled, after Radio had taken an alarming tumble off the porch.
True, there were issues to work, out. The house was crowded, and Kirby had to rework his budget to allow for more mouths to feed and bodies to clothe. Blanky clung to her so tightly she could barely go anywhere without stumbling into him. But now Toaster bathed in Christmas, resting assured that time would work itself out.
Heavy footfalls made the floor creak, reminding Toaster that they still needed a rug for that hallway. She turned her head as Kirby emerged, half dressed in the only pair of slacks he liked (she had yet to persuade him into pajamas).
"What are you doing on the floor?" His face was shadowed in the glare of the lights before her eyes, but Toaster knew him well enough to picture the confused, yet fond smile on his face.
"Enjoying the lights, of course!" She stretched out a hand through a tree bough. "Come on! Try it!"
"No, thanks. Too cold down there." But he shuffled and grunted until he was sitting beside her legs and rested one hand on her knee. Toaster patted his hand.
"Merry Christmas!" she said.
"Merry Christmas." Kirby set a box wrapped in glittery green and gold tissue paper on her belly.
"What's this?" Toaster sat up so quickly she set the branches shaking.
"A gift, you idiot." Kirby's mouth twitched as he removed tinsel from her hair. "I thought you knew what those looked like."
"I thought we agreed we wouldn't do Christmas gifts this year!"
"Yeah, so we did. But it's not from me." Kirby tapped the side of the gift, pointing out a tag Toaster missed.
"Rob." Toaster smiled at the familiar name, written in the vet's clear handwriting.
"It was in that bag of hand-me-downs Chris brought over for Blanky," Kirby whispered bending close to Toaster's ear.
"It was?" Toaster turned to him with wide eyes. "But I turned that bag inside out, and I didn't see this!"
Kirby was far too smug. "So, I figured."
"You scamp! How did you hide it?"
"What do you care?" Even Kirby couldn't mask his excitement. "Quit wasting time and open it up."
She did, after running her hand over the tissue and offering a quiet thanks to the humans that had done so much for her. The tissue pulled away easily from its corner, and the lid to the packing box come off with Kirby's help.
"Oh!" She and Kirby exclaimed at the same time when they saw the same object nestled delicately in its white paper bed. Toaster rested the box on her knees as she traced the soft gold hair and gentle gown of the Christmas angel.
"Tinselina." Tears pricked at Toaster's eyes as she lifted the Christmas angel into her hands. "But how could he know?" Tinselina's smiling face, though painted, appeared to beam even more at sight of them.
"Look." Kirby bent further over the box to pluck out a card from the paper. Toaster pressed Tinselina to her cheek as Kirby fumbled to open it.
"Merry Christmas, friends," he read. "The first Christmas in a new home can be tough. We wanted you to have something special to make your holiday complete. Chris rescued this angel from the trash and remade her. Now she'll be part of your home. A little piece of our home for yours."
"Oh, Rob." Toaster kissed the angel's forehead. "He's wonderful, isn't he?"
"Of course, he is. He's always been." Kirby's voice wavered, and his hands shook as they held the note. "Chris, too."
"Are you sure?" Toaster held the angel to her eyes, searching the still eyes. "Are you sure you want to stay here with us? Away from everyone?"
"What do you mean, away from everyone?" Kirby heavy hand cupped the angel's head. "She'll be here with us, won't she?"
"But she won't be able to talk to us," Toaster whispered as that old uncertainty crept back on her.
"But we can talk to her," Kirby replied, as he struggled to his feet. Toaster held the doll with one arm as Kirby helped her up. "And she can see everything we do."
Toaster handed him the angel and watched as he set her on the top of their tree.
"And we'll never pack her away," Toaster declared, admiring the sight she made.
"Well, that figures," Kirby grumbled. "We leave those dimwits for good, and they send someone to spy on us." But he wrapped his arms around Toaster, drawing the blanket warmly around her.
"Not a spy," Toaster insisted, gazing up at her friend. "A guardian!"
Merry Christmas, friends, Tinselina's gaze seem to reply as she looked mightily down on them and their new home. And good luck in the coming year!
"Merry Christmas," Toaster whispered back, turning her head up to invite Kirby for a kiss. "We'll need all the good luck we can get."