Disclaimer: I do not own Home Alone.
The weather was cold enough to spear Marv's flesh as he and Harry rode within the blue plumping van. The taller bandit continued check the heater for what seemed like the hundredth time, but there was no difference. "Is this thing broken?" Marv mumbled as he tried to turn on the heat one more time before turning his eyes over to Harry.
"How should I know?" Harry answered as he shivered in his coat and hat while driving down the streets of Winnetka. He felt his teeth silently clattering against each other when a chill rushed down his spine from this weather. How much he wished that he was back at the apartment and into its welcoming heat, no matter how small it was, but Harry knew that this sacrifice was going to be worth it. The McCallister house was the last one from their heist and all this cold and waiting was going to be worth it.
What might we expect this time? Harry thought to himself when the McCallister home came into view from the far distance. Would there be lights on? Another party? Someone shoveling their driveway? Whatever the case was, it was important that they were extra cautious. Harry remembered when they were almost caught during the first night of their heist and he didn't want that to happen again.
As opposed to Harry's thoughts, Marv's mind still remained on the coldness that was in the car. To Harry's question, Marv only responded by pulling his brown jacket tighter against his shoulders and around his frame. "It's just too cold Harry."
"Deal with it," Harry gruffly responded before shooting his friend a glare. The last thing that Harry wanted to hear was Marv's complaints about the cold season. If Marv thought that he was only one who was suffering through all of this he was wrong, for Harry was going through the same thing. "And we're finally here," Harry said as he pulled up towards the McCallister property but it wasn't until a confused expression came upon his face.
The place seemed eerie silent, like nobody was home. Harry had expected to at least seen somebody outside. With a family that had so many people, they couldn't all just be gathered in one room watching television or whatever it was that they did. "I don't get it," Harry suddenly broke the silence in the van as he squinted towards the house. "Right now it looks like nobody's home. Last night the place was jumping."
Marv squinted at the property. He definitely remembered all of that Christmas music that was blaring from the house and the people that were gathered for the festivity. Even though it was something that neither of the bandits had expected to see, Marv wished that he, Harry, and Amy could do something like that with one another, but when it came to Christmas, there was no bargaining with Harry's opinions about it.
"Go and check it out," Marv suddenly heard his partner tell him but he didn't budge from his seat for a mere couple of seconds, which was the moment that he noticed Harry expectantly looking at him.
"Now?" Marv asked.
Annoyed and throwing his arms in the air Harry yelled, "no tomorrow egghead, now! Go ahead!"
Frowning at his friend's outburst, Marv slid out of the van and shut the door leaving Harry alone in the van. No matter how long Harry had been good friends with Marv, his slight stupidity irritated him. Letting out an exasperated sigh, Harry leaned back against his seat and waited for Marv's return and hopefully with any news about whether they could go into the house. Speaking of the house, Harry's mind wandered over to the many items that he had observed when he was 'checking the security.' There were plenty of beautiful paintings, objects that seemed to have cost more than what they had pawned off, and many more. Items that were the most tempting for Harry to steal were the jewelry. When the bandit had spoken with Kate McCallister before he had left, he had noticed the pair of earrings that she had been wearing as the dangled and sparkled within the lighting. Seeing that, Harry had come to the conclusion that not only did that woman possess a good amount of jewelry but it was highly likely that the family also had many items that were worth a whole lot.
However, Harry knew that his temptations were going to have to wait. It all depended on how long it took Marv to return.
Inside the house, both Becky and Kevin had arrived a little earlier with their groceries. An incident had occurred before their arrival home, which include the items falling through the plastic bags and onto the ground. Since Becky had punished Kevin into holding the bags, she decided the her little brother had been punished long enough so she took some of the heavier items in her arms and assisted him. At least home had not been too far away.
After completing some of the domestic tasks, one of them being the laundry, the two siblings were in the kitchen. Becky was putting away the groceries while Kevin was washing some dishes from last night. "And lastly the milk," Becky said as she stored the milk in the proper place of the refrigerator. "How about we have some lunch once we're finished?" Becky suggested.
"I'm not really hungry," Kevin answered, "I feel like I just came back from having breakfast."
Becky lightly chuckled upon hearing that. That pancake house really lived up to its standards on serving the best pancakes in town. "I think I'll skip lunch too," she said in agreement with Kevin, "we need to keep some room for din-who the heck is that?" her voice suddenly dropped in a whisper and her eyes widened at the shadow that made it's way to their door.
Looking at his sister, Kevin slowly turned his head and a light gasp escaped from his mouth when he noticed the shadow. Could it be...no it couldn't! It's only my imagination Kevin thought as he tried to keep himself calm while Becky remained frozen in her place, afraid to make any noise that would alert their uninvited guest. Suddenly, both siblings looked down to the dog door when a shoe appeared and fell on the floor with a clatter. Becky flinched at the sound of it and took a step back when a hand shot through to retrieve it.
On instinct, Kevin quickly grabbed a hold of the remote and turned on the television. Becky turned her eyes when she noticed the picture showing up on the television screen. It was that same gangster movie that had scared Kevin and it was the same scene where the man's partner was murdered. What Kevin was up to right now, Becky didn't know.
"Get the hell outta here," the main character's voice shot out of the television.
"What the hell is taking him so long?" Harry grumbled under his breath as he continued to wait for Marv's return. Even though Harry hadn't been waiting for hours on end, he couldn't shake off the feeling that Marv had been caught.
Marv Merchants wasn't one of the greatest cat burglars especially at being quiet but if something had happened to him, Harry was at a roadblock. Should he just abandon his mission and leave Marv there or go and rescue him from his captors? Leaving Marv behind wouldn't be an option at all! What kind of a partner, and friend, would he be? Marv had the tendency to be a bumbling thief but he was Harry's one and only friend.
"This is rid-" Harry was saying as he was about to get out of the van until he noticed Marv frantically running towards the van. The look on his face seemed like he had seen a ghost and his breath was short from the running and whatever he had seen. "What's happened?" Harry asked as he looked at Marv.
"Someone just got blown away!" Marv explained, "they beat us to the job, someone's in there!"
Kevin looked at the scattered remains of the firecrackers that had exploded from the red pot that he had placed in front of the door. The shadow was there no longer and that was more than enough to make Kevin think that he had been scared off. Becky on the other hand was petrified in her place from many factors that had just happened. The shadow, the shoe, the television, and the firecrackers.
"Hey," Kevin said as he tugged at her arm and she looked down at him. "Don't worry Becky, he's gone."
The teenager shook her head and looked down at Kevin. Out of the both of them, she should have been the one to not be so fearful of this, but the tables had turned. Kevin was the one who was being very brave and knew exactly what to do. Kneeling down in front of her brother, she placed her hands on his shoulders and looked at him. "That was some quick and smart thinking," she said. Even though there was a smile on her face, there was fear in her eyes.
Kevin shrugged his shoulders as if this was something that he had normally done throughout his childhood. "It was nothing," he said, "we just gotta use what we have around the house."
"And using a gangster film and firecrackers was enough to scare him off?" Becky asked, feeling a bit skeptical about the outcome of the situation. "I don't think it did."
"You need to stop worrying," Kevin said and gave her a light push with his hand, "it's Christmas Eve and we still have plenty of things that we need to do to get ready. We have to get out the decorations, the stockings, and find a tree."
"And just where are we going to find a tree genius?" Becky asked and placed her hands upon her hips. If they were going to have to go to another store to get it, Becky wasn't up for going outside once again, especially when it was only going to get colder.
Kevin pointed to the back of his shoulder with his thumb. "Our backyard. Where else? I don't think we even have enough money to buy one anyway."
"You do know that we have a Christmas tree in the basement," Becky said. Why go through all the trouble to take down a Christmas tree when they already had a fake one downstairs. Sure it would take a while to bring up such a cumbersome tree to the first floor of the house, but that didn't mean that they wouldn't decorate it to make it all the more beautiful.
However, Kevin disagreed with Becky's suggestion. To him, a Christmas tree needed to be real and that one that was in the basement was as fake as the nose on one of Kate's friends whenever they came to visit their mother for an afternoon coffee. "No. A tree needs to real. What's the meaning of Christmas when you don't have a real tree?"
Well, that was quite the question that made Becky think. Would it be a fake Christmas after all if the tree wasn't real? Whatever thoughts were going through that eight year old head of his, Becky believed they were just too complicated for her own teenager mind to even ponder about. "Okay, okay," she said and held up her arms in surrender. "Fine, go get that tree."
With his sister's consent, that was exactly what Kevin was going to do. He had noticed a perfect little tree that he could cut down and then decorate it with Becky if she wanted to. After all, he wanted to have the best Christmas that he could with as much as he could, even though there were moments when he dearly missed his parents and his brothers and sisters.
Back at the apartment, Amy looked over at the small amounts of food that she had managed to buy. At least none of the groceries were frozen dinners that she, Harry, and Marv would usually have during the week. Amy would have loved to have bought a big enough turkey for the three of them, but hopefully the medium small ham was enough for them to enjoy, along with a side of roasted vegetables, some old age wine that had been sitting in the cupboard, and some roasted apples with sugar and cinnamon. That was, if she had some sugar and cinnamon.
Just then, a knock was heard on the door and Amy's eyes lightened up. She had not been expecting anyone at this time but if it was Harry and Marv, then that would be quite the pleasant surprise. Amy quickly hurried to the door and once she placed her hand on the doorknob and pulled it open, she was surprised yet a tad disappointed that it wasn't her husband nor her friend. "Oh, hello Tracy." Tracy Krinkle was one of the neighbors that resided on the first floor of the apartment. She had long, lush brown hair, brown eyes, and worked as a grocery store clerk. "I thought you were at work," Amy said and pulled the door a little wider for her to enter inside.
"I got off a little early today," Tracy said as she took the liberty and walked inside the apartment. "It was because I was planning on my picking my parents up from the airport but my father just called and said that they will return sometime tomorrow. A woman was asking my mother if she could switch her ticket with theirs so she could return home to her son."
"Oh," Amy said before walking over to the kitchen and coming back with a small glass of wine, something that she usually did with Tracy when Harry wasn't home. "She seemed to be in quite the hurry."
"Apparently according to my father who got some information from her she had left her eight year old son home alone," Tracy said and thanking Amy with a smile, she took the glass of wine and took a sip. "Which reminds me, I did see an eight year old kid today."
"How do you know he's eight?" Amy asked.
"It wasn't difficult for him to tell me," Tracy said, "he was with his babysitter."
Amy remained quiet for a minute as she went deep into her thoughts. She remembered seeing a child in the grocery store whom she helped and then another child, older than the other who had tagged along. "I think the 'babysitter' must have been his sister."
Tracy turned her head and looked over to Amy. "You saw them too? Well, I'm not surprised that he would lie to me. Especially after he called me a 'stranger.'"
"And is that why you look so upset about?" Amy lightly laughed as she gave her friend a little push, causing her to chuckle as well. "He's just a kid."
Tracy shrugged a shoulder at that. "I was taken aback by it. But after what my father had said about that moment who wanted to get home to her son, I think that was the kid that I saw who, might I add, said to me that his mother was waiting out in the car." Taking a sip of her wine, Tracy turned her eyes to Amy. "I just hope that they made it home safely."
Amy gave her friend a pat on the shoulder. "Hey you tried your best and I'm sure that they did make it back. There's just something about the Eve of Christmas that gives peace and protection to everyone, especially children."
"Do you always have this sort of Christmas spirit?" Tracy asked as a laugh escaped her lips.
"Hey one of us in this apartment has to be," Amy defended herself with a smile, "which reminds me, do you have some sugar and cinnamon."
"I believe that I do," Tracy said and placed the wine glass back on the table, "looks like you'll be having quite the homemade feast while I dine out with my boyfriend."
"To each her own," Amy said and escorted her neighbor out the door and began to get the food prepared on Christmas Eve.
