Chapter 4 – Carols and Spirits and Phantoms! Oh, My!

"I've been looking for you, JD…" the other pretty, blonde Elliot Reid called to him in a sing-song voice. "I kind of went a little overboard on the eggnog and now my hands won't work." She laughed uncomfortably. "Can you write me a prescription for it?"

"I don't have time, Elliot," he replied, putting on a jacket and walking toward the backstage exit. "I have to find a Christmas tree and bring it to the after-play party later."

Elliot stood in his way, completely ignoring him. "Okay, I'll make this quick: put me down for some Vicodin to ease this hangover. Or maybe something that will have me forget the hangover. Or maybe I just need another eggnog! You know, bite the dog that bit me? Heh, I guess it really doesn't matter." She sighed fondly. "I love the holidays…. Oh! Except, of course, the year I was nine and my parents got me a Nancy Regan 'Just-Say-No' poster. And I asked what I was saying 'no' to and then they said, 'Legwarmers, five-figure jogs, and sex with minorities.' Oh, and over dinner my mother yelled at my father because she found out in college he played Santa in the local mall and ended up in the gift-wrapping department with a 'hoe-hoe-hoe'," she said mockingly, "which then drove him to go a little overboard on the eggnog, which…." Elliot paused and looked down. "I can't feel my legs."

JD, who was taking all this down on a little notepad, tossed the notepad into the air and groaned, "Oh, good grief, Elliot! Ugh! Save it for your Tuesday session!" He stomped out the building, throwing his hands up in exasperation.

"Merr-merry Christmas!" Elliot yelled after him, attempting to pick up the notepad with her non-functioning hands.

---

House, meanwhile, was walking carefully through the slippery snow as the harsh winter winds licked across his freezing face, but that didn't matter to him – he was a man on a mission.

"Feliz Navidad!"

House's ears perked up as he heard something.

"Feliz Navidad!"

He squinted his eyes and spotted a Mexican family consisting of Manny Rivera, his father and grandfather caroling out in the middle of a block while Manny waved a little bell as they collected money for a fund raiser. "Feliz Navidad!" they sang. "Feliz Navidad! Prospero Ano y Felicidad. I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas! I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas! I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas! From the bottom of my heart!"

Rolling his eyes, House slipped two dollar bills into the family's bin of money. Manny smiled appreciatively and the corner of House's mouth twitched, whether it was upward or downward was difficult to decipher. When the doctor walked away, Manny's grandfather's hand reached into the bin, attempting to swipe some cash. But Manny's father slapped his hand way, waving his finger disapprovingly as Manny groaned.

---

"Oh, where's House?!" Arthur bemoaned once again, prompting everyone around him to roll their eyes.

Right at that moment, House walked in through the exit and said briskly, "I'm back."

"Where the bloody hell were you?" Arthur demanded as House slipped on his Scrooge costume again.

"I was taking care of some last minute Christmas shopping," he answered simply.

"Don't you lie to me!" Arthur snapped.

"Fine, don't believe me," House shrugged indifferently, limping toward the stage. "Just don't blame me when Sandy Claus arrives in town and leaves ya a large lump of black coal."

"After all the crap you've put us through, that coal will be left for YOU!" Arthur groaned, slapping his forehead despairingly.

House flapped his right hand like a mouth mockingly and rolled his eyes. The flowing red curtains steadily drew open. "House slowly marched his way to his home through the layer of an inch of snow," Daffy quietly narrated.

"It was a c-c-cold night," Porky stated. "An s-s-sort of c-cold night that s-spelled change…." House finally reached his home, a large forebodingly empty mansion. He reached into his pocket and drew out a cast iron ring of keys, as he flipped through his various keys for his home's House felt a frighteningly cold chill run down his spine.

"Hoooooouse…"

House looked up and down the dark street and saw not a single soul. He shook his head; his old age is playing tricks on him.

"Hoooooooooouse…"

He looked at his gargoyle door knocker and his eyes' pupils shrunk, for his door knocker had become the ghastly image of his dead partner Jacob Cox. "Hoooooooooooooooouse!" it called to him with a dreadful moan.

House shut his eyes tight and, after a second or two, he slowly opened them again. The image had vanished and only his gargoyle door knocker remained. "Bah humbug," he grumbled, annoyed that he allowed something as inconsequential as a partner's death to affect him. He jabbed his key into the mansion's keyhole, turned it, stomped inside and slammed the door shut.

"House p-p-pushed it to t-t-the back of his mind," Porky continued. "But t-t-this was o-o-only the s-s-start of this n-n-night of d-destiny."

House limped into his living space, changed into his nightwear and cap, and carrying a little bowl of cold porridge. He set his cane and dinner gently on to armrest of his armchair that sat before a fireplace. He bent over and stroke up a fire in the fireplace, easing his chilling body and sat back down into his armchair. He dipped a spoon into his porridge and placed the chilly oatmeal into his mouth. House shuddered. "Blah!" he gagged quietly. "Did Bender make this?" Hiding his disgust from the audience, House ate his meal.

He placed his empty bowl on the armrest once again and his eyelids flickered, growing tired. But he was awoken by the sounds of clatter coming from outside the door of the room. Grabbing his cane and wielding it like a club, House shouted, "Who goes there? I'm warning you, I've got a chainsaw!" He pretended to rev a chainsaw and mimicked its sounds. "Rumb-brak-clakka-clakka! Rumb-brak-clakka-clakka!"

"Man, that's stupid!" a large fat man named Homer Simpson in the audience laughed. His loving, but exasperated, wife Marge rolled her eyes.

"Ebenezer Hooooouse!" a chillingly startling voice echoed to House.

"Show yourself!" he demanded, holding up his cane, but regretted it immediately. The sound clomping of shoes etched itself to him, along with those horribly clanging chains. Finally, he arrived. House would have screamed if he could, but was far too frightened. His deceased partner Jacob Cox slowly sauntered toward him. "No, no, you're dead! It can't possibly be you! Be gone from my sight!"

"Face it, pal-y," Cox said scathingly. "The ghost of your dead partner's here in your house. Get over it."

"Oh, yeah, it's you all right," House murmured disdainfully. "What are you doing here, Cox?"

"I'm here to haunt ass and chew bubblegum," he answered. "And I'm all out of bubblegum."

"Can the jokes, Cox," House grumbled, "if that's even you. I probably shouldn't have had that porridge. Probably had spider eggs in it or something…."

"House!" Cox thundered, startling him and causing him to drop to the ground. "Back when I was alive, we had robbed the widows and swindled the poor!"

"Yeah, and all in the same day!" he sighed fondly, reminiscing the past. "Ah, those were some good times. You had class, Cox!"

"Heh, heh, yeah…." Cox smiled proudly, but slapped his own face. "No, what am I talking about?! No! No! I was wrong and foolish to have done that! I had committed cruel and pitiless crimes in life. Now, as punishment for it, my spirit has been banished from the afterlife and forced to wander the world of the living, dragging these heavy chains forever more!"

"That'll explain the bling-bling," House said, holding up one of the chains bound to Cox's arm.

"This is no joke, House!" he boomed, shoving House back into his armchair. "Each of these chain links was every single cruel act I had done. I have suffered…pained…and experienced the rightful karma I had deserved! And I am unable to pass on…. And you are to receive the same fate, Ebenezer House, unless you change your ways now!" he warned, wringing his chains around House's throat.

"No, no, no!" House begged, pushing the chains away. "Please, Cox! Help me! Save me from this terrible judgment!"

"Tonight, you'll be visited by three ghosts," Cox said.

"Including you?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"I mean, are you one of those three ghosts? Or is it one of those after the first ghost kind of deals and then comes the actual first ghost-"

"Focus, House!" Cox roared mightily, creating a gale of a storm to revolve around the room and silencing House. "Three ghosts shall visit you tonight; listen to them, learn from them, understand what you have done, or your own chains will be heavier than mine!"

"More ghosts?" House protested. "I can't even stand seeing you, Cox. How'd you expect me to-?"

"Just do it, you stubborn jackass!" Cox cried out once more, glaring fiercely House in the eyes, and sighed. "You were my friend, House. I wish for you to escape this horrible path I have taken. There is still hope for you. Expect the first ghost tonight when the bell tolls one."

"Cox…" House whispered as he gazed at his old partner slowly ascending through a closed window.

"Change, House…" Cox moaned once again, dragging his chains through the air. "Change…"

His spirit vanished. House wiped away a tear dripping from his eye and stared at it – he angrily waved it away. "Bah! Humbug!" he growled. "What am I getting all sentimental about? I didn't even cry at his funeral!"

House carried a lit candlestick to his bedroom. He was about to crawl into his bed when a through struck him. He cautiously peeked under his bed and found nothing. Sickened with his act, he jumped into the bed and threw the covers over himself. He declared once more, "Spirits…humbug!" and blew out his candle, plunging the room into darkness.

The long ruby curtains drew a close again, and, just as before, the audience clapped their hands at the performance. Hopping out of the bed, House opened the curtains slightly and basked in the peoples' applause. "Ah, my adoring public," he smirked.

"Blah, I'm a better Scrooge than you any day…" Cox mumbled contemptuously, sticking his hands into the pockets of his jacket as he exited the backstage due to that his part of the play was over.

"Hey, Arthur?" Rika called, walking over to the stage manager. "We can't find the costumes for the big dance scene with Scrooge and Belle in the past."

"What?!" he gasped, throwing his clipboard into the air that struck Daffy in the back of the head. "Why not?!"

"I dunno," she shrugged. "They were in the props closet but now they're gone. Oh, and I found this."

Rika handed to Arthur a little card that he recognized immediately as the Phantom of the Gold Soul Theater's. "Argh! Why does this keep happening to me?!" he bemoaned, pulling on his hair. "Have the Janitor and Bloo go to a shop and buy some new ones!"

"Gotcha!" Nodding, Rika quickly made haste.

Arthur clenched his fist irritably. "I'm going to take you down, Mr. Phantom…."