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hanukkahbingo 2023

Fic or Art/Graphic Title: alone in the dark, chapter five : “Shadow of a Thousand Dead” Author/Artist Name: josiebelladonna Fandom: Testament (Band) Jewish or Jew-Ish Character(s): Alex Skolnick (and how) Bingo Squares Being Filled: latkes, applesauce, sour cream, anti-assimilation, smashing fascists 🔥 Rating: Mature Warning(s): Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings Link to Work: x @aimmyarrowshigh

I awoke to the gray light of the morning outside, and the feeling of a warm little body right next to me in the bed. For a second, I believed that I had woken up back home in the safety of my bed and with my girlfriend in my arms. But the feeling only lasted for a second, and I remembered that I was in the grandparents’ house, and it was Christine had nestled up against me like a little teddy bear. I ran my hand down the middle of her spine to the band of her pajama pants: the thought still lingered in the back of my mind, the one that told me to keep my hands off her lest someone in her family find out about it at some point, whether it came about after I left or not.

She groaned in her throat as she buried her head right into my chest. Her hands had found their way down onto the seat of my pants for a good feeling: every so often, her fingers pulsated on me for a little squeeze. Whenever she did it, I curled my toes and snickered. The feeling was new to me, and I couldn’t help but feel tickled by it.

She gave me a squeeze, and I chuckled a little louder that time.

I knew the rain had died down a bit, so I could be heard in there, but I wanted her in particular to hear me, though.

“Like squeezing a ripe avocado,” she whispered. “A nice, full, round, sweet, delicious little avocado—” She squeezed me again, and I rolled away from her enough to where her hand rested on my hip. I looked on at her and the tip of her tongue tucked into the corner of my mouth. “You have such a nice butt,” she remarked.

“If you like my butt, then surely you like my belly, too,” I told her as I ran my fingers through my hair and pushed my head down into the pillow so she could see the edge of my jaw and the side of my neck as well.

“Beautiful neck,” she remarked in a low voice. “Very beautiful neck.” She inched closer to me with her fingers up to my neck for a little stroke.

“Don’t tell me you have a fancy for necks, too,” I quipped to her.

“For yours,” she retorted back to me; she pushed her head in closer to the side of my neck for a soft kiss on the side.

“Ooh, that feels good,” I noted.

“You like that?” she whispered into my ear.

“I love it so much—more—more—” She kissed me some more, right on the tender spot right on the spot between the nape and the edge of my shoulder. Her lips were soft, and she touched me with such delicacy that to compare it to the tips of feathers would just cheapen it.

“I love how sensual you are,” I said to her.

“It’s funny, I don’t think of myself as such,” she confessed right into my ear. She buried her nose and lips back into the side of my neck, which only made me relax even more. The rain may have died down a bit, but I was feeling so cozy.

“I really don’t want to leave this bed,” I confessed to her.

“And I don’t want you to leave, either,” she whispered to me. Her hand slid down my chest and down onto my belly, and I realized that I had slept without a shirt on all this time.

“You should wear those leather pants again,” she suggested.

“Wear them after I eat all of the gelt, the latkes, the rugelach, the kreplach, and the sufganiyot and the waist band is so tight after that?” I teased her.

“Wear them after you eat all of that, and you also get tied up in lace and latex, too,” she added with a little flick of her eyebrows.

“I’m kind of intrigued by this whole… thing that you’re into,” I confessed to her. “It’s interesting and I find it tickling me whenever I think about it, too. Wanting to see me with a little extra weight on my body to the point I have a little belly going.”

She hung over me so her short red hair dangled down over the side of her head and face, like a little cherry wave from a primordial ocean. Her eyes twinkled from the mere suggestion of it all. Not only had she woken something in me, but I had a hunch that I had woken something up in her. She licked her lips and ran her fingers through her short hair so I could see her whole face.

“And it’s hanging over the belt of your pants, too,” she quipped with a slight gyration of her head. “I wanna feed you and feel you and keep you all to myself. I want to hide you in the closet and sneak you out when my mom isn’t looking.”

I cracked her a playful little smile at the sound of that.

“Oh, that’s so sweet,” I remarked, and my voice broke with sleep. “But I have to keep a life of my own or I’ll wither away. My parents will be worried sick about me.”

“But we’ll take good care of you, though,” she promised me. “We’ll tell your parents that we’re taking good care of you, especially when you have very little places to go after this.”

“That is… so, so sweet, Christine,” I told her with a slight shake of my head upon the pillow. She leaned into my face for another kiss, that time on my lips. I thought about what she had told me the night before, in that she would want to kiss me all the time, and that was all I could think about, as well.

She lifted up and gazed straight into my eyes, and a rich warmth swept over me like the wave of hair upon her head. She licked her lips and ran her fingers through my hair, the little ringlets on the right side, right underneath the streak. I showed her the tip of my tongue and rested my hands upon my chest.

“I want you to say it,” she whispered to me, and I caught the sound of the rain on the roof once again, albeit at a rather soft pace.

“Say what?” I asked her.

“That you’re sexy,” she replied.

“That I’m sexy?” I chuckled.

“You’re really sexy,” she confessed as she tucked a stray ringlet behind my ear. “I swear, if you my age, I would want to be with you all the time. If you were my age, I would have my hand tucked into your back pants pocket just so I could feel your nice little ass.”

I raised my eyebrows at her.

“Would you?”

Christine brought her lips to mine again, that time with a bit more spice and a bit more force as well. She had a hold on me, an absolute death grip on me, like the blizzard over the Rockies. She was making the feelings inside me swell like the cold waters which gathered around the property and the base of the hill. I couldn’t help but let my chest rise up from the feeling. My heart pounded inside of my chest, and she held onto the sides of my face with nothing more than the tips of her fingers.

She let go and gazed into my eyes again. My head spun and my heart hammered inside me. I could feel myself firming up in between my thighs, and all I could do was lay there with my eyes locked onto her.

“You look so good,” she cooed to me with a sweet smile on her face.

“This is—so good,” I gasped out, and I had no idea what came over me right then. “Kiss me—please, Christine, kiss me. I need it, and you need it. Kiss me and feel me. I want you to feel my hair, too. I need you. I need to feel you.”

“And I need to feel you—” she whispered back to me.

She kissed me again, that time with that same force as well as her hand tucked in at the back of my head: her fingers entwined around the roots of my hair and she gave me a little tug at the back. She moved her lips down to the side of my neck for another tender little kiss. I closed my eyes and rested my hand on the small of her back.

She lay down on top of me, and I could feel her heart was pounding as well. I lifted my fingers off her back just so she was the one feeling me.

I gave myself to her.

It was all I needed, the feeling of someone loving me and nourishing me, and I couldn’t believe that I was going to have to leave it all behind me at one point. The feeling was silky and soft, and it only left me feeling even warmer than I had the mere few hours before then.

Christine rested her knee on the side of my hip, as if she was grounding me right there in the bed.

For a second, I had forgotten everything that brought me up to that point. I had forgotten about all the times I was up on stage with a leather vest and I left it open for everyone to see my skin and the hair on my chest. Right as I thought that, she ran her fingers down my chest. She stroked the fine little sprigs of hair with nothing more than the tips of her fingers. It was as if she had read my mind and knew exactly where to touch and feel me.

Most of all, I had forgotten my ex. In fact, I forgot I even had an ex to begin with: all I knew about was Christine, her precocious power and passion. She lightly caressed me and held me, as if we had known each other for far longer than a mere twelve hours. She nestled down next to me, and she used my body as her pillow. I was her rock right then. I was her crutch, and I was more than happy to be that for her as well.

She never did stop kissing me as well, even after she lay back down next to me with her hand rested upon the side of my neck.

“Oh, that was wonderful,” I breathed out to her as she lightly stroked the hair at the very top of my head. “Where did you learn to make out like that?”

“All of the times that I made out with my hand,” she replied. “I also thought about the times I considered making out with my ex, too.”

“He would have been so lucky,” I confessed to her. She sighed through her nose at that, and I rolled my head over the top of the pillow for a better look into her eyes and the wistful look in them. “He would have been so—so lucky,” I repeated, that time in a low whisper of a voice.

“By the way, I love how your voice gets all husky and soft whenever you feel good,” she noted.

“It does?”

“Oh, yeah. It almost feels like you're whispering a secret to me. It also helps that you and I are laying in bed together, too. I notice you talking like that last night.”

“Well, 'cause there's no power in the house. Anything we say or do is going to be heard, and I remember you telling me just that last night, too.”

“Sound travels in this house as if the walls are made of copper tinfoil,” she replied with a wiggle of her eyebrows. “And by the way, I also love how warm you are, too.”

“It's what I get for being a soft boy, eh?” I joked to her.

“You are soft!” she replied with a little tap of the tip of my nose, and then she put her arm around my waist. “Very soft, indeed.”

“Christine?” Wendy's voice floated in from the hallway right then. Christine herself meanwhile, closed her eyes and sighed again.

“Is the door closed?” I asked her in a low voice.

“Yeah, it is...” With a groan, she let me go and sat up in the bed next to me. She climbed out of the bed by the time her mother called her name once again.

“Yeah?” she called out.

“Where are you?” Wendy followed up.

“In here!”

“Where?”

Christine reached for the bedroom door and flung it open, and right as I was getting out of bed as well. Luckily for the both of us, she only had to adjust her pajama pants where I had to fix everything on me in order to appear decent. I hoped to whatever that her mother did not get the wrong idea about us, and especially about me—

“Oh, there you are!” Wendy declared as she strode up to the doorway. “I didn't see you in your room and I wondered if you and Alex had gone out walking together.”

“No way,” I assured her as I slid my legs out from under the covers; I cleared my throat as I thought of an excuse right as she walked on up to the door. “I was telling Christine when she came in here a little bit ago that I didn't want to leave this bed because it's so warm and it's all so cold in here, too.”

“It really is! Is that why the door was closed?”

“Oh, yeah, yeah,” Christine assured her with a nod. “I came in here earlier and he was like 'close the door! It's freezing in here!' and so I did.” She shrugged her shoulders.

“What time is it, by the way?” I asked Wendy.

“It's seven thirty,” she replied. “But I was going to ask you kids if you wanted some coffee from the market a few blocks from here.”

“Ooh, I definitely would,” I said as I rubbed my hands over my upper arms. I turned my attention to Christine. “Have you seen my shirt?” And she shook her head. I peered over to the desk on the other side of the room, where I spotted my coat but not my shirt, however.

“Maybe you oughta go without the shirt,” Wendy suggested. “You know, just wear your coat over your body and have nothing more than your pants, too.”

“Yeah, and with my hair down like this, I'd look like Michael Hutchence,” I said with a chuckle, but I decided to do just that regardless of my own insecurity, though. I slung the coat around my body and ran my fingers through my hair.

“So hot,” Wendy remarked with a little twinkle to her eye. It apparently ran in the family as I had a hunch that she liked me as well. I didn't really want to dig deep into that because I knew that she and her husband were separated but not properly divorced: I needn't have that on my conscience as well. Nevertheless, I followed the two women out to the hallway, which was still somewhat dark despite the sun having risen up and the fact that we no longer needed hurricane lanterns and candles as far as I knew.

I fixed the lapels of my coat and took a seat at the kitchen table: I moved my coat around so only the top part of my chest was exposed to the two of them as well as the grandparents. My own freedom aside, they needn't see me like this, and not when there was a lot to do in that house to serve as a proper distraction, either. I kept my left hand tucked into my pocket to keep my coat closed off, and my right hand rested upon the table before me, and I watched Wendy put on her boots and her jacket as well before she headed out to the rain.

“It's not that far,” she assured us with a shake of her head. “I'll be right back.”

“We'll be here,” I promised her with a little smile; she scooped up her keys and ducked out to the rain, which still fell in utter droves out there. I was curious if there was any sort of flooding down the road from us as well. I then turned to Christine, who took her seat right next to me: her red hair seemed to shimmer under the gray light, and I couldn't recall her skin appearing that creamy smooth, either.

“We got anything to nosh on?” I asked her.

“Nosh?” She raised an eyebrow at me.

“Yeah. Like something to eat before breakfast, or before your mom comes back with the coffee. Don't tell me you haven't noshed before.”

“I've noshed, I've noshed,” she insisted with a nod of her head, and then she sauntered over to the table and rested her hands on the edge furthest from me. She leaned forward so I could only see a small window of her chest right then.

“Nice try,” I told her, and she glanced down at her chest.

“Nice try what? You don't like what you see here?”

“You need a top with a lower neckline,” I said with a straight face. “I do like it, but... if you're going to do that, wear a top with a lower neck, though. You know, I want to see more of the boobs, not just a tiny little peek the size of my thumb. Besides—” I took a glance over my shoulder to the gray shadows right behind me: her grandparents were still sound asleep in the room at the far end of the hallway; I remembered we had to put the screen back onto the window near the back door as well. I then returned to her, still with a straight face. “I'm a leg man.”

“You're a leg man?” she asked me with a grin. “Well, why didn't you say so?”

She hoisted her left leg up onto the chair next to me and lifted up the bottom of her pajama pants, to which I giggled at her.

“Hey, now, you gotta have the proper clothing,” I said.

“I'm in proper clothing!” she insisted as she rolled it up to her knee.

“Nah, you need like fishnets or something to accentuate all of this...” I gestured to her, and then I let my eyes wander onto her, onto the curvature of her lower legs as well as her ankles. I was a bastard for thinking about it, but I pictured her in shorts, and I had a feeling she was going to do something for me before our time was up here at the house.

“Question,” I started again, and I kept my voice low again lest her grandparents hear us in there.

“Hm?”

“Do you have any pedal pushers?”

“Pedal pushers, like... capri pants?”

“Not really,” I said with a shake of my head. “They're kinda fitted and they only go to your knees. They're—dare I say—hot. They're quite hot.”

“Like you and that coat of yours?” she teased me back, and I gave my hair a little toss back with the flick of my head. I let the coat sling open so she could see more of my chest.

“I guess you could say that,” I told her with a little shrug of my shoulders.

“You guess? You guess or you know?” She pressed her hands to her hips, and she straightened out her spine so her chest was so prominent right before me.

“Man, your mom wasn't exaggerating, you do have a thing for me,” I teased her, and she giggled at that.

“What, did you think that those kisses I gave you were all lies?” she retorted back to me.

“I never said that,” I assured her with a shake of my head, and I couldn't resist laughing, either. It had been quite some time since I had a playful debate like this with someone else, let alone a girl, that I could not help but laugh to myself.

“But you did imply it, though!” she insisted, and she began laughing as well.

“What do you mean? That I have some sort of secret that I'm harboring for you?” I ran my fingers through the ringlets on the side of my head.

“You could be,” she teased me, and she set her foot back down on the floor so she stood before me like Wonder Woman.

“Like what?” I asked her as I leaned back in the chair, and I let the coat open up for her to see all of me. Just like the leather vest up on stage with Testament.

“Maybe you like me,” she answered.

“Of course I like you,” I quipped to her. “I mean, that should be obvious. I mean...” I glanced over my shoulder again, and then I returned to her. “I let you kiss me and sleep in my bed with me.”

“Hey, now, I didn't just kiss you but I also held you and rubbed that little belly of yours.” She wagged her finger at me as if she was lecturing me.

“Plus, you've been flirting with me and looking at me all wide-eyed this whole entire time. I mean, it's no secret to me.”

“Back up, I thought this was about you, not me,” she chided.

“Yeah, it is,” I replied with a straight face. “It just makes sense to bring you into the fold because you're the one doing all of the action.”

“What, you're passing the buck onto me?” she asked me with her hand pressed onto her chest.

“Yes. Yes, I am! You came onto me, not the other way around.”

“Ah, but you let me come onto you,” she quipped with another wag of her finger. “It's not all about me, after all.”

“I think it is! You wanted to get close to me because your mother was right and you have a thing for me.”

“And you don't have a thing for me?” she demanded with a flutter of her eyelashes and a slight raise of her head.

“I never said I don't,” I assured her as I ran my fingers through my hair again, and I couldn't resist the smile on my face. She cocked her head to the side, and she stepped on closer to me, and all the while, her hands never lifted off from her hips. She stood right before my knees, and I wanted to know what exactly it was that she thought right then. I nibbled on my bottom lip, while she ran her tongue along her top row of teeth.

“You really do look like Michael Hutchence,” she told me, and I gave my hair a quick flip with the flick of my head.

“I'm not as good of a singer as him, though,” I pointed out.

“You ought to be,” she suggested. “I can just imagine you singing with this really sexy, really husky baritone, all dressed up like this, too. You'd make my teenage dreams come true in a hot flash.”

“Well, I'd have to take singing lessons and really step into my own, neither of which are a walk in the park, especially the last one. Ever since my breakup and when I left my band, it's been a tall order to try and find my footing, especially within myself.”

“Shall I help with that?” She stooped over before me and even though her chest wasn't all that exposed to me, I still let my eyes wander there. “Eyes up here, big boy.” She pointed to her face.

“'Big boy', that's something I haven't heard before,” I said to her, and I couldn't help but laugh again.

“You really never believed you were a big boy?” she teased me.

“Of course I did. I mean, I practically dwarf you and your mom, of course I know I'm big.”

“No. I mean... you really never believed you were a big boy?” She ran her tongue along her bottom lip again, and that time, she dropped her gaze to my body. I followed her gaze and I realized she was looking at my lap.

“Yeah, you, me, and my leather pants,” I told her; right as she glanced up, I flashed her a wink.

“Will you wear those again?” she asked me.

“Maybe. It depends.”

“It depends on what?”

“It depends on what you wanna do here while you're face to face with me. You wanted to help me find my footing.”

“Of course,” she replied, and she kissed the tip of my nose, which caught me by surprise. She giggled and showed me her tongue.

“Ah, yes, a nice game of 'kiss the schnoz',” I said with a straight face, and she burst out laughing at that. She stood up before me for a second, and then she ran her fingers through her red hair.

“Man, and I thought I was saucy,” I muttered.

“It's funny 'cause I wasn't always like this,” she told me.

“Neither was I! It's like when we get together and everyone is still asleep, we bring out the—what we call in my family—chutzpah in each other.” She paused for a second, and then she gazed on down the shadowy hallway, and my heart skipped a few beats as a result. “Are your grandparents awake?” I asked her in a low voice close to a whisper.

“I don't think they are,” she confessed, also in a low voice. “I just thought they were.” She then returned to me with a flex of her eyebrows again as well as a slight twinkle in her eye. “Yeah, I guess we do bring out the—what'd you call it again?”

“Chutzpah. A bit of—” I stood up before her, still with the coat wide open for her to see the hair on my chest as well as my bare belly. “—walking around like you've got it and I want it. Or rather—” I pressed my hands to my hips. “I've got it and you want it.”

“Or perhaps I've got it and you actually want it,” she retorted back to me with a gentle stroke of my chest. She licked her lips at the feeling of my skin, and then she moved her hand back up to my chest hair. “You have really sexy chest hair. I didn't think I was all that enticed by a guy's chest hair, especially when my dad used to be all thick with it when I was little, but... here I am. Feeling attracted to chest hair.”

“Go ahead and touch me,” I insisted to her, and she used both hands to stroke me. She wound some of that hair around the tips of her fingers, which felt a bit better than her hands on my belly but I wasn't going to complain or split hairs.

“I like how it's just these cute little tufts all over your chest,” she remarked.

“Would you rather I have a full rug on my chest like that of a gorilla?” I asked her, and she wrinkled her nose and giggled at that.

“Nah, this is—this is kind of perfect, actually,” she confessed. “In fact, it's... it's making me all tingly.”

“It's making you tingly? It's making you tingly where?”

“You know where,” she replied.

“Oh, you mean—below the equator,” I said. “In the heart of the deepest pits of the Dead Sea.” And she snickered at that; right then, I caught the sound of her grandfather saying something.

“I think they're awake,” I told her, and she took her hands off of me and sniffed her palms. “Wow.” I raised my eyebrows at that.

“Would you rather I took my hands off of you and put them down my pants?” she retorted to me, and I nibbled on my bottom lip at that.

“I ain't telling you,” I quipped to her, and she giggled at that.

“So that was perfect is what you're telling me?” she asked me as I closed the top three buttons of my coat to have some modesty before her grandparents came into the room right then.

“It was interesting,” I said to her with a slight flutter of my eyelashes to her, and she snickered and sniffed her palms yet again.

“Mmm, smells like a boy,” she told me; she turned her head towards the hallway, and then she turned her body away from me, and I could only assume that her grandparents were coming down the hall. I sank back down to the chair while Christine made her way over to the sink: for a second, I believed she was going to wash her hands, but she got herself a drink of water instead.

The front door then swung open, and I was greeted by the smell of the rain as well as fresh coffee.

“Ah, the two best smells in the world right there,” I declared as Wendy nearly stumbled into the house; I strode on over to her to help her out with the cardboard carrier and the four cups of coffee: I noticed she held one in her hand as well.

“Phew—” Once the door was closed, she stripped her hood off her head and gave her hair a shake.

“Wet?” I asked her.

“Quite,” she replied. “I forgot to ask you how you like your coffee so I just got you a plain espresso.”

“Oh, that's okay! I like me some espresso.”

“It's the one closest to you, and I should also say that—” I raised my eyebrows to her. “The airport is still closed,” she told me. “The clerk in the store told me about it and I knew I had to tell you once I got back home. And I feel like it’s going to be closed for another day, too. I mean, it is just pouring rain right now, like I'm amazed there hasn't been flooding outside.”

I sighed through my nose, and I picked out my cup of coffee from the bunch before I set it down on the kitchen table for Christine and her grandparents. I then doubled back to the front door and I peered outside to the street as well as the drenched yard. What snow had fallen had completely gone at that point, and at least it wasn’t snowing again, but the sheer amount of rain that was falling out there only made me all the more concerned about how and when to get on home to my parents. It was Sunday, and the sands of the hourglass dwindled down with every passing second.

I had no idea if these people had a menorah on hand or any sort of candle that lit up with oil.

I couldn't stop thinking about it, either, such that I neglected to bide the grandparents with a simple good morning.

“So, if the airport is still closed for the next, say, couple of days, that means he misses the first night of Hanukkah with his parents,” her grandfather followed along, to which I sighed through my nose yet again. I sipped on the espresso, only to feel the first twinges of hunger within. I turned my attention to Christine's grandmother, who strode up next to me with her cup of coffee as well as a glass of water.

“Are there still mashed potatoes?” I asked her.

“Oh, yeah, there’s plenty,” she replied, and then her face lit up. “We want some of those potato pancakes, don’t we.”

“Yeah, we do,” I replied to her, and I could feel my own face growing warm.

“Well, once we've had a bit more coffee, we'll fire up the hot plate and slice up some onions and get the olive oil out, and we could have some latkes.”

“Do you have applesauce or sour cream, too? I like mine with either one.”

“I think we do!”

“And I think we do have some oil candles, too?” Wendy assured me as she strode on into the room from behind her. “We’re probably going to be lighting candles every night for the next couple of days, anyway. That is until they get the power lines fixed, and we aren’t relying on a hot plate and some open flames, as well. They’re these little white candles, too—I'm not sure, but I feel like they're like the ones you would see on a menorah.”

“Oh, perfect!” I said, and I turned my attention to the hearth on the other side of the room. Right in between the framed photographs of Wendy, Christine, and other members of the family as well as a small wreath of orange leaves, acorns, and pine cones, stood a blank spot that looked to be big enough for a row of candles for a makeshift menorah.

“Do you have nine?” I asked her. “A menorah has nine in order to be kosher: four on either side followed by the shamash in the middle, and it’s gotta be offset from the other ones a bit.”

“Oh, yes,” she replied. “We could have the eight lined up on the hearth, and then the ninth one can be pushed back a little bit.”

“You're a guest in our house,” Christine's grandmother told me with a hand rested upon my shoulder. “The best thing we can do is make this place feel like home for a while.”

“Thank you,” I told her with a little bow of my head and a sip of my coffee. I then returned to the kitchen where Christine and her grandfather were in fact starting up the hot plate and gathering the potatoes out for the latkes. It wasn't going to be like those from my mom or my grandmother for that matter, but I wasn't going to turn them down for nothing, though.

There was in fact a jar of applesauce there in the kitchen, and I was eager to have a nice little plate for that morning as well as the cup of warm espresso. Once I had taken my seat on the couch in the living room to see how the makeshift menorah would look, for a second, I really did believe I was back home with my parents and my grandparents. If I hadn't known better, I would have sworn that I was a teenage boy again back at my family's house right outside of New York. No sooner had I sipped on my coffee again when I thought about calling my mother again to tell her what was happening.

And no sooner had I thought that when there was a knock on the door.

“I'll get it!” Wendy declared, and she doubled back past me to the front door. She opened it to reveal a short man with salt and pepper hair wrapped in a beige coat.

“Hello, dear,” he greeted Wendy, and all I could think about was Sir Anthony Hopkins right then.

“Kenny!” Wendy gasped.

“Dad?” Christine sputtered, and she stalked out of the kitchen to see what was the matter. Her grandfather followed suit with a plate of latkes and a bowl of applesauce for me.

“Here, son,” he told me. “Happy Hanukkah.”

“Thank you so much,” I whispered to him, and then he turned his attention to the front door.

“Oh, hello, Kenny, what’re you doing here?” he greeted him rather coolly.

“I got caught in the makeshift swamp right outside here, and I remembered that this is my in-laws’ house,” he said in a single breath, and he barged in like he owned the place. “Smells good in here, what's cooking?”

“Something that doesn't involve you,” Wendy scoffed as she closed the door part of the way to keep any more cold air out of the house; and then he turned his attention to me, to which he curled one side of his lip at me.

“Who’s this funny-looking little runt?”

“Kenny, he’s not funny-looking!” Wendy insisted; Christine slid next to me and hunkered closer to me. Kenny frowned at me and pressed his hands to his hips. I swallowed and shifted my weight. It had been some time since I had experienced something like this before, with my ex’s father looking down at me because of the streak on my head and the full bulbous tip of my nose, and the fact that I was eating latkes fresh off the griddle with a little bowl of applesauce to the side.

“You keep your hands off my daughter,” he warned me, and I swallowed at that.

“Dad, he’s a good guy,” Christine assured him, slightly heated.

“Alex is a sweet guy!” Wendy exclaimed.

“I’m just here because I can’t get home otherwise, sir,” I sputtered out, and I held my plate of latkes close to me.

“I hope that's all you're doing,” he told me in a curt voice.

“Alright, get out of here,” Christine's grandfather ordered him. “Until you start talking to my daughter again like a mature adult, I don't want to see you, I don't want to know you, I don't want to know anything about you.”

“One hand on my Christine and you're target practice for me,” he warned me with his finger right in my face.

“That's enough!” Wendy snapped, and she tugged him aside and escorted him back outside. I turned my attention to Christine, who then shook her head.

“I have no clue how he got here,” she confessed to me in a low voice.

“I don't think anyone does,” I assured her with a shake of my head. “I'm just glad he's out of here.” And she nodded at that. Wendy returned to the living room, whereby she shut the door behind her and locked it. She ran her fingers through her hair and let out a low whistle before she stood in front of the two of us.

“I'm so sorry,” Wendy told me, to which I shook my head. “Well, now you know why he and I are separated.”

“It's okay,” I assured her. “No, really! I've seen plenty of assholes in my day.” And she snickered at that. “The one thing that got me about him was it just totally caught me off guard is all. I also want to know why he was here, too.”

“How he got here, too,” Christine added.

“Yeah, that, too. Well, at least he didn't kill me. I can eat knowing that I survived it.” And with that, I took a bite of latke, and I nodded my head at that. “Oh, yeah, that's the stuff right there.”

#panfandom hanukkah bingo 2023 #testament (band)#alex skolnick

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hanukkahbingo · 5 months

Text

An addendum to @25daysofvoyager day 8 submission:

Final chapter of A Very Voyager Holiday is now up on AO3!

There's a bit more Hanukkah in there too, for @hanukkahbingo

Full final chapter is below the cut, but if you want to read the whole thing, you'll have to go to AO3

The morning briefing was just wrapping up when Captain Janeway turned her attention to her morale officer. “I believe that concludes all official business. Now, Neelix, how is the holiday party planning coming along?”

Neelix sat up a little straighter in his chair and tried not to appear flustered. He hadn’t been expecting to give a report today and there was still so much to do and only a few days left to do it all! “Right on schedule, Captain,” he declared. “With so many traditions to incorporate, it looks like the celebration will go for several days! Uh, several evenings, rather. We can’t have the whole ship at a stand still for a whole week, now can we?” he chuckled to himself.

Janeway looked mildly horrified when she interjected “A week, Neelix? That sounds a little… extreme, don’t you think?”

“Oh, no, Captain! A lot of the holidays last for several days! Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Las Posadas all last a week or more!” Neelix reassured her.

“Yes, I understand and people who celebrate those holidays are welcome to do so for their full duration. But let’s keep the official celebration to…” she glanced at Chakotay and Tuvok for confirmation, “... no longer than three days? Three evenings,” she ordered gently.

“Er, ah, yes, Captain, I can make that work,” Neelix acquiesced.

Janeway rose to her feet and called the meeting to a close, dismissing the senior staff. Neelix lingered, however, and he approached her once everyone else was gone.

“Was there something else, Neelix?” she asked curtly, though not unkindly.

He fumbled for the right words. “Well, it’s just a small thing… barely worth mentioning really… only…”

“Spit it out, Neelix,” Janeway ordered.

“I’m concerned that we don’t have enough dilithium for me to prepare everything in only three days,” the Talaxian blurted out. “There are a lot of different types of food, and decorations, and I was planning to spread out my replicator use over a week so there would be time to recharge, but now I have to do it in less than half that time and–”

The captain held up a hand to keep Neelix from babbling again. “Neelix, you have my permission to replicate as much as you need to. It’s been a rough few months; the crew deserves a good celebration. And besides, Seven thinks she has found a planet rich with dilithium about a week from our current position so we’ll be able to restock soon.”

“Oh! Thank you, Captain! If you’re sure… oh, that’s wonderful!” Neelix bubbled.

“Of course, I’ll have B’Elanna keep an eye on the energy levels and if we are getting too low, you’ll have to stop immediately. Understood?”

“Absolutely! Oh, Ensign Kim will be so happy that I can make his patjuk - there really isn’t a good substitute for the red beans, you know - and we’ll be able to have the Bajoran fireworks display on the holodeck, the talent show for Kwanzaa’s evening of creativity… Oh! And Lieutenant Paris’ Festivus pole! Thank you, Captain. You won’t regret it. This will be a holiday to remember!” Neelix exclaimed as he rushed out of the room.

Captain Janeway shook her head in amusement as the doors slid closed behind Neelix. His unbridled enthusiasm was both contagious and exhausting. She turned to pick up the small stack of PADDs on the table and stopped suddenly.

Did he say ‘Festivus pole’?

***

Neelix most certainly had said ‘Festivus pole.’ Further research into the holiday of Festivus had led him to an acceptable alternative to fighting the captain, and the newly replicated pole now stood proudly next to the Christmas tree.

With Naomi’s help (and unlimited replicator access), Neelix had put together a holiday celebration for the ages.

In addition to the tree and the pole, a Hanukkah menorah and a Kwanzaa kinara were prominently on display in the center of the mess hall, each fully lit with holographic candles that could last all night. There was even a Vulcan prayer candle, despite Tuvok’s insistence that it wasn’t necessary to include any Vulcan rituals as their holidays were usually celebrated in solitary meditation.

Tables of food lined the room, representing all the different cultures and religions. Neelix was far too busy playing host and running between the mess hall and the holodeck to explain the dishes in person as he usually would, so it had been Naomi’s idea to include labels explaining what the dish was and which tradition it belonged to.

Thanks to the captain’s generosity with the replicator, Neelix was able to make both traditional and Delta Quadrant versions of many of the dishes. In most cases, the traditional dishes were more popular, but the surprise hit was Neelix’s Leola root latkes. Tom even went so far as to suggest that this be the primary preparation for Leola root going forward but Neelix insisted that they would be reserved for the holiday so that they remained special.

The holodeck was very busy for the three days as well. There was a packed schedule of performances and activities, including traditional spirit dances of both the Trebus and Earth varieties, Klingon opera (performed by the Doctor and a troupe of holograms, of course. B’Elanna refused to have any part of it), a talent show to celebrate creative expression, and a nightly Bajoran fireworks display, just to name a few.

During the daytime, the holodeck was transformed into a winter wonderland. Off-duty crew (and there were a lot, since the ship was operating with a skeleton crew for the holidays) could stop by at any time to build snowmen, go sledding, or sit by the fire with hot cocoa. Neelix even heard a rumor that Captain Janeway and Commander Chakotay had spent some time strolling in the snow together hand in hand - but he found that harder to believe than the rumor that Lieutenants Paris and Torres had started a massive snowball fight between bridge officers and engineering.

On the morning after the final evening of celebrating, Naomi found Neelix in the mess hall, sitting next to a half-packed box of ornaments. He had a sort of far away look on his face and, sure, enough, he jumped in surprise when Naomi tapped his shoulder.

“Oh! Hello, Naomi!” Neelix exclaimed with a tired smile and just a bit less exuberance than usual.

The perceptive child squinted at him, threw her arms around his neck, and asked “Neelix, are you ok?”

Neelix caught Naomi in his arms and hugged her for a moment before placing her back on the floor. “Oh yes, just a little post-holiday blues. Nothing to worry about,” he reassured her. He chuckled softly and added, “Who would have thought that I’d run out of energy before the replicators?”

“Oh! That’s what I came to tell you!” Naomi remembered suddenly. “It’s a Hanukkah miracle!”

Neelix looked at her quizzically so Naomi explained further. “The replicator shouldn’t have had enough energy to last the whole week - but it did! And Mom says we’ll even have enough to get us to that dilithium planet to restock!”

“That’s wonderful, Naomi, but what does that have to do with Hanukkah miracles?” Neelix wondered.

“Neelix!” Naomi whined, starting to get annoyed. “It’s like how the oil was only supposed to last one day but it lasted eight!”

Neelix’s eyes grew wide with realization. “Do you know, I spent so much time planning the party, I never learned about any of the actual holidays!”

Naomi giggled, “Neelix! We’ll have to work on that for next year. Like, did you know that Bolians celebrate because…”

Naomi continued to catalog all she had learned about holidays but Neelix wasn’t listening. His brain had shut down at the words ‘next year.’

#panfandom hanukkah bingo 2023 #star trek

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