There was a general chorus of “Okay” and “G’night” and “Thanks, Mrs. Rodriguez” as the group making for the puptents headed down the stairs. But as she followed Dairine and Carmela and Ronan and Filif and Matt and Marcus and Sker’ret toward the stairs, Nita looked over her shoulder and saw Kit’s mama stop him as he picked up the pot of cocoa.
“Sweetie, I keep meaning to ask you…”
“What, Mama?”
“All this stuff Legs has brought us is really lovely…”
“Yeah, it is!”
“And you should thank him again. But one question.”
“Yeah?”
She lowered her voice. “I was kind of nervous. I didn’t know if it was a religious thing…”
“What?”
“Why is so much of this food blue?”
***
Nita hung back a little to help Kit with the cocoa if he needed it. “Is she okay?” she said. “They don’t think we’re ditching them?”
“They’re fine,” Kit said. “They look about ready to start Adult Talk. Best time for us to get out, yeah?”
Nita nodded as they got to the bottom of the stairs. Kit’s basement looked much like hers, except tidier: it wasn’t the catch-all area that her family’s basement had turned into over time. Over against the back wall were several wide vertical dark patches that marked inactive portals, but one, the central one, glowed golden with activity and light from its far side. They stepped through.
Nita looked around and breathed out, nodding. Dairine’s description of Roshaun’s puptent space from his previous visit as “overdone” was at best an inadequate summation of a tall bright space full of gilding, of rich carpets and hangings and ornately carven furniture. Instead of the usual bright light pouring in from the hot bright sun of Wellakh, though, the windows were dark, and lamps standing on tall pedestals around the edges of the room were lit, casting a subdued light over everything, catching the glint of a gem here, the sheen of a carving there. And in the middle of it all, in front of a trio of big sofas arranged in a U-shape, and heaps of big pillows and cushions, was a twin of the entertainment center upstairs.
Kit paused and stared. “Uh… Dair, I think they might complain about us just moving this down here…”
Dairine was already flopped down among the pillows. “Kit,” she said, scornful but only gently so. “The very first thing I did when I got to be a wizard was duplicate a computer. You think cloning the entertainment system is a problem? Especially with hardware support.” She stroked Spot’s case: he arched his “back” against the gesture. “All I had to do was make sure the remotes have different ID chips in them so they won’t wind up countermanding each other.”
“In other words,” Carmela said, “now we can have… a movie marathon!!”
This suggestion was met with general agreement, as the possibility had first started being mentioned about the same time the invitations went out. “After all that food,” Kit said, “I wouldn’t mind stretching out for a while…”
“And after all that excitement,” Filif said, from where he’d settled behind the centermost sofa, “a little relaxation will be welcome.”
“Anybody wants to change into night stuff,” Dairine said, “there are changing rooms through that arch there…”
“And then Ice cream!” Carmela said, while Dairine grabbed the remote and brought up the same TV guide they’d been looking at earlier. Ten minutes or so went by while everybody changed into sweats or pajamas or other comfortable latenight wear, though Marcus elected to stay in his fatigues.
Filif had been reading the onscreen TV guide while the others had been putting themselves together “’A Christmas Carol,’” Filif said when everybody had made themselves comfortable. “Kit, your mama said that there would be caroling tomorrow… is this something to do with that?”
Kit shook his head. “Not really. Or not directly. It’s about a guy who loses the meaning of Christmas…”
“Fil should see that!” Nita said.
“Yeah, but which one?”
Filif rustled in surprise. “There’s more than one version of this story?”
“It’s like the bigger Christmas story that way,” Ronan said. “A lot of variation, a lot of different ways to look at it…”
Nita looked over at Dairine. “Line a few of them up?”
She picked up the remote. “Sure. But I want popcorn!”
“I’ll get that,” Nita said, knowing where Kit kept the stuff that he microwaved. But she’d barely stood up when she was distracted by some one appearing out of nowhere…in a red “tuxedo” pajama top and green pants.
“Darryl!” Nita and Kit said in unison, as the new arrival plunged around the room hugging everyone in sight, and briefly nearly losing himself in Filif’s lower branches.
“My God,” Ronan said. “How’ve your folks let you out this late?”
Darryl shrugged. “They think I’m home in bed.” He smiled. “I am home in bed.”
“Not dressed like that, I hope!”
“Yup.”
“You’re a terror!”
“Not as much as him. Hi Matt!”
“Gonzo boy! Have some ice cream.”
“How long can you stay?” Nita said.
“Until I fall asleep,” Darryl said, tucking himself down among the cushions. “I go back to being one of me then.”
“No rush about that,” Matt said, handing him a bowl of ice cream. “If you eat this too fast, which of you gets the brain freeze?”
“Let’s find out!”
A few more minutes were spent assembling popcorn and more drinks, and turning down unneeded lights, and getting everybody comfortable. Finally Dairine looked over her shoulder, “Everybody ready? And Darr, if this gets too loud for you say the word.”
“If this gets too loud for you, say the word,” Dairine said to Darryl over her shoulder.
“No problem. What’s on?”
“The classics,” Kit said. “Roll it!”
Dairine brought up the 1951 A Christmas Carol first, and on this Filif was most intent. When the Ghost cried, “Business! Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business…!” Nita heard Filif murmur, “We could have made a wizard out of him with a little work.”
“Well, kind of late for that, the guy’s dead,” Carmela said. “But also, it’s fiction. He didn’t really exist.”
“But this came out of someone’s mind?” Filif said.
“Yes…”
“Then he exists. All that’s left is to determine now is how concretely…”
Nita grinned, not sure how to even start arguing about that. When that film was done, they took a break for more popcorn, and then Dairine cued up Scrooged. Filif laughed as hard as any of them at this, which surprised Nita a little. How much research has he been doing on us?… she wondered.
The end of that produced demands for fresh drinks and more popcorn and ice cream among the viewers. While these were being distributed, Dairine grabbed the remote. “Got one more for you,” she said, grinning.
Nita had seen that grin. Often it didn’t mean well. “Okay,” she said, “what have you got up your sleeve?”
Dairine began punching numbers into the remote. “Should I be concerned?” Kit said. “Is it going to suddenly start spouting some new language at me that I can’t cope with?”
“Not at all,” Dairine said, “not at all.” She concentrated on the numbers she was punching into the pad, and glanced over at Spot. “Is that right?” she said.
There wasn’t any answer that any of them could hear, but Dairine looked satisfied. “Go,” she said to the entertainment system.
Moments later, the strangest screeching, howling, whining noise was coming out of the speakers. Some of the guests stared at that and the bright swirling graphics that accompanied them. But Ronan’s head came right up at the sound, and his mouth fell open, and he turned a look on Dairine that was profoundly accusatory. “How did you—”