“Before we start,” Michelle said, “I would just like to say how impressed I am with you, Mr. Scrooge. It’s such a tragedy to lose a friend and business partner so suddenly.”

  “He was like family, yes.” Eb knew his projected image would appropriately express sorrow.

  “Yes. And for you to accept his daughters into your house is just… magnanimous.”

  Eb beamed with pride. For real. “And may I say that I’m a big fan of your work, too,” he said. “You will be asking very friendly questions, yes? Something I can jack out of the park. It is Christmas, after all.”

  He trusted his alligator smile would be smoothed over on his projection. The hosts laughed agreeably. Bingo.

  “This is Entertainment Nightly, not Investigative Tonight,” David said. “Softball questions are the house specialty.”

  “And that’s why I love your show.”

  “Where are the girls?” Michelle asked.

  “Bathing.”

  “Well, your whole life is about to change,” she said.

  Eb twitched. It was the way she said it, jabbing him with words. It was hard to tell if she was talking about the girls or everything else. Or maybe nothing at all.

  It’s been a weird day.

  Assistants tended to the hosts’ last minute needs. The droid touched up Eb. It was really unnecessary since his projected image smoothed out the wrinkles and blemishes. Behind the cameras, the crew squared up the mics and lights, rolled teleprompters in place. Several members milled around with clipboards and iPads. Off to the left, a young woman watched the chaos with a small fashionable posse.

  Eb pushed the droid away.

  “Hey there.” He waved at the posse. “Did they catch him?”

  They stopped chatting and looked around, unsure if the crazy projection was talking to them. The young woman in the middle—the one with the bright pink stripe down her face, the one that spent Christmas Eve bashing Eb with two other fashion snobs—sneered.

  “Did they catch him?” Eb repeated.

  She shook her head, silently saying, “What?”

  “The guy that spilled the paint.”

  He pointed to his face, pointed at her. It took a moment, then she caught it and answered with a very rude gesture that involved one finger.

  “Todd?” Eb said, smiling viciously. “Are all your employees this unprofessional?”

  There was a rush to remove Pink Stripe from the set. A formal complaint and a little hustle and she wouldn’t see her cohosts ever again.

  A confident smile slithered across his face. Ebenezer is back.

  The countdown to air began. Michelle and David sat back, their smiles reassuring him that the questions would be fat as sugar plums. The world would know he was a good man after tonight. They would know he was… how did she say it?

  Magnanimous.

  ~

  11:42 p.m.

  Pack up the lights, throw away the tinsel and burn the tree. It was almost the day after Christmas.

  Eb’s favorite time of year.

  He cruised out of the projection room, having just viewed the Entertainment Nightly segment for the twentieth time and giving it two fat thumbs-up. His image was beautifully sculpted, made for television one might say. He emoted the proper amount of regret when asked about his friendship with Jacob (I only wish I could have done more) and beamed with hypersonic joy when asked about the new additions to the family (indeed a gift beyond words). Instant feedback among the younger demographics was dazzling.

  They love me. They really do love me.

  They were going to gorge themselves on Avocado, Inc.’s new line of entertainment gadgets. Once Eb had the ship sailing in that direction, he’d be bathing in money, fill the Grand Room pool with gold coins. Maybe add another castle or two, one for each girl.

  Let’s not get carried away.

  Eb hit the ramp at full speed, exited on the second floor to make a pass through the west wing. The girls should be given some credit for the public’s adoration. They didn’t do anything. They were just there, being needy. But people loved that stuff.

  There was no light beneath their door, but he heard voices. He slowed down and circled back. Yes, definitely voices.

  He put his ear to the door.

  “Change is difficult,” someone said. The voice was gruff. Then something about next year and having patience—

  Eb turned the knob.

  A quick commotion whirled in the room, a dust devil whipping the curtains. The girls weren’t in bed. They were sitting on the window ledge, hands properly folded on their laps. The moonlight outlined their silhouettes, their bows properly tied and shiny. They were still wearing their dresses.

  Eb pushed his glasses up. “Who are you talking to?”

  They didn’t answer.

  The carpet was damp in several places. The room appeared to be in order. No one was in the closet, which took two attempts to confirm and two shaky knees.

  He half-expected Jacob to jump out.

  “Why are you awake?” he asked. “Are you not sleepy? You hungry? Do you need pajamas? What’s the deal?”

  Their eyes followed him around the room.

  “Could you nod or something? Blink your eyes once for yes.”

  He looked out the window. Snowflakes were soft and large. There was no hint of the tracks he’d seen that morning. The girls remained still, staring across the room.

  “You’re creeping me out, girls. This is no joke.”

  The droid entered the room, wearing a robe. His dull gray feet sank into the carpet.

  “What are they doing up?” Eb asked.

  “They’re still adjusting, sir.”

  Addy and Natty put their arms up and climbed into the droid’s embrace. He carried them to the bed and tucked them beneath the covers, wedging a wide-eyed doll in each of their arms.

  “Why is the carpet wet?” Eb asked.

  “They weren’t properly dry after their bath, sir.”

  “Their bath was like twelve hours ago.”

  “They had another, sir.” He turned to the girls. “Would you like another song?”

  They shook their heads. He brushed the hair from their foreheads.

  “Goodnight, Jenks,” they whispered.

  “Goodnight, princesses.” The droid elbowed Eb on his way to the door and jerked his head toward the bed, eyes growing wide to say something.

  “Oh. Goodnight,” Eb said. “Don’t let the bedbugs bite.”

  The girls lay on their sides with one arm on the outside and facing each other, their dolls pressed against their cheeks, bright yarn-hair poking out. Weird, that was how Eb slept, on his side, arm out, hand under his cheek.

  He followed the droid out of the room.

  “Who’s Jenks?” Eb asked.

  “The name of their previous servant droids, sir. Jacob employed an identical series, although their skinwrap was a shade darker than mine. It comforts them to use that name.”

  The name was familiar. Eb had heard it before. They had named a product Jenks once before. What was it?

  “Is that what you want them to call you?” he asked.

  “I’m not a fan of Dum-dum, sir.” The droid fetched the Segway for Eb. “If there’s nothing else tonight, sir, I will return to the basement.”

  Eb took the handlebars. The droid nodded once and started toward the ramp.

  “What’s a humbug?” Eb asked.

  “Pardon, sir?”

  “I think I heard them say that word this morning… humbug. Out of the blue, they just said it.”

  The droid cocked his head. “Sounds like word play to me, sir.”

  Eb remained outside their door for quite some time. There were no more voices, no whirlwinds. Just the silence of the house. It was past midnight when he reached his room on the third floor.

  Christmas was finally over.

  PART II

  ~

  THE GHOST OF CHRISTMAS YET TO COME

  SEVEN

  ~

  2:00 p.m.

  The offices of Avocado, Inc., were full throttle. If a picture captured the moment, no one would guess it was Christmas Eve.

  There was no tinsel on the walls, no garland around the lights. Just the fully lit avocado logo and the smell of productivity. Gone were the compassionate greens and tranquil blues, the quirky loungers and fully stocked coffee stations.

  The Ping-Pong table was the first to go.

  If his employees looked up from their desks, they would see an image of a handsome middle-aged man looking down from the glass wall of a cantilevered office. If they went into the office and stood in front of the mahogany desk, they could pass their hand right through their debonair leader. But few ever were allowed into the inner sanctum, so they never really knew if that was him or not. And that was the point.

  Either way, they were being watched. They knew that.

  There was a mahogany monstrosity in the center of the Castle’s projection room, an exact replica of the one in his California office. Even a placard that read Ebenezer Scrooge. He watched the employees without ever leaving the Castle. Even the smell of the Avocado plant was piped into the projection room, a hint of plastic and cement, the steamy burn of circuits that wafted in from the plant’s adjoining fabrication lab.

  There was no difference where his body was, whether he was here or there. They both felt just as real.

  He took notes of which employees were making their deadlines—deadlines that were nearly impossible to make. Eb liked to think he could warp reality, could push his people to achieve things they never thought possible, accomplish goals too lofty or ambitious. Eb told them they could, that they would.

  And they did.

  You could accomplish quite a bit with one-hundred-hour workweeks.

  At 2:25 p.m., he had completed his naughty and nice lists, which boys and girls would get a bonus and which would get a lump of coal in their bank account. The naughty list was quite lengthy.

  The joyful squeals of little girls zoomed outside the projection room, followed by the chase of dull gray feet. They were not to be in this part of the Castle, and the droid knew that. He leaned back to shout exactly that when a door opened.

  A gray-blonde woman entered his California office.

  Eb checked the time in the corner of his round spectacles. “You’re a minute early.”

  “Your time is fast.”

  She appeared to sit in front of his desk, her back to the glass wall. A necklace of tiny Christmas lights blinked around her neck. Eb studied his computer. Jerri Mitchell was at the top of the nice list.

  He needed to find another word for “nice.” Productive? Essential?

  “Don’t make me wait, Eb.” Longtime pain in the butt? “It’s Christmas Eve,” she said.

  “So?”

  “You can get back to counting your money, the rest of us have family.”

  “I have family.”

  She would know that. The whole world knew that. Eb had paraded the girls through a dozen interviews, had posed for photo shoots that appeared in magazines and newspapers. There were videos of the girls playing in the snow, riding bikes, having lunch in the park with kites overhead. They were all digital creations, but what was the difference, really? It was a great story and everyone bought it.

  “Lucky little girls,” Jerri said flatly.

  Not everyone.

  “Is that why you called this meeting, to insult me?”

  “I want to wish you a Merry Christmas, Eb.”

  “Anything else?”

  She played with her Christmas light necklace. “How long have I worked here?”

  “I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

  “Thirty-one years, Eb. You hired me thirty-one years ago.”

  “Jacob hired you, but let’s not quibble. You’ve worked here since we started the company, is that all?”

  “We met in a café, you remember? First employee you hired, and we did it in person, flesh and blood. It wasn’t this… projection stuff.” She waved at the image she was talking to, wrinkling her nose like he farted.

  “Don’t forget, you helped create this projection stuff.”

  “I can’t tell you how silly it feels to talk to a projection, Eb.”

  He smirked. “You see me, I see you. I’m here, you’re there, what’s the difference, Jerri?”

  “It’s better in person, you know it.”

  “Did you just want to complain about projection technology?”

  “Why have I been with the company this long?”

  Eb sighed. “Mind reading, is that it?”

  “Because I have always believed in our mission, Eb. That’s what won me over at that café thirty-one years ago, the vision that was laid out over espressos and lattes. I had three offers, you remember? Avocado paid me the least by far, but the vision, Eb… the vision we created made my decision.

  “You pitched me on making the world better through understanding, through innovation, to push the boundaries of creativity.”

  “More money, is that what you want?” Eb said. “There’s no room in the budget.”

  She chuckled. There was plenty of room, they both knew it. “It’s not about the money. That’s my point.”

  She twisted the lights around her neck. You didn’t work with Ebenezer Scrooge for thirty-one years without knowing how to roll with the punches. She pushed out of her chair and walked to the glass wall, her running shoes squeaking as she looked across the plant. A woman that always wore pants and baggy sweater shirts, she saved the ugly ones for the holidays.

  Eb tapped his pen. “Whatever it is you want, Jerri, can you just send it to me in an email that I can delete?”

  “What happened to you, Eb?”

  Jacob had asked him something like that a year ago. Or his digital ghost did, an experience he was still trying to forget. Now he was reliving it from his vice president.

  “You were so different.” She turned around and leaned against the glass wall. “Now I’m looking at this abomination behind a desk.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Your projection is ridiculous, Eb.” She laughed. “I can’t figure out if you think you’re training for the Olympics or varsity football.”

  He pulled at his shirt, the hem creeping up his belly, and stopped from checking his hair in one of the dark monitors. Of course, his projection sent none of that reality to the plant. She saw an impeccable version. The only similarity was the round spectacles that sometimes hid his green and blue eyes.

  His trademark.

  “Jacob had the vision,” she said. “He never lost it. You had the vision, too.”

  “Check the financials. Profits have rocketed since his death. That vision you’re touting was killing us. Had Jacob not passed, I’m sorry to say, we’d be bankrupt. So if this is about the future—”

  “It’s about the present, Eb.”

  He hesitated. For a moment, he thought she meant Christmas present.

  “You have all these new projects—”

  “That are making money,” he said.

  “I don’t know where you’re going with the company, Eb. These… gaming projects and movie makers and these… secret projects no one can see.”

  “Money, money and—wait, what?”

  “You cut the medical division.”

  “Back up. What secret projects?”

  She crossed her arms. “You cut medical, Eb. It’s what made Avocado different than all the other tech companies.”

  “Medical was where our money died.”

  “It’s what made a difference. No one was doing what we were doing.”

  “Yeah. Killing money.”

  “We were almost there,” she said. “The last strain of stem cells was stable. Market introduction was twenty or thirty years away. No disease would be incurable, no handicap unfixable. Our profits, whatever they are now, would easily increase tenfold.”

  “Synthetic stem cells, Jerri. Synthetic, don’t forget that. You’re underestimating the ethical and moral blowback from the general public. You, Jacob and all the others just can’t accept that it was never going to work.”

  “In your lifetime, that’s what you’re worried about. Those profits weren’t going to show up until after you passed.”

  “This is about your granddaughter, isn’t it? Let’s be honest, you don’t need the product to save the world, just to cure your granddaughter.”

  She tapped her forearm, lips grim. Bull’s-eye.

  “It’s selfish, you’re right,” she said. “I’m watching my granddaughter decline and Avocado might have something that could help her. And if not her, then those like her. My heart’s not big enough to hurt for everyone suffering in the world, but it hurts to see those closest to me; it hurts to just watch it happen and do nothing.”

  She approached the empty desk in front of her, the one where Eb would sit should he ever actually go to California, a desk so orderly it could be a display at OfficeMax.

  “You ever care about someone like that, Eb? Because if you do, you can’t just shove aside your feelings.” She moved a World’s Greatest Boss mug from one corner of the desk to another. “It’s not as easy as that.”

  Eb paused. His projected image would appear thoughtful, compassionate. Not impatient. And certainly not the eye rolls. “I’m really sorry, Jerri—”

  “Don’t modulate the emotions. Doesn’t matter what all that looks like”—she circled her hand at his projection—“I know you don’t mean it. Where are you, Eb? What do you feel, really? Because I don’t believe you don’t care. I know the Ebenezer Scrooge I met in the café. He cared. And I know he’s still there, wherever you are.”

  Right on cue, the girls went squealing past the room.

  “If you can’t do it for others,” Jerri said, “then do it for the company you love, the vision that started it all. Not the money. You’re crushing the heart of Avocado.”

  He folded his arms. Hope cast its shadow on her face for a moment, that maybe her plea was actually finding fertile ground, that she’d dug through the hardpacked shell and found the real Ebenezer Scrooge deep in the gooey center.

  Then he said, “Is that all?’

 

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