Advent stories.

A Yuletide Knock.

“Take two steps back,” the man stopped his monologue as I demanded he move back from the entrance to my home. He was clearly able to grow a luxuriant grey beard. He was at best morbidly obese and he kept pushing his round spectacles back up on to the bridge of his nose.

“Just so I have this right. You are not selling anything?” I was guarded, fed up with attempts at being fleeced by chancers that permeate our society today.

“I bring glad tidings and a Merry Christmas,” the man beamed at me like an outsize garden gnome.

“Well, that’s all well and good, but we don’t take kindly to unsolicited visitors knocking on the door, didn’t you see the sign? I pointed to the sticker in the window that simply stated, ‘NO CALLERS.’

“But I have gifts for you and your family,” the man indicated a bulging sack next to him.

“No! I am not buying any tat from itinerant salespeople. Off you go,” I pointed in the direction of the street.

The man turned. I noticed the white edging to his red coat was coming unstitched and his red trousers looked worn.

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