The Cinnamon Invasion: Week 3

Day 15

"Yay!!" I hear a disturbing scream coming from the next room too early in the morning and I'm startled out of bed. I find Cinnamon with a wide smile on his face. It seems we've made peace, or have at least reached some kind of compromise. Either way Cinnamon is in far too good of a mood to bother with any threats, idle or otherwise.

"Check it! This is perfect! They'll never find me!" he says with a confident swagger that doesn't match his stupid elf voice. "The perfect disguise!"

Day 16 

The Saturday end of a busy week. I'd planned to try and get some Christmas shopping done, but it didn't go well so I gave up and drove home. My neighbor Don was standing out in the yard between our houses, raising a hand in greeting as I park in the driveway. 

"I wasn't sure if you were home," he said, nodding toward the house. "I was sure I saw your car leave a few hours ago, but the music is so loud in there we could hear it from our living room." This is no small thing since it's winter and all of the windows on both our houses are closed up tight. I thank Don for his concern. As I walk in through the garage entrance, I'm greeted by an apocalyptic blaring. Cinnamon sits beside my old CD player.

"Dude, why didn't you tell me we had all this?" he said. "This is SO MUCH better than Burl Ives and Gene Autry and Andy Williams!!"

Apparently he calls me Dude now. And I can't help but wonder: What exactly does he mean by "we?" 

Day 17

"Hey! HEY!" I hear myself being summoned. "Get a picture of this and put it on the Internet," Cinnamon tells me, his voice temporarily reduced to a dry gag.

"To what purpose?" I ask.

"More effective than a disguise," he replies. "If there's anything about the world that I know for sure, it's that your enemies won't hunt you down if they think you're already dead."

Day 18

Cinnamon was waiting at the front door when I got home.

"Are you alone?" he asks. His voice has a nervous tremor I haven't heard before.

"Yeah, of course I am," I answer. I try the key. The door is barricaded from the inside.

"Are you really alone?!" he demands. "I'm not joking around here!"

"Yes, I'm alone! Open the door, you twerp! It's raining!"

I barely get inside before he slams the door and locks it again. He looks up at me with haunted eyes.

"They found me," he croaks. "We aren't safe anymore."

There he goes with that "we" business again....

Day 19

A burning smell as I enter the house, and my fight or flight response activates. Something left on a furnace grate? A forgotten candle? Is my house safe?!

"HELP!!!" A scream from the kitchen. Cinnamon's enemies must've found their way in. I quickly remove him, mostly to prevent any further damage to the grill. "Put me...on the tree...." he pants. "Time on...the Christmas tree...only way...to heal...for certain...."

Reluctantly I comply. 

Day 20

This morning I find Cinnamon impaled by an ornament and lying motionless on a plate as if he's been served up. This happened while I slept? I hadn't heard a thing. Oddly enough he seems to have something like maple syrup leaking from his body instead of blood, and somehow this doesn't surprise me. (At least it smelled like maple syrup; I wasn't about to taste it.) 

I don't like the thought of his enemies being able to enter my house at will, particularly in the middle of the night. There's no way this can end well.

"...tree, again..." he pleads, barely with the strength to speak. "...please... hurry...."

Day 21

There's no sign of Cinnamon anywhere this morning and I think, maybe he crawled off to die somewhere.

No such luck.

"Take me with you!" he pleads. "I'm not safe here alone!"

 

"Dude, they stabbed you when I was here, sleeping. I don't think I'm really much help."

He unconsciously pats at his side, mumbling something about how that was only a warning. "I just...I don't know what to do."

"Well," I tell him, "I've invested a lot of time into crafting a safe and welcoming classroom environment, and you represent a variable I am not comfortable introducing into that. Maybe you want to think of a better hiding place than sitting on the kitchen counter and staring out the window."

I pick him up and carry him back inside. He's still too weak from his injuries to struggle.

One week until Christmas. Part of me wants to see how all of this ends, while another part just wants it all to end....