Of the Gospel (Redactor’s Addendum)

I sat at the dinner table, next to Ma, listening to my brother whine.

“How had I not known?”, he pleaded.

“It was of immense importance,” he said, pouting.

This was the evening of December 12th. The second Thursday.

The day that Herschel found out about his so-called “Latter-Day Emendation.”

Ma and I had thought he was a handful, before. Ha!

We hadn’t seen nothing, yet.

Ma scowled, and said nothing. She seemed to be playing the waiting game, hoping he’d just stop, if she gave him the silent treatment for long enough.

Ha! As if that had ever worked, with Herschel.

“Christmas is all around us,” Herschel said.

“The trees, and the lights on them. The holly, the bells.

“My Mother, my Sister! Why have you not taught me anything about the meaning of these signs?

“Anything at all?”

I cringed, and took furtive bites of my chopped liver on rye.

“Well, Herschel,” I began.

He glared at me. His stare was always quite a thing to behold. Those wide, wide eyes, on that broad flat face.

“It’s just,” I said.

“It’s just that we, well.”

“Well?” he fumed.

My little brother, peevish lord of all creation!

I squirmed.

“Well, it’s just that . . .

“We’re Jewish, Herschel.

“We don’t celebrate Christmas, see.

“It’s not one of our holidays. It’s a holiday for other people.”

Wasn’t he supposed to be some sort of genius, now? With that test, and all?

Why, then, did I have to talk to him like he was a very dull little boy of six or seven? And not a young man of sixteen, with a perfect score on Raven’s what-have-you?

My brother was still glaring at me.

He was properly mad, now. He was furious.

“The cult of Yeshua,” he said, “does not interest me, Sister.

“I have no interest in ‘Christ,’ the false messiah,” he said.

“It is Claus, the true Intercessor, who interests me,” my brother said.

Ha!

Ha!

A laugh riot!