Donald Trump awoke at the sound of dragging footsteps, and low and bitter wailing, now far off, but growing closer. All the lights were out, and it was deathly cold. Moonlight reflected off the perfect blanket of snow covering the South Lawn, giving President Trump just enough light to see his own breath. He shivered and wondered who had turned off the lights and the thermostat. Trump glanced at his phone. It read “12:00am.”
The moaning grew more distinct and nearer still. “Trump,” it called just on the other side of the double doors to the Oval Office.
Frightened and alone, awoken in the middle of the night, a madman murmuring his name on the other side of a door, not knowing if this moment would be his last in this mortal coil, Donald Trump did what any other person would do in his situation. He picked up his phone and tweeted.
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
This is not a drill. All true Americans must now come to my aide as is required in the Constitution. Where is the Secret Service when you n
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
ed them?
“Trump,” it called out again, emphatic.
Jumping to his feet, the President of the United States rushed across the Oval Office. Jittery hands fumbled with the door locks but found their target. Deadbolts latched with a heavy CLACK.
Trump took a few steps back from the door, and then called out, “No one’s here,” for good measure.
Then a most spectacular thing happened. Without opening, a figure stepped through the closed door. It was dressed in the regalia of an American general from the eighteenth century, but wrapped about him were ropes and cords and chains. They encircled him and tied around him in every direction, and they strung out behind him taut as if attached to some great weight. The cords and chains disappeared into the still closed door, the object they dragged still somewhere beyond the closed doors. He was tall, gaunt, and possessed a face Donald Trump knew well. It was the face emblazoned upon every twenty dollar bill. He was transparent and glowed an eerie shade of green reminiscent of US currency.
“Donald Trump,” the apparition said.
“What’s the meaning of this? Are you pulling some kind of prank? Who are you?” Trump said.
“Ask me who I was.”
“What kind of question is that?”
“In life, I was the seventh President of the United States, Andrew Jackson.”
Donald Trump glowered at the presence before him.
“You don’t believe in me,” said the ghost.
“Fake news,” said Trump.
“Why do you doubt your senses?”
“Because you can’t trust them,” said Trump. “Everything’s a fake nowadays. You could be a hologram made by the Chinese. They are a very clever people. Ruthless. Cunning.”
The phantom stood there, silent, with a penetrating stare.
Donald Trump fished for another explanation. “Or, or, you’re a hallucination, a very fake and very silly hallucination, brought on by—” he scanned his office, “—food poisoning! I just ate McDonalds. Who knows what they put into that stuff. I’ve seen Super Size Me, okay? They’re cutting corners, padding their beef with magic mushrooms or some nonsense. You’re just an undigested bit of beef. You’re a blob of cheese. You’re more special sauce than specter, that’s for sure!”
Trump smiled at the joke he believed he had made. The sudden urge to tweet it welled up inside him, but he couldn’t decide how to give enough context in the space of 140 characters. He was about to attempt it anyway when the spirit unhinged its jaw and shrieked. It lunged forward and grabbed Trump by the lapels.
“Look into my eyes, Donald John Trump,” it said, its breath as simultaneously freezing cold as it was blazing hot. Trump could do nothing but look into the creature’s eyes. As he did, he realized he could also make out the back of Jackson’s eyeballs, his skull, his brain, the hair on the back of his head. It was a gruesome and sickening sight. “Observe the bullet lodged near my heart,” the ghost said, and Trump’s gaze drifted downward. To his amazement he could see inside the ghost’s chest. Wedged next to a heart that did not beat was a glinting metal fragment. “I received that wound in a duel in the year 1806. It remained there my entire life. Do you believe in me now?”
“Sure. Sure,” Trump said, releasing himself from the ghost’s grasp. “So why are you here? And make it snappy. I need to give some Hollywood losers a reality check. On Twitter.”
Find out what happens next in A Presidents Day Carol now available in paperback and ebook!