CBC flash challenge--congrats to the winners + my malevolent offering

Congrats to the winners of the CBC flash fiction challenge--Carolyn Ciccoritti, Kate Belcher, and E. Craig McKay. Read their stories on the CBC site.  Now I can finally place my glorious, magnificent, unprecedented work of art right here on my blog, as some of you have asked.  Happy Holidays!

ANIMAL MAGNETISM OR BEWARE OF THE EVIL SNOWMAN

By Ania Vesenny (HO! HO! HO!)

The snowman grinned malevolently as Prancer and Dancer jumped off the roof. Taking over Christmas might, after all, be easy. He barely counted to five, and two of them submitted. Animal magnetism at its best! The deer landed on all fours like overgrown kittens and trotted to the bucket of carrots by his side.

Every year he agreed to a ratty scarf, tolerated snowballs with a placid smile. And not an iota of appreciation! Did anyone ever bring him cookies and milk? All he got was the pesky jingle. Frosty! No glory in that name! He fixed his eyes on Rudolph, imagined the red-nosed wonder pulling his sleigh for a change.

Snow started falling, wet and dense. Soon the kids would be out, patting his thighs, smoothing his biceps: twenty minutes of bliss. Then they’d scurry inside, blabbering about Santa and his hoofed beasts. Not the time to get sentimental, the snowman thought. Rudolph, still on the roof, glowed like a zit. “Your hoofs are loose and limp.” The snowman licked his lips. “I’m gonna count up to twenty now.”

Santa’s head popped out of the chimney. “Mitts off my transportation, Frosty!” The snowman felt sharp hooves busting his body open as Prancer and Dancer galloped back to the roof. “Hee, hee, hee!” Santa wagged his finger.

The snowman groaned. He’d need to re-read Hypnosis for Dummies and improve his reaction time. At least not another slow melt this year. What a treat, what splendour, to be buried alive!