Forgotten by L. Hollar

Chip was alone. He'd been in the basement with the other Christmas decorations when the man came down and dragged them all upstairs. All of them except for Chip. The snowman had been shoved into the corner when he was put away last Christmas, and the man didn't notice him.

"He'll be back," Chip whispered to himself. "The lady loves me. She'll send him back for me."

It was scary by himself in the dark. Upstairs he could hear the children yelling, and heavy feet moving back and forth across the floor. Dust fell down on Chip, like snow, except it was dirty and made Chip sneeze. The sneeze sounded loud in the empty basement. Chip imagined he heard someone say gesundheit. At least he hoped it was his imagination. It was scary in the dark. All by himself.

Chip waited and waited, but the man didn't come back. He could see a little out the window. It wasn't even winter. There were birds in the bush that covered most of the basement window, and a purple flower that had bloomed. Upstairs he heard the lady ask if they'd packed everything.

"Did you get everything from the basement?"

"Yes dear," the man answered. "All except for the mice."

Then Chip heard a door open and close and the house was quiet. He knew then, they weren't coming back. The lady had forgotten about him.

"MICE!" Chip thought. "Did he say mice?"

Chip wasn't sure how much time had past, but suddenly there was noise in the house again. The light came on in the basement and he heard feet.coming gently down the stairs.

"Be careful," a woman's voice said, "the steps are a bit rickety."

"My goodness," another woman said, "it looks like a torture chamber down here."

"Oh you know these old houses," the first woman said, "but it's dry and has a lot of potential."

"I suppose. Hey, what's this?"

Chip almost squealed when he felt himself being lifted into the air.

"Looks like a snowman. Kind of cute I suppose. The previous tenants must have left it behind. I guess it's yours now, if you want it."

The woman looked Chip up and down. She didn't look very friendly. If he'd been made of snow rather than fabric, he'd probably have melted.

"It looks moth eaten."

Next thing Chip knew, he was outside. He tried to look at the bright side of things; it was snowing and the house across the street was lit up with Christmas decorations. And he wasn't in the basement with the mice anymore. That was good, right?

In the distance he hears the sound of a garbage truck as it made its way down the street. With every squeal of the truck's breaks, Chip shivered. He was sitting at the curb. What if they thought he was trash? They would take him to the junk yard. There were rats at the junk yard. Suddenly Chip wished he were back in the basement.

As the garbage truck drew closer, Chip remembered past Christmases, where he had stood proudly next to the Christmas tree. He'd had an important job, guarding the presents for Santa, as well as reporting back to the big guy himself about the children. Were they being good, were they being bad?  But he'd gotten old. His fabric wasn't quite as white as it used to be. His magic had faded. And that stupid Elf on a Shelf became a thing.

 The garbage truck pulled up in front of Chip and stopped. The snowman shivered. A man jumped off the back of the truck and began dumping the contents of the garbage can into the truck's gaping maw. He threw the can on the ground and stopped to look at Chip.

"Hey Joe," the man yelled, "take a look at this."

"Yeah, what is it?"

"A snowman. My wife has a thing for snowmen. She's got a whole collection."

"It's trash, Shawn."

"Oh not, it's a little dirty, but I bet I can clean it up."

And then the man picked Chip up and set him inside the cab of the truck. Chip rode the rest of the route sitting between the two men. Tears of joy would have rolled down his face, if he'd had any tears. He wasn't alone anymore. And he wasn't going to the junk yard. He didn't know where they were going take him, but as long as there weren't rats, and it wasn't a dark basement he was good with that.