Thelma smiled at her mate as he entered the hallway, deftly sidestepping his cat Goliath, who lay curled asleep on the welcome rug.

"How was your day?" she asked him, relieving him of the box and depositing it under their Christmas 'tree'.  It was actually a pyramid made of fine wire, decorated very simply with a plain silver star at its apex -- the design a melding of his own religion with the trappings of the Christian world's holy time.  Christianity, along with many other religions, had suffered much from the arrival of the Visitors: the Fundamentalists became either extinct or even more fundamental, and most of the others simply lost their faith, having had their god-concepts rearranged too drastically to cope.  Christmas, however, endured, as a time for feasting, and to celebrate and share good fortune.

"Good," Willie responded to his wife's question.  "The animals are getting more used to me, though the zoo likes it best if I work with the reptiles."  Willie worked part time now for the Seattle zoo as a cleaner, helping to support them both while he studied to become a fully fledge veterinary surgeon.  Working with Alex Bailey for four years had sealed it as his goal, and he was now half way through the course.  Thelma still worked for Mr. Ham, on a fairly generous salary for a secretary (it had been joked that she got paid danger money for the job) so they were now paying off the house they lived in.

Thelma laughed a low, Saurian chuckle, and reached up to rub Willie's scaly skull-ridge through the plasti-flesh in a peculiarly alien gesture of affection.  "You're so cute."

He smiled, a little sheepishly, but caught her up in a hug, nuzzling her sensitive eyebrows.  Thelma brushed him off reluctantly but definitely.  "No time for that I'm afraid," she admonished, "We are supposed to be at Ham's in an hour for Christmas dinner."

"Yes, I know."  But he still gazed after her wistfully.  Flattered, she wagged a finger at him, and his eyes sparkled.  He had always cared for Thelma, but it felt good to know that now he really loved her.  He reached out for her and captured her wrist.

"Willie, no!" she protested.

"No, no, not that... but maybe later," he promised with a gleefully wicked smile, "I want to give you your present."

He turned to the box under the silver pyramid and pulled out a large, flat parcel.  "Go on," he urged, putting the unwieldy thing into her lap.  True to her organized nature, she opened it slowly, carefully, savouring the moment.  She loved this custom, the giving of gifts, and it amused her, too, to see Willie jumping up and down, fidgeting, almost but not quite blurting out "Hurry!"  Finally though, she peeled away the colourful wrappings and was silent.

"Well... ?" Willie's tension grew with the silence.  "Do... do you like it?"

"Oh... Willie... it's... it's... "  Thelma lapsed into incoherent Saurian speech, all the subtle gestures, scents and sounds running madly into each other as she tried to express her delight.  Willie let himself breathe again and as she reached up to rub his soft stomach he had to back off.  Only an hour to get ready for Ham's party, after all.

"Where shall we hang it?" she asked then, glancing about the walls.  The painting, now radiating a soft ruddy glow in the house's dull lighting, would not perhaps have been beautiful to a human.  Too red, too arid, too alien -- but it was a piece of Thelma's home.  Willie had asked a Saurian friend who painted to do this landscape of a place near to where he and Thelma had grown up.  Much as he loved Earth and all its customs, Thelma was more traditional.  She loved her husband and her home but sometimes she missed the homeworld so much.  The painting was his way of giving her back a little of the world she had given up for him.

Thelma found a suitable place for the picture above the lounge and admired it for a few moments before remembering something.  "I'll be right back!" she told him, and disappeared into the back room.

"Here," she handed him an oddly shaped parcel which he, being less fastidious, tore open with the excitement of a child.

"Oh... wow!"  His eyes were huge and his grin spread from ear to ear.  "An Earthers team baseball mitt!  And cap!  And ball!  A genuine Earthers ball -- and it's autographed!  Oh... wow....!"  Reduced to speechlessness, he hugged her fiercely.  "Thank you, Thelma, they're wonderful!  Wait till I tell CT!"  CT -- Christine Thomasina Tyler -- was, at five years old, the Earther's second biggest fan.  They even swapped gum cards.

"Speaking of CT, we'd better get ready to go."  It took a little while, but she finally managed to convince him not to take the mitt, ball and cap along with him to dinner.  She smiled again.  He was so like a child sometimes.  She loved that in him.
 

Walking up the Tyler's driveway, their ears were assaulted by a great noise issuing from the front room of the house.  Most distinctly heard was Chris' booming voice singing 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer', but behind that was CT's childish, off-key shrill and a piano -- the only melodious thing in the cacophony.  It actually sounded like music to Willie (except for the piano).  The front door was wide open as they came to it, so Willie and Thelma just stepped inside and headed for the noise.

Alex nodded hello from her position, reclined in the roomy sofa and pinned down by a puppy and her three year old son David.  Tash Petersen was sitting straddled across a chair, arms folded across its back and chin resting on the arms.  She appeared to be a little drunk and was murmuring the words of the song along with those at the piano.

The piano, a baby grand, was Ham Tyler's pride and joy, and it was an unwritten, but very well understood rule, that absolutely nobody touched that instrument except Ham himself.  No animals were allowed on it, and they learned that soon enough.  Children were strictly barred from even touching the polished surface.  Even now, CT was being held up in her Uncle Chris' arms but dared not touch the Piano.  Chris was leaning against the wall, holding up himself and his small burden.  He winked at Willie and Thelma as the song came through its rousing finale and he boomed out, "M-e-e-e-e-e-eery Christmas!!"

Ham turned around, all smiles himself, to wish them the best of the season, and that's when Willie saw the photo -- the only thing on the piano.  He regarded it quizzically, and the writing across it -- "To Ham Sandwich, love Jenni".

"Who...?"

"Remember that kid, from the orphanage?" Chris supplied, "We met her about, oh, eight years back, one Christmas during the war.  You know -- freckles and pigtails..."

"Ah!" recognition dawned.  "Yes... Jennifer.  How did she find you?"

Ham shrugged, "Looked me up under the yellow pages, I guess.  She's 17 now, studying to be a teacher."

"Ah, so she is really what you said then," piped up Alex from under the dog and child.  She struggled out from under them, regarding Willie closely.  "She was only about 8 when they met, huh?"

Willie shrugged.  "I still can't tell human ages very well, but I think so."

Alex grinned suddenly.  "She sure knows how to make a lasting impression, doesn't she?  That's the only thing besides your fingers you've ever let touch that piano of yours."

Ham grimaced but refused to enter into a conversation on the matter.  Young Jennifer had been completely unafraid of him, which had both impressed and annoyed him at the time, and had broken through his barrier enough that he had actually enjoyed Christmas that year, for the first time in a long time.  Jesus Christ, he'd even gone and put on a damned Santa suit for the kid.  Of course, he'd been going a bit soft in the head about Sandy and Fern at the time (good, how he could think of them now without pain).  That thought led him to wonder when his final guest would arrive.

A soft knock at the door answered his thought and he glanced towards the hallway to see Julie Parrish come hesitantly inside.

Alex was a little puzzled by the warm, welcoming smile that spread across Ham's face.  That was his Special Smile, reserved normally for herself, and the kids.  Or so she thought.  But here it was, on display for Julie Parrish.  She wondered about that.  The first time she had seen the two of them together there had been none of that warmth.  Still, that had been during the war, and it had always been much more tense back then.  Afterwards they hadn't seen much of the LA group at all, except for the occasional visit by one or another.  Their careers were all too disparate.

Ham had risen from the piano stool to show Julie in, where Chris gave her one of his patented Bear Hugs and she, laughing, tried to get her arms around him to return it.  CT bounded up and asked who she was and David scrutinized her from behind mommy's legs until he was certain she was safe.  Julie greeted Alex warmly.

"How are you?  You're looking well."

Alex smiled back.  "I am well."

"You look... different...?"

Alex fluttered her eyes at the doctor, and Julie realized with an 'oh' as she saw eyes, one green-tinted hazel and one brown, and both working perfectly well.

"Your eye -- you've had a transplant!  When...?"

"Just after David was born.  They couldn't find a match for it, you'll notice."  Alex sighed dramatically, "You just can't get anything done exactly right these days, can you?"

Julie grinned and said that it was all too true, and the 'quiet dinner party' got into full swing.  The singing started up again, and everyone was suitably impressed by Julie's lovely voice (except, naturally, Willie and Thelma who still thought Saurian music was tuneful).

Over dinner, Alex watched her husband and Julie thoughtfully.  It was nothing they said or did, just a... feeling.  Their body language, the way they seemed to be smiling at some private joke... and she began to wonder if they had once been... more than friends.  Not that it mattered now of course.  Ham was her husband and they had two terrific kids, and each had a business and career and in all they were pretty happy with their lot.  Still, it puzzled her.  She didn't know what the relationship was between Ham and Julie, and it was the not knowing that bothered her.  So she told herself.

After dinner, gifts were exchanged and there was more singing at the piano.  The puppy joined in this time, and David 'la-la-ed' along with them all.  Finally, Chris ended up on the floor, leaning back on the lounge, and Tash was in front of him, half asleep on his chest.  CT and David had both fallen asleep, she with her little uzi replica and he with a giant stuffed dragon, twice his size.  Ham and Alex would put them to bed later and organize Santa's presents for the morning.

Seeing that everyone was dozing off, Willie and Thelma wished everyone a bright and happy Christmas and bid them all goodnight.  On the way out to the car they heard Julie doing likewise, and glanced back to see Ham giving her a hug goodbye at the door.  She kissed him on the cheek and then waved farewell as she walked down the driveway.

"Merry Christmas, Julie," called Willie.

"And you!  Both of you!  I'll try not to leave it so long between visits next time!"

"Yes, please.  Bye."

Still waving, Julie drove down the road and into the night.   Willie sighed.

"I wonder what Elizabeth has been doing to celebrate."

Thelma patted his arm, "I'm sure she is thinking of you.  She sent a card, didn't she?"

That brought the smile back to Willie's face and, piling presents into the storage compartment, they got into their own transport.  Thelma looked across to the Tyler household, still aglow with Christmas lights.  She could see Alex and Ham in silhouette at the doorway.  She seemed to be asking him something, but Ham was shaking his head, indicating that 'it was nothing' and that he didn't want to talk about it.  It looked for a moment that she might be getting annoyed, but in the end he bundled her up in his arms, against the protests Thelma could faintly hear, and kissed her.  After that Alex laughed and they went back inside.  Then Thelma guided the transport into the air and it floated off down the road.

At home, Willie and Thelma changed into white robes and stood before the silver pyramid in their living room.  Moonlight caught the sheen and reflected onto Thelma's painting.  Quietly, and with due respect they took smouldering tapers and lit four white candles, set at each corner of the pyramid's base.  One for Earth.  One for the homeworld.  One for happiness.  One for peace.

After lighting the candles, they just watched for a while, as the light flickered over the wire framework of their shrine to their own gods, shadows licking over the star on top.  The light and shadows played across the painting on the wall and made it seem like a window to the homeworld.  Just outside.  Close enough to touch.

Willie gathered Thelma into his arms and kissed her softly -- a human custom he had learned to enjoy -- then brushed his cheek against her eye ridges.

By mutual consent they went to bed for the night to celebrate a religious festival their own way.