A Christmas Miracle

A Christmas Miracle

Christmas Eve on the night shift is always very quiet.  Most of the bad guys are at home with family and friends, just like the honest folks. Crooks have to have Christmas too. My main responsibility, when not answering radio calls is checking buildings in the downtown commercial area for break-ins. From 10PM Christmas Eve to 8AM on Christmas Morning, I patrolled monotonously, looking for signs of break-ins or suspicious activity.  Patrolling is sort of like hunting or fishing.  There are long boring times interspersed with brief periods of excitement. My wife always makes fun of me when I just start patrolling aimlessly, just driving where the mood takes me, when the family is in the car. This Christmas Eve there had been no excitement at all. Like I said, even criminals like to spend Christmas Eve with their loved ones.

I planned on getting off in a few hours when my shift ended. I was going home and having Christmas with my wife and two year old little daughter, before I went to bed for the day. When I was a kid I thought staying up all night was exciting, but not so much now.  Third shift was usually sort of peaceful, but Christmas Eve is even more peaceful and the most difficult thing I had to do was try to stay awake.

On the outer perimeter of my patrol zone was a large commercial complex that had been abandoned years ago and now sat in decay.  I always drove around it to check for trespassers or frozen winos.  I turned off my headlights and slowly coasted in behind the old unsafe and haunted looking structure. There was a bright moon so I could see where I was going without any problem. I flipped the switch that turned off my break lights and backup lights and came to a quiet stop.

As I sat in my warm patrol car looking at the old falling down three story structure, I thought about how my little girl, Jennifer, would be all excited when she opened her presents that Santa Claus would leave under our Christmas tree tonight.  She was still too young to understand it all, but her eyes would be sparkling anyway tomorrow morning. While I am out here working, I know my wife, Leah, has put all the little presents under the tree for our little girl. I volunteered to work tonight, so that some of the guys on my squad with older kids could stay home with their families. I’ll probably get home before Leah and Jennifer wake up tomorrow. I have never been a big fan of Christmas myself. I had a few bad Christmas experiences when I was a kid, but once you have a kid of your own all that changes. Christmas is all about the children.

As I daydreamed about Christmas morning, I thought that I could barely make out a dim glow coming from a third story window of the old building.  I knew there was no electricity on in the building so it couldn’t be an electric light. It wasn’t moving so it probably wasn’t a person with a flashlight...

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