**December 27th Refuses to Behave**
December 27th woke up late.
This was unusual, because dates normally wake up exactly on time, neatly stacked between their neighbours like polite slices of bread. December 26th had yawned, brushed the tinsel out of its hair, and shuffled off without complaint. December 28th was already standing impatiently in the corridor, tapping its foot and checking its watch.
But December 27th lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, feeling wrong.
The ceiling was covered in faint glitter that would not come off, no matter how much one scrubbed. A half-deflated balloon drifted past the window. Somewhere in the distance, a turkey sighed.
“Not yet,” muttered December 27th. “I’m not ready.”
When it finally stood up, something slipped out of its pocket and clattered onto the floor. It was a receipt. No shop name, no date, just the words:
**YOU HAVE ALREADY PAID FOR THIS, WHATEVER IT IS.**
December 27th did not remember buying anything.
Outside, the world had lost its edges. People wandered the streets clutching boxes of chocolates they no longer wanted but felt morally obliged to finish. Children tried out new toys that already seemed faintly disappointing. Adults stared into cupboards, searching for something they were sure they had bought but could not now locate.
Time behaved oddly. It was both too fast and too slow. Morning lasted forever, while afternoon disappeared entirely. Evening arrived early, dragging a chair behind it and asking awkward questions.
“Was this a good year?” Evening asked.
No one answered.
In Ballykillduff, the church bell rang once and then stopped, as though it had forgotten what came next. A man named Seamus swore he heard it cough apologetically. The postman delivered yesterday’s letters again, insisting they looked surprised to see him.
Meanwhile, December 27th wandered about, rearranging things when no one was looking.
It moved a sock from one drawer to another.
It hid the scissors.
It put a memory where a worry used to be, just to see what would happen.
People felt unsettled but could not say why. They stood in doorways, convinced they had meant to go somewhere, though the idea of where had evaporated. Dogs barked at nothing in particular. Cats stared at corners where something might have been yesterday.
At lunchtime, December 27th sat down heavily on the calendar and caused a small temporal dent. This made everyone feel mildly tired, as though they had eaten too much pudding and not enough meaning.
“I don’t want to be just the leftovers day,” December 27th said to no one.
“I want to be… something.”
So it tried a few things.
It briefly became a Monday. This upset people enormously.
It tried being a holiday, but forgot to provide instructions.
It flirted with being New Year’s Eve, but was told politely not to rush.
Eventually, December 27th did something reckless.
It paused.
Just for a moment, everything stopped. Not dramatically. No clocks exploded. No one screamed. The kettle simply hovered halfway to boiling. A thought remained unfinished. A yawn never quite closed.
In that pause, December 27th looked around and noticed something surprising.
Everyone was still here.
Not celebrating. Not regretting. Just… existing. Sitting in jumpers that smelled faintly of smoke and sugar. Thinking about things they might do differently, or not at all.
December 27th smiled. A strange, crooked smile, like a date that had learned something important.
Then it nudged time forward again.
Evening finished its questions. Night tucked the world in. December 28th finally got its turn, huffing and smoothing its pages.
As December 27th left, it slipped the receipt back into its pocket.
This time, new words had appeared underneath:
**NO REFUNDS. NO EXCHANGES. BUT YOU MAY KEEP WHAT YOU NOTICED.**
And for the rest of the year, people occasionally felt an odd sensation — a quiet moment between moments — and thought, without knowing why:
*Ah. That must have been December 27th.*
The Crazymad Writer Writes Again 