Hours and hours of darkness!

Dr. Ermann Esse had never done a suicide watch before, and he would not have guessed Bridezilla would be his first, but here he was.

"I don't even know if he preferred garland or tinsel, you know?" said Bridezilla, contemplating what to put on her Christmas tree.

"You could put on a little of both," replied the psychiatrist--who had not seen a regular client in a very long time, ever since the CIA had blackmailed him into working for the Agency.

The conjoined miniature guinea pigs (once named Thelma and Louise, then named Flower Girl and Maid of Honor, now back to being called Thelma and Louise) squeaked, and Bridezilla interrupted her tree preparations to go over to their miniature Tudor dream house to pet them.  "I know!  I miss him, too."

It had been a week since she was having dinner with her boyfriend (Esperantu Edward), half-expecting an engagement ring as an early Christmas present.  Instead, he had started hemorrhaging in his brain and had a stroke right in front of her--felled (though she did not know it) by a pro-Putin Russian agent fed up with Esperantu Edward's work on behalf of the émigré resistance.  It was on Thursday that the Prince and Prowling junior attorney had taken a break from burying herself in work to buy her parents Christmas gifts at Union Station.  It was there she had accidentally run into her former shrink (who had been taking a chance that Melania's absence from the White House and her usual routine of getting fitted for clothing and enjoying other naked activities with undercover CIA agent "Gunther Zimmer" [her fashion designer] would result in a lull of CIA handling and allow Dr. Esse ["Gunther Zimmer"] to board a train, skip town, and escape his forced espionage servitude).  Bridezilla's accidental discovery of Dr. Esse at Union Station, followed by her bursting into tears and pouring her heart out to him, had changed everything.

The psychiatrist had seen (and briefly partaken of) many disturbing things, but he could not look at the conjoined guinea pigs without freaking out, so he stood up to hang some tinsel, himself.  "I think you should bring your pets to your parents' house for Christmas, even though they said they don't want them.  Just offer to put them in your old bedroom, out of sight.  That way you can go upstairs to pet them whenever you are feeling stressed."

"I had a dream that God was punishing me because I supported the GOP tax bill," said Bridezilla, still petting Thelma and Louise.

"God is not like that, and certainly would not give your boyfriend a fatal stroke to punish you."

"If Thelma and Louise were people, they would eventually lose the Medicaid needed to survive.  They would be forced to rely on the charity of people like me.  The super rich don't give money to Siamese twin freaks!  They like to spend their money on things they can put their names on:  hospital wings, theater wings, the Halliburton Loophole--"

"The what?"

"It's not important," sighed Bridezilla.  "No, it is important!  It's all important!  I'm being punished!  The Ghost of Christmas Past told me!  I knew that eliminating the Obamacare individual mandate would de-stabilize the health insurance markets, and I just didn't care!  And I lied to Senator Collins about it because I thought it was for the greater good, but it's NOT for the greater good!  And now I'm being punished!"

"We all do things we regret," said the psychiatrist (who once murdered a patient while under the influence of the Cursed Rolex).  "All we can do is learn from our mistakes and move forward."

"I've learnt I'm a horrible person who doesn't deserve love!" Bridezilla sobbed.  "I'm not even gonna tell you what the Ghost of Christmas Present said to me!"

"Didn't the Ghost of Christmas Future say anything hopeful?" asked Dr. Esse.

"He said I'll meet a tall dark stranger next year," she sniffed, "but I filled out the e-Harmony profile, and they told me they cannot accurately predict a match for me!  I'm a bigger freak than these pigs!"

Dr. Esse, who had enjoyed a dozen three-ways in December with Melania and Steven Miller's bodyguard Randy "Bubba" Blaylock (another CIA asset), all in the name of eliciting information on the White House's Slavic underground, no longer considered himself an authority on what constituted freakish behavior.  "Most human beings struggle to find a long-term satisfying romantic partner.  This is actually the normal human condition."

"I'm a FREAK!" insisted Bridezilla.  "I'm a tragic Southern belle, something out of a Tennessee Williams horror show!  And I'll never know if Edward was a lying Russian spy!"

"What?!" exclaimed Dr. Esse, thoroughly startled.

"He knew so many Russians!  And I don't even know what side they were on!  I don't know what side anybody is on!  How am I supposed to trust anybody but these guinea pigs?!  Is it normal for a Russian ambassador to call on a Senator from Alabama?  Is it normal that Putin likes Oliver Stone, Jill Stein, and Ivanka Trump?  Why is Palau our strongest ally at the United Nations now?  What does Palau know about Jerusalem?  And what is the deal with Melania, anyway?   Nothing makes sense to me anymore!"

"Well, Melania, um," faltered Dr. Esse, quite discombobulated.  "Perhaps you could give me the names of the Russians that Edward knew, and I could ask some acquaintances to look into it."

"I can't give you those names!  They were all Prince and Prowling clients he found for me!  We closed the Russia Practice now, but that's all confidential."

"Prince and Prowling had a Russia Practice?"

"Yes," sighed Bridezilla.  "We drank a lot of vodka.  But Breadman doesn't want it anymore, and he's too busy with the--"  She stopped herself in time, and looked furtively at Dr. Esse, only to discover he was staring at the Christmas tree.  "Are you sure you can't come to Christmas with me?"

Dr. Esse was contemplating the mystery of Edward's Russian acquaintances, his sudden death, and whether the CIA already knew about Bridezilla's recent Russian clients.  He shook his head, amazed that he was even contemplating exceeding the already unethical mandate given to him in exchange for CIA silence on his murdered patient.  "I have to stay in Washington, but I encourage you to text me frequently.  I am hoping your family will rise to the occasion and be a source of comfort to you."

"Well, they'll be a source of cookies," Bridezilla whimpered.

Meanwhile, Angela de la Paz and FBI agent Dulles Samuelson were taking advantage of the freakishly warm rain to wash the exterior of their houseboat, Singapore Surprise.  Wearing wet suits and rain hats, they were soaping, scrubbing and laughing their way around the vessel.  (It was an ugly day after an ugly week after an ugly year, but they were in love, after all.)  It was then that a team of FBI agents arrived to search the boat berthed next to theirs, Molotov Cocktail.  One of the agents exchanged a look with Dulles before disappearing into the hold.

"I thought you weren't gonna tell the FBI about those Congressmen on the boat!" whispered Angela

"Let's just say there were some previous concerns about tiptoeing quietly around apparent Russian sympathizers in Congress, but those have recently paled in comparison to the orchestrated media campaign to discredit McCabe, Rosenstein, and Mueller.  I may or may not also have recently acquired a piece of information making it more relevant to take a closer look at Devin Nunes and Dana Rohrabacher, and since they're all out of town right now--"

"Stop!" interrupted Angela.  "Don't tell me!"

"Since when are you so concerned about keeping secrets?!  You're a spy!  Wait, are you keeping secrets from me?"

"That's different, and no," she said, closing her eyes and taking her hat off to let the wet wind whip her hair around.  "It's just...I don't want to know the details until it's all over."

"I get it," he said, putting his arms around her.  (She could send ghosts to purgatory and kill demons, but he had learned a lot about her discouragement and frailties this year)  "I still know very little about Mueller's investigation, but I do know a lot more shoes are going to drop.  It's just going to take time."

Not far away, Barbara Hellmeister was also taking advantage of the unseasonably warm afternoon:  she was sitting in the 14th Street Bridge watch tower quarters that her boyfriend had, for the most part, persuaded her to abandon after her pregnancy had reached the third trimester.  Just weeks to go now, she was hugging her own stomach with eyes closed, feeling the warm drizzle blowing into her face.  She was, more importantly, feeling the soothing presence of Ardua of the Potomac--the demon she still did not realize was just below her.  "This will be genetically perfect," she whispered to herself, thinking about the Hitler DNA-infused Donald Trump sperm she had cloned and implanted in her uterus, and trying not to think about the deformed baby she had given birth to a year ago at Trump National Golf Course.

"Why do you say that?" asked Ricky Chesterfield, startling her.  "Sorry!  Didn't mean to sneak up on you!  Finished the drug sales early.  What do you mean, genetically perfect?  I mean, we're both Aryans and all, but you can't be expecting perfection, honey!  My dad had to wear glasses, and my mom--"

"That's not important," said Barbara impatiently.  She had duped her Charlottesville Klansman into thinking the baby was his, but after it was born and her vulnerable period was over, she would be ready to dump the barely Aryan half-wit.  "I took samples from the amniotic fluid."

"Oh, alright," he said, sitting down next to her to hand her some cheeseburgers.  "The rain is sorta getting in here."

"I love it!" she exclaimed, opening the wrapper eagerly.

Ricky had loved the kinky sex, but this pregnancy was making her weirder and weirder.  He was starting to think he was gonna have to be a man about it and insist they go to South Carolina and stay with family until the baby was born.  "I been thinking, hot mama, that this plan to give birth naturally in our Arlington pad might not be the best plan."  (He was talking about her rented laboratory space, which now had a few domestic accoutrements-- including their bed and a bassinet.)  "Now, I know you're a brilliant scientist and all, and my Congressman told me not to buy Obamacare, and you ain't got insurance, but my mama and aunt know about birthin' babies and--"

"South Carolina?" she interrupted, screwing up her eyes in annoyance.  "Never!"

"I just don't understand you!" he replied.  "You got no family, you said, but you won't meet mine!"

"You are the only one I need!" she answered, as if this were perfectly logical and only a simpleton would question it.  "You bring the meat and this!"  She grabbed his balls in the way she always did when she was about to perform an orgasmic sexual asphyxiation act on him, and he immediately forgot about the baby.

Down below them, Ardua was sad that the shortest day of the year had passed and a little bit more sunlight would appear every day, but she felt stronger than ever.  She smiled, thinking about the hideous creature about to be born to this Nazi woman, and laughed at how distracted Angela had been this year.  2018 could only be better!

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COMING UP: The Seekers make their last 2017
effort at Trumpian cult de-programming!