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of some sexually repressed priest? “God’s will.” Devin would have resented the woman for that, if she weren’t feeling so very tired. Tired and unhappy. Just like Christopher.
    *     *     *
    How often did it actually snow on Christmas eve? Well, it was snowing out there now, but she was in here. Not home. But what was home these days? Peter long gone. Her father dead and her mother remarried to that dick Phil, both in Florida for the winter. She hadn’t called her mother. Didn’t want to spoil her holiday. Didn’t want to talk about Christopher. This was her private ordeal. She was glad all the doctors were gone, all the nurses inattentive. She wanted to be alone. Still, she saw colored lights glowing out there beyond the dozing dark parking lot with its few cars, shrouded like old furniture. There were children in those homes, dreaming of the morning.
    She missed that stupid little TV lady. TV. That’s what she needed—distraction. Hopefully something really mindless; a Kung Fu flick, a Godzilla movie. She pulled the hovering set down closer to her, turned up the volume a bit. Six-twenty; early enough for some dumb old Christmas cartoon, maybe. Ah; on the special movie station they were playing a Christmas movie starring that redneck Ernest guy. Perfect.
    A nurse brought dinner. It was better than she would have thought. Another nurse came to read her blood pressure, take her temperature. Devin told her she was fine, just to get rid of her, but afterwards regretted that she’d forgotten to ask what would be done with her baby. She considered buzzing, decided not to. She still wasn’t sure she wanted to know. She hadn’t wanted to know what became of her cat Sting last year after he had to be put to sleep. If only she had him to come home to. Not even      that…
    After the Ernest movie, Devin clicked through the channels again, and paused out of mild curiosity when she reached channel Eight. Taped religious music played softly as a background to the one static camera angle of the St. Andrew’s Hospital chapel. The camera was apparently close to the ceiling, pointing down toward the altar. No lights were on in the chapel, but for one candle just to the left edge of the screen, its glow more visible than the flame itself. The scene was so dim, so grainy, that Devin watched it a few moments if only to discern what she was seeing. She saw the first two or three pews at the bottom of the screen but had no idea how many there might be altogether. An aisle between them led to a slightly raised dais, where a block shape must have been the draped altar table. In back of that were three thrones, as Devin thought of them, the one behind the table particularly tall. That was all she could be sure of. There seemed to be a podium set off to one side and a door in the corner, but it was just too murky. It was as lonely a place as this hospital room with its one occupied bed.
    Though she was not religious, and though her musical tastes ran more toward The Cure, Devin liked Gregorian chants and medieval music, so the background of very old Christmas music was agreeable to her. She left Chapel onwhile pulling toward herself a rumpled woman’s magazine someone had left in the top drawer of her side chest.
    *     *     *
    Devin awoke to silence. A glance to the wall clock; it was ten-fifty. She’d slept for hours, but given her day, she was surprised it hadn’t been longer. The lack of music finally registered, and she looked to the TV. Chapel was still on, but the taped music had ceased. No sound came from the television.
    Off down the hall somewhere, a baby cried. This was postpartum recovery, and a woman must have had her baby brought to her for nursing. The nursery was down the hall, but the babies in there were few tonight and quiet behind their glass wall. Devin was glad for that.
    Out the window, the snow had become thick, muffling the world under a caul.
    Devin was thirsty, and buzzed the nurse’s