The stupidest angel: a heartwarming tale of Christmas terror

have to use the argument: And look at what a complete loser I am – you don't want that for yourself, do you, Sam? He left the scene feeling even more useless than he had after the verbal bitch-slapping he'd taken from the pilot at Lena Marquez's house.
    When Theo pulled into his driveway at lunchtime, hoping he might be able to patch things up with Molly and get some sympathy and a sandwich, he saw Lena's truck parked in front of the cabin and his heart sank. He debated shuffling over to the commercial pot patch and smoking a sticky bud before going in, but that sounded an awful lot like the behavior of an addict, and he was simply on a little slide from grace, not a blowout. Still, he came through the door humbled, not sure at all how he was going to handle Lena, who might be a murderer, let alone Molly.

    "Traitor!" Molly said from over a pan of noodles she was layering into a pan with sauce, meat, and cheese. She had sauce on her hands up to her elbows and looked like she'd been engaged in some very messy surgery. The back door out of the kitchen had slammed shut as he came in.

    "Where's Lena?" Theo said.

    "She went out the back. Why, are you afraid she'll reveal your secret?"

    Theo shrugged and approached his wife, his arms out to the side in a "gimme a break" gesture. Why was it that when she was angry her teeth looked really sharp? He never noticed that any other time. "Mol, I was just doing it so I could get you something for Christmas – I didn't mean to – "

    "Oh, I don't care about that – you're investigating Lena. My friend Lena. You just went to her house like she's a criminal or something. It's the radiation, isn't it?"

    "There's evidence, Molly. And it's not that I got high. I found fruit-bat hairs in Dale's truck and her boyfriend has a fruit bat. And the little Barker kid said – " Theo heard a car start up outside. "I should talk to her."

    "Lena wouldn't hurt anyone. She brought me cheese for Christmas, for Christ's sake. She's a pacifist."

    "I know that, Molly. I'm not saying that she hurt anyone, but I need to find out – "

    "Besides, some fuckers just need killing!"

    "Did she tell you – "

    "I think it's the pot that makes you reveal your mutant self." She had a lasagna noodle in her hand and was waving it at him. It sort of looked like she was shaking a living creature, but then, he was still a little buzzed.

    "Molly, what are you talking about, 'my mutant self'? Are you taking your meds?"

    "How dare you accuse me of being crazy. That's worse than if you asked me if it was my time of the month, which it isn't, by the way. But I can't believe that you'd imply that I need to be medicated. You mutant bastard!" She flung the noodle at him and he ducked.

    "You do need to be medicated, you crazy bitch!" Theo didn't deal well with violence, even in the form of soggy semolina, but after the initial outburst, he immediately lost the will to fight. "I'm sorry, I don't know what I was thinking. Let's just – "

    "Fine!" Molly said. She wiped her hands on a dish towel, then tossed it at him. In dodging it, he felt like he was moving in blurred bullet time in the Matrix, but in truth he was just a tall guy who was a little baked and the towel would have missed him anyway. Molly stomped through the little house, into their bedroom, and dropped to the floor on the far side of the bed.

    "Molly, you okay?"

    She came up holding a package the size of a shoe box wrapped in Christmas paper with a few dust bunnies clinging to it. She held it out to him. "Here. Take it and go. I don't want to see you, traitor. Go."

    Theo was stunned. Was she leaving him? Asking him to leave her? How had this gone so wrong so fast?

    "I don't want to go. I'm having a really bad day, Molly. I came home hoping to find a little sympathy."

    "Yeah? Okay. Here you go. Aw, poor stoned Theo, I'm so sorry that you have to investigate my best friend the day before Christmas Eve when you could be out playing in an illegal pot patch that looks like the jungle plateau of the gibbon people." She held out his present and he took it.

    What the hell was she talking about? "So it is about the victory garden?"

    "Open it," she said.

    She didn't say a word more. She put a hand on her hip and fixed him with that "I am so going to kick your ass or fuck your brains out" look that excited and terrified him, as he wasn't always sure which way she would go with it, only that she was going to get satisfaction one way or the other and