At Number 9, the top of the Close, Margaret Head looked at the Christmas card that was lying on her hearth rug. The card hadn’t been there last night. Who had delivered this and how? She looked at the spidery writing on the card addressed to her. She opened the envelope and looked at the angels on the card. In front of her eyes they started to sing to her “come and see us” beckoning her towards them. Mesmerised she stared at the card and then opened it. The last thing she ever saw was a scythe slicing through her life and a voice screaming “You’ve arrived at your destination.”

At Number 7 Gary Collins was spending Christmas on his own; a single child his parents had died when he was in his twenties. Now in his mid-forties he was heading downstairs when he tripped over a fairy. Gary wasn’t expecting the fairy to be there as he didn’t have a tree; the fairy grinned as Gary went sprawling. When Gary recovered his senses he saw ghostly fairies carrying candles standing on the floor next to him; he hated fairies and had regularly singed them on the tree when his parents weren’t watching. The fairies were exacting revenge; they set fire to his clothes and the flames licked around him; he couldn’t move as a ghostly reindeer pinned him down until Gary was well alight.

At Number 5 the Clarksons were having Turkey for brunch; to their delight the bird, who no-one could remember buying, cooked easily. The meat was beautiful and the four Clarksons ate joyfully. The husband and wife pulled the wishbone; instantly the family experienced severe abdominal pain and a ghostly voice shrieked the words “Feel my pain”. They rolled around in complete agony until the pain caused them to faint. A ghostly turkey hopped around the room and pecked at their unconscious faces.

At Number 3 Cindy and Albert Parsons were about to enjoy their pudding. A Christmas ritual was to pour brandy over the pudding and light it. As luck would have it this year they’d won a pudding in a competition and it had been delivered late on Christmas Eve. It looked unusual as it had a fuse-like wick, which made it look like a bomb. Albert poured the brandy over the pudding and lit the fuse. Both Cindy and Albert put their hands over their ears in mock expectation of an explosion. When the fuse burnt to the brandy the pudding froze as did the whole room including Albert and Cindy.

At Number 1 the Elliott children opened a present from Granny and found a lump of snow, “to be used as a head when building a snowman”. There was a lovely long carrot for the nose, which was to be screwed in when the snowman was complete. They went outside and quickly created a vast snowball for the body. Placing the head on the body, they then pushed the carrot into the head. The explosion blew them through their lounge window and frightened their hamster.

Death observed proceedings and murmured to no-one in particular “Merry Christmas everyone.”