Act I: The ghost of Anna Tecson
It's Christmas Eve, 10 years to the day after the death of her business rival Anna Tecson, Valerie Edovas and her downtrodden assistant Peter Demanarig are at work in Valerie's clothes store. Valerie's brother, Lawrence, arrives with seasonal greetings and an invitation to Christmas dinner.
Lawrence: Sister dearest, perhaps you want to join us for Christmas....
Valerie: No way!!!! Christmas is a fraud and an excuse for people to drown their sorrows by buying stuff! I mean, really! At least people go to my store to buy clothes which will give them the illusion of beauty!
You get one year older but not an hour richer!
Lawrence: Are you sure you don't want to join us?
Valerie: Bah humbug!
Lawrence leaves, but he is still optimistic that his sister will come to love Christmas. Two gentlemen collecting charitable donations for the poor are likewise rebuffed by Valerie.
Charitable gentlemen: Merry Christmas! Ooh, if it's okay with you, can we please have some donations to help the poor?
Valerie: If they would rather die [than go there], they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.
The gentlemen leave, rather disappointed. As she and her assistant prepare to leave, she grudgingly permits Peter one day's paid holiday the following day.
Valerie: You can have that day off tomorrow, but you must come 3 hours earlier than usual, or else I'm gonna deduct your salary!
Valerie returns home to her small house beside her clothes store and a series of supernatural experiences begins. Her doorknocker appears to transform into Anna's face; a "locomotive hearse" seems to mount the dark stairs ahead of her; the pictures on the wallpaper in her room show Anna's face. Finally all the bells in the house ring loudly, there is a clanking of chains in the bed and on the floor, and the ghost of Anna passes through the closed door into the room.
Ghost of Anna: Valerie!!!!!
Valerie: Who in the hell are you?
Anna's ghost: I'm your business rival that died 10 years ago, you idiot!
Valerie: Anna!? How come you're here when I don't believe in ghosts?
Anna's ghost: Well Valerie, I have come to warn you about something!
If you don't change your ways, you'll suffer my fate, but worse! You'll walk the earth eternally burdened in chains, invisible among people! You'll see suffering that you could've prevented, but you will become powerless to intervene!! Don't worry your little head, for you will get a chance.
Valerie: What in the hell do you mean?
Anna's ghost: I have arranged your only chance of redemption. You will be visited by 3 spirits on successive hours on this night, and they may help you change for the better!
As Anna leaves, Valerie gets a nightmare glimpse of the tormented specters who drift unseen among the living, and now shattered, she falls into bed.
Act II: The Ghost of Christmas Past
The Ghost of Christmas Past appears in Valerie's room as the clock strikes 1. It is a young lad, wearing a simple t-shirt with matching jeans.
Ghost of Christmas Past: Hello!
Valerie: You're the first one, right.
Ghost of Christmas Past: Yes! Now I'll show you something.
It leads Valerie on a journey to some of her past Christmases, where events shaped her life and character. She sees her first Christmases, where she enjoys it with her family.
Ghost of Christmas Past: Well, you had it good early on.
Valerie: True, I was rather fortunate. To be honest, I regret what I had to done to my brother.
They revisit a merry Christmas party given by Wilhelmina Lombard, Valerie's kind fashion instructor.
Valerie: I so feel bad for what I did to Peter.
Finally, she is reminded how her love of money and snobbishness lost her the love of her life, Peter.
Valerie: Poor Peter.........
Ghost of Christmas Past: Don't go blaming me for your choices!
Furious, Valerie turns on the spirit, tries to snuff it like a candle with its cap, and finds herself crumpling up in her bed sheets and wakes up feeling remorseful.
Act III: The Ghost of Christmas Present
Valerie wakes at the stroke of one, confused to find it is still night. After a time she rises and finds the second spirit, the Ghost of Christmas Present, in an adjoining room, on a throne made of Christmas food and drink. This spirit, a great genial man in a green coat lined with fur.
Valerie: You're the second spirit, right?
Ghost of Christmas Present: Yes! I'm the Ghost of Christmas Present, and I'll show you something.
The spirit takes Valerie through the bustling streets of Yerevan on the current Christmas morning, sprinkling the essence of Christmas onto the happy populace. They observe the meager but happy Christmas celebrations of the Demanarigs, and the sweet nature of Peter's adopted daughter Jenny, and when the Spirit foretells an early death for the child if things remain unchanged, Valerie is distraught.
Valerie: I had no idea that Peter is working to let his sisters study. I thought he lives alone. He really lives with his sisters.
Ghost of Christmas Present: Yes! And you are always mistreating him!
Valerie: I had no idea!
Ghost of Christmas Present: Look at his adopted daughter. He is single, but due to sympathy, he went to the orphanage a few years ago and adopted Jenny. She is suffering from rickets, and if you don't change your ways, she'll die in a year! You and your "If they would rather die [than go there], they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population." speech is wrong!
No one is worthless or undeserving to live!
She is shown what others think of her: the Demanarigs toast her, but reluctantly, and "a shadow was cast over the party for a full five minutes".
Peter: Let's make a toast to the founder of this feast, Valerie Edovas!
Pauline: Toast indeed! She never gives you your proper wages!
Daffodil: I think you should demand a raise!
Gabrielle (Which is a female, by the way.): Please brother dearest, demand for a raise!
Peter: I can never do that!
Gabrielle: You really love her, don't you?
Peter: Yes.
The spirit then takes Valerie to her brother's place. Lawrence and his friends gently mock her miserly and snobbish behavior at their Christmas party, but Lawrence maintains his younger sister's potential for change, and Valerie demonstrates a childlike enjoyment of the celebrations.
Lawrence: Christmas is a fraud and an excuse for people to drown their sorrows by buying stuff! I mean, really! At least people go to my store to buy clothes which will give them the illusion of beauty! You get one year older but not an hour richer!
Lawrence's friends all laugh at how Lawrence mocks Valerie's behavior.
Lawrence: I think Valerie will change.
Conrad: Are you sure? She's a damn snob!
Lance: Yeah! She treats her assistant like a dog!
Caroline: Poor Peter..............
Lawrence: Come on, she will change for the better!
Lance: Ok..... So, let's celebrate!
As the party gets started and the people in it dance, so too does Valerie.
Ghost of Christmas Present: I think I must go. But before I do, please beware of ignorance!
Valerie: Ok.
At the end of the visitation, the bell strikes three. The Ghost of Christmas Present vanishes and the third spirit appears to Valerie.
Act IV: The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come takes the form of a grim specter, robed in black and wielding a one-handed double-edged long broadsword.
Valerie: You're the one that shows the future, are you?
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come: Yes!
Valerie: Oh no!!!! You're the one that I'm most afraid of!
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come: I'll show you something!!!!
The spirit shows Valerie a harrowing vision of a future Christmas. But first, the spirit takes Valerie to the fashion district of Yerevan, where they see two gentlemen talking about a death.
Eric: It's a damn shame that she is gone.
Geo: What shame!? That devil is gone!
Eric: I'll go when there is a lunch provided.
Geo: She's so cheap and snobby, you're not gonna get lunch at that funeral!
Valerie: Who are they talking about?
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come: Why tell you, when I can show you!
The spirit then takes Valerie to her own home, showing her a corpse of a dead woman in the bedroom.
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come: What are you waiting for? Unmask the corpse!
Valerie: I can't.
After pleading to the ghost to see some tenderness connected with death, Valerie is shown Peter Demanarig and his sisters mourning the passing of Jenny.
Gabrielle, Pauline and Daffodil: Well, now that Peter's job is gone, our hope of getting a good future is gone, and so is Jenny.
Peter: Well, you are all right. Because of this, we have no other choice but to join the Imperial Army!
Valerie is then taken to an unkempt graveyard, where she is shown her own grave, and realizes that the dead woman of whom the others spoke ill was herself.
Valerie: Before I draw nearer to that stone to which you point, answer me one question. Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of things that May be, only?
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come: It depends. If you want the latter to happen, then you shall change your ways for the better!
Valerie: Men’s courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead. But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change. Say it is thus with what you show me!
I am not the woman I was. I will not be the woman I must have been but for this intercourse. Why show me this, if I am past all hope!...I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!
Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come: My mission here, is done!
Valerie awakes to find that all three spirits have visited in just one night, and that it is Christmas morning.
Act V: The End of It all
Valerie changes her life and reverts to the generous, kind-hearted soul she was in her youth before she rejected Peter. She anonymously sends the Demanarigs the biggest turkey in the butcher shop, meets the charity workers to pledge an unspecified but impressive amount of money, and spends Christmas Day with Lawrence and his wife Caroline, along with the Demanarigs.
Valerie: Merry Christmas everybody!!!!!
Caroline: I knew she had a good side!
As Caroline says that, Valerie blushes at the sight of Peter.
Lawrence: Now Valerie, do it!
Valerie approaches Peter.
Valerie: Peter, I have something to tell you. You'll be receiving a 13-month pay starting now, and you'll get a raise of 25%!!!
Peter: Oh, thank you. Now, let's toast to the founder of this feast, Ms. Valerie Edovas!!!!
Gabrielle, Daffodil, Pauline and Jenny: Thank for for all this!!!!
Valerie: That's not all! I know how I have treated all of you is wrong! Will you ever find it in your hearts to forgive me, especially Peter?
Lawrence, Caroline, Gabrielle, Daffodil, Pauline and Jenny: Ok, we forgive you.
Peter: I have always forgiven you!
Valerie: Peter, will you marry me?
Peter: Sure.
Valerie gains a reputation as a kind and generous woman who embodies the spirit of Christmas in her life.
The end.
Disclaimer: This is just an adaptation of Charles Dickens' masterpiece, "A Christmas Carol", so this is not, in any way, plagiarism.
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