The Author's Spotlight ??

Please welcome the third place winner of the Weekly Writing Contest week 1, which is a short story about Sam and Elsa and all the adventures they're going to get on, and it was written for the prompt, "One day, you noticed a package sitting outside your door. You open it to see a snow globe along with a note reading, 'Shake and the Magic of Christmas will appear.' Skeptical, you shake it and an elf appears."

By Mochi711

Elsa yawned, mindlessly scratching her stomach over her faded grey sweatshirt as she walked out of the kitchen with a cup of caffeinated goodness. Before she could even take a sip, a dull thunk sounded outside her door. Curious, she went to the front door and opened it. Looking around, nobody was there. Frowning, she nearly closed the door before her eye was caught by a simple cardboard box with a red bow tied messily on top.

"I don't remember ordering anything," she thought to herself while warily eyeing the box with no return address. It was a toss up. It could either have a glitter bomb in it, or it could be something from her grandma who lived way out in the boondocks that her address was practically a swamp. Deciding it couldn't hurt, she took a swig of coffee before picking up the box and taking it inside. Setting her coffee down, she opened the box, one eye shut in case it was in fact a glitter bomb.

"Huh. So it's glittery, but not a bomb. I was half right," she said with a chuckle.

Inside lay a snow globe, a little elf on a park bench inside it with fake snow on the ground. When she lifted the glove out of the box, her eye caught a slip of paper. Picking it up, she saw that it looked ancient and yellowed, with words written in faded black calligraphy: "Shake and the Magic of Christmas will appear."

"I think I'm too old to be mesmerized by snow globes Nana," Elsa thought, rolling her eyes and setting the globe down on the counter.

She went about her day, eating breakfast, running errands outside, and working on her laptop when she returned home. By noon, she finally finished her mini to-do list and decided to take it easy for the rest of the day. Her eyes slipped over to the snow globe and note on her glass coffee table in the living room, not sure why her mind kept thinking about it. Sighing, she set her laptop down and picked up the snow globe, giving it a good shake.

Before her eyes, a green and red blur appeared out of thin air, crashing right into her glass coffee table and smashing it on impact. She screamed in shock. A man, just over 6 feet tall, popped up out of the wreckage of glass and splintered wood with a grumpy look, brushing the glass off his woolen sweater. He wore a bright green sweater, burgundy chinos, glossy black dress shoes, and a bright red velvet Santa hat with its signature white puff sat comically askew on his silky black hair.

"Glass? Seriously? Why is it always a glass table?" the mystery man grumbled.

"Who the hell are you?!" She shrieked.

"I'm an elf, duh," the man said in annoyance, rubbing his ear with one hand. "Sam at your service." His sharp eyes glared in mild annoyance, marring his handsome features somewhat.

"What kind of elf is tall, stylish, and...handsome? Aren't y'all supposed to be small and cute?" Elsa asked, still bewildered but unable to take her eyes off the ridiculously handsome man. He vaguely reminded her of those Korean boy bands with his model good looks, the only major difference being that his skin wasn't alabaster, but his olive skin was beautifully sun-kissed.

Sam cocked his head in confusion before realising what she meant.

"Oh that. It's our glamour. We project a different appearance to humans when we're caught unwilling because we all look like what humans would use as models. But when we come to you willingly or in a job like this instead of being caught, you get to see what we really look like," Sam explained.