It's Christmas Eve with your resident neighborhood dream thief. They've been roommates for two years now and it's been ridiculous, but mostly good. Kavinsky knows that it is somewhere in his power to make for Ash what he truly wants; that out of love, comes power. He lies down his bed, a handful of golden pills in his palm, which he plans only to use if he must.

In the morning, she joins them at the table.

The other roommates have rotated in and out since the beginning of their lease; they find her entertaining, harmless, very beautiful; a fleeting curiosity. They ask her over waffles, where she came from. She describes Wiltshire, its barren beauty. She is not an especially gifted chef; the French toast comes out burnt. She picks a fight with Kavinsky when he leaves his used dishes at the table, the maple syrup beginning to stick, demands to know who is looking after her daughter, and accuses him of cheaping out on the drawing pencils he built for her. (He did not. He didn't know what kind to dream.)

But it's worth it. The look on Ash's face after he comes back from his pre-dawn walk, opens the door to find her inspecting the light steaming onto the sofa, looking for the best room to put up her easel. She says: "Oh, there you are. Did you want some company?"

Ash apologizes, automatically. Yes, he did. But it had never occurred to him that he had the right to ask.

It's Christmas Eve with your resident neighborhood dream thief. They've been roommates for two years now.

Kavinsky dreams a Martha for him. She is exactly right: not too kind, and not cruel, like he is.

He planned, initially, on leaving her in the breakfast nook, or under the tree; somewhere that Ash can find her. But he ends up talking to her more than he originally meant to. Checking that she's what Ash described, and also, more than Ash could ever have told him. She remember things that Kavinsky could never know; what he's like to wake up to, in the middle of the night, when his android body needs no sleep but loves to hold you. How patient he is, how steadfast in love and diligent a lover.

How she had almost killed him.

And maybe it is to protect Ash, in the end: that he takes Martha into the backyard, while everyone is sleeping. Lets her watch him dig the hole. Hits her over with the shovel, and pushes the clods over her blank face. He can't be sure, whether it's the risk to Ash himself or the possibility of losing him differently, to this creature of magic and flesh, who would never steal from Ash his happiness, even at the expense of her own broken heart and cold, haunted home.

When Ash comes back from his morning walk, Kavinsky gives him a kiss. "Merry Christmas," he says, dragging him toward the breakfast table huddle. "Didn't get you anything. Come watch us eat."

Ash looks happy enough; he doesn't seem to mind. He never has. Maybe next year--