Every year, we hold a school wide competition around the holidays:

Who doesn’t love a good Hallmark holiday movie?  You are a screenwriter for the Hallmark Network.  The holiday season is just around the corner.  The company executives want you to pitch them your best Hallmark Holiday Movie idea.

In keeping with tradition, I am sharing my submission from this year.

Second Chance at a First Christmas

William shared the perfect life with his loving wife and three beautiful girls.  The family was set to take their annual December ski trip to the mountains.  All three girls loved skiing and had gotten quite good at it over the years.  But, the consensus favorite part of the trip was stopping at McMathers’ Christmas Tree Farm on the way home to pick out a Canaan fir (William preferred Canaan’s because of their strong branches which could withstand the weight of the roughly 2 million ornaments the family had accumulated over the years).

With the car packed and ready for the three hour journey to Beech Mountain, William received an ill-timed call from Travis.  There was a last minute work snafu involving a high-value client threatening to end a multi-million dollar deal that William had spent months putting together.  Knowing he had a strong relationship with the client, William assured his wife that if she left with the girls, he would tidy up the matter quickly.

After a few phone calls, William jumps into his car, eager to catch-up to the girls.  Frustration sets in as he hits unexpected traffic.  Just about to get moving again, William peers out his window to see what caused the delay.  To his horror, he sees the family van turned upside down on the side of the road.

THREE YEARS LATER

William now resides in a tiny one bedroom apartment with nothing on the walls, an empty fridge, and a couch that doubles as a bed.  The only remnant from his former life is an unopened storage bin with Christmas Ornaments written on a piece of masking tape stuck to the side.  

Trying to avoid his past, William left the fast paced business world.  In his new job as an employment specialist, he spends his time working with adults with special needs.  Specifically, helping them develop the skills necessary to obtain jobs.  William loves working with adults with special needs, because of their optimism, resiliency, and love for life.  An ancillary benefit is that most of the people that he works with do not ask him about his past.  

Carl, a 28 year old with Down Syndrome, is William’s favorite client to work with… even though he’s not supposed to have favorites.  Carl has a unique sense of humor and his encyclopedic knowledge of movies enables him to insert a movie quote for any given situation (most of the time the quotes are completely unrelated to what is currently happening).  

Charlotte, Carl’s sister, has always been very protective of her big brother.  So, when she visits Carl for the holidays, she’s initially weary of William, leading to her bombarding William with questions about his past.  The very thing William has been avoiding.  Initially jaded by her incessant inquiries, William begins to slowly let Charlotte into his life.

Will Charlotte finally get William to face his tragic past?  Is Charlotte the one to get William to give love one more chance?