Stern finished the 4,100 word short story in 1943 after working on it since November 1939. Hank Biddle, owner of the maple tree George crashed his car into in the original timeline.Marty Jenkins, Arthur's brother, and a thief who stole $50,000 from the bank in the alternate timeline.Harry Pratt, George's brother, whose life George saved in the original timeline.Arthur 'Art' Jenkins, Mary's husband in the alternate timeline.James 'Jim' Silva, owner of a real estate company that is selling the bank in the alternate timeline.Mary Thatcher, George's wife in the original timeline.The Stranger, a strange man, never identified, who grants George's wish and later reclaims it.George Pratt, a suicidal man, who wishes he was never born.Without turning around, George knows the brush was the one he had presented to her earlier. As he is about to explain, his hand bumps a brush on the sofa behind him. He hugs his wife and tells her that he thought he had lost her.

George returns home and finds everything restored to normal. George digests the lesson and begs the man to return his life.

The man explains that George wanted more when he had already been given the greatest gift of all: the gift of life. George returns to the bridge and questions the strange man. Their son pretends to shoot him with a toy cap gun, and shouts, 'You're dead. He offers her a complimentary upholstery brush, but he is forced to leave the house by her husband. George finds the woman he knows as his wife married to someone else. His little brother, whom he had saved from death in a swimming accident, perished without George to rescue him. His friends have taken different and often worse paths through life due to his absence. George returns to his town, and discovers that no one knows him. The man tells George that he should take the bag with him and pretend to be a door-to-door brush salesman if anyone addresses him. The man tells him that his wish has been granted and that he was never born. The man strikes up a conversation, and George tells the man that he wishes he had never been born. As he stands on a bridge on Christmas Eve, he is approached by a strange, unpleasantly dressed but well-mannered man with a bag. George Pratt, a man who is dissatisfied with his life, contemplates suicide.

It's a wonderful life gif