Santa Claus Conquers the Homophobes (25 page)

Upon the destruction of Fritz’s reputation would he build his own. Santa’s favorite would fall, and he, Gregor, would rise.

* * *

All that day, Santa felt miserable. He covered it convincingly, his workers too caught up in toy making to notice how many Cokes he downed, how ever-so-slightly-off his rhythms were.

Wendy had given plenty of help to Heinrich, the identical sextuplets who specialized in porcelain dolls. Since the night before, she and Santa had confined themselves to the most trivial of interactions. He sensed her discomfort with everyone’s jollity. He knew also that she wasn’t fooled by his festive mood.

Now he sat, late at night, in his unlit office in the workshop. Unable to sleep, he had crept out of bed and strode across the commons past the elves’ quarters and the stables to the workshop. The place was vast and idle, though shortly before dawn his helpers would throw the light switch and dive with glee into their tasks. He had retired to his office, shut the door, and church-keyed the cap off one more Coke bottle, smoking with mist as he raised it to his lips.

Perched on the stool at his workbench, he stared past a clutter of folders and papers and ran his fingers through his hair. “What can I do?” he murmured. Chills of helplessness bristled along his spine. “The great and benevolent Saint Nick, stymied.”

Why was it, he wondered, that one could accomplish so much, yet feel a failure? There was never enough time to do all the good you were capable of. And sometimes, you couldn’t even see your way clear to righting a wrong, not though it sat up on its filthy haunches and stared you down in defiance. Why ever had he told Wendy he would do something? The problem was too vast. He couldn’t
begin
to think how he might tackle this, even were his annual Christmas tasks lifted from his shoulders. How could he possibly visit and divest of prejudice every last bigoted mortal on earth? Given how judgmentally inept he had been with four mortals, the prospect of transforming millions of them made him blanch. He was sure to bring misery upon himself and his little girl, raise defensive barriers in the homophobic masses, and fail miserably.

Santa took another swig of Coke.

He mocked himself. Oh, what a poor sad bloke am I!

Anxiously stroking his beard, he propped his head upon his fist, his elbow planted on his workbench's hard, scored oak. Michael. What had the archangel said as he ascended? If you need my aid and comfort, you have merely to summon me. “I do then,” he murmured. “I summon you.”

“Indeed you do.”

Santa ought to have been startled at the voice, at the being who hovered there, the redemptive light of heaven emanating from him. But it seemed as though he had been ever-present. His manifestation to eye and ear merely extended the power of those organs to detect one who had never left.

“Oh, Michael,” said Santa, wondering if he ought to fall to his knees, “I would not dare ask for what I desire. My daughter has shown me overwhelming instances of the misery non-heterosexual human beings suffer from childhood on. She has pleaded with me to do something to stop it. And I have assured her, with too much haste, that I would somehow set it right. But sometimes one makes promises in the heat of the moment and lives to regret them later. We have saved a good little boy from suicide. But even he is fated to suffer ridicule and rejection. And there are vast multitudes of boys and girls out there who are doomed to stagger beneath the yoke of bigotry as they mature, living every day in a world that belittles them and rejects their expressions of love. And all of it carried out in God’s name, a profanation the prejudiced regard as the duty of the righteous.”

Santa clasped his hands in prayer. “Help me, I beg you. Teach me how to ease Wendy’s disappointment, to let her down gently and keep her from despising her stepfather too much. Or if there is indeed a way to ease the heartache of the world entire, show me that way. I do not presume to ask the impossible. Yet I fear I have already presumed in my heart.”

Michael’s face was unreadable.

Was he stunned? Bemused? On the verge of tears? Angered at the jolly old elf’s temerity? All Santa knew for sure was that the archangel was utterly present, listening with every fiber of his being to Santa’s plea.

At last he spoke: “Dearly beloved, be not dismayed. The world is as it is, joyous and sorrowful, broken and whole, an imperfect yet perfectible perfection. You have asked the impossible.” His brow furrowed. “Indeed you have.” Again, he lapsed into a silence whose import could not be known. “But to God,” he continued, “all things are possible. I shall return on the morrow. Meantime, take heart, apply yourself diligently to your tasks, say neither yea nor nay to Wendy, and do this only: Embrace the comfort that surrounds you.”

A smile of compassion lit his boyish face, though it was tinged with a hint of exasperation. Then he was gone. As before, Santa was heartstruck at his departure, even as he basked in a golden afterglow.

He sat for the longest time, buoyant, bubbly, blessed.

“How
about
that?” he said, laughing uproariously.

At length, he poured the flat Coke down the sink, recycled the bottle, and traipsed across the commons to bed, marveling as he went.

* * *

As Michael began his ascent, he was surprised to find himself yanked back to the North Pole, this time to Wendy’s bedroom. She had lit a candle on her nightstand and sat, propped up against her pillow, in a flannel nightgown decorated pink and lavender with a small pale-green bow at the neck.

“Oh, goody,” said Wendy, unclasping her hands and clapping them with glee. “You’ve come.”

“I have indeed,” said Michael, feeling peeved with himself for giving these two carte blanche. “Angels do not make promises lightly.”

“Okay, so listen up, please. That’s not a command, of course, only a request, I’m excited is all. I mean, I’m in
awe,
that’s for sure, but I won’t let it bowl me over or tie my tongue. If anything, it loosens it. But to the point. Santa’s fretting. I know he is, and it’s all on account of me and my stupid wish to prevent all these boys and girls from suffering over some dumb prejudice. Take a look. Oh but never mind, I’m sure you can read minds and see everything that ever was or will be on earth, so you already know all of that. Well anyway, I showed my parents and blurted out to Santa that we needed to save every last one of them somehow. I could tell he was distraught, but his heart’s so pure, he said he’d think of something. But there’s really nothing he can do, is there? It’s out of his hands, the sheer vastness of human suffering. He already acts from a place of such overwhelming generosity. Even if it
were
possible, how could he take on more?

“So what I’m asking, and this is in the strictest confidence, is for you to ease his heart. I wish I hadn’t brought it up. If I could take it back, I would. He’s upset. It’s my fault. And I wanted you to remove his upset, or help me figure out how to reverse what I said and restore him to his cheery self. Can you? Could you? It seems like you can do
anything
you set your mind to. I mean, aren’t angels all powerful, as long as it fits into God’s plan?”

She gazed at Michael with a wide-eyed look of anticipation that barely masked a grown-up sensibility inside. Her love for Santa filled him with delight. And her appeal to his pride, it must be admitted, struck a chord. Might he do something grand? Something that would please the Almighty greatly, and erase all the embarrassment his Hermes side had caused a while back? This called for serious thought.

“Dear heart,” he said, “on the morrow, I will come again. I will devise a way to ease his suffering and yours. Fret not and know that you are loved. Be gentle with your father. Accept the child in him, though he sometimes misspeaks. The blessings of heaven be upon you.”

He raised his right hand and brushed his fingertips—though no contact was made—against Wendy’s brow. She gasped in wonder. Then, drawing a veil of invisibility over himself, he watched her blow out the candle and settle her head on the pillow with a contented sigh.

Then heavenward Michael sped, mulling the pair of requests he had received from these most precious immortal souls.

Chapter 25. Bold Initiatives

WHAT FIRST NUDGED FRITZ TOWARD WAKING was the soft glow of magic time. He drifted up from dream far enough to recognize its embrace, though not far enough to question why magic time should be embracing anyone tonight.

Then the throwing of a huge switch somewhere shattered the night’s peace. Floodlights exploded against his eyelids. “What the dickens?” grumbled someone. Someone else gave an exaggerated yawn. Max, one of Fritz’s bunkmates, shouted, “Turn that darned thing off!”

Fritz hardly had time to consider what a violation of the natural order this was. Only Santa and his wives were allowed to bathe the community in magic time. It was one thing to enter magic time of one’s own volition; they all did that, as the need arose. It was quite another to...

Then Engelbert and Josef scattered his thoughts, striding among beds and bunks, shaking elves awake and barking at them to rise and shine and give God their glory glory. Gregor stood with folded arms at Santa’s lectern, an eyebrow arched in the garish light, waiting impatiently for his brothers to bring the troops to their feet.

The floor was cold but Fritz managed, in the melee, to find his bedroom slippers. “Enough,” yelled Gregor, slamming his fist against the lectern. “You will come to order.”

Which, pretty much, they did.

Knecht Rupert, bleary-eyed and only half awake, said, “Aw, geez, Gregor, what’s the point o’ this? We need our sleep.”

“Silence! You’ve slept enough, and far too deeply, in my estimation. Perversity slithers amongst you, but your eyes are shut. Sin smacks its lips and gobbles its nasty provender, but your snoring drowns out the vile sounds. A stench of misdeeds most foul swirls about your nostrils, but you are aware only of the fantastical aromas of dreamland.”

He paced and punctuated, did Gregor. Fritz had never seen him so animated, never heard his words bite so sharp.

“Often have I lectured you on the picking of noses. I have excoriated you for it, you have deserved it, and it has done some little good. My words have penetrated one poor micron into your skulls, and many of you have abandoned your sin-sick ways. From diligence in personal hygiene come toys that are second to none. But even now, there are those who turn a deaf ear to my message. Blithely do their fingers find their docking place, from whence they extract those noisome nuggets, blaspheme their mouths with satanic bonbons, and head back for more.

“But my fellow elves, it isn’t that which leads me to rouse you from sleep. Greater perversities are afoot. And I mean to bring them to light.”

Fritz began to sweat. Could he possibly have...but no, they had been careful.

“Come forth, o unworthy ones,” commanded Gregor, his eyes aglow. Do not force me to expose you. Confess your misdeeds, and the shame will fall lighter on your shoulders.” He scanned the crowd, his gaze skipping past Fritz. “No response? Why am I not surprised?”

Friedrich the globemaker raised a tentative hand. “Forgive me, Gregor, for I have sinned.”

“What the devil are you babbling about?”

“At times, getting dressed in the morning, I’ve skipped a button on my jerkin. Fumble fingers, you might call me. For this sin of omission, I am heartily sorry.” Hearing the worthy Friedrich humble himself before Gregor’s bullying made Fritz’s blood boil.

“Idiot!” said Gregor, beet-red with scorn. “I don’t give a tinker’s dam
how
you button your jerkin. Now button your lip, and do that right at least. You and you, put your hands down. I know who the sinners in our midst are. They’re too cowardly to admit their perversion, thinking perhaps that Gregor is merely bluffing in hopes of ferreting out minor infractions.”

Herbert’s face went white, to which Fritz shook his head ever so slightly in assurance.

“Oh, my friends, how the mighty have fallen. I hereby call to account...our once-beloved Fritz and his sin mate Herbert.”

Fritz’s heart sank.

“In the woods this afternoon did I see them, though from their slinking and the way they glanced nervously about, it was clear they did not wish to be seen. But God brings all misdeeds to light. Not content with the perverse thrill of violating nature’s way with simple nosepicking, I have caught them picking each other’s noses, feasting on the contents, and heading back for more in obvious enjoyment of this unspeakable practice.” He jabbed a finger at Fritz. “Deny it if you will. You
cannot
deny it.”

His mouth moved, but nothing came out. Herbert buried his face in his arms and wept.

Fritz’s rage at Gregor for hurting his friend flared. But his mind was in such turmoil, he could do naught but stand there paralyzed, head bowed, brow burning, unable to look his fellow elves in the face.

“This comes of spiritual neglect. Let one vile tendril of sin slither in and the whole stinking mess, root, branch, and bitter fruit, surges eagerly after it. Who among us would
dare
indulge in such an abomination?”

Standing at the midpoint of the assembly, Knecht Rupert eased an uncertain hand into the air, and Gustav as well. More boldly, flaxen-haired Franz the watchmaker raised a hand. Beside him, Johann tepidly wiggled three fingers at the lectern.

Fritz took heart.

“Do you mean to say there are others?” Gregor spat the words, contempt dripping from his lips. “This shall not endure. O Sin, I Gregor vow to chase you from our midst, to restore once more the purity of our toymaking endeavors, to keep clean our fingers so that the dolls and fire engines and board games we fashion shall never carry the foul taint of misdeed.
All
of you, raise your right hands. Higher. Repeat after me. I solemnly vow...in the presence of my brothers...never to pick my nose...and never, for the love of Christ, to pick another’s nose...so help me God. Good! We three are going to hold you to this vow. And you must hold one another to this vow. I shall personally administer a beating to any elf caught breaking it.”