Mistaken Santa

The boy stumbles through the snow on his way home from the bus stop. The last day of the third grade before Christmas break always leave a child filled with joy to return home…return home to warmth, Christmas lights, and songs about presents. The snow is thick on his boots… the boy trips and suddenly his face is blasted with the coldness of winter. He stumbles to his soaked feet, and wipes his face, which now feels as hard as stone, and bitten with frigid air. All he can think about is staring at the television, playing video games for a whole two weeks. Hes so preoccupied with the joys of a virtual world he doesn’t notice that he left a mitten behind when he fell a few steps back. He’s so preoccupied he doesn’t see the other children running home to welcoming parents and eager siblings to enjoy the spirit of Christmas.

This boy has to walk the extra few steps to home; it takes him twice as long, treading in the snow, than the other kids because he lives in a different part of town. There’s no one else on the bus to walk with him home, so he braves the cold alone. It helps when he envisions himself as a solider braving the terrors of nature, the look of a trespassing dog, or the boy down the street who owns one of the biggest water guns in his class. The walk continues, and the boy trips again, his boots are too big for him, and sometimes they get in the way. He’s not sure how he got them, whenever he gets clothes he doesn’t go shopping for them like the other kids do, he usually sees an older gentleman dropping off a bunch of clothes at his front door. The man obviously didn’t realize that the boots were one size too big. Tall houses are covered in snow, lights are wrapped around every window, every bush, every tree, in perfect arrangement. Sometimes the boy thinks of living in one of the top windows, where he could look out of his room at his kingdom below him, it would be like he ruled the world!

The boy can always tell when he’s almost home… the houses get smaller, the road gets rockier, the pavement gets overrun by grass and empty coke bottles. The best parts of the walk home is kicking these empty glass bottles, one by one, listening to them roll off the pavement. Today is different though, the sidewalk is covered in snow and the glass bottles are overtaken by snow… the boy can’t enjoy a round of coke bottle soccer. The boy walks by the broken glass of the convenience store and peers in the crack to see if the new edition of his favorite comic book has hit the stands. Today must not be his day, first no bottle soccer and still no new comic for December… what a day, he just wants to go home and play some video games. He’s on level thirty-five, one of the hardest levels to beat, or at least that’s what his friends at school say. Just one more level until he can beat the boss of the game, the boy smiles at the excitement of it all. His book bag starts to get really heavy as he rounds the corner and sees the pursuit of home. The boy beings running, his heart beating immediately out of his chest, the wind causing his red nose to run... he struggles to wipe his face with the ice that has become his hand, he realizes then he left his mitten behind… his mom is not going to be happy about this, those were his only gloves. At this point the boy doesn’t care, he runs up the broken steps that make up the threshold to his home, throws open the storm door that reminds him of his grandma’s house two doors down, and throws himself into the chipped white door to his one floor, one bedroom hideaway.

He steps into the doorway, shaking off the snow from his jacket…. the sound of thumping snow hitting the floor is all that can be heard in the boy’s house. He walks through his smoke filled house, pacing around attempting to find anyone alive. You would never know it’s Christmas time in the boy’s house without the black and white Santa Claus crossword he brought home from school sitting on the coffee table. The walls in this house are never adorned with garland, paintings, or even family photos… usually just the occasional birthday card hung up by small stripes of masking tape. The boy walks into the bedroom to find his dad sitting on the floor, staring out the window, rocking back and forth. His father’s long fingernails tap nervously as the dad turns around to see that his child is home from school… it seemed like just thirty minutes ago his child had left this morning. As the boy waits for something, he never really knows what he waits for from his father, he turns back into the living room and fixes his eyes on his PlayStation…. its time to play. Hours pass, the father still wide awake, keeping the door to the bedroom shut, as the boy wastes away in front of the television… playing video games.

The front door opens wide, as the stale air of the house gets overturn by a blast of winter air, the boy looks up to see his mother walking in, with a single brown paper bag, and that same glazed look she’s had on her face for a week. Nothing is said, the boy returns to his games, as his mother creeps around the house, finally opening the door to the bedroom. The clock ticks as screaming is heard from the bedroom, the clock ticks as something is thrown across the bedroom, the clock ticks as the boys parents talk about money, the clock ticks, and the boy plays his video games. Hunger creeps up once again in the boy’s stomach; he rolls his eyes, and continues to play his video games. Mc Donald’s sounds like a Thanksgiving feast at the moment.

When suddenly the boy remembers that his teacher gave him a piece of chocolate today for Christmas, the boy stumbles to his feet, runs to the door, tearing into his book bag, finding the chocolate nestled between torn folders and broken pencils. The smell of his book bag reminds him of school, of his friends, and French fries on cafeteria trays.  The boy takes his candy to his seat in front of the television, devouring every morsel of his dinner, before he throws the wrapper amongst cigarette buts, empty glass bottles, and the Holy Bible.

The boy squints his eyes, as he wakes up to the sound of his father rushing out the door, and the sight of sunlight gleaming through the window, past the mismatched window shades. He must have fallen asleep playing video games, the television shows of a paused pursuit on a fantastical mission. The boy stumbles to his feet, to the sound of his mother crying. He walks into the kitchen and finds some crackers, those ones that come six in a pack, as the doorbell rings… the boy didn’t even realize they had a doorbell until now. He waits for his mother to answer it, as the bell rings again. The boy looks around the corner of the living room to see who it would be, Saturday morning and someone wants into this house? The mother stumbles out of the bedroom to the door, ignoring her son on the way. The door opens to tall gentlemen, giving the widest grin the boy had ever seen on a person. The man is well dressed, holding gifts wrapped in Christmas wonderland paper. The boy’s eyes widened, he had never heard of Santa coming to the front door before, and he didn’t remember it being Christmas day… in fact the boy knows it isn’t Christmas. The smiling reindeer and snowmen on the wrapping paper fill the boy with the most joy he had experienced since beating that one video game last year. The man hands the gifts to the boy’s mother, they exchange some words... the boy would listen if presents weren’t in the picture. His mother closes the front door as the gentlemen walks away. The presents are set on the damp carpet of the living room, and the mother tells the boy he can open them as she returns to the bedroom and closes the door. Elated, the boy rushes to his knees to open his gifts, his gifts brought by Santa, his gifts brought by a stranger. This is the best Christmas the boy had ever had.