‘That’s just elfist,’ she said. ‘What are we supposed to look like? Little pixie types with pointy ears and snub noses?’
‘Well…yes,’ Amy said. ‘That kind of is how you are supposed to look.’
‘Blame Disney for that,’ Becca said. ‘There are a few fairies and pixies in the mix, but mostly we’re humans of all shapes and sizes. And it’s hardly surprising, being an elf is the best job in the world.’
‘But, I mean…how do you get to be an elf?’ Amy asked Becca, whose eyes were glued on Gilbert as he dirty danced with a woman Amy could only assume was Kirsty, the flirty elf.
‘You have to be ready to see the magic,’ Becca told her. ‘All of us, all humans are born able to see the magic. When we’re kids we don’t think twice about it. But then we get older and everyday life, jobs and bills, boring stuff like that, rub it away, little by little, until we forget that there is magic at all. And for some of us, our lives get to a point when if we don’t see the magic, all we will see for evermore is darkness. It’s always when you think your life is at its lowest ebb that you’re given a second chance. But you have to be ready, and you have to be looking.’
‘How do you know if you’re ready?’ Amy asked, intrigued.
Becca shrugged. ‘I was pole dancing in a “gentlemen’s” club when I saw the ad in my local paper: “Elf wanted, Lapland.” I can’t tell you how much I hated my job – every soulless, depressing, empty hour of it – and to be honest, I thought the ad was for just another dancer and that Lapland was a name for another nasty club. I turned up at the address it gave one afternoon, expecting the usual sleazy suspects, but no one else was there – just Santa, oh and Suz, who handles recruitment. And even after all the things I’d done and seen, I still passed the CCRB check. I was still good at heart. Santa offered me the job.’ Becca turned and smiled at Amy, warmth filling her eyes. ‘And you know what, it’s such a relief when someone tells you they still have faith in you, no matter how you feel about yourself. I’ve been here nearly eight months now, Suz has been here ten years, and Hot Gilbert – he’s a novelist, he’s been here over four years now while he’s working on his book.’
‘And once you’re here, do you have to stay forever?’ Amy asked, fascinated.
‘No, it’s only Santa who signs up for the long haul,’ Becca said. ‘The rest of us can come and go as we like. Once we feel ready for the world again, we can go back. It’s sort of like magical rehab for the terminally tired of crappiness.’
‘Wow,’ Amy said. ‘It sounds amazing; I want to be an elf!’
‘Oh, you can’t be an elf,’ Becca said, suddenly very serious. ‘You’ve got to get back on the sleigh and find a boyfriend pronto. Otherwise…’
‘Otherwise what?’ Amy asked.
‘Well, if Santa fails to deliver each Christmas Wish exactly as it was wished for, which in your case is for a hunky man to cuddle up with every night, then he’s failed. He’ll have to resign in the New Year and they’ll look for another Santa, one who’s not so easily distracted by pretty girls, which would be a shame, because since time began, no Santa has ever failed at making the Christmas Wish come true before.’
‘I had no idea,’ Amy gasped. ‘I had no idea I get could him fired!’
‘And the worst thing is,’ Becca said, ‘if Santa gets fired, that will be it. He’ll never be able to see the magic again. His life will always be dark and, I hate to say this, but it will be all your fault.’
13. Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree
‘RIGHT,’ BECCA SAID. ‘I’ve had enough of this. I’m going to go and show Gilbert how to do a real North Pole dance.’
Without a second glance, Becca leaped onto the dance floor gyrating her way in between Kirsty and Gilbert in one fluid manoeuvre.
Dumbstruck by Becca’s bombshell, Amy turned around and crept unnoticed out of the Holly and the Ivy and into the freezing night. Except it wasn’t cold, she noticed as she trudged through the snow towards a huge Christmas tree that lit up the town square like a beacon. And the snow didn’t melt or seep through her flimsy shoes and showed no trace of footprints, hoof prints or muddy sludge edges contaminating its pristine sparkle.
As Amy approached the tree she stopped, gazing up at its pinnacle. At first she thought it had a particularly amazing star decoration at its very top, but then she realised it was a real star, positioned in just the right place in the sky so that it looked like it was sitting on top of the tree. As she walked around the tree, she discovered that, no matter where you stood, the star was always in exactly right place.
‘If I don’t fall in love by the end of tonight,’ Amy told the star unhappily, ‘then Santa will lose his job and, worse than that, lose everything he loves. His life will be miserable and sad, like Becca’s before she came here. And I can’t let that happen because I…’
‘Love him?’ Amy looked sharply to her left to find another elf, this time a beautiful looking creature with long golden hair that tumbled down her back. She was holding an aged looking reindeer by the halter.
‘I didn’t hear you coming,’ Amy said.
‘You wouldn’t have,’ the beautiful girl said. ‘It’s an elf thing. Well, it’s an elf and reindeer thing. Bronson here and I were just off to relieve one of the other reindeers for their next run. Dasher’s knees aren’t what they used to be. I’m Heather by the way. I’m a Reindeer Elf.’
‘Hello, Heather.’ Amy smiled weakly. ‘I don’t know what to do. I just want to make everything OK for him, he’s done so much for me. I couldn’t bear it if he lost his job because I’ve gone and…’
‘Fallen for him,’ Heather said. ‘It’s OK, you can say it out loud. There won’t be a siren and police arriving to arrest you for crimes against falling in love sensibly. Frankly, pretty much all of us have crushed on him one way or another since he got here anyway, even the boys. He’s the hottest Santa we’ve had in centuries.’
‘Are you saying you think this is a phase?’ Amy asked. ‘That I’ll get over it? Like when I used to snog my Gary Barlow poster every night before bed?’
Heather observed her for a moment. ‘Hmmm, no. I think you’ve fallen for him. That’s another elf thing, we tend to know what other people are thinking and feeling. What’s real and what’s not. It comes in handy when we’re checking the Christmas letters, making sure that all the children who say they’ve been good actually were, that sort of thing. And as for you, you’re smitten, babe. You’ve got it bad. You are drowning in lurrrrrrve.’
‘Oh, good,’ Amy said sarcastically. ‘Well, I’m just going to have to snap out of it, aren’t I? Get Santa to take me somewhere, find some man, pretend I’m in love with him and the job will be done. Santa can come back here and be happy and I can live the rest of my life alone and in misery, destined never to see my One True Love again. Perfect.’
Heather repressed a smile. ‘Actually, you can’t do that. A fake Christmas Wish come true won’t work. You’ll have to actually love the person that you end up with, and they will have to actually love you.’
‘But I can’t have the person I’m in love with and he’s far too busy being handsome and good and kind and well, Santa, to be in love with me.’
‘Yes,’ Heather said, burying her head in Bronson’s neck. ‘I suppose it does rather seem that way.’
‘What shall I do, Heather? What shall I do?’ Amy asked desperately.
‘Ask him to take you to Bethlehem,’ Heather said, peeping over Bronson’s nose.
‘Why, what’s in Bethlehem?’
‘Duh!’ Heather laughed. ‘Have you forgotten completely what Christmas is about? A stable, a baby born to be King? Some sheep, the odd donkey…’
‘Oh you mean, THAT Bethlehem.’
‘Yes, that one,’ Heather said, shaking her head. ‘Look I don’t know how you are going to sort this mess out. Christmas Wishers are out of bounds to Santa, and if you can’t stop being in love with him then he is almost certainly doomed for all eternity. But I do know t
hat when you see what is happening in Bethlehem tonight, you will feel better. And maybe then you’ll think of something.’
‘Maybe then I’ll think of something?’ Amy said, anxiously. ‘Not exactly the reassurance I was looking for.’
‘That’s why I retired from being a fairy godmother,’ Heather said. ‘It was always me getting the princesses put to sleep for a hundred years or locked up in a tower they couldn’t get out of! Never did give the advice right…Anyway, good luck! You’re going to need it!’
And without another word she leaped onto Bronson’s back and they galloped up into the air, towards the runway.
‘Bethlehem,’ Amy said thoughtfully. Well, at least it was a place to go and it would give her time to think, to formulate a plan. Or at the very least, to find some faults in Santa that would put her off him. Because whatever happened, she knew one thing: she couldn’t let Santa lose everything he loved because of her.
14. Hark! the Herald Angels Sing
‘BETHLEHEM?’ SANTA ASKED, when she caught up with him in what looked like his office.
After Heather had flown off with Bronson, Amy had run in the general direction that Santa had disappeared in and peeped through windows, until she eventually spotted him, sitting at a massive desk, his head buried in his hands, poring over what looked like a very, very old book.
Trying to work out how to stop her ruining his life, no doubt, Amy thought, and keen to get the whole Christmas Wish debacle back on track, she had burst in through the door and declared, ‘I want to go to Bethlehem!
‘Yes,’ she continued. ‘I mean when else will I get the chance to travel back in time a couple of thousand years and witness an event that changed the world?’
Sighing, Santa closed the book, got up, and walked around the desk to stand opposite her.
‘I’ve heard that it’s the most magical, wonderful moment in all of time,’ he said. ‘It’s just, I’m trying to work out exactly how we can be…’
‘I know,’ Amy said. ‘I know, Becca and Heather explained everything to me. But look, you don’t need to worry, we will get this sorted. I will fall in love with someone soon. I’m famous for it, falling in love at the drop of a hat. I was in love with the sandwich bloke in the deli next to the office for months just because he gave me extra smoked salmon in my bagel for free. I mean, he never actually spoke to me, but he gave me extra salmon, and that’s pretty flirty, right?’
She looked at Santa for affirmation, but he looked more confused than she did. ‘And I was in love with Gavin about three seconds after meeting him, planning our wedding, naming our babies. Some people would say that makes me mental, but I say it makes me optimistic. What I’m trying to say is that you don’t have to worry. I’m thirty-one. Put me in front of a man with a job and without a criminal record or a wife, and I’m pretty sure I’ll fall in love with him given half a chance and maybe a large gin.’
Santa dropped his chin onto his chest, his shoulders deflating.
‘What?’ Amy asked. ‘I thought you’d be pleased?’
‘Pleased?’ he said, looking back up at her. ‘I thought…I was just…there’s this loophole and…So you want me to take you to Bethlehem as what? A side trip on the road to finding you a passable man to devote your beautiful heart to? Drop in and see baby Jesus before you give all of your love and life to some average Joe who will never appreciate you or care about you as much as…’ Santa stopped himself, clenching his jaw, ‘…he should do.’
‘Yes,’ Amy whispered unhappily. She had underestimated just how cross and fed up with her Santa was. It hurt that he’d so clearly had enough of her, but that was just another reason to get this mess sorted out now. Amy hadn’t been lying when she said she was famous for falling in love quickly, the thing was she hadn’t expected it to be with Santa, and she hadn’t expected it to feel deeper and stronger, and more real than anything else she’d ever felt in her life. But the facts were the facts. Santa needed her off his to do list, and that was one thing she could do for him. It would be her one act of true, selfless love, even if he never knew it.
‘Fine,’ he said, unable to look her in the eye. ‘Whatever.’
‘Whatever?’
‘I’ll need to ask an angel first,’ he said. ‘You know, it’s the nativity, it’s not like it’s on the time travelling tourist trail. You need special permission to visit. And a disguise.’
‘More dressing up?’ Amy asked, brightening.
‘That’s what makes this really depressing,’ Santa said, as with a sad smile, he reached out to touch her face. ‘You would have been perfect.’
‘For what?’ Amy asked. But Santa was already marching back across the snow towards the sleigh.
*
Amy wasn’t exactly sure where they arrived next because it wasn’t exactly a place. It was more a sort of a light feeling, or no…a sort of a happy, joyful feeling. And there was a lot of singing, a lot of happy but, quite honestly, really terrible singing. It was only when Santa took her hand that she could see them properly. There was a choir, or perhaps a host of angels at choir practise. Beginners choir practise by the sound of it.
‘Heaven save me,’ the lead angel said. ‘And I’ve got sixty-odd years before Gareth Malone gets here! Focus people, focus. Nicky, how do you expect to get your wings if you never, ever practise? You have to be able to sing and play the harp at the same time, love! It’s not exactly rocket science. And as for you, Caroline, well…I’m just wondering if some other branch of angel school wouldn’t be better for you. Guardian angels maybe…or angels of total and utter SILENCE.’
‘Hey, Laura-Anne,’ Santa said, leading Amy across what seemed like a stream of space. It was as if she were walking on stars that fell away from her feet for what looked like eternity.
‘Oh, Santa.’ Laura-Anne turned round and smiled at him, dazzling them both with what Amy could only describe as an indescribable beauty. ‘Trying to knock the latest batch of new recruits into shape. Funny how they always think that once they get here they will be able to sing, like it’s a given. Who’s this?’ She looked at Amy with eyes that were made of pure light, which seemed to bore into Amy’s soul. ‘Because I can tell you right now, she can’t carry a note in a bucket.’
‘This is Amy Tucker,’ Santa said, squeezing Amy’s fingers for reassurance. ‘I’m endeavouring to make her Christmas wish come true. It’s proving to be quite difficult…’
Laura-Anne turned her particular brand of attention to Santa. ‘Yes,’ she said more gently. ‘I can see that. Will you be OK?’
‘Eventually,’ Santa said, so sadly that Amy thought she would dissolve on the spot with the shame of making such a wonderful man unhappy.
‘I’m going to fall in love,’ she piped up. ‘Really soon, honest. I’d just…well, I heard that Bethlehem was a good place to really examine the contents of your heart.’
Laura-Anne looked at her and smirked, as much as it was possible for an angel to smirk.
‘Humans,’ she said, rolling her eyes at the host of angels who all giggled and then shut up again the moment that Laura-Anne remembered she was being strict. ‘And that goes for you too, Santa. Magic you may be, but a more human man would be hard to find right now. Remember, an awful lot of trouble can be saved if you only let others see into your heart.’
Santa and Amy said nothing, neither one really sure of what Laura-Anne was talking about.
‘Fine!’ she said, exasperated. ‘I’ll write you a pass, and then you can get out of here.’ Laura-Anne turned back to the angels. ‘So, you want to be in Angel Choir? Well, Angel Choir costs, and right here is where you start paying…’
*
‘Were we just in heaven?’ Amy asked as they flew back into the endless night.
‘No, we were in an alternate reality where celestial beings exist on another plane,’ Santa said, matter-of-factly.
‘Oh,’ Amy said, none the wiser. ‘Santa?’
‘Amy.’
‘Are you mad with me? B
ecause I just want to say that I…well, you are so great…and I would feel really bad if you were mad with me.’
‘I’m not mad with you, Amy,’ he said as he pulled a hard right, directing the sleigh towards the brightest star in the sky. ‘I’m mad at myself.’
15. Away in a Manger
‘I FEEL LIKE we should have brought something,’ Amy said as they stood on the brow of a low hill. It felt strange to feel so warm and there was a distinct lack of snow. From a lifetime of glitter encrusted Christmas cards featuring this very location, she’d expected that there would be snow. But then again, she supposed, this was the Middle East. Snow was probably pretty thin on the ground here.
‘Brought what, a packet of nappies and a couple of Babygros?’ Santa asked. ‘Besides, I think the Wise Men have got that side of things covered.’
‘What can a baby do with myrrh anyway?’ Amy mused. ‘Is it like for nappy rash?’
‘Look,’ Santa said, marching a couple of paces ahead of her. Amy found it difficult to keep up with him in her sandals; she kept getting sand in her feet and tiny stones caught under her toes. ‘Shall we stop all the chatting and just get on with it?’
Amy came to a halt on the track, sighing. Santa was in a mood with her and understandably too, but that didn’t help the way it made her feel. If they had to part, then at least she wanted them to part as friends and for him to think of her fondly. Maybe she should tell him she was sacrificing her future happiness for his job prospects, and then maybe he’d be nice to her again. Although that did rather take away the selflessness of her grand romantic gesture.
Gazing up at the bright star that was shining like a beacon in the sky over Bethlehem, Amy wondered if it would be completely out of order for her to wish on it? Probably, she decided. After all, it was sort of someone else’s star and she was in the middle of a special one-off Christmas wish as it was. It wouldn’t do to be greedy with baby Jesus’ star.
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