“Naughty … yes, got that one. Naughty … yes. Naughty … we have a very high success rate.” Then he sneered at a line, crossed it out vigorously with the nib of his quill pen. “Somebody slipped up—this kid’s in the Nice column! People tend to notice when nice kids go missing.” A supervisor hench-elf scurried off to rectify the error.
Elfis picked up a bullhorn and began shouting toward the factory floor. “Listen up, kiddies! I have plenty more applicants to choose from, so if you want to be promoted in my criminal organization, you’ve got to produce, produce, produce! Only the best can survive this boot camp—also known as the Holiday Season! If you work hard, you’ll be real henchmen by Easter.” Elfis then started to laugh. “We’re going to put that damned bunny out of business, too!”
He slid his sunglasses up on the bridge of his narrow nose as his fiendish hench-elves pushed us forward. He seemed surprised to see us. “Mr. Chambeaux and friends—have you come to negotiate on Santa’s behalf again? Well, it’s too late. I’ve already got the holidays sewn up in a body bag, and now you’ll never stop me.”
When all else fails, when things look grimmest, I like to state the obvious. It puts villains off guard and usually gets them talking—too much. “You said you didn’t have Santa’s list of Naughty and Nice. That was dishonest.”
He held up a long finger. “No, that was misleading. I said I didn’t steal the list in order to earn brownie points or to make Santa look incompetent. I stole it strictly for my own purposes.” Elfis waved the parchment, showing us the long list of names. “It’s a recruitment tool, like a screening folder for job applicants. Santa already identified the naughty children for me, the ones suitable to become part of my operation.”
“But you put them to work as slave labor,” Robin said.
Elfis shrugged. “Well, they are naughty. Even criminals need to know the consequences of their actions. You do the crime, you pay the time. Community service for my community.”
I struggled against the satin ribbons binding my wrists. It reminded me of my childhood, trying to snap the ribbons so I could open my presents. Now, as then, the ribbon had supernatural strength.
Elfis leaned forward, opening both of his hands to warm them at the nearby furnace. The conveyor belt continued to clatter, dumping defective toys into it, plastic ones as well as metal. “It’s so nice to be warm for a change. And you three will be all toasty, too. I’m afraid I can’t allow my plans to be foiled—or tinseled. Into the furnace with them!”
The hench-elves swept forward like a blizzard of evil. Even though I’m a zombie, I had no desire to be cremated. And speaking for my two human friends, I knew that neither Robin nor McGoo wanted to tour the interior of the furnace either. I had to get us out of there.
Zombies, for all of our fragile bodies and flesh that’s prone to decay, have very strong teeth. Some zombies use them for ripping into flesh and bone; now I discovered that my teeth were excellent at cutting Christmas ribbon. I tore into my colorful satin bindings, snapped the ribbon—and I was free.
But I couldn’t fight all those armed hench-elves. Thinking of only one thing that might save us, I jammed my hand into my jacket pocket and grabbed the loop attached to the emergency jingle bell.
It wasn’t much of a jing-jing-jingle—but it was enough to summon Old Kris Kringle.
The flames in the furnace brightened, then made a coughing sound. Black smoke swirled out, and with a whoosh of hot air Santa Claus slipped down the smokestack and made his dramatic entrance. The conveyor belt came to a screeching halt as the jolly guy in the magic red suit (which also proved to be non-flammable) emerged from the furnace like something out of The Lord of the Rings. He planted his gloved hands on his hips and bellowed, “Ho-ho-ho! Who’s been a naughty boy?”
Elfis nearly jumped out of his skin and scrambled down from the director’s chair so rapidly that his sunglasses clattered on the floor. With the empty cloth sack over his shoulder, Santa stalked forward like an avenging angel—and not the type that goes on top of a Christmas tree. He spotted his lengthy rolled-up list on the worktable and seized it, holding it up like a baton. “You have gone too far, Elfis. And now you’d better cry, because Santa Claus is coming to get you.”
The hench-elves were panicked. They dropped their candy-cane cattle prods and icicle spears and cowered. Their teeth chattered as if they had gone caroling naked on a cold winter’s night and no one was offering wassail, or even hot cocoa.
Elfis tried to run, but Santa quickly caught up with him. I couldn’t believe how fast the old bearded guy could move, but he had to have a secret power if he could hit millions of households around the world in a single night.
McGoo held up his bound wrists for me to bite the ribbons. Now that was showing a measure of trust! “Good plan, Shamble.”
“I call it Santa ex-Machina.” I picked bright green satin out of my teeth, then turned to free Robin as well.
Santa had cornered Elfis by the big coal hoppers, and the evil elf had no place to go. Santa didn’t need any help, but I was part of this, too—and I had a bone to pick with anybody who wanted to throw me and my friends into a furnace.
Next to me, one of the cowering hench-elves still had a sack filled with the icy rock-filled snowballs. I grabbed one and hurled it with perfect aim, proving that not all zombies are disoriented and uncoordinated. My snowball shot struck the release latch on the coal hopper just above Elfis’s head. The trap dropped open, and Elfis looked up just in time to see a black avalanche dump down on him. He was buried under lumps of coal.
Robin, McGoo, and I rushed over to Santa, who gazed with satisfaction at the mound in front of him. “Coal is what Elfis deserved … although I’d hoped he would turn his life around if given the chance. Such a disappointment.”
“You knew Elfis beforehand?” I asked.
Santa nodded. “He was one of my toy laborers, assigned to my workshop for community service, but he escaped, broke the rules of his North Pole parole. I was going to report him, but not until after the holiday season was over. It’s a busy time of the year, you know.”
We heard a groan, then a stirring. We moved the coal blocks away to reveal an Elfis now entirely covered in black dust. He plucked in dismay at his ruined jacket. “I guess I won’t be having a white Christmas.”
Santa unslung the sack from his shoulder, tugged it open, and strode forward. “Here comes Santa Claus.”
Elvis scrambled backward when he saw the yawning sack. “No, Santa! Please! No!”
“Naughty children get what they deserve.” Santa snatched Elfis, stuffed him into the sack, and cinched the opening shut. The captive kept squirming, but could not get out. Santa tucked his rolled up Naughty and Nice list under one arm. “Thank you all. I’ll start checking these names, see who deserves to be sentenced to the North Pole for a few years.”
“Sentenced to the North Pole?” Robin said.
“Oh-ho-ho, this list doesn’t just show me who gets presents and who doesn’t. The naughtiest of the naughty have to help me spread holiday cheer. Parents write me, too, you know. ‘Dear Santa, please help me with my child who keeps acting out.’ We have a community-service program up at the Pole, where naughty children can learn good behavior by doing good works.” He had a twinkle in his eye. “There’s a long waiting list, but our success rate is remarkable.”
“Except for Elfis,” I said.
“Some nuts are harder to crack than others, but a few days of shoveling out the reindeer stables usually makes them a little more cooperative.”
Moving with supernaturally swift footsteps, Santa stalked around the factory floor, grabbing the cowering hench-elves one by one and stuffing them into his sack, which was obviously much larger inside than it was on the outside. It needed to be. How else could it hold a world’s worth of toys?
With the bulging, squirming load over his shoulder, he turned to Robin, McGoo, and me. “I’ll let you free the children.” He turned to the shackled waifs on the now-sti
ll production lines. “Ho-ho-ho! Have you all learned to be nice instead of naughty?”
A chorus of the enslaved kids affirmed that they had indeed learned their lessons. Some, including Buddy, even volunteered to do community-service work up at the North Pole—after they recovered back home with their loving families.
Santa went to the coal furnace, shifted his heavy sack. “I won’t forget you on Christmas morning, Mr. Chambeaux. Or you either, Ms. Deyer, or Officer McGoohan. And now, Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good”—he pushed down his black glove so he could double-check the time on his wristwatch—“a good night.” He tossed the squirming bag ahead of him into the mouth of the furnace, touched the side of his nose, and vanished up the smokestack.
“Elfis has left the building,” I said. “But the kids are still here.”
The three of us spent the better part of an hour freeing the natural and unnatural children from their shackles. When Robin unlocked his chains, Buddy Tannenbaum threw himself into her arms. “Thank you, thank you! Can you take me back to my Mom and Dad now?”
“You’ll be home for Christmas,” I promised.
For a lot of families, it would be a happy holiday season, except perhaps for those who had ordered their gifts from Elfis Industries and were expecting delivery by Christmas Eve Eve.…
While McGoo called for backup to shut down the factory and secure the crime scene, Robin took down names and developed a plan to reunite the kids with their parents. I called the Tannenbaums directly, and Buddy’s parents rushed right down. It was a wonderful reunion, with the werewolf kid nuzzling his parents and promising he would be good.
10
It was Christmas morning in the Chambeaux & Deyer offices—and we found surprise gifts waiting for us, brightly wrapped in colorful paper with holly leaves and berries, wreaths, and little snowmen. Since we didn’t have a chimney, Santa could only have delivered the presents by breaking-and-entering, but I wasn’t going to press charges.
“Looks like Santa was true to his promise,” I said.
Grinning, Sheyenne brought the gifts into the conference room. “If you can’t trust Santa to keep a promise, who can you trust?”
I hadn’t put anything on my wish list, but Santa Claus was supposed to know exactly what a person wanted or needed. I had to admit I was curious.
“You first, Robin.” I nudged the thin, rectangular box with her name on it. As a lawyer, Robin tried to remain cool and businesslike, but I could see the sparkle in her brown eyes as she tugged the ribbon aside, and politely worked at the tape. When she couldn’t get it unwrapped, she used a letter opener to slash the paper with all the finesse of a well-practiced serial killer.
Inside was a single yellow legal pad and a sharpened No. 2 pencil. Her excitement dimmed, though she remained smiling. “I can certainly use these. And not every lawyer gets to use a pencil and legal pad from Santa himself.”
“There’s a note,” I pointed out.
Robin pulled a slip of holly-fringed stationery from behind the second yellow sheet, skimmed the hand-written note, then read aloud as her smile grew. “‘I don’t normally give magical gifts—I don’t want to establish a present precedent, but I am so grateful for your efforts. After checking my list and the footnotes I made throughout the year, Robin, I know that your work delights you more than anything else. This special legal pad will never run out of paper, and the enchanted pencil will take notes for you so you can have your hands and mind free to concentrate on your client. Ho-ho-ho, best, S.C.”
Robin’s smile was wide. “I can’t wait to try it out!”
Excited, Sheyenne picked up the box with her name on it. She used her poltergeist abilities to undo the bow, pull the ribbon aside, and then, giggling, ripped the wrapping paper to shreds. She opened the box to find an envelope inside—with both our names written on it.
“It’s something the two of us can use, Beaux!” With luminous fingers, she opened the flap of the envelope to find an embossed, official-looking certificate inside. “Oh! An all-expense-paid romantic weekend for us at the cozy North Pole Winter Wonderland Bed and Breakfast! Off-season only, it says.”
“Now that has definite possibilities,” I said, imagining a wonderful time away with my girlfriend. We would have to be creative to overcome the supernatural difficulties that precluded us from touching, but I was up to the challenge.
“Open yours, Dan.” Robin handed me the very small box with my name on it.
Judging by the size, I thought it might be a new pair of cufflinks or a tie clip, but who was I to doubt Santa’s wisdom or imagination? Zombie fingers are not the most adept at unwrapping small gift boxes, and Santa’s elves had used way too much tape, but I managed.
I opened a hinged, velvet-covered box to reveal a small plastic cylinder labeled “Magic Lip Gloss. Use Sparingly.” I wasn’t disappointed so much as confused, not sure what Santa had been thinking. “Lip gloss?”
Sheyenne made a delighted sound and snatched the tube out of the box. “I think it’s for me, Beaux—and that means it’s for you.” She popped off the cap, extended the lip gloss, and applied it to her widening smile. “A special film for my ghostly lips that might just allow a kiss.…”
She leaned closer, but I told her to wait. “Just a minute, let’s do this right.” I slipped a hand into my jacket pocket and withdrew the wadded and prickly tumbleweed ball of the McMistletoe artificial substitute that Elfis had been trying to bring to market. I raised it up over my head. “This is supposed to be as good as mistletoe.”
Robin was skeptical. “With all the quality that we’ve come to expect from Elfis Industries?”
Sheyenne’s lips glistened invitingly from the magic lip gloss. Under the McMistletoe, she came very close, and her ectoplasmic lips brushed against mine. Yes, I definitely felt a warm tingle.
“I think it works just fine,” she said.
Look past the tinsel, trimmed trees and wrapping paper, and you’ll see holidays are bound by family. Secrets, tricks and lies can break these bonds, however, in ways no festive Holiday dinner can mend.
Nina Hoffman’s supernatural tale deftly explores such a tangled web of familial tension, and shows that “close knit” can have several—sometimes ominous—meanings.
—KO
Close Knit
Nina Kiriki Hoffman
“Come on, Melly. Let me spend Christmas day with you and the kids,” Leo said into his cell phone. “I promise I’ll bring presents, and I won’t bring any of our regular arguments.”
“What, you have a whole new set?” asked Melissa from the house they used to share on the other side of town.
Leo leaned back against the frilly-shammed pillows his mother had layered against the bed’s headboard in what used to be his childhood room. His mother took cushions to an extreme. There was so much padding in his parents’ house you often couldn’t find the furniture beneath.
Since he moved out at eighteen to marry Melissa, his mother had turned his old room into a guestroom for someone who loved ruffles, country patterns, the scent of lavender, and no actual contact with dirt. Leo didn’t like any of those things, but his room was the one his mother turned into a guest room. His older brother Rick’s room had become a sewing room, and his older brother Andy’s room had turned into a study for his dad. When he moved back in following the separation, he ended up in his new old room.
In his parents’ house, he was in his mother’s power, which made it hard to move out.
He had been hoping the split with Melissa was temporary, hoping he’d move home to her and the kids in a week. It had stretched into months.
If he couldn’t go home, he needed to get out of his parents’ house and live somewhere else.
Live alone. Oh, God. When he considered the prospect, the world went dark behind his eyes. He thought of his middle brother, Andy, the one they had made unmentionable after his suicide. Andy had lost his wife in childbirth, and then himself. The bond had been too strong for Andy to
survive without his wife.
“I will sign a pact of nonaggression,” Leo said. “Please, Melissa. You know you can trust me.”
“Well,” she said, and let the silence stretch. “My folks are coming for Christmas dinner at two in the afternoon. Can you be gone by then?”
“Do they hate me that much?”
“I just don’t want to stress about this!”
“Okay. If I can have the morning with you and the kids, that’d be great.”
“All right. See you around eight a.m.”
“Roger that. Thank you, Melissa. Thank you.”
“Don’t screw this up, Leo.”
“I won’t.”
She hung up. He set the phone on the bedside table and sank back against the pillow mountain. He only got to see his three kids once a week, and they kept changing while he wasn’t there to see it. He never saw Melissa at all, only talked with her on the phone.
Christmas Day, he’d have another chance to collect the threads of family and reclaim his power.
In the meantime, he’d have to survive life among the marshmallows.
Leo had done what his father told him. “Don’t pick the most beautiful, the most talented, the smartest, the most ambitious,” Dad had said. “Find someone who doesn’t have big dreams or plans.”
Leo picked Melissa when they were in tenth grade. Melissa was a nice, quiet girl, no great beauty, but pleasant and pretty and thoughtful. He supported her, spent time with her, spun the bond to draw her to him. She smiled and came into his embrace.
He’d proposed when they were at the top of a Ferris wheel at the county fair their senior year in high school. He reined in all his family magic to let her make the choice without him pushing her into it. That wasn’t something his father had told him to do.
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