by Roz Marshall
Contents
Title Page
Description
Skiing with Santa
An extract from 'Fear of Falling'
Other Secrets in the Snow books
A note from the author
Characters
Copyright
About this story
Sandy is like the original Scrooge – he thinks Christmas is commercialised claptrap, and refuses to have any part of it. So it's like his own personal nightmare when Ski School manager Jude tries a new marketing ploy, 'Ski with Santa' and he has to play a part he abhors. Will his naughty and nice pupils help this reluctant Father Christmas to face his ghosts and discover the quintessence of the season?
HE KNEW THEY called him 'Santa' behind his back. If only they knew how ironic that was.
He didn't even believe in all this X-mas nonsense. He narrowed his eyes. Nothing to do with Christ in this modern Christmas. X-mas is much more appropriate. He couldn't wait for the commercialised claptrap and the excess of acquisitiveness to be over for yet another year.
"I hate Christmas, you know that!" he'd told his wife, Jean, that morning, when she'd asked if he would get the decorations down from the attic. He didn't want all that gaudy tat around the house, reminding him of X-mas. There was enough of that on the telly and in the shops. You couldn't get away from it. But she'd persisted.
"Sandy Potter, stop being such a killjoy and help me get the house ready!" she'd said, waggling a finger at him. "You may hate Christmas, but the grandkids love it. Christmas is all about family, and we need to get the place sorted!"
But he'd drawn the line when she suggested buying a new tree. "Absolutely not, my dear, there's nothing wrong with the old one!" he'd told her. "And remember, we need to save our money. All this hype and nonsense is just lining some fat-cat's pocket. But that won't give us anything to retire on, will it? Mr Capitalist isn't going to pay our bills once we're too old to work, is he?" He knew he'd won that one, because she turned and flounced out of the room, her mouth set in a stubborn line.
-::-
When he got to work at the ski school that morning, he found that Jude had come up with another bright idea; one that he was sure was designed especially to annoy him: 'Ski with Santa'.
She had some mad theory that it would help to pull in the punters during the week before Christmas, and had handed out red costumes and white beards.
He pulled the loose-fitting red robe over the top of his ski jacket, thinking that he'd have felt victimised if all the other instructors weren’t having to dress up like that fat bastard as well. Jude's got that one wrong. The sight of that weirdo, Spock, in a Santa suit is more likely to send them running for the hills than into ski class! He fingered his whiskers. But at least I won't have to endure an itchy fake beard for a whole day.
Through the window of the ski school hut he could see the milling crowd of ankle-biters, desperate to meet Father Christmas and give him their list of demands. Jude had promised the instructors a bonus for taking part in this charade. But, looking at the rapacious mob outside, perhaps it was actually danger money they should be getting? He rolled his eyes and jammed the red hat over his ears. Time to face the firing squad.
-::-
As he clumped outside in his heavy ski boots, Sandy noticed his Kiwi lodger, Mike, who was deputising as chief instructor whilst Jude's husband was working – ironically – in New Zealand, at the other side of the meeting area. When Mike had turned up at the house a couple of weeks ago asking for a room, he'd assumed the man would only stay a day or two. He'd never imagined that he'd be having to remind Mike in the week before Christmas that they were only a Bed and Breakfast, so the incomer would have to find somewhere else to spend Christmas day.
He sniffed and stomped down the steps, just as the Kiwi's voice rang out. "Sandy! Let me introduce you to your group."
Mike motioned him over to where he stood with a motley crew, ranging in age from a pigtailed girl of about six to a grey-haired old dear, who would certainly be using an OAP concession lift pass today. I hope she can keep up!
"This is your instructor for today: Santa Claus. Be sure and be nice for him, not naughty!" Mike introduced him to the class, most of whom laughed appreciatively. To Sandy, he said, "This is a running group, they can all use the uplift and are mostly at beginner parallel level, Santa, so they'll enjoy skiing with you whilst they tell you about their Christmas wishes."
Sandy sighed inwardly. Why couldn't he have had a snowplough group? This lot would need escorting all over the mountain, and his knees and ankles would be aching by the end of the day.
He put on a fake smile, puffed out his chest and opened an arm expansively. "Merry Christmas, class. We shall start today on the Highlander chairlift." At least I can get a sit-down for a few minutes. He hoisted his skis onto his right shoulder and tramped off. "Follow me!"
-::-
As he settled himself into the hard plastic seat of the chairlift, Sandy turned to see whose Christmas demands he'd have to endure for this journey. "So, young man, have you been naughty or nice? Will Santa be bringing you any presents this year?"
The earnest-looking boy beside him was eyeing him suspiciously. "I don't believe you're the actual Santa," he said, and without any warning, shot out a hand, tugging hard at Sandy's beard.
"Ouch!" Sandy said, batting the boy's hand away. "That hurt!" Bloody cheek of the boy!
"Oh," said the boy, with a frown, "it's real?"
"Well, what did you expect? I am Father Christmas, after all."
"You're not Father Christmas. There's no such thing as Father Christmas. How could one single man manage to visit all the children in the world, in just one night?" The boy shook his head. "Even if he could get down and up a chimney at all, seeing as he's so fat from eating all those cookies," with this he looked accusingly at Sandy's expansive girth, "even if he could get down and up in five minutes or less, he'd still struggle to get round a small town in one night. There's no way he could travel the whole world in twenty-four hours."
Sandy sighed. Give me strength! Convincing non-believers wasn't part of the job description – he didn't even believe it all himself. "But, young man, I have special time-shifting powers," he tilted his head, "which means that for me, time travels much more slowly than for mere mortals." He warmed to his theme. "Which is why I age so slowly that, to you humans, I always look the same."
The boy narrowed his eyes. "But you don't always look the same. I saw at least three other Santas taking ski classes today, and their beards definitely looked fake!"
Something in the boy's words seemed to echo down the years. He was sure he'd heard similar arguments before.
He shook his head. "No, no, no, son, you see, that is my time-shifting power again," he lifted his chin, "it lets me appear to be in more than one place in your time. But in fact, I am just moving incredibly quickly, by your standards."
The boy pursed his lips. "Do the elves make all the presents for you, then? The ones in your sack?" Sandy's sense of déjà vu increased.
"Yes." Sandy looked up the hill. How much longer is this chairlift going to take?
"Really?" The boy raised his eyebrows so much that they disappeared under his fringe. "Last year I got a Nintendo DS from 'Santa'. And Nintendos are made by a Japanese company. Not elves. My sister got a Barbie princess doll, and they're made by a company called Mattel. Not elves. So how come Santa gives presents you can buy in shops, not ones made by elves?"
How on Earth do I answer that one? But something in the boy's tone stirred a memory, and he grasped at it before it disappeared again; he recall
ed himself as a child, asking his father something similar, and managed to dredge the reply from his hazy memory banks. "Uh, well, you see, my elves are so clever at making things that sometimes the big manufacturers get them to go along and help at their factories. So that's why we have branded goods to give." He gave the youngster a pointed look. "To the nice children."
The boy pursed his lips again, and Sandy decided it was time to take the initiative, before he got asked about rocket-powered reindeer or something. "So, young man, what is your name?"
"It's Hester," the boy said, rubbing his nose.
"Yester? That's an unusual name."
"No, it's Hester."
"Oh." Sandy waved an arm. "So, Hester, why did you come to this class today, if you don't believe in Santa Claus?"
Hester sniffed, and muttered, "For my sister." He motioned at the girl wearing a pink jacket in the chair two ahead of them.
"Your younger sister?"
"Yeah."
"And she still believes in Santa?"
"Yeah."
Sandy narrowed his eyes at the boy. "Well, I still have to hear her Christmas wishes. So I hope I can rely on you to play the game for the rest of the day, young man? So as not to spoil it for her?"
Hester rubbed his nose again, and mumbled, "Yes, Santa."
"Good," said Sandy, and had to rub his mouth with his hand to hide a triumphant smile.
-::-
The morning passed by in a blur of children with lists of toys – most of which he'd never heard of – and ski drills for his class to practice as they slid down the busy runs of the ski resort.
As the class reconvened after lunch, a weak midwinter sun glistened off the piles of snow the snowploughs had left at the edges of the car park. The air was strangely still and quiet, apart from the slow churn of a nearby drag tow's engine, and the metallic 'clink' as its returning button poles stacked between the guide-rails of the loading area.
Doing a head-count to make sure everyone had returned, he realised thankfully that he'd already accompanied nearly all of them on the chairlift or one of the t-bar surface tows. Thank goodness! I won't have to endure this Santa charade much longer.
One person he hadn't travelled with yet was a skinny teenaged girl, who was one of the better skiers in the group. He beckoned her over and then told the group to meet him at the top of the Highlander run.
"My dear, I haven't escorted you yet. Would you join me on the chairlift?"
"Yes, Santa," she replied.
He looked sideways at her, wondering if she was being disingenuous. But there was no guile in her expression; she looked back at him with clear green eyes, their underside shadowed by purple-tinged skin.
They reached the entrance to the chairlift, and he motioned her in front of him. "Ladies first." Once the mechanism scooped them up and was whisking them up the hill, he turned towards her, twisting his large frame as best he could within the confines of the metal chairlift cradle. "You've been doing very well in class today, my dear. Can you remind me what your name is?"
"Trudy."
He nodded. "So how did you learn to ski, Trudy? Was it with your school or with your parents?"
She pursed her lips and shook her head. "No! I've been up a few times with the 'Ski Development Trust', though."
Ski Development Trust? Where have I heard that name before? Then he recalled the charity collectors whose rattling tins he'd studiously ignored when he passed them outside the ticket office that morning. "Oh, tell me, what do they do? I don't know anything about them."
"They help kids like me who wouldn't be able to afford to go skiing otherwise." She shrugged. "They do bus trips from Dundee and," she frowned and twisted her nose, "some other places, I forget where, and race training for the better skiers." She widened her eyes. "I'm hoping to get onto the race training programme next year."
"I see, I see," he nodded. "Good luck with that." He patted his tummy. "Now, do you have any Christmas wishes you'd like to share with Santa?"
He fully expected her to ridicule him, much as Hester had done that morning and as he himself would have done as a teenager, but she seemed to consider his question carefully. "I wish…" her voice was quiet, and he had to strain to hear her, "I could be with my family for Christmas."
Sandy frowned. "But why would you not be with them, young lady?"
Trudy looked up at him, furrowing her brows as if she expected him to have known the answer. "Me and my brother are in a care home just now, 'cos Mum's in hospital."
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that, my dear. Is there any chance she might be out in time?"
"Don't think so," she muttered.
"What about your father?"
She screwed up her face again, shaking her head as she replied, "He left ages ago. We've not heard anything from him for years."
Sandy exhaled loudly. "I'm sorry to hear that, young lady."
She looked down and picked at her glove for a minute, and he thought she was finished until he caught a whispered plea. "I wish you'd bring my mum home for Christmas." She lifted her chin and looked him in the eye.
He tilted his head at her. "You do know that I'm not the real Santa Claus, my dear?" he said gravely.
Her eyes started to fill with tears and she looked down. "Yeah, I s'pose" she said, "I just hoped…" She sniffed. "I just miss my family. Christmas isn't the same without your family."
He patted her arm. He was never sure what to do when women got emotional. Mostly he tried to ignore them, but it was hard to avoid a tearful teenager, sat right next to you in the confines of a chairlift. He sighed. This is turning into a long day.
-::-
As he pulled down the safety bar of the chairlift for the final time, Sandy closed his eyes for a moment and rubbed his aching left knee. Thank goodness this is the last run of the day. He looked out of the corner of his eye at his companion. It was the old lady, Morna. She'd seemed to be cooperative and quiet so far – maybe he'd get a bit of peace for this journey up the hill.
No such luck.
"I don't rightly know what made me join the Santa class today," she turned her shoulders and looked at him. "I weren't thinking straight. All this stupid palaver, all the children with their Christmas lists. I should've known better."
"Oh, I'm sorry, my dear, have you not enjoyed the lesson?"
"No, no, it weren't you, lad, it's me." She shook her head. "I 'ate Christmas," she said, drawing out the vowel sound so that she sounded quite fierce. "Since three year ago, when my partner died. On Christmas Eve. Brain aneurysm, they said it were. She just dropped down and died, all of a sudden, like."
Sandy's eyebrows raised as he realised that this woman's partner had been another lady. He'd never met one of them before. He looked at her with curiosity.
"It were that Anne Robinson's fault." Morna continued, "It was the Christmas Special of ‘The Weakest Link', and she were being right horrid to the contestants. Susan got herself all red in the face, shouting at the telly, then, next thing," she paused, and rubbed her nose with a ski glove, "she were gone." She pursed her lips and looked off into the distance. Her voice modulated. "She were my life; she were so full of energy, of fun," she sniffed, "everything's just been grey without her." She turned watery eyes on Sandy. "I've hated Christmas since that day."
Sandy nodded slowly, recognising those feelings.
"That's why I've come up here to Scotland," she waved an arm at the scenery that passed by as they ascended the chairlift, "for Christmas – to get away from the memories."
"But do you not have family to go to?"
"Susan were my family," she said emphatically, and looked down at her gloved hands. "And now she's gone, it's easier to spend the 'festive' season on my own."
Sandy nodded again, and rubbed his bottom lip. "I'm afraid I also know how you feel," he said quietly. He saw the woman frown. "You see, my father died on Christmas Day when I was nine. A heart attack. And I've hated Christmas ever since, as well."
"Oh, you poor
thing, here's me moaning about my troubles from a few year ago, and you've had to put up with it all your life." She shook her head, and patted his arm. "And they're making you wear this stupid costume, and be all 'Ho, ho, ho' all day, and you don't even like Christmas." She frowned again. "But if you don't like it, why do this Kris Kringle," she waved an arm at his outfit and beard, grasping for the word, "pantomime, at all?"
He rolled his shoulders as he thought about her question. He remembered his initial flush of pleasure when Jude had said there'd be extra money just for dressing up as Santa for a few hours, and how he'd suppressed his real feelings about the season because of the lure of some additional pay.
He thought back to the sceptical boy from this morning, Hester, and the emotional girl, Trudy, and how they'd made him think beyond the superficial face of Christmas.
Scrunching his eyes, he replayed this morning's conversation with Jean in his mind's eye, and heard her voice in his head, 'You may hate Christmas, but the grandkids love it. Christmas is all about family.'
And now this reclusive woman was sitting next to him, verbalising his daydreams of spending Christmas on his own, far away from the need to be sociable and magnanimous. But instead of epitomising his fantasy of solitary splendour, she just sounded sad and lonely.
That gave him pause. He looked across at her, and wondered if people felt sorry for him as well, the way that he was starting to take pity on her?
She was looking expectantly at him, and he realised she was still waiting on an answer. "Ah, well, I suppose I've come to realise that Christmas isn't about taking," he said slowly, "it's about what we can give." He looked down at his portly tummy in the red outfit, and rolled his eyes at her. "It doesn't exactly take much for me to look like Santa, does it?"
He must have actually made a joke, of sorts, because she smiled back at him. Wonders will never cease!
-::-
Sandy raised his hand in farewell as he left his class at the bottom of the Highlander run, and started to trudge, head-down, across the car park towards the ski school hut.