What’s on my mind?
I was 16. My job was to steer over-excited kids onto Santa’s lap; to blow up balloons with a hand pump as Santa grilled them; and to hand the brats a balloon and a candy cane before their beaming moms.
Probably the sole reason Santa got the job as a department-store Claus was that he was fat. Probably the sole reason I got the job as a department-store elf was that I wasn’t. The elf costume fit perfectly, as it had for the many, many, men-nee elves who’d preceded me. A quick sniff of the underarm area confirmed that.
Santa’s German accent was thicker than goulash. A tiny fleck of spittle usually danced on his lips. Terrified by his voice, his spun-plastic beard, and ... well, the spit, some kids wailed and peed on his legs. Santa bounced them on his knee to shut them up; the photographer took a picture; I handed them a balloon and a candy cane; their mothers took them away and ordered them to stifle.
On our coffee breaks, Santa’s beard came off and his feet went up in a foldable secular house painted with fake gingerbread men, candy canes, and a sign reading THE NORTH POLE. The house was near the red velvet chair where his equally red velvet suit routinely absorbed the pee hits. If the still-stinky underarms of my elf costume were any indication, the department store wouldn’t be dry cleaning any elf or Santa outfits when our Christmas gig ended.
I joined Santa on these breaks, pumping up extra balloons to get ahead of the mob. Moms sometimes plunked three kids on his lap; I needed to be ready when the hordes descended.
In the privacy of his foldable house, Santa loved nothing more than to reminisce about his Glory Days in the Luftwaffe. With my reading mostly focussed on porn, I didn’t know much about the war. Trying to make conversation, I said: “My father was a tail-gunner with the Royal Air Force. He flew over Dresden at 20,000 feet.”
Santa glanced up from his reverie. In a soft, even voice, he asked: “Was ist das?” I assumed the question was hypothetical, and continued pumping balloons.
Without warning, Santa screamed: “WAS IST DAS!?!?” He sounded like I imagined an interrogation officer would sound, which was exactly how (as I later learned at the movies) interrogation officers sounded.
Also without warning, he snatched my balloon blower, pushing it down his pants (“Is that a balloon blower in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”).
Outside the foldable house, with Santa back in his chair, everyone was decking the halls and laughing about a holly, jolly Christmas and asking Rudolph to lead their sleigh tonight while my virginal 16-year-old lips couldn’t pucker hard or fast enough to meet the demand for balloons. I was a lamb thrown to the Wölfe. Kids started mewling: “I want a bal-lo-o-on!” Even two candy canes wouldn’t pacify them.
Santa told the department store I wasn’t up to the job. I told the department store Santa was a closeted Nazi who’d stolen my balloon blower. The department store fired me. I had to turn in my sweaty elf costume. This experience taught me to steer clear of men in red suits.
© Nicole Parton, 2020
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