However, when we landed in the North Pole, it was to a scene of chaos. The elves were assembled in the village market square, all of them looking angry and upset. They were chanting slogans and holding up signs that said things like ‘No Santa, No Christmas!’, ‘What Would Santa Do?’, ‘We Want the Truth!’ and ‘I’m So Angry, I Made a Sign!’
Avery, Granddad and Mom stood with Xander, Austen and Selena, Mom holding on to Xander to stop him from wandering off. They were arguing loudly with a group of elves and only stopped when they noticed us approaching. Mom ran up and hugged me hard before getting down on her knees to hug Bean, Gilmore and Coral.
‘Glad you’re back.’ Avery smiled at me, as he and the rest of the crew walked over to us. ‘Maybe you can sort out this mess seeing how you’ve become the official Claus problem-solver.’
‘Any luck so far?’ I asked.
‘The elves are refusing to work,’ Selena said.
‘They’re saying there’s no point to a Christmas without Santa,’ Austen said gloomily.
‘How did they find out he was missing anyway?’ Bean asked. ‘I thought you were supposed to keep it quiet.’
‘We were,’ Selena said, looking at her granddaughter. ‘But that was supposed to be a temporary measure. It’s Christmas Eve and we still haven’t found Santa. There was no point keeping it secret any longer.’
‘Besides, we were hoping they would handle it as well as the elves at the other factories did,’ Austen said. He sounded disappointed that the North Pole elves had let him down.
‘Granddad, can’t you help?’ I asked. ‘You were Santa before Dad. Won’t they listen to you?’
‘I tried, El,’ Granddad replied. ‘Apparently, only the real Santa will make them happy. They think having me back, even temporarily, will damage what true Christmas is supposed to be.’
‘You’re the elders.’ Gilmore turned to Selena and Austen. ‘Aren’t they supposed to listen to you?’ The elves in question shook their heads sadly.
‘I have not travelled the world and put up with all that just to have these elves ruin the plan,’ I fumed. ‘Come on!’
I marched over to the sleigh, with a bewildered bunch of family and friendly elves in tow. I reached for the loudspeaker we had snagged in Peru and walked back to the group of protesting elves. Using my mechanically- amplified voice, I told them about our journey through the other elf factories all over the world. I also made it a point to mention how all the other elves were on our side, with or without Dad.
‘Those elves just don’t value the traditional Christmas ways,’ a female elf yelled out. ‘How could they agree to a Christmas without Santa?’
‘You can’t argue about tradition with me,’ Gilmore interrupted. ‘I’m about as traditional an elf as it gets. I could never have imagined a Christmas without Santa either.’
‘Which is why we can’t work,’ a protesting elf said. ‘You should understand, Gilmore.’
‘No, I can’t,’ Gilmore said.‘I’ve been around the world and met elves with much bigger problems than we can even hope to imagine. They aren’t letting a missing Santa stand in their way. They do value the Christmas tradition. And they understand that Christmas has to go on, no matter what.’
‘We can’t have a Christmas without Santa!’ another elf insisted.
‘Christmas isn’t about you!’ Bean cried angrily. ‘We have a duty to the kids of the world. We can’t let them down. Christmas isn’t about any single person, not even Santa. We have to do our best to make it happen, not get distracted by things we can’t control.’
‘You’re too young to know what you’re talking about,’ an old elf called out.‘You don’t understand these matters. Christmas cannot go ahead without Santa Claus. It’s unthinkable.’
‘You lot are unbelievably stupid,’ Coral said. ‘You are so blinded by the idea of Santa Claus. Anybody can do Santa’s job. The important thing is that the job is done and the toys are delivered to the brats around the world. Your mindless arguments do not matter.’
I looked around at Bean, Gilmore and Coral. I had spent a week complaining about the three elves and wishing for different companions. But listening to them fight for everything we had worked for together made me proud.
‘You’ve done all the work,’ I told the protesting elves. The other elves are raring to go. All we need is your support.We’ve become pretty used to international travel.’ I smiled at my team. ‘I don’t mind doing it again, if I have these three with me.’
‘We’ll handle the toy deliveries,’ Gilmore nodded at me.
‘Another adventure!’ Bean sounded ecstatic.
‘I suppose it will be practice for when I am running things around here,’ Coral muttered grumpily.
It would have been a great plan, too. I was almost looking forward to meeting all the elves again, even the crazy ones. But the protesters refused to budge. They wanted nothing to do with our, as they called it, blasphemous plan. They went back to chanting loudly, waving their protest signs in the air and making faces at us whenever we made eye contact.
‘Can we do it without them?’ I asked.
Avery shook his head. ‘Even if all of us chipped in, there are too many technical details to take care of,’ he said. ‘We need them.’
‘So what do we do?’ I demanded.
‘I don’t think there’s anything more we can do, El,’ Granddad said.
‘But that’s impossible!’ I exclaimed. ‘We can’t just let it all go, not after everything we’ve done.’
Granddad exchanged a look with Mom. ‘Noel,’ she began.
‘I need to clear my head,’ I said and stalked off.
When things hadn’t gone my way in the past, I would sulk in my room or throw tantrums. Dad and Mom would usually ignore me until I cooled off. Their silent treatment always annoyed me even more. How do you fight with someone who won’t fight back? It made me feel helpless in a situation out of my control. I’ve always hated that feeling. That’s exactly how I felt now, except this was ten times worse.
I walked for ages trying to come up with an alternate plan. But I couldn’t think of anything. I couldn’t believe that all our hard work had led to this. That our plans had been thwarted by a bunch of stubborn elves.
In the course of my long walk, I found myself at the base of the mountains behind the village. I decided to hike up one of them so nobody would find me. I felt like I needed to take a break from the world for a bit. I couldn’t handle dealing with anyone right then.
I scrambled up the slippery slopes using both my hands and knees. When I finally stopped to take a breath, I noticed that I was nearly halfway up the mountain. As I looked around, I also realized that this was the same mountain Dad, Avery and I had spent the night on. I wondered if I could find the same cave we were in but then I remembered it had been much higher up. I began to climb up again when my foot got caught in a stone buried deep in the snow. I tried to yank it out but only managed to twist my ankle.
I yelled out as I fell to the ground with a loud thud. My ankle throbbed agonizingly. I gathered some snow to put on it to ease the pain. I tried to stand up but discovered that I couldn’t move.
Oh great. This was just what I needed. To be stranded in the middle of a mountain that nobody knew I had climbed. I wondered if I could possibly crawl down half a mountain slope without killing myself when I suddenly heard a sound behind me.
I twisted around slowly, yelping as I felt a sharp shooting pain down my ankle, only to see the last person I had expected to find.
25
How to pull off a successful disappearing act:
1. Before you disappear, don’t let anyone suspect that anything’s out of the ordinary.
2. When you leave, disconnect the GPS device on your sleigh so you can’t be tracked.
3. Decide where you’re going to hide out.
4. Make sure to set up your hideout with enough stock of food for yourself and your getaway reindeer.
5. Make sure your hideout is in the
last place anyone will ever look, for example, half an hour away from home.
‘Dad!’ I cried. ‘What are you doing here?’
My supposed-to-be-missing father walked towards me, bent down to put his arms around me and lifted me awkwardly. My abnormally long limbs didn’t quite fit in his normal-sized ones. He then proceeded to haul me up the mountain. After some time, we neared a cave that was higher up on the slopes.
‘Isn’t this the same cave you brought Avery and me to?’
I remarked absent-mindedly. I was still in a daze at the sight of him. I was half-convinced that I had hit my head too hard and was having a concussed dream.
Dad nodded. ‘I come here a lot when I want to get away from the world.’
As we made our way inside, I could see signs of an extinguished bonfire at the mouth of the cave. There was a circle of powdery soot, surrounded by half-burned pieces of wood.
When we entered the cave, I heard whinnying noises. Dad propped me near a wall and I glanced around for a better look. The cave was massive, so huge that I could hardly see the back wall. It was dimly lit by the sunshine spilling in from the front. A makeshift stable had been set up in the corner where his reindeer were nonchalantly pawing the stone floor. A mattress with disarranged sheets lay in the other corner of the cave.
‘Have you been living here?’ I asked in astonishment.
Dad ignored my question. He looked closely at my ankle, which by then had swollen to double its size. He gently ran his hand down it to test the injury. I winced.
He walked out of the cave, squatted down and retrieved a wooden stick. He then walked back to me and untied the scarf from around his neck. In a few minutes, my foot was bound up in a makeshift splint. My ankle felt well enough for me to stand up and hobble around after Dad with a little help from the cave wall.
As I took a closer look, I saw that the cave had other signs of inhabitation. The reindeer had enough carrots and water to last them through the winter. I also noticed a pile of clothes next to the mattress. A few books were scattered around the floor.
‘You have been living here!’ I exclaimed accusingly.
Dad looked supremely unconcerned by my tone. He walked around the cave, straightening a few things, and looking for who-knows-what. He then noticed me limping behind him.
‘Sit down this instant!’ he said sharply. ‘Do you want to damage your ankle even further?’
‘You still haven’t answered me,’ I retorted. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I’m looking for food for a crazy daughter who thinks that climbing a mountain and spraining her foot is a smart idea,’ he answered.
‘I didn’t twist my ankle on purpose!’ I said, stung by the unfairness of him scolding me for carelessness, when he had been careless enough to go missing for over two weeks.
‘You could have looked where you were going,’ Dad said. ‘What are you doing here in the first place? Shouldn’t you be at home?’
‘That’s exactly what I’m trying to ask you!’ I exclaimed. ‘You are here, the reindeer are here. I can’t see your sleigh but I’m guessing it’s around here somewhere too.’ I took a deep breath. ‘What’s going on, Dad?’
Before he could answer (or ignore me again), we heard a sudden commotion followed by familiar voices outside the cave. Before we could turn around to investigate, loud gasps filled the air.
‘Dad!’ cried Avery.
‘Santa!’ cried Gilmore and Bean.
‘Douglas!’ cried Mom and Coral.
The five of them hurried into the cave. This day was turning out to be full of surprising guest appearances. I looked at all of them in bewilderment. ‘What are you guys doing here?’
‘We were worried about you,’ Avery replied. ‘So we followed you to make sure you were all right.’
‘It was either go with them or stay behind with those striking dolts,’ Coral muttered. ‘I chose the less dim-witted crowd.’
‘We waited at the bottom of the mountain for ages!’ Bean exclaimed. ‘We thought you got lost or something.’ ‘Mom started freaking out so we decided to climb up after you,’ Avery said.
‘Santa Senior, Selena and Austen stayed behind at the bottom with Xander,’ Gilmore added.
Meanwhile, Mom had walked up to Dad in a trance, like she couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Her eyes sported a glazed expression, probably identical to mine when Dad had found me. She put out her hand and touched his cheek, as if to make sure he wasn’t an apparition.
‘Hi Ruby,’ Dad said, smiling gently.
And that’s when she began whacking his head with all the force she could muster.
‘Ow! Ruby!’ Dad yelled in pain.
‘DO YOU KNOW HOW WORRIED WE’VE BEEN?’ Mom shouted. ‘And you’ve been here this WHOLE time?’
She had clearly put two and two together after observing the lived-in appearance of the cave and discovering the missing reindeer.
‘In my defence, I wasn’t here the whole time,’ Dad said, with his hands over his head, trying to protect it from Mom’s blows. ‘I stayed in Australia for a couple of days before—STOP TWISTING MY EAR. RUBY! RUBY, IT’S GOING TO COME OFF!’
After Mom finally stopped hitting Dad and yelling obscenities at him and after she had thrown in a few kicks for good measure, all of us sat down to hear Dad’s explanation.
Remember how we had elaborate theories concerning Dad’s disappearance, which included malfunctioning sleighs, kidnapping plots and a stranded Santa? The truth was much less complicated. Dad had run away from home.
Responding to our stupefied faces, he looked at us defensively. ‘I just needed a break.’
‘If you need a break, you tell us before you take off,’ Mom growled. Dad inched away from her when he noticed her murderous glare. Clearly, she still hadn’t forgiven him. I wasn’t exactly in a forgiving mood myself.
‘It’s nearly Christmas, Dad,’ I said. ‘Couldn’t your break have waited a week?’
‘But Christmas is exactly the problem!’ Dad exclaimed. ‘I’m sick of dealing with all its issues. I’m tired of the factories and the elves and their problems. I’m fed up of being Santa Claus. I quit.’
26
Reactions to Dad’s announcement:
1. ‘I’ve clearly knocked the brain right out of your head.’— Mom
2. ‘Are we secretly being filmed for a reality show? Because this would all make a lot more sense if we were.’—Avery
3. ‘I think it’s time I retired. I’m getting too old for this.’—Gilmore
4. ‘At least Coral will be happy.’—Bean
5. ‘I didn’t think that success would taste so ordinary.’—Coral
‘First the elves, now you?’ I asked. ‘Is the whole world going on strike?!’
‘Oh, they’re on strike now, are they?’ Dad asked.‘Typical.’
‘But why do you want to stop being Santa?’ a perplexed Gilmore asked. ‘It’s the best job in the world!’
‘It’s exactly things like these I can’t deal with anymore!’ Dad groaned. ‘Handling the elves requires too much patience. And I’ve run out of it.’
Gilmore and Bean looked wounded. Even Coral looked a little miffed.
‘But you love the elves!’ I said.
‘Absence makes the heart grow fonder!’ Dad replied.
‘You’re always worrying about them!’ I insisted. ‘You would go crazy if you didn’t know they were okay.’
‘The elves are always worrying me, that’s the problem!’ Dad said. ‘They’re always up to something. Some think I’m ill-treating them, others think I’m ignoring them, some are convinced humans are spying on them and now they’ve gone on strike. I’m one person. How much can I handle?’
‘But you love your job, Douglas,’ Mom said, forgetting to be angry.
‘You travel the world, delivering toys, and making kids happy,’ Bean said. ‘The kids love you. The elves love you. The world loves you. How can you want to quit all this?’ ‘You’re only talking a
bout the glamorous part of my job,’ Dad said dismissively. ‘You forget all the problems that I have to solve on a regular basis.’
‘But you’re Santa Claus!’ Gilmore exclaimed. ‘You’re supposed to solve problems.’
‘And that’s the other thing,’ Dad said. ‘The pressure that comes with this job! Everyone is looking at me for answers. What if I don’t have any?’
I looked at Dad thoughtfully as everyone continued arguing. I was beginning to understand what he was trying to say. I had only spent a week in his shoes, and even then I nearly went insane dealing with all the issues. At least I had Bean, Gilmore and Coral along. I couldn’t imagine going through this all year, all by myself.
Dad couldn’t deal with everything he was supposed to handle. Even though the elves took care of the physical aspect of Christmas, they all looked at Dad for guidance. For them, he was this all-powerful figure that could make all their problems disappear. But he couldn’t make all their problems disappear all the time. At least not single-handedly.
But that’s what a Santa Claus was supposed to do. Handle everything by himself. When Granddad tried to step in earlier, he was boycotted by the North Pole elves. If Santa had handled everything throughout history, that’s what he was supposed to do now.
‘You don’t have to do this alone,’ I said. ‘It’s time to start some new Christmas traditions.’
‘Have you packed emergency reindeer rations?’ Gilmore asked.
‘I never leave home without them,’ Dad answered.
‘I knew Iwas forgetting something!’ I smacked my forehead. ‘I don’t want to crash in the middle of the desert again!’
When Dad had finally got all that ranting out of his system, I sat down and explained my idea to him. He was sceptical at first. The phrases ‘You’re just a child!’ ‘The elves are never going to agree!’ and ‘That’s not going to work!’ were thrown around a lot.
But when Bean, Gilmore, Coral and I told him about all our adventures, he was impressed.Well, initially he thought we were lying to make him take back his resignation. But when he did believe us, he was definitely impressed.
When Santa Went Missing Page 13
