Santa Claus Conquers the Homophobes

by Robert Devereaux

  This was greeted with a general murmur of agreement.

  “The question is, what are we going to do about it? We have been driven to feel shame over something that isn’t shameful in the least. Nosepicking feels good.” Saying that out loud was very affirming, so he repeated it, bolder still. “And mutual nosepicking, far from being deviant, is an expression of love. How dare Gregor hold himself up so high and mighty? Who gave him the right to judge us?”

  “It wasn’t me,” said Gustav.

  “Me neither,” said Franz the watchmaker.

  “We ought to shout him down,” said Knecht Rupert.

  “If I may,” objected Johann, “that seems a wee bit harsh.”

  “You have a better idea?”

  Johann looked blankly at Rupert and slowly shook his head.

  “Any other thoughts?” asked Fritz.

  Herbert snapped his picture, there where Fritz stood before a crackling fire. He rested the camera against his chest and raised his hand. “I suggest,” he said when Fritz acknowledged him, “that we drop in on Gregor and shower him with blessings.”

  Fritz laughed. “You know that just might work. I must confess I don’t feel very benevolent toward Gregor, but suppose Herbert leads off that way and then each of us steps forward and speaks his mind. He may just change his tune.”

  Knecht Rupert snorted. “Fat chance.”

  “Hold on, Rupert,” said Gustav, hugging a pillow as he sat cross-legged on the bed. “We won’t know until we try. I think that’s better than shouting him down in public. He would never listen to us then. There’s nothing like putting someone on the defensive to close off debate.”

  Johann shook his head. “There should be no debate about this,” he said. “Gregor has turned us into pariahs. For what? For picking each other’s noses. Fritz is right. It’s pleasurable and it’s good. It draws us closer. Why, you might as well debate the morality of sharing a smile or a laugh, or patting one another on the back!”

  “We ought to string the bastard up,” said flaxen-haired Franz with a gimlet eye, “him and his complicit brothers. That would put a stop to this.”

  Fritz was appalled at the suggestion, and said so with great if respectful force. That launched a spirited discussion about prejudice and tolerance and whether such a thing as righteous intolerance could exist, and if so, how one could possibly be sure, with any certainty, that one’s own intolerance was righteous.

  But in the end, Herbert’s plan prevailed.

  Before leaving, he convinced them to pose, arm in arm, by the foot of the bed so he could snap a few photos. Then they doused the fire, straightened the bedclothes, and made their way through the woods toward the stables.

  * * *

  Gregor sat brooding at his desk. A large green-glass lantern of the ancient design cast its glare everywhere, upon straw and stall, upon slumbering reindeer and his brothers’ made-up cots. For fat Josef and Engelbert now slept in the elves’ dormitory, so as to be ever vigilant over Santa’s weak-willed helpers.

  Resident spies gave Gregor the edge. Their absence also allowed him to pick his own nose in peace. Which he now did, half-conscious of his actions but fully attuned to the pleasures they delivered. Did he feel the hypocrite? No. For he was Gregor, brave condemner of the practice. And who better to condemn, on what better foundation built, than he who, wracked by the pangs of temptation, on occasion yielded to them. In among the pleasures, he felt a terrible guilt, a guilt whose spice made the practice all the more enticing.

  Lately his mind had been preoccupied with the half-dozen helpers who had confessed to sharing snot with one another. Knocking Fritz off his high horse fit in well with his plans, but they all partook of that rebellious streak. He had shamed them to such an extent that...well, he hoped it had squelched the practice entirely, but perhaps the very act of shaming had sparked curiosity in everyone else. Perhaps the slippery slope of deviance had already claimed new victims, smarter ones whom it would be nearly impossible to ferret out. If only there were some foolproof method of detection, fingerprints left on nostrils, trace elements one could plant among clumps of mucus and geiger-counter in a night-sprung scan of slumbering elves.

  Gregor shuddered. What possible attraction could so repulsive an act hold? Taking up his lantern, he strode among the reindeer, their antlers bramble-high, Lucifer’s pulsing on and off in REM sleep, Donner and Blitzen dozing flank to flank. The opaque sheen his lantern cast upon the windows made him feel cozy and protected. He held the light up. There lay Comet and Cupid, their nose leather glistening black and smooth.

  “Comet,” he whispered. “Cupid.”

  They stirred, raised their great heads, and blinked in wonder.

  “Don’t rouse the others.” He settled on a hay bale before them. “No need to get up,” he said, waving them back down. “I have a favor to ask. Now watch. You see this? It looks vile, doesn’t it? But it’s really quite tasty, to my tongue at least. And perhaps to yours. Would you sample it, oh, just a little? That’s right, that’s my good boys.” Their tongues were warm and rough on his fingertip, which he restocked so that each reindeer received his gift in equal measure. They seemed to like it, not shying away in the least.

  “And now,” he managed to gasp, “do you think I might return the favor?” Again, they did not say him nay, nor did they resist his bold probe, an index finger exploring the leathery tunnel of Cupid’s right nostril; the other, Comet’s left. Their mucus was grainy and gritty as he rolled it betwixt thumb and forefinger. His heart pounded. The stuff revolted him, even as it captured his fancy. Dare he sample it? Having gone so far, why not? Yet his fingers refused to rise to his lips. Don’t be ridiculous, he thought. I’ll try it once. If it’s wretched, I’ll spit it out. A bit of rum will kill the taste.

  He shut his eyes, took a deep breath, and inserted his fingertips into his mouth. Far from grossing him out, the taste delighted him. “Again?” he pleaded. To which the reindeer obliged with sharp snorts that brought their offerings to the very portals of their nostrils. Gregor’s bolder second attempt was wicked and delicious, his mind delirious with malfeasance.

  I ought to stop, he thought. This is madness, a moral lapse unworthy of me. But he could not stop, not until he had had his fill. At length, Gregor gave over, outraged at his sinfulness and vowing to redouble his condemnation of this practice on the morrow. Moreover, he would yank one of his brothers, Josef, yes, fat Josef, from dormitory duty and reinstall him yonder in his rightful bed.

  He would not risk further exposure to temptation. Why, what if he were seen at this? He suddenly had misgivings about the windows. He shuttered the lantern. When his eyes adjusted, he breathed a sigh of relief to see no one peering in, nor anyone moving across the blue moonlight of the commons.

  * * *

  Fritz and the others, rounding the stables from the back, could barely contain their glee at the sight that greeted them. Johann saw it first, slapping a guffaw-muffling hand over his mouth and waving his companions forward.

  Quickly they hurried Herbert to the fore, gesticulating wildly at his camera until he caught on and shuttered picture after picture. It was all they could do, not to jostle him nor obscure his line of sight. They crowded his shoulders, nearly crawling on top of him to get the best view of their compromised tormentor.

  Fortunately, Fritz noticed Gregor’s sudden look of panic and shoved them below the windowsill just before the lantern went dark. There they stayed, hushed, hunched over, bunched together, until Fritz signaled them to creep around the side of the stables and tiptoe back to the dormitory.

  Resuming their nightshirts and tucking themselves in, they took a long time getting to sleep, giggling amongst themselves but not so loud as to wake Josef and Engelbert or anyone dozing nearby.

  “We’ll bide our time,” said Fritz, pondering whether payback was a worthy elfin impulse, but having a feeling that in this case it was. “The ideal moment is bound to present itself.”

  As indeed it did.r />
  Chapter 30. Disaster Looms

  THE WEEK LEADING UP TO HIS special holiday, the Easter Bunny flew into a tizzy of last-minute preparation, his brain abuzz with frenzies of bliss. As for Santa’s recent visit and the horrendous memories they revived, they had been utterly forgotten; for so had he been reinvented eight years prior, God knowing he would otherwise be useless, come Easter.

  The hens, used to his pre-holiday hyperactivity, paid him little heed. Steady and reliable industry was their watchword. Nor was it in their nature to speed up a process calibrated to produce exactly the number of eggs he would need by Easter Eve.

  The remaining processes were likewise engineered to a tee, the cutting of shreds of fake grass, the continual clatter of jelly beans down distant chutes, the orderly sweep along conveyor belts of yellow marshmallow chicks with perfect black eye-dots, chocolate poured into and painstakingly removed from bunny molds by well-oiled machine arms—everything assembled into baskets and kept as fresh as the day of their assembly in cool, dark, well-nigh limitless caverns.

  But the Easter Bunny was one excitable creature. And excited he grew. A few more days would usher in his moment in the sun, or to be more precise, in moonlight as the world slept. He vaguely recalled a time when he had resented and envied Santa Claus for being associated with Christ’s birth while he, the Easter Bunny, had been saddled with the Savior’s suffering and death. That vague recall had surely to be a delusion.

  For Easter celebrated rebirth, new beginnings fresh-wrapped, all sufferings past, forgiven, and forgotten. What though the day had been adapted from pagan fertility rites? As far as he was concerned, this day was a day equal in generosity to Christmas. Equal? Nay, Easter surpassed Christmas in that wise. Not that he was competing, mind. He shook his head so emphatically that his ear tips snapped like fresh sheets on a clothesline. But this day, to which mortals would wake joyous and spring-fresh, celebrated the generous earth opening its fecundity out of the frozen months of winter, seeds germinating in riot and sprout, fresh buds tremulous and green wherever the eye chanced to light. On this day, people were kinder to one another. They wore pastel, the women and girls. As for the men and boys, though their ridiculous façade of ba-rumph and macho zombie-ism slipped but a fraction, yet it slipped indeed. And behind it could be glimpsed the randy zest of gentle goats, not the grasping of satyrs but the full bloom of vigor and vitality. Tamed, to be sure, by Mother Church. Such goatishness could not frisk too boldly in the sun, oh no indeed. For where would commerce be, where war, where the gladiatorial thirst for blood, both virtual and real, if all decorum were tossed aside and an unfettered celebration of rutting life were to sweep the globe?

  For an instant, the Easter Bunny’s heart leapt. Then he leapt, high in his burrow so that his ears brushed the earthen dome. Deftly landing, he scurried about the exercise area, burning energy at once renewed. In tip-top shape. That’s what he’d have to be three nights from now. Through the air he would fly, tumbling silently into homes frozen in magic time and pulling out just the right Easter basket for Joey or Jane, setting it down, straightening the red ribbon about its wicker handle, then dashing off through wall or window toward his next destination.

  With joy he chittered, scurrying so fast that his feet rose up along and pounded the cylindrical walls, which grew warm and then hot from the repeated friction of his passing. In the distance, he heard and delighted in the white-noise click and clatter, the hum and buzz, the clip and rustle, the rump-roll of ovoid wonders in all their glory down innumerable chutes.

  Readiness was all.

  And the Easter Bunny, Christ love him, was raring to go.

  * * *

  Two days later, as brilliant sunlight burnished the edge of Good Friday’s gathering dawn, Santa Claus summoned the entire community to their favorite forest grove. Fritz had looked up in surprise from his workbench, a moo-box in his right hand, a plush empty-bellied Guernsey in his left. There before them all stood Santa and Wendy, looking more radiant than ever.

  “If I may have your attention,” said Santa, not raising his voice one iota, but cutting straight through the stitching and hammering and sanding and packaging, so that all activity at once ceased. “Leave off your industry for awhile, lads. We have something to celebrate, and we shall do so this glorious morning in the Chapel. Our special Christmas Eve deliveries are nearing fruition. To mark this moment, Wendy will project scenes from humankind’s altered future.”

  Fritz had nearly forgotten that miraculous night, so deep into the delights of toy manufacture had he immersed himself. Now, called to mind, its memory brightened him. Setting the cow and the moo-box aside, he slid off his stool and shared a moment of speculation with Beckmesser, the bushy-browed elf who tinkered beside him at the workbench.

  Gregor and his brothers had taken to sitting in shifts, off to one side, observing. When Santa had asked what they were doing, Gregor replied with a shrug, “Quality control,” an answer Santa had accepted without further probing. Now Fritz saw Gregor leap from his stool and draw Santa aside. Nearby, master weaver Ludwig canted his head. When Santa nodded assent, Gregor bowed perfunctorily and went his way.

  Fritz made his way swiftly to the master weaver. “Ludwig,” he said, “what’s up with Gregor?”

  Ludwig started, mulled, and squinted. “Why, old Buttinski Bushy-Brow there wanted the chance to address our gathering first, a matter of great urgency, he said, and Santa agreed to it. Some fool harangue, I imagine. Up to no good. Ranting in front of Santa and his family. First time he’s done that, eh? Us weaver folk, we call it Gregor’s warped woof. Behave, he tells us. By which he means cower before my whip, set me on a pedestal, and bow so low you breathe dust bunnies. Well, my lad, maybe our purblind master elf will finally figure out what’s up and put Gregor in his place. End this infernal nonsense so Gregor and fat Josef and Engelbert can devote full time to tending the reindeer, as they’re meant to, and not getting high and mighty with the rest of us.”

  Fritz waited until Ludwig paused for breath, then thanked him and slipped away. He spied Herbert wrapping things up at his workbench and revealed his idea even as he hatched it. “It’s our golden opportunity. We couldn’t have planned it better.”

  “Your eyes are so bright, Fritz. I like that. May they always glisten so. But I wonder if Gregor’s will dim.”

  “Dear Herbert, always considerate of others. Usually I am too. But Gregor has brought this on. I’ve given it lots of thought, and if we do this in the spirit of fun and not with vengeance in our hearts, I’m convinced it’s the right path.”

  “May God be with us then,” said Herbert.

  Quickly, they enlisted Gustav and Knecht Rupert to help haul equipment on sleds, snowshoeing along a shortcut as the winding train of helpers made its predictable way to the Chapel.

  The first elves to arrive did not question their presence there, and soon the Chapel filled, and Santa and his family stood before the gathered multitudes.

  * * *

  Santa had no idea what bee might be frantically buzzing beneath Gregor’s bonnet. Whatever bit of gristle had stuck in his craw, to hear him harrumph about it would doubtless provide a few light moments to set the mood for the main event. Gregor’s feints at meanness tickled Santa’s funny bone. Call it a peculiar flirtation with crossing less than acceptable lines of decorum. Whenever it was, it made for good theater and had never, to his knowledge, harmed a soul.

  “Friends, colleagues,” he began, “before Wendy and I launch our celebration, Gregor has asked to say a few words. Now, now, none of that hissing and booing, lads. It isn’t elflike. I’m sure whatever the master of the stable has to say is of great import, and we will all benefit from hearing him out. Gregor, lad, you have the floor.”

  Gregor marched boldly out of the crowd, nodded to Santa, took his place at the lectern, and cast a cold eye upon his brethren. “I stand here today,” said he, “because it’s high time a certain jolly old elf understood the depths of deviance and degenera
cy which have befallen our number and led directly to our shoddy work of late. Good master Santa, you have told us we have it in us to solve our own problems. Until a few days ago, I concurred in that judgment.”

  Wherever was this leading? Santa wondered. Tone often told the tale long before words. This felt like a different Gregor, for whom there were no lines that couldn’t be crossed. This was no feint at meanness, but the thing itself, and alarm bells sounded in his head.

  He was on the point of taking the stablemaster aside for private conference, when he noticed Gustav and Knecht Rupert shimmying up two young oaks and dropping a pale-yellow bedsheet between them, pulling the corners tight so that only their heads and their bloodless knuckles could be seen above the horizontal stretch of fabric.

  “Over yonder are two of the malefactors I was about to name, Santa, up to no good. They hope to divert us with some nonsense, but they shall not stop me from exposing their perversity to all and sundry. These two, and the other four, Fritz, Herbert, Franz, and Johann, have been caught or confessed to the vile practice of...of—”

  Bold upon the bed sheet, from a suddenly switched-on projector, were thrown images of Gregor and Comet and Cupid, images in quick succession which left no doubt what they were doing. Swells of disbelief and then laughter rippled through the crowd. Gregor turned absolutely white, his jaw moving but his lips lax and incapable of forming words. His eyes grew wide and his neck took on a pronounced blush. The crowd’s nervous titters turned to giggles, then to guffaws and belly laughs. It was all Santa could do to suppress his own jolly outbursts, though he was, at the same time, appalled at the breakdown in civility he was witnessing.

  This smacked of payback. Gregor had pushed the elves, had beaten them over the head with some utterly harmless little habit—nosepicking it appeared, something Santa himself occasionally indulged in—and now the stablemaster had been exposed as a hypocrite.