by Kieran Scott
“Hey, Paul,” Lainie Lefkowitz said, cutting the giggles short so that everyone could hear. “I see you’ve got your dorky little hat back.”
I looked over my shoulder at her and just stared. I stared and stared and stared as her cocky grin faded, then she had to look away, and then she finally rolled her eyes and turned away. I smirked. It was interesting. Suddenly I didn’t care about the teasing anymore.
But then Sarah had to speak up.
“Yeah, aren’t you supposed to stop being Santa when you leave the mall?” she said, earning another round of laughter. “Are you delusional or something?”
That was it. That was all I needed. She just had to sink to their level, didn’t she? On top of everything else she’d already done to me. All the pent-up tension and anger toward her rushed into my head at once and something inside me snapped. I walked right over to Sarah and her sniveling little friends and the entire room fell silent.
“You had me so fooled,” I said, looking right into Sarah’s surprised face.
“What?” she asked, trying to laugh it off.
“I thought you really liked me, but it turns out you’re nothing but a materialistic, selfish money-grubber. All you were interested in was my car,” I said, my whole body heating up.
“What car?” Lainie put in. The laughter was quiet and less assured this time. I ignored her. My beef was not with Lainie Lefkowitz. It was with the girl who’d tricked me into giving her my heart.
“Well, you know what, Sarah? If you’d rather date a scrawny dorky pseudorapper who sports a monster Adam’s apple just because he has money, then that’s fine by me,” I told her as she tried to look away. “Because I wouldn’t touch you again with a ten-foot pole. In fact, you can just take Scooby and all his gifts and his stupid homemade rap album and blow them all out your tiny little butt!”
“Oh!” Turk Martin let out as I turned back to take my place on the risers. All the guys hooted and clapped and I even noticed a couple of girls trying to hide their smiles.
Mr. McDaniel walked back into the room and sat down behind the piano.
“Okay, let’s try ‘Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas’!” he called out jovially.
Sarah shakily took her place and I could tell she was looking at me from the corner of her eye, but I ignored her. As McDaniel started to play the intro to the song, I saw Turk turn out of the line, perpendicular to everyone else.
I glanced over at him and he grinned and raised his eyebrows. “Crazy!” he mouthed, with nothing but admiration in his eyes.
I started to sing. If this was what crazy felt like, I should have tried it sooner.
My mother wanted to drive me to the mall on Tuesday afternoon to turn in my Santa suits, but I convinced her to let me go it alone, giving her some speech about facing the music and being a man. What she didn’t know was that I didn’t plan to hand in the costumes and walk out of there with my proverbial tail between my legs. All I could think about were Santa’s words:
“You can’t trust every guy in a Santa suit.”
He had to mean Scooby. He just had to. But the thing was, I already knew Scooby was a loser and a schemer and a girlfriend stealer. I already knew I couldn’t trust him. So what, exactly, was Santa getting at? I was determined to find out.
The glass doors slid open in front of me and I walked into the mall. Dale Dombrowski spotted me from his position at the corner by the Diamond Center and he instantly brought his walkie-talkie to his mouth, his eyes never leaving my face. I knew he was warning the office that I had arrived and I felt a little spear of shame shoot through me. All I had wanted was to be a mall Santa and now I was public enemy number one.
Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty?
I hopped on the escalator and double-timed it to Papadopoulos’s office, more than ready to get this over with. Sharona Drap, Papa-D’s secretary, took one look at me, picked up the phone, and started dialing, pretending to be too busy to deal with me. When I walked into the inner office, Mr. Papadopoulos jerked out of his chair, stood up, and smoothed down his tie.
“Paul,” he said, clearing his throat. “Didn’t think I’d be seeing you again so soon.” Because I figured you’d be well up the river by now, his eyes added.
My heart twisted, but I reminded myself that I had done nothing wrong. And once I cleared my name, all these people were going to be rushing to apologize to me.
“Just wanted to turn in my costumes,” I told him, leaving the neatly stacked pile of red suit pieces on a chair in the corner. They looked so sad and sorry just sitting there. Suddenly I was hit with the realization that I’d never done them justice. My body had been in those suits, but my heart never had. All I wanted was a second chance, but that was never going to happen.
I took a deep breath and looked at my former boss. “For what it’s worth, have a merry Christmas,” I told him.
His expression softened slightly and his shoulders relaxed. “You too, Paul,” he said.
My spirits heavy, I turned and walked back out to the mall. I knew that Dale and Papa-D and everyone in this place would be happy if I would just disappear, but I wasn’t ready to leave just yet. I walked across the food court to the bathrooms and made my way to the last stall, my heart pounding with nervousness. I put my backpack on the toilet seat and yanked out my father’s trench coat and a fake beard from an old wizard Halloween costume. It took me a while to get everything on, what with my hands shaking and all, but I managed. Finally I pulled my Giants baseball cap low over my head and emerged from the stall.
The mirrors were right across the way and I did a double take when I saw my reflection. Even I didn’t recognize myself. I looked like a celebrity who was trying to go Christmas shopping incognito. No one was going to realize who I was in this getup. Not even Scooby.
I slipped from the bathroom with the confidence of a supersleuth, feeling like I could go anywhere and do anything undetected . . . and walked right into Melissa Maya.
“Hey! Watch it!” she screeched.
“Oh . . . sorry,” I said. Then, hearing my youngish voice, I cleared my throat and tried again. “Sorry, excuse me . . . sorry.”
She narrowed her eyes as I scurried away, but I was pretty sure she didn’t recognize me. Still, I was going to have to remember that even in disguise, I wasn’t exactly the invisible boy. I stepped onto an escalator behind a crowd of shoppers and tried to blend in.
Moments later I was leaning against one of the pillars across from Santa Land, stewing in a familiar pot of anger. There Scooby sat, in all his Santa glory, welcoming child after child onto his lap, shoving CD after CD into their faces. But other than his normal level of repulsiveness, nothing seemed amiss. After standing there for an hour I started to wonder again what Santa’s hint meant. Of course I couldn’t trust Scooby, but how was that knowledge going to help me save Christmas? How was it going to help bring my family back together?
Suddenly I missed Holly more than ever. I needed someone to help me figure this out. I needed her. But she hadn’t even left me her number in Colorado. For all she knew, I had no idea she was there. Maybe I could try calling all the ski lodges in Aspen, looking for her, but even if I found her, wasn’t she just going to laugh in my face if I told her how I felt?
“One problem at a time, Paul,” I told myself, trying to put all Holly thoughts out of my mind. “Save Christmas first, then deal with finding Holly.”
By the time Scooby had sold his tenth CD of the afternoon I was fed up, my stomach was growling, and my beard was itching me something awful. Maybe it was time to lay all this to rest.
But as I walked around the back of Santa Land, I saw something that made me pause. There, behind the collection counter for Hope House, was That Awful Woman. She must have felt me watching her because she looked up from stacking coins and her steely eyes locked with mine. An icy shiver passed down my spine.
I swear on my life, the woman is pure evil.
Finally I managed to drag my eyes away and I ke
pt walking. My disguise must have worked on her because she immediately returned to her business. Knowing her, if she’d recognized me, she would’ve called out the National Guard. Part of me wanted to just go home and sulk, but I knew instinctively that something was up, so I ducked behind the Stuff ’Em Yourself stocking kiosk to watch her.
On the surface it wasn’t that strange, a mall employee volunteering more than once to work the charity booth. But it was weird that Marge Horvath was there again. That Awful Woman didn’t care about anyone but herself. I figured she spent her free time at home, polishing her broomsticks and counting her money. She definitely wasn’t the type to volunteer her time.
Suddenly Marge’s head snapped to the right and I followed her gaze to see what had commanded her attention. Eve Elias was stringing up the red rope and telling everyone in line for Santa that it was time for the big guy’s dinner break. Marge took note of this, then leaned over to the girl working with her at the charity booth and said something in her ear.
This was it! She was about to do something off— something wrong. I could feel it. The girl nodded and Marge smiled her tight smile, grabbed up one of the metal tins full of money, and scurried away toward the escalator.
My mother had told me that when the till reaches eight hundred dollars, the workers always bring the money to the mall office to be put in the safe. My heart sank slightly. Here I thought my instincts had caught Marge in the middle of something devious and I was wrong. So much for my supersleuth career.
But the moment Marge got to the bottom of the escalator, she looked over her shoulder, then ducked around it instead. My pulse started to race. Where was she going? What was she doing with all that money?
Forgetting about trying to blend, I took off after Marge, afraid that she’d disappear inside a store or something before I found her again. But when I got to the other side of the escalator, I spotted her in the crowd, making her way back around toward Santa Land.
“Hey, buddy! Watch where you’re going!” an angry dad called out as I practically tripped over his stroller. This time I didn’t even stop to apologize. I was on to something.
When I came around the second escalator, Santa’s throne and the Santa Shack were in full view. Scooby was just walking into the shack from the front door as Marge slipped in through the back! My whole body sizzled with anticipation. Marge and Scooby! Of course! How could I not have seen it before? They’d been together at the mall last night and they were both, well, totally slimy! They were clearly up to something together!
Moving as quietly as I could, I crept up the snowy hills of the North Pole and crawled over to the window in the side of the Santa Shack. I held my breath, turned my baseball cap around, and peeked over the bottom edge of the window. What I saw inside was better than any visions of sugarplums that had ever danced in anyone’s head.
Marge and Scooby were divvying up the bills from the charity tin.
“What are you doing?” Scooby demanded, grabbing Marge’s bony wrist. “You’re taking more than half!”
“That’s because you, my little elf, took seventy-five percent last time, remember?” Marge said with a sneer. “To pay for those diamond earrings I got you at discount?”
“Yeah, well, you should’ve just stolen ’em for me,” Scooby said petulantly. “After everything I’ve done for you . . .”
It took me a moment to snap out of my shock and realize the importance of what I was seeing, but when I did, a devious smile spread slowly from cheek to cheek. At that moment it all fell into place.
IT’S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE CHRISTMAS
“DALE! DALE!” I STAGE-WHISPERED AS I RUSHED TOWARD the security guard, who was still at his Diamond Center post. I waved at him, trying to get his attention. When his eyes finally fell on me, he planted his legs wide apart and put his hand on his nightstick. His mustache twitched. He looked like a dog sniffing the air for trouble.
“You just stay where you are, friend,” he said, holding out his free hand. “Don’t come any closer.”
“Dale! It’s me!” I said desperately, my heart pounding. We were losing precious time. I looked down at my getup and exhaled in frustration. “Look!” I said, pulling down my beard. “It’s me, Paul.”
Dale’s tiny eyes narrowed and he didn’t remove his hand from that nightstick. Duh. Why should he? He thought I was a “disturbed teen” who’d tried to burn down the mall.
“Dale, you have to come with me,” I said, letting the beard snap back to my chin. (Ow!) “There’s a crime in the works.”
I knew that old-time detective-speak would get his attention. He pressed his lips together and pulled himself up to full height, which wasn’t all that impressive.
“Show me,” he said.
Moving as quickly as possible, I led Dale up the North Pole hills to the window in the Santa Shack. The glittery fake snow crumbled and shed under our feet, but neither one of us could be bothered with the damage. The moment Dale peeked inside the shack, his face reddened and he started fumbling for his walkie-talkie.
“There’s no time for backup,” I whispered, grabbing his hand so that he wouldn’t make any unnecessary noise. “This bust is all yours, Dombrowski.”
His face lit up from the inside and he gazed off past my shoulder. I could just imagine what he was seeing in his mind—commendations, his picture on the front page of the Record. This was the kind of glory most mall security guys only dreamed of. With determination in his eyes Dale stood up, walked around to the back door of the Santa Shack, and kicked it in. Okay, it was a little dramatic, but who was I to burst his NYPD Blue bubble? I heard Marge yelp and the whole structure shimmied. For a moment I thought it was going to collapse again, but it miraculously held.
“Freeze!” Dale said, pulling out his pepper spray. “I’ve caught you red-handed!”
I stepped up behind him and smiled at the stunned faces of Marge, who had a few bills sticking out of the low collar of her shirt, and Scooby, who was holding a whole wad of cash in his grubby hand.
“The jig is up, my friends,” I said, rubbing my palms together as I grinned. “The jig . . . is . . . up.”
Dale had Scooby and Marge stand against the wall while he radioed upstairs for a few of his men to come down. Marge glared at me as we waited, but Scooby, well, Scooby started to cry like a baby without a pacifier. It would have been funny if it hadn’t been so darn pathetic.
Three of Dale’s deputies appeared and the four of them escorted the criminals up to the mall offices to await the actual police. I waved at them happily as they were led away. It was an utterly perfect moment. My number one enemy and my mom’s number one enemy being hauled off to face criminal charges. And it was all because of me . . . and Santa.
Yep, I thought, leaning only half my weight against the precarious Santa Shack. Christmas is starting to look a whole lot rosier.
“Mom! Why are those policemen arresting Santa?” a tearful voice squeaked nearby.
My heart dropped and I looked down at the line of kids waiting for Santa’s return, all of whom were watching with big, sad eyes as Scooby ascended the escalator. Santa in custody—can you say “traumatizing”? I couldn’t believe it. In the midst of my triumph, I’d ruined Christmas for about fifty little kids. Somehow I didn’t think this was what Santa had in mind. I had to fix it.
I slipped into the Santa Shack and propped up the fallen door over the opening, then ripped open Scooby’s locker, which had been left unlocked in all the commotion. Hanging from one of the hooks was a nice clean spare Santa suit. I said a silent thank-you that Scooby had done at least one thing right in his life.
As I stuffed my arms into the velvety sleeves and buttoned up the fake leather buttons, I could hear the commotion outside growing louder and louder. Most of the kids were wailing and that poor Eve was being accosted by no fewer than six Jersey Mall Moms—plus one Jersey Mall Dad, a rare but dangerously frustrated breed. I glued the beard to my face as quickly as possible, yanked the wig and ha
t on over my head, and exploded through the front door of the Santa Shack.
“Ho! Ho! Ho!” I shouted, spreading my arms wide. “Merry Christmas!”
The blubbering and screaming stopped. The Jersey Mall Parents’ mouths snapped shut. And in that moment, when all hopeful eyes turned to me, I felt a tingling rush that started at my toes and whipped through my body, drawing me up with its warmth and bringing a gleeful smile to my paste-covered face.
The Christmas spirit was back. I was back. And it was good to be me.
“Santa!” a cherubic boy with tears drying on his face shouted. “But . . . but they took you away!”
“Ho ho ho,” I chuckled, holding my bowl-full-of-jelly stomach. “No, they didn’t, little Timmy—”
Eve’s eyebrows shot up.
“Peyton. My name’s Peyton,” the kid said.
Okay, so maybe I got a little carried away there. The spirit was back, but it hadn’t instilled me with Santa’s clairvoyance.
“Right, of course, Peyton,” I replied. “That wasn’t me. That was one of my . . . helpers. And it turned out he wasn’t such a good guy. Apparently there was a little blip in the whole naughty-and-nice system. But . . . well . . . nobody’s perfect, not even Santa, and . . .”
The kids were all staring at me, confused, and Eve started to wave her hand frantically, telling me to just sit down. I fell into the throne and told myself to shut the heck up and get on with business before I made Santa Claus look like a wack job.
“Okay!” I said. “Who’s first?”
Peyton came running up to me and climbed into my lap. He wiped his face with the backs of his pudgy hands and sniffled as he adjusted himself on my thigh. Then he straightened his jacket, folded his hands together, looked right into my eyes, and said, with a seriousness typical of a wizened adult, “Santa, all I want for Christmas is for my sister to get better.”
My heart squeezed tightly in my chest and I glanced over at his mother, who was waiting at the bottom of the red carpet. Her hand flew up to cover her heart and I knew she was feeling the same thing I was—a mixture of warm pride and sadness. Any Grinch I had left in me was sent packing at that moment.
