“But how will we know?” I ask.
“You’ll know. Just write nice or naughty across the front of the file and put them in separate piles. You are welcome to ask me for help, of course, but I have my own work to do. Come on then, let’s get down to it or we’ll be here all day.”
“We could’ve started half an hour ago if someone wasn’t so bloody chatty,” Luke whispers in my ear.
I kick him under the table, but I can’t help but grin back at him. Luke has a knack of saying exactly what I’m thinking.
I’m sure that Poinsettia must have heard him because the elves always seem to hear whispering, but she doesn’t say anything. To be honest, it seems that the only things the elves do hear are the things you don’t want them to.
We take a file each, and when I open mine, the face of a little boy stares out at me.
Name: Alfie
Age: Six
Offence: Rode his bike into his sister
Date of offence: July 6th
Comments: None
“This is insane. How do you know all this stuff? How do you have a close-up picture of this kid?”
“We have surveillance and a task force working around the clock. This is one of the most important parts of Christmas. No expense is spared when it comes to sorting the naughty from the nice children.”
“So, this kid. Is this it? I mean, it says date of offence in July. Has he done anything bad since then?”
“If he has, it will be in the file.”
I leaf through it, but there’s only the photograph and the one-page report. “There’s nothing,” I tell her.
“Then he hasn’t reoffended since July. You really should be able to work this out for yourself, Mistletoe.”
“But it’s stupid,” I complain. “How do you know it wasn’t an accident?”
“If it was an accident, he wouldn’t be on the naughty list.”
Luke is barely hiding his laughter behind his own file.
I kick him again. “If you’re so smart, what have you got in yours?”
“I’ve got a kid who hid her dad’s car keys so he couldn’t go to work.” Luke laughs. “She goes on the nice list.” He slaps the file shut in satisfaction and scrawls “NICE” across the front of it.
I roll my eyes. “Well, I don’t think this kid deserves to be on the naughty list because of that one little thing. Besides, maybe the sister provoked him.”
“Whatever you think, Mistletoe. It’s your call,” Poinsettia says.
“But what if I’m wrong?”
Luke is still laughing and I kind of want to kick him again, but it’s good to see him happy after last night, even if it is me he’s laughing at.
“Go with your heart. It won’t be wrong,” Poinsettia tells me.
“It might be.”
“Oh, for Frosty’s sake, Mistletoe. I wouldn’t have given you this job if I didn’t think you could do it. Just bloody get on with it!”
“I didn’t think elves were allowed to swear,” Luke says.
“Just get on with it, both of you. Christmas is creeping up on us hour by hour, and the more chattering we do, the more children may end up on the naughty list when they don’t deserve to.”
I find it quite funny how she can go from flittery and squeaky to strict businesswoman when it suits her.
I write “NICE” across the front of Alfie’s file and open the next one.
Name: Chad
Age: Ten
Offence: Insect-related destruction
Date of offence: Ongoing
Comments: A truly unpleasant little boy
I have no idea what insect-related destruction might be, and even though it doesn’t sound like a particularly bad thing in my book, I mark him as naughty and move on.
Name: Milo
Age: Thirteen
Offence: Hit a teacher
Date of offence: November 3rd
Comments: See file
I start leafing through his file. I’m not sure which is worse—the pictures in the file or how the elves got such personal pictures. The pictures are of the boy, taken while he is standing in front of a mirror, bruises marring his torso. There is one of him sitting awkwardly on his bed, crying and clutching his arm to his chest. My breath catches in my throat when I come across one of his house. Through the curtains you can see the silhouette of a grown man raising his arm to the little boy.
It makes me think of Luke and what his life must be like. I look over and give him a sad smile when he meets my eyes.
This boy is like Luke. His dad is beating him up. He’s on the naughty list for hitting a teacher. I know without a shadow of a doubt this is what Tinsel meant when she was talking about not taking things at face value and finding the reason behind it. Yes, this boy hit a teacher, which obviously isn’t good. But he doesn’t know any better. His own father hits him. He probably doesn’t realise that it isn’t normal. He’s probably grown up thinking that the way to get what you want is to hit someone.
I fight the overwhelming urge to reach over and hug Luke. I knock my foot against his gently, and he looks up and smiles at me again. It makes me feel better that he’s okay, even if he’s not really okay. Maybe this boy will be okay someday too.
But he’s certainly not staying on the naughty list. I write “NICE” across his folder. I think about him on Christmas morning. I wonder if his father will buy him any presents. Somehow, I doubt it. It suddenly hits me that the only present he’ll get will be the one from Santa. The one the elves in the factory make. I realise this boy is a perfect example of what they were saying. Some children have no one who cares about them. This little boy will wake up on Christmas morning, and it makes me feel better to know he’ll have at least one present. He’ll know that someone cares about him, even if he doesn’t know who it is. It’s me. It’s us.
Tears fill my eyes and I push the file away.
“Bathroom,” I mutter to Poinsettia, and I run out of the office and down the stairs. I don’t go to the bathroom though. I go out the door and into the snow. There’s a windowsill and I sit down on it, despite being freezing. My hat and coat are still upstairs. I wipe my eyes and try to hide my face when Luke comes out the door a few seconds later.
“Hey.” He crouches down in front of me. “What’s up?”
“Nothing. I’m being stupid.”
“Paperwork getting to you, huh?”
“No, it’s just… some of those kids. It’s really sad.”
“Yeah, I get that. Santa has a real nerve putting them on the naughty list when they don’t deserve it.”
I realise being on the naughty list means that poor little boy only got a lump of coal for Christmas last year. It makes fresh tears fill my eyes. “I wish we could give them two presents to make up for last year.”
“I don’t think it works like that, Mis.”
“I know. He just… doesn’t deserve that.”
“Who?”
“A little boy. I was reading his file. He’s like you. His dad is hurting him. It just… I don’t know. Got to me, I guess.”
“I’m not some poor little battered kid. I can hit back.”
“He just reminded me of you.”
“Yeah, well, forget it, all right? I don’t want anyone knowing about that. It’s my business.”
“I’m not going to tell anyone, Luke. It doesn’t mean I can’t care about you. I don’t want you to go back to that.”
“I have to go back to that.”
“That’s the problem.”
“So you’re crying over me and some little kid you’ve never met because we have abusive fathers?”
“No, I just… We should tell the elves. Maybe they can help.”
“What, like they’ve helped that kid?”
“What?”
“Think about it, Mis. That kid is on the naughty list. Someone has put him there. It might not have just been Santa last year. Some other elf has read through that file and done nothing about it. Whatever ‘elf
task force’ they have down south to get all those pictures, they haven’t done anything. You can read his file and want to help, but at the end of the day, there’s sod all you can do about it. And the same goes for me. My only way out is to get a decent job that pays enough for me to take care of my sister too, so that’s what I’m doing.”
He’s right. I know he’s right. All we can do is read his file and send him a present. I wonder about Luke. I wonder if he was on the naughty list. I wonder if he ever got a present from Santa and thought that someone cared about him.
“It just makes me realise how important Christmas is,” I say.
“Congratulations, I think you just graduated from North Pole Reform School.”
“Ha ha.”
“I’m serious. Isn’t that what this whole thing is all about? Realising the magic of Christmas? Realising how important it is?”
“Well, I’m not about to turn into some jingle-bell-loving elf, if that’s what you mean.”
He laughs. “I think they brought us here to make us realise Christmas is important to people and we shouldn’t be ruining it. This is what they want you to feel.”
“Haven’t they got to you yet?”
He shrugs. “I’m not going to steal decorations off people’s lawns anymore, but at the same time, I’m not going bloody Christmas carolling in the morning.”
“What about the children?”
He shrugs. “I never really hated Christmas in the first place. I can’t say I care about Christmas either way. The only thing that’s different about Christmas Day is that Dad’s too drunk by lunchtime to cook dinner, so I end up trying to do it without burning it. It’s not exactly a special time of year for my family, but I’m glad children who have nothing else will get a present from Santa to open on Christmas morning.”
“Did you ever get anything from him?”
“Pfft. Let me tell you about presents in the real world. In my life, I steal enough money from my dad’s wallet to buy my sister two presents. One from me, and one that I sign from him, even though he has no idea. I don’t want her to think that he doesn’t even care enough to buy her a Christmas present.”
“Luke, I…”
“Yeah, Mistletoe, I know. You’re sorry, you want to help. Well, guess what? No one can help me. No one can make it better until I can get us both out of there, and Santa’s Village isn’t the place to start. And don’t tell me that the elves can help because they clearly haven’t helped the boy in the file you just read.”
I’m shivering as I wipe more tears off my face.
“C’mere.” Luke pulls me to my feet and wraps his own coat around me. Then he wraps his arms around me too and I hug him back.
“I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean to get tetchy. I just…”
He doesn’t finish the sentence. Instead, he kisses the top of my head and I just stand there and hold on to him.
When we get back inside, the other files are waiting. I have no more cases as serious as that one; mostly it’s children who fight with their siblings or don’t clean their rooms. I feel a little bit guilty for judging these children. I’m probably on the naughty list myself, so who am I to judge anyone? But Poinsettia points out that it has to be done, and better that it’s done by people actually reading the cases than by a power-hungry Santa who didn’t even look in a single file.
In the middle of the morning, Poinsettia uses her candy-cane wand to tap on the glass, and an elf appears, carrying a tray of refreshments. Peppermint crème sweets and peppermint steamed milk. It’s a candy cane in a mug of hot milk, yet another way for elves to showcase their love of peppermint.
We were only meant to be on N and N duty for the morning, but when we sit down for lunch—figgy pudding, two candy canes, and “Please Come Home For Christmas” as slaughtered by the elves on the piano—Tinsel announces that Poinsettia has requested we go back for the afternoon.
“Teacher’s pets,” Joe mutters.
For once, Luke ignores him.
CHAPTER 21
The next day, we’re on Post Office Duty.
“You’ll like it,” Emily says. “There are no ducks.”
“I don’t know about you lot, but I haven’t seen a bloody duck since we got here,” Joe says.
“Oh, they’re there, Joe. They’re always watching, but they’re sneaky so you don’t see them. They attack when you least expect it.”
“Emily, have you ever actually been attacked by a duck?”
“Well, no, but…”
Luke and I leave the room before we get pulled into that argument too.
The post office is another building that surprises me.
“Oh, we’re not the official post office,” the elf that greets us inside the door says. “We’re just the replies department. I doubt they’ll send you to work in the official one. It’s much more sophisticated than this.”
He is correct on that. We are in yet another basement.
“Is it me or do elves have a bit of a thing for basements?” Luke says in my ear, and the elf looks at me curiously when I laugh.
“I’m Jingle,” he says as he shuts the door behind us.
I see why Emily likes this place. There are no windows, only one door, and a desktop lamp that isn’t nearly bright enough. In the corner of the room is a large chute. It looks like a cooker hood, but underneath it is a huge pile of multicoloured envelopes. Jingle starts talking, only to be interrupted by a creaking noise and a rush of air as another pile of envelopes slides down and lands in the pile at the foot of the chute.
“Ah, next delivery,” he explains. “As you may have noticed, we’re underneath the main post office. Hundreds of elves work up there, much like any other mail-sorting office you would have down south. All the North Pole mail passes through there. As I’m sure you can imagine, at this time of year, we get a lot of letters to Santa. People keep saying that e-mail is all the rage these days, but nothing beats a handwritten letter from a child.”
“From a greedy bugger demanding Christmas presents, you mean?” Luke asks.
“Oh no, you mustn’t think of it like that. A lot of children confide in Santa. He is a very important figure at this time of year, and children place their trust in him.”
“I bet,” Luke mutters.
Jingle ignores him.
“This is where we come in. The only thing nicer than a child who has made the effort to write to Santa is when Santa makes the effort to write back. Of course, this Santa is far too busy to do anything menial like that.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, this Santa has only been in the job since last year. The previous Santas used to personally write back to the children, and there was a whole department dedicated just to sorting the letters from children. At the busy times of year, the elves would write the letters, but Santa would sign them, so it was still a little bit personal. When this Santa came on board, he got rid of all that. He dissolved the whole department. He eventually saw fit to keep me on, but as you can see, I was relocated.” Jingle waves his arms around to indicate the basement. “Nowadays, I’m not a department, I’m just an elf, shoved away and forgotten about in a basement. Every letter a child writes to Santa is sorted by the official post-office workers and thrown down the chute to me. I sit here all day and night and write replies, supposedly from Santa, although the man himself has no interest in them, and I am lucky to still have a job at all as he very nearly did away with letters altogether.”
“This Santa doesn’t sound very—”
“Oh, we must never speak badly of Santa,” Jingle says. He puts his finger over his lips and looks around worriedly, like someone might be listening.
Perhaps it’s a duck.
“I’m very glad to have you here, actually. I know some elves aren’t keen on the reform program, but you lot are the only help I get at this time of year. One woman from your group has been particularly devoted to helping me this year and has requested to come back again and again.”
; Emily, of course. Neither of us have the heart to tell him that it’s probably not so much devoted to helping him as it is devoted to staying away from imaginary ducks.
“So, what do we do?” Luke asks.
“Simple. Take a letter from the bottom of the pile—the oldest are at the bottom—and write a heartfelt reply. Sign it from Santa so the children will think it’s from the man himself. Address the envelope and pop it in the sack by the door. We get a pickup once a day.”
“Why not sign it from Elf Jingle?” I ask.
“Yeah, I’m sure the children would be equally excited to hear from one of Santa’s elves,” Luke adds.
Jingle gasps. “Unheard of. Absolutely unheard of. It’s preposterous.”
“Why?”
“Because… because… because I’m not Santa. The children write to Santa. They want a response from Santa.”
“But the response isn’t from Santa. It’s from you.”
“Yes, but the children don’t know that, and we must keep it that way.”
“But you’re just encouraging them to believe in a Santa who doesn’t really care about them.”
“I… I’m sure he cares really.”
“From all accounts we’ve heard, it seems like he really doesn’t,” Luke says.
I think about it. Luke is right in that assessment. Almost every department we’ve been to has had something negative to say about this Santa. I never imagined Santa could be the bad guy.
“I think you should start signing the letters from Elf Jingle,” I tell him. “All children know Santa is busy. They would be even more overjoyed to receive a reply from you. An elf who genuinely cares is much better than a falsified image of a Santa who doesn’t care a bit.”
“We were in the Naughty and Nice building yesterday,” Luke says. “Do you know that Santa put loads of children on the naughty list last year without even reading their files? He doesn’t deserve you covering for him. Sign your own name. To hell with him.”
“Do you really think…? No. No, I couldn’t.”
North Pole Reform School Page 14
