by Gregory Ashe
“Are you ok?” Somers asked, grabbing paper towels to mop him up. “Did you choke?”
“I didn’t choke.”
“So you’re spitting coffee on yourself for fun?”
“No. Stop. Give me that.” Hazard wrested the paper towels away and finished sponging himself off. “Just, don’t look at me for a minute, ok?”
“What the hell is going on?”
“Turn around.”
“This better be some kind of sexy game I’ve never heard of. Do you spit coffee on yourself and then take off your clothes?”
“Turn around. And no peeking.”
Somers turned around.
Hazard opened the drawer and took out the piece of paper he had been working on. Then he opened the oven. His mouth was moving; he couldn’t stop it. “I don’t want you to get mad.”
“Why would I get mad? And it’s definitely cinnamon. And something else. Cloves. I smell cloves.”
“Or excited. I don’t want you to get excited.”
“Ok.”
“Just try not to show any major reactions.”
“Uh huh.”
“And try not to feel anything either. I can tell when you’re having those huge feelings, and I don’t want this to be a big deal, ok?”
“Just so we’re clear: don’t get mad, don’t get excited, no showing feelings, no feeling feelings. Is that right?”
“More or less.”
“It’s what every little boy dreams of hearing.”
“And don’t be snide. This first.” He passed the paper over Somers’s shoulder.
He could hear the hitch in Somers’s breathing.
“No,” Hazard said. “Absolutely not. And don’t turn around.”
“But—”
“No.”
“But it’s a hand turkey.”
And it was: the same kind of thing Evie had brought home from preschool, a turkey drawn by outlining Hazard’s hand against the paper.
“And you wrote what you’re thankful for.”
“Ok. Bottle it all back up now, John.”
“You wrote my name. And you wrote Evie’s name.” His voice faltered. “Does that say Ken Burns?”
“Let’s not get bogged down in details. You can turn around.”
Somers started crying. Just a little.
“No,” Hazard said.
“I’m going to kiss you.”
“I told you no big feelings. No big deal.”
“It is a big deal. You made me a pie.”
“It’s just a pie.”
“It’s a pumpkin pie.”
“It’s not a very good one.”
“It’s going to be the best one I’ve ever had.”
“Then I feel sorry for you.”
“Now I’m going to kiss you.”
“No, just bottle it all back up, John.”
But Somers kissed him, and Hazard kissed back. A little. Just to be polite.
“Let’s cut a slice. I’m having it for breakfast.”
“Absolutely not,” Hazard said, tucking the pie away, out of his reach. “Don’t even think about it. I told your parents we were bringing dessert, and this is the one and only time in my entire life I’m ever making a pie.”
“My parents?”
“You talked about stuffing.”
“You called my parents?”
“And you talked about that cigar you smoke with your dad.”
“Yeah, but . . .”
“I’m a detective. It took me a while, but I put together the clues.”
“Like, you, in person, Emery Hazard? You called them? You didn’t hire a more charming robot to do it for you?”
“Thank you very fucking much.”
Somers took a step toward him.
“No pie,” Hazard said, twisting to keep it away.
“The pie is for after,” Somers said, grabbing Hazard’s shirt and tugging him toward the bedroom.
SANTA: A CULTURAL HEGEMONY
This story takes place before Transactional Dynamics.
I
DECEMBER 24
MONDAY
4:57 PM
EMERY HAZARD STARED at the red duvetyne suit with its faux fur trim and said, “No.”
“Ree, please.”
“Absolutely not.”
“I’d do it, but the suit won’t fit me.”
“It’s not exactly a fashion show; nobody will care if it’s a little baggy.”
“The coat slips down too far. And the wig and the beard won’t stay in place. The kids will know I’m not the real Santa.”
“There’s a wig?” Hazard couldn’t squelch the note of horror. “No, John. No.”
His boyfriend—as of that morning, his fiancé—John-Henry Somerset was sitting on the edge of the bed, dressed in a jeans and a long-sleeve tee, running a hand through his rumpled blond hair.
“What?” Hazard said.
“I kind of promised Noah and Rebeca that we’d do Santa.”
“You what?”
“I thought it’d be fun. Raquel and Robbie are old enough that that they know Santa’s—” Somers paused, glancing at their bedroom door, and then whispered “—not real, but the rest of the kids still believe, and Evie’s obsessed with him this year. She’s been talking about him nonstop. Cora did one of those elf-on-the-shelf things, and Evie’s been crazy about it. She looks for the elf every day. Can’t stop talking about her. Pixie? Trixie?” Somers frowned. “Dixie?”
Hazard tried to look somewhere else, but his eyes kept going back to the duvetyne suit.
“It’ll just be for half an hour,” Somers said.
“Half an hour?”
“Fifteen minutes. Tops.”
“Why are you not hearing me on this?”
“Ree, I didn’t want to do this. I really didn’t want to. But you’re forcing me, here.” Somers clasped his hands, and his tropically blue eyes got huge, and he bit his lower lip.
“Stop it,” Hazard said.
“Please.”
“You’re embarrassing yourself.”
“Please, Ree. I’m begging you. This is now, officially, me pleading with you.
“No.”
“Entreating.”
“No.”
“Imploring.”
“Not a chance.”
“Beseeching.”
Hazard’s eyes narrowed. “You rehearsed this.”
“No, I didn’t. This is spontaneous importuning.”
“You used a thesaurus. You probably wrote this whole thing out. Admit it.”
“I might have . . . prepared. A little. But only because I know that you’ll be really glad you did this after the fact.”
“Great, well, before the fact, I’m really fucking annoyed.”
“It’s my birthday.”
“I already gave you your birthday presents. And I threw you a birthday party. And I proposed to you. In front of the entire town, for the record. So I think that covers your birthday.”
“My Christmas present—”
“Wrapped and under the tree.”
“In some cultures, it’s customary for the groom to pay a bride price, and I was thinking that you playing Santa could function symbolically as—”
“You are not a bride. I am not bartering for you with your father. For that matter, I am not going to pay anything, symbolically or literally, for a man who uses Roget’s Thesaurus when he’s preparing emotional blackmail.”
Somers frowned. “How did you know I used Roget’s?”
Hazard just rolled his eyes.
“Ok, well, your sick obsession with reference books aside, can we talk about this?”
“You made a promise you can’t keep, John. You shouldn’t have done that. You should have asked me first.”
“Yeah, I get that. And I’m sorry. I just didn’t realize you’d object so strongly.”
Grunting, Hazard pawed thro
ugh the closet, not really looking for something but desperate not to stare at the damn suit anymore. Or not to have Somers looking at him with so much betrayed hope.
“Let’s list some pros and cons,” Somers said. “Pro, kids love Santa. Pro, you’re the right size for the suit. Pro, you’re great with kids.”
“I’m not great with kids, John.”
“Ok, well, Evie is basically glued to you twenty-four-seven, and Noah and Rebeca’s kids literally can’t get enough of you. Remember when you told Robbie you’d like one of his drawings for your office?”
“I didn’t say that. I said the drawing was surprisingly skilled, and his use of color and shadow was well above average for his age, and I thought it would be a good reference piece if I ever worked a case involving kids.”
“Right, whatever, but then he did, like, twenty drawings, and we had to spend two hours hanging them on your door because, quote, ‘I want the angles to be right,’ in the words of Emery Hazard. Kids love you. Pro.”
“You already said that; you can’t count it twice.”
“No, I said you were good with kids, and now I’m saying kids love you. Two separate pros. What are we up to? Five pros?”
“Four,” Hazard said. “No, three. Damn it, John, we’re not doing pro and con.”
“Pro. Yes we are.”
The growl broke from Hazard’s throat. “That’s not even how pro and con works. Con, the Santa myth teaches children that socially-conformist behavior is economically rewarded. Con, the Santa myth creates a rift in child-parent relationships by fostering a lie that is always ultimately revealed, exposing the parents as liars. Con, the Santa myth incentivizes children with material goods. Con, the Santa myth normalizes a panopticon culture and perpetual surveillance, undermining the Fourth Amendment. This is a fucking Constitutional issue, John, and I don’t know why you can’t see that. Con, the Santa myth is a product of American hegemony, but it’s also a fantasy that reinforces it. And con, John, big fucking con, I don’t like the idea of my little girl sitting on some weirdo’s lap and telling him secrets.”
For what felt like a long time to Hazard, Somers was silent. Then he muttered, “Scute.”
“What?”
“Scary cute. It’s my new word for you.”
II
DECEMBER 24
MONDAY
5:21 PM
HAZARD WAS IN Evie’s room, helping her into a sweater that was a confection of glittering beads and bells and stitching. If she turned around too fast, she was probably going to give someone a seizure. But when her mop of dark curls popped through the neck of the sweater, she screamed with delight, grabbed his face, and kissed him.
“Princess shoes,” she squealed as she shot toward the door.
“No,” Hazard called after her. “Get your boots.”
“Princess shoes,” was the reply—a long, excited scream that dragged out the words.
Picking through the mess of princess dresses—she had absolutely no interest in the child-sized lab coat that Hazard had bought for her—Hazard tried to find her winter coat. He folded up a play apron, found a tin of plastic muffins that went with her kitchen set, and scooped up a handful of crayons. He was turning to put the crayons back with the rest of the art supplies when he put his foot down and heard a crack.
“Uh oh,” said Somers from the doorway.
“It’s fine,” Hazard said, but he dropped to his knees pretty fast. Maybe a little too fast. He tossed aside a mermaid tail, a backpack, and a bucket of building blocks. And then he groaned.
“The Fashionista Fillies celebrity road trip trailer, special edition,” Somers said. “With the hot tub attachment.”
“Shut up, John.”
“Ouch.”
“I said, shut up.”
“Her absolute favorite toy of the moment.”
“It’ll be fine.”
“I think you decapitated one of the Fashionista Fillies when your giant clodhopper crushed the driver’s window.”
“I’ll just—” Hazard picked up the trailer with hot tub attachment. He poked at the crumpled frame at the front. “A little glue. I can—”
A horse head tumbled onto the floor.
“Ouch,” Somers said again. “Was that Brilliantina? That’s her favorite.”
“I know it was her fucking favorite, John.” Cradling the trailer against his chest, Hazard scooped up the severed head and shoved it through the passenger’s window. “I know very fucking perfectly fucking—”
“You already said fucking.”
“—well that Brilliantina is her favorite. And so help me God, if you—”
“Princess shoes,” Evie screamed on re-entry, and then she came to a halt, staring up at Hazard and the trailer and the decapitated Brilliantina. “Fillies?” Only it sounded more like fiwwies.
“Hey, sweetheart,” Hazard said, turning so that his arm and shoulder hid the trailer. “Did you find your boots?”
Evie’s dark eyes fixed him with uncanny knowledge. “Dee Dee break?”
Terror closed like a fist around Hazard’s gut. His eyes found Somers’s.
Somers mimed hanging himself.
Please, Hazard mouthed.
“Dee Dee didn’t break it,” Somers said, flipping Evie over his shoulder and tickling her so that she burst out laughing. “He’s getting a surprise ready. Go find your boots.” And then he put her down, swatted her bum, and said, “Scoot.”
Evie ran down the hall screaming, “Surprise!”
Sweat trickled between Hazard’s shoulder blades; he couldn’t quite meet his boyfriend’s eyes.
“I’m going to cut you a little slack at this moment,” Somers said, “and I won’t point out that you lacked the balls to either tell the truth or lie to your daughter, and instead, you made me lie.”
“Thank you for not pointing that out.”
“Just minutes after you gave that impassioned speech about how lies inevitably disrupt the fundamental parent-child blah blah blah.”
“Relationship of trust,” Hazard said, the words getting smaller one by one as Somers shot him a glance.
“Oh?” Somers said. “Now you want to say something? Should I have Evie come back?”
“I’m not proud of what I just did.”
“Instead of focusing on your most recent debacle, let’s talk about narratology.”
Even through the cloud of shame, Hazard recognized what was happening. “You’ve been planning this for weeks. You did research.” He couldn’t tell if he was horrified or excited. “You’re using research against me.”
“You are currently in disgrace, so please, no more interruptions.” Somers pulled a notecard from his pocket. “According to Vladimir Propp’s account of fairy tale syntagma, the Santa Claus story executes the following seventeen of his thirty-one possible functions. Number one, absentation, when Santa Claus—why are you looking at me like that?”
“Did you take notes?”
“I mean, yes. I have a good memory, but I couldn’t keep all of this straight in my head.”
“You did research. You sat there with a pencil behind your ear. You made notes with those big, elementary-kid letters you use.”
“Hold on, my handwriting isn’t—wait. What’s going on?”
“Come here for a minute.”
Somers drew back.
“Just hold up the notecard,” Hazard said. “Furrow your forehead like you’re thinking really hard. Tell me again about narratology. Did you use more than one notecard? Did you have to organize them?”
“Oh my God,” Somers said with a groan. “You’re sick, you realize that? You’re legitimately messed up.”
“Push up your sleeves and mess up your hair a little. Like you’ve been up all night studying, but you finally figured it out.”
“Sure. As soon as you promise to—” Somers glanced up the hall. “You know. Put on the suit. Fifteen minutes. I bet we could shave it down
to ten.”
Hazard bared his teeth. “John, I am not going to inculcate a lie.”
“Are you sure?” Somers stretched, waving the notecard. “Because I had to take a lot of notes. If you play Santa, I could tell you about them. Show you. I’ve got this pair of reading glasses that slide down my nose.” Somers mimed pushing the glasses back up. “And I’ll wear a big chunky sweater and play with the sleeves. I’ll even let you guess which style guide I used for the bibliography.”
It took longer than Hazard liked for him to say, “No. You’re the devil. No, I’m not doing it.”
“Suit yourself,” Somers said, fanning himself with the notecard.
Hazard couldn’t help it; he called after him. “Did you use sub-topic headers for the cards, John? Can you at least tell me that?”
III
DECEMBER 24
MONDAY
6:02 PM
STOP PRESSURING HIM,” Rebeca said to Somers.
“Yes, John,” Hazard said, giving his boyfriend a flat look. “Stop pressuring me.”
“I’m not pressuring him. I couldn’t pressure him even if I wanted to.”
“Ha,” Noah said from where he was tending a steamer on the stove.
“Ha,” Rebeca said as she poured sangria.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Somers said.
Invitation to Christmas Eve dinner with Noah and Rebeca had come as a surprise, but, Hazard had to admit, a welcome one. He enjoyed the married couple’s company, even if their house did always sound—and smell—like a middle school PE class was in session. As though in sync with his thoughts, half a dozen kids tumbled through the kitchen, the whole herd moving toward the basement. Evie was suspended among them, one moment in Raquel’s arms, then in Robbie’s, then seeming to float on a cloud of hands and shoulders like in a Peanuts cartoon.
“Be careful with her,” Hazard said, pushing away from the counter.
Somers caught his sleeve.
“They’re going to drop her,” Hazard said.
“Don’t drop the baby,” Noah shouted.
For some reason, that made the entire herd burst into laughter as they shot down the stairs.
