The Lies They Tell Kids

When Abbie was born, there wasn’t anything noticeably different to her. When adults say that they knew a child was special on the day they were born, this is a universal expression of parenthood and the unique experience each parent and child has. That it is standard rather brings into question the uniqueness of the special quality of a new born, but then every snow flake is sacred and without all those flakes, a snowman could not be made.

Only when Abbie could walk and talk was her difference apparent and that difference was that she seemed to channel a maiden aunt that no one in the family was aware had ever existed. An unexpected inheritance that she spent with gusto from then on in. She had a crisp wisdom that trumped all else. A haughty knowing that filed things in the boxes that were correct as far as she was concerned and everyone else’s opinions be damned.

Nowhere was this more apparent than when Christmas came around. Doug, her doting stepfather would build the festive excitement only for a dour Abbie to give him one of the looks from her already extensive repertoire and tell him, “there is no such thing as Father Christmas.”

To bystanders, if there ever were any, it was obvious that these words landed painfully upon Doug’s person, and yet his love for that little girl never wavered or diminished even as she brutally crushed all of his endeavours to enter the Christmas Spirit and enjoy each and every aspect of the holiday season.

“Santa is a brand. He sells fizzy drinks,” said a four year old Abbie.

Doug’s face creased in consternation. He knew that the drinks brand in question had not invented Santa, but they had changed his image. Besides, he was already aware enough to know that were he to protest and put forth his side of the Santa story, Abbie would machine gun him to pieces. This little girl took no prisoners and she had no interest in cultivating a bedside manner or blunt the edge of her being right when she so chose to be. Which was becoming more and more of an occurence.

At night, having read her a bedtime story, Doug would lament Abbie’s condition to her mother, “she picks holes in all the stories I read!” he would shake his head sadly, “even when I try to pre-empt the holes, she finds an angle I’m just not prepared for,” then he would shrug, “and she just won’t listen!”

Abbie’s mother would smile, “she’s a little girl,” she would say, as though this was an explanation all in itself. Never did she see Doug eyeing her anew as he wondered whether his wife had been like this as a child and if that were the case, what did that mean for their relationship, even before he considered Abbie coming more and more into her powers.

Soon enough, Doug dreaded Christmas, but you would not know this to see him as he celebrated the season of goodwill to all men. He still held a flame of hope that he would be included in that merry band of men. After all this was a season of hope and renewal. A time to give thanks, safe in the knowledge that good things were about to happen. The baby Jesus, a gift to all. And the coming Spring when the miracle of life would emerge from ground that once seemed to hold no promise at all.

Doug smiled, when inside he was crying. The little girl who he loved with all his heart wounded him with a lack he could not articulate or understand. All he knew was that this was not how it was supposed to go and this was not how it was supposed to be. And so he dug deeper and kept on going. Racked his brain for an inspiration that would not come. He tried everything he could to spark within Abbie a sense of wonder. Attempted to encourage her to suspend her disbelief and to enjoy the moment for all its wonder.

The problem was that Abbie was steadfast and stubborn in her disbelief. Disbelief is a belief that can be more powerful than any other belief as there is no counter or replacement to it. Abbie was a confirmed Santa atheist and there was no turning her head. This hurt Doug because it was more than the death of Santa himself as far as the little girl was concerned, it was the death of an innocence that once it began would not end. A cancer of cynicism that would smother Abbie’s childhood and launch her into a world that was all the tougher for not having played, explored and danced in imagination. These pillars of childhood helped an adult to be flexible and to adapt as life created a singular assault course that must be traversed in order to be. Doug knew this in his heart and he lamented the difficulties his family were facing. And he felt like an abject failure in not delivering the childhood that Abbie so richly deserved.

Doug realised that he hankered after that childhood too. He felt robbed of joy and happy family memories. As time went on, he would find himself looking at Abbie’s Mum and as he snatched surreptitious looks at her, unbidden questions arose unannounced in his mind. Questions that could not be refused. And the questions always had Abbie’s certain and unshakeable voice to them.

He wondered where Abbie’s Mum was in all of this. But he found that he was afraid to ask. That he didn’t want to hear unsavoury answers that would further rock his world to a point where it would topple and shatter.

Everyone had a belief system. Doug knew this now. And it helped to believe in something good and wholesome. Santa was an introduction to this way of believing. Doug had sacrificed the tooth fairy without a backward glance and now he felt guilty about that. Thought maybe that capitulation had emboldened Abbie and encouraged her rampage through fairy tale lands with scissors and matches.

And all the while, there was no sign of Abbie’s Mum.

He thought about his own beliefs. Searched for them far and wide and found them in the tales he so wanted Abbie to love as much as he had as a child. The way good always prevailed over evil. The certainty of better days ahead. This life being worth it because in the end it all boiled down to love.

As the next Christmas approached, Doug did all he could to get Abbie into the Christmas Spirit, but all his attempts were thwarted. Now he saw that his wife’s indulgent smile was not for him. Never for him. In that smile was a knowing and he sensed a certainty that Abbie would win far more than this childhood battle.

Now Doug saw the shape of this childhood and what it meant not only for the life ahead of Abbie, but also for himself, were he to remain in this place. The sadness of that realisation was overwhelming and a despondent Doug went through the motions of the festive preparations. Clinging to rituals, such as the decoration of the house. Singlehandedly working at something that he knew Abbie and her Mum did not value.

He felt the weight of their appraising eyes on him as he hung the baubles on the tree and spread tinsel across the branches. His shoulders slumped as he held the angel and considered asking one of them to place it atop the tree to finalise his efforts. Handing the glory to another in an act of love that he now understood was not reciprocated.

Christmas had become a millstone around Doug’s neck and he struggled with the confusion of how this could be. This a beacon of love and hope. Now there was only darkness and shackles. He was the Ghost of Christmas Lost and he haunted himself.

He could not leave. Not now. The very thought of walking away from his family crushed him. As did his search for the reason for all of this calamity and his search for how and why he had failed those he loved so miserably.

Timing in life is everything and as Doug considered the timing of his betrayal of Abbie and her Mum he could not find it within himself to leave during any of the four seasons. There was never a good time for such destruction. He would stare at his hand and imagine an axe in it. A blade that would cut ties that he had believed were eternal.

Every day of the advent calendar was a torture. Abbie gleefully guzzled the chocolate as Doug reminded her to open the next door. He watched her eating and saw an advert for blind and greedy consumption. The meaning of Christmas had been slain in this place and he knew that were he to turn his back, if he were to cease to care, the cardboard of the calendar would be recklessly torn asunder and all of the chocolate eaten in one sitting. No one would lift a finger to stop it. No one would remonstrate with a little girl who thought she knew better and had been allowed to entrench that belief despite Doug’s love for her.

In the end, Doug could not say why he had stayed for as long as he had. Of all the days to be overcome with a revelation, it was Christmas Eve when it happened. It wasn’t that everything had gotten too much. That had happened somewhere back along the path of life. Some things are a matter of clandestine increments. They creep up upon a person. A crowd intent on overwhelming their victim. They suffocate them and drown them and it is only later that the victim becomes aware of the mugging that took place. Or rather the series of muggings that rendered them a broken shadow of their former self.

And it was the night before Christmas that Doug decided enough was enough and left his family. Nothing seemed to stir. Not even a mouse. Not even his shattered heart.

That was the Christmas that Abbie decided enough was enough too. She had crept downstairs and sat awaiting Doug. She had the digital camera she’d insisted Doug buy her for her birthday and a bag of sweets to occupy her whilst she lay in wait.

At the stroke of midnight a shadowy figure entered the room. Abbie did not show her hand straight away. There was no need. She had Doug bang to rights. There was no doubt in her as the figure moved into the dim moonlight near the Christmas tree painting the red of the Santa outfit almost black and the white trim a dirty grey. Abbie remained steadfast even as she wondered why Doug had bothered with such an outfit. An outfit she had never before seen.

And when the figure turned towards her, she swore that it was Doug beneath the beard and folds of a hood that hid almost everything barring eyes that sparkled like moonlit magic. Eyes that pierced with a dark focus Abbie could relate to. Eyes that did not belong to the Doug she knew.

“I’m real, Abbie,” the figure’s voice was broken, as though he’d cried all his life and the sobbing had ruptured his vocal chords, “and you have been a very naughty girl.” He laughed then and that laugh turned the blood in Abbie’s veins to ice even before he said, “did you know that Santa is an anagram of Satan? You believe in Satan don’t you? Everybody believes in him. They have to. They really do… Santa and Satan. They’re both red. And they both have a list of the very naughty people.” He moved towards her then and the moon covered its face with a cloud.

In the morning, Abbie’s Mum awoke to an empty bed. This was not unusual. Neither was her rolling over and going back to sleep, or scrolling through her phone when she awoke a second time.

When she decided to make her way downstairs, she noted Abbie’s empty bedroom and nodded in the expectation of breakfast, present opening and the Christmas Dinner that Doug prepared each year.

In the quiet kitchen, she grumbled at having to make herself tea and toast. Later that day she would call the police and report the missing duo. Now though, she would enjoy her breakfast before composing the necessary narrative and build up to the tears required to deliver it with aplomb.