Santa Who

Santa Who?

If Grady had learned nothing else from watching all those Seth Rogan movies, it was that if you didn’t have the green, you could in no way hit the scene.  And Grady definitely did not have the green.  But he desperately wanted the green.  Make no mistake.  And one way or another, by hook or by crook or by, he guessed, snook, Grady was going to get the green today.  He had to.  The dopamine levels in his brain demanded it!

              So, later that day, Grady found himself incompetently following his best friend, Nabs, a kleptomaniac with a penchant for rhinestones and shiny small animals, throughout the city. 

              Nabs muttered through clenched breath for like the eighth time that day.  “Beat it, will you Grady?  I told you.  I don’t want to hang out today.  I got work to do.”

              “Oh, come on, Nabs,” Grady wheezed.  “I can help you.  I can be a distraction.”

              “You already are.  Beat it.”

              But Grady refused to beat it and for the next thirty minutes, Nabs was forced to play distracting games of his own in an attempt to dislodge the unwelcome varmint.  At the light on 30^th and Wabash, Nabs played, “What’s that behind you?” But Gradywouldn’t fall for it.  In the middle of Franklin Street, Nabs fell on the ground and pretended to be dead.  But Grady just stood there and waited for him to rise. 

              Thus, at the corner of 29^th and McAllister, Nabs pulled out his dirtiest and three out of ten, deadliest trick.  “Okay, you can help me,” he said, head down and feigning sadness.

              “Really?”  Grady asked. 

              “Sure.” 

              Nabs threw a large potato sack on the ground.  “Here,” he said, “you can be my bag man.  Just get in the bag.”

              When Grady squeezed down, inserting his 5’10” frame into the three-foot enclosure, Nabs gently whacked him in the back of the head with a 2×4 he’d been carrying for the last three blocks and Grady went down like a wet sack of phlegm and chicken bones.

              Three hours later, Grady awoke to darkness.  He quickly took the bag off, rolled out of the sewer and walked the last four blocks to Nab’s usual target: The Women’s Health Clinic.  Nabs had an interesting habit of dumpster diving and one evening had discovered a half-filled tube of cream at the bottom of the Women’s Health Center dumpster.  He had returned to the scene of the (in his mind) crime ever since. 

              Now, business was slow at the Women’s Health Center, what with the Man keeping us down and all, so Nabs was forced to wait for Kelly, the lead receptionist, to dump out the trash.  But this time, Nab’s wait would finally pay off like a one-eyed podiatrist in a monocle mine. 

              See, earlier that day, call it fate, call it karma, or just call it luck of the Irish, a shipment of donated organs had been delivered to the Women’s Health Clinic by mistake.  Right away, Kelly stamped the box with the dreaded “Return to Sender” stamp she saved for special occasions and placed the box next to the couch in the lobby for safe keeping.  After a series of misadventures, featuring a rotten bout of diarrhea, a misplaced lunch and a rabid monkey named Sue Ellen, the same box of organs was unceremoniously thrown in the dumpster out back.  Kelly left work early because of said stomach flux. 

              And Nabs…well, Nabs was the luckiest kleptomaniac this side of the Mississippi.  In fact, he was so enamored of his recent treasure that he completely missed the approach of one Grady until the latter’s shadow crossed the former. 

              Nabs turned around sheepishly to see his best buddy directly behind him with a rather cross expression on his mug.  “Hey there, Grady old buddy.  No hard feelings, right?”

              Grady smiled a wide, toothless grin.  “Sure, old pal.  Look, I brought you a gift.”

              And Grady pulled out a hamster that he had been polishing for weeks for just such an occasion.  (If you don’t get the joke, please reference the second paragraph above).  

              The box temporarily forgotten, the kleptomaniac snatched up the shiny hamster like a cat in a yarn tornado and crawled behind the dumpster for some peace, quiet and introspection…probably.  Which left Grady with the box of secrets.  And Grady liked secrets…Indeed he did.

              However, knowing that his friend could break free of his shiny-hamster-induced euphoria at any moment, Grady did the only reasonable thing he could think of and tucked the box carefully under one scrawny arm, tested the wind’s direction by licking his right index finger and jamming it in his ear canal and ran for it.    

*                             *                             *                             *                             *                             *                             *

               About the time that Grady and Nabs were scheming over the box full of unknown merchandise, Patrolman John Holman, currently grabbing a coffee from Crazy Jeb’s Gas-N-Go, started to feel his scalp itch.  Now, it was true that Patrolman Holman had a serious dandruff problem, but this wasn’t a dandruff kind of itch.  This was a something-is-up-in-my-fair-city-and-by-God-I’m-gonna-find-out-what-it-is-as-soon-as-I-get-my-coffee kind of itch. 

                So, as soon as he paid Crazy Jeb’s brother, Ernie, for the medium cup of heavily creamed, heavily sugared, strong as death coffee, Patrolman Holman hit the streets, on the prowl for whatever was causing the suspicious itch.  And trouble he did find, directly behind the woman’s clinic dumpster in the form of one kleptomaniac named Nabs, who was caressing some shiny, brown object, which may have been a rock but was, more than likely (knowing Nabs), intended to be a small rodent-like animal.

                And even though Patrolman Holman’s size 12 department issue shoes made a sizeable echo in the alleyway, he came upon Nabs completely unaware.  “Say, whatcha got there, Nabs?”

                Whatever it was went quickly behind Nab’s back.  “Well, if it ain’t my old buddy, Patrolman Holman.  As I live and breathe.  What a day this has been.  Oh yes, indeed.  Fluffy brown melon.”

                Patrolman Holman raised a bushy eyebrow.  “Fluffy brown melon?”

                Nabs grinned the grin of the hopelessly self-condemned.  “Eh, sorry.  I meant to say that I’m not doing nothing, so you can just beat it, please and thank you.”

                Patrolman Holman grinned back.  “Now, now, Nabs.  Let’s not be so hasty.  You and I both know that you’re fond of them shiny brown animals.”

                “Well, and where’s the crime in that?”

                “To be truthful, Nabs, liking shiny, brown animals ain’t no crime.  But, we also are both fully aware that your usual accomplice, one Grady, is also fairly aware of your love of the shiny beasties and will very often take advantage of this knowledge to fool you out of whatever you might have, oh how shall I say it, unlawfully appropriated.”

                “Dur,” Nabs attempted to interject some nonsense.

                “Now, I’ve got to stop you right there, Nabs.  While whatever was about to exit your oratorial canal was, and I’m sure, going to be very eloquent and well-spoken, it nevertheless would probably have resulted in only a cheap and, dare I say, very untoward excuse.”

                “Dur,” stated Nabs, before Patrolman Holman raised a hand to stop him again.

                “Now, while I would dearly love to stand here and bandy words with you all day long, and I’m not just saying that, I would also love to locate said friend of yours, one Grady, and whatever unlawfully appropriated goods he may have bamboozled you out of.”

                “Now hold on one cotton picking minute,” Nabs interjected.  “He didn’t trick me out of nothing.  We traded, fair and square.”

                “Well,” said Patrolman Holman, “never being the one to directly want to contradict a fellow human being, I nevertheless would love to remind you of a couple insightful instances where said fellow Grady did indeed attempt and succeed to deceive you after you had unlawfully appropriated some items that particularly tickled his fancy.”

                “Um…”

                Patrolman Holman consulted his notebook.  “May 13, 2018.  After relieving a jogger of their left shoe while the jogger sat down to recuperate on a nearby park bench, one Grady proceeded to trick you out of said shoe by offering you a, in his words, shiny squirrel.  However, upon closer examination, the shiny squirrel soon revealed itself to be an old sock covered with glitter.”

                Nabs shrugged.  “Well, fool me once and all….”

                “Indeed.  We will soon find out that the old adage ‘Fool me once, shame on you and fool me twice, shame on me’ is as relevant to this situation as ‘a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush’ is relevant to a certain film by Alfred Hitchcock.  Shall I go on?”

                “Dur…”

                “Thank you.  One week later on May 20, after relieving a young lady of her dignity by sneaking up behind her and stealing a kiss on her left cheek, to which, I may add, she required immediate hospitalization, one Grady proceeded to trick you out of said kiss, and how this was supposed to be accomplished one would have no idea…”

                “Well, you see,” started Nabs, “since a kiss is transferred by the lips to the cheek…”

                “And may I remind you,” Patrolman Holman interrupted, “that I have no interest whatsoever in gaining knowledge of said transaction as the results of which could possibly result in making me physically ill.”

                Nabs shrugged.

                Patrolman Holman continued.  “Upon receipt of said stolen kiss, Nabs received as payment, one shiny kitten, which, upon closer inspection, turned out to be a thoroughly polished, but still amazingly shaggy Italian sausage.”

                “Which still contained an amazing amount of good flavor.”

                “I’m sure it did.”  Patrolman Holman raised another eyebrow.  “Should I go on?”

                “Please don’t.”  Nabs replied.

                Patrolman Holman flipped his notebook closed.  “Fair enough.  Now, if you’ll be so kind, please inform me, very slowly and in great detail, what was unlawfully appropriated and in which direction said Grady ran with said items.”     

*                             *                             *                             *                             *                             *                             *

                At the moment that Patrolman Holman was expertly interrogating Nabs, Grady found himself and his “unlawfully appropriated” goods in a very foreign environment.  In his haste, he had taken a left down an alley behind Troost instead of a right and had come to a dead stop in front a mysterious wooden door, adorned with a nameplate, proclaiming “Our Lady of Perpetual Admonishments Orphanage.”  Shrugging because of the amount of fifty-cent words currently facing him, Grady quickly opened the door and ducked inside. 

                When the dimmed light finally allowed him to see definite shapes, Grady could make out about four dirty faces smiling expectantly up at him.  “Whaaaaaaaa…” he let out like a fine wheeze.

                “Who are you?”  One of the dirty-faced children asked him.

                “I, uh…” Grady expertly replied.

                “Are you the new pastor?”  Another asked.

                “Well, you see….”

                “What’s in that bag?”

                Grady looked down at the burlap sack, into which he had hastily shoved all the bags from the box.  “I, uh….stuff?”

                “Are you Santa Claus?”  One particularly dirty-faced girl asked as she squinted up at him.

                Grady quickly bit into that tasty morsel like a drowning rat biting into a floating donut.  “Uh, sure.  That’s who I am.  I’m that Santa guy.”

                The kids huddled closer, all squinting up at Grady with joy beaming through the dirt on their cheeks.  One of them tugged at his sleeve.

                “Santa, it’s me, Mirabella.  Did you get the letter I sent you?”

                “Uh, sure,” Grady stumbled forward.  “I get all the letters.”

                “What about mine, Santa?”  A little squinty, dirty-faced boy asked.  “Did you get mine too?  I asked for a bike.”

                “Like I said,” repeated Grady, “I get all the letters.  So, yeah.  Yours too…I guess.”

                “Well,” the boys persisted, “did you bring me a bike?”

                “Uh, lemme see what I got here.”  Grady pretended to look in the sack, knowing full well that he did not have anything close to resembling a bike. 

                Actually, Grady was a little confused about what exactly was in the bag.  When he had emptied the contents of the box out behind Dis Count Liquors, he came to realize that this “unlawfully appropriated” haul was a bunch of gallon sized baggies full of water and what looked like sides of beef.  He didn’t take the time to examine them any closer as his imagination envisioned Nabs rounding the corner at any moment with a polished rock in his hand and anger in his heart.  So, he quickly shoved them in the burlap sack and continued his long escape.

                “Well, what did you bring us?”  The rude little boy asked.

                While Grady took a moment to organize his thoughts and design a clever escape plan, he glanced around to note that he and the children were apparently in some sort of dark closet or small bathroom.

                “Hey,” said Grady.  “Why’s it so dark in here?”

                Mirabelle, the apparent ringleader of the group, flipped on the light, revealing that they were indeed inside a relatively small coat closet. 

                “What are you guys doing in a coat closet?”  Grady asked.

                “Oh, I’m sorry,” said Mirabelle.  “I thought for sure we were out in the playground this time.”

                “Why would you think a closet was a playground?”  Grady wondered.  “Are you guys from France?”

                “No,” said the rudest little boy who wanted a bike.  “We’re not from France.  We all have ocular disorders.”

                “Whaaaa,” said Grady.  “So, you are from France.”

                “No Santa,” said Mirabelle.  “He means that we all have problems.  I was born blind.  Julianna there has a degenerative eye disorder.  Ferdinand was born with a rare eye problem where he sees only in black and white…”

                “And shades of gray,” offered Ferdinand.

                “Of course,” dismissed Mirabelle.  “And little Pepito here” she pointed to the one who wanted a bike, “why, he’s the strangest one of all.”

                Pepito shoved out his chest.  “That’s right.  The doctor who was performing cataract surgery on my eyes accidentally replaced my eyes with fingers.”

                Grady glanced up at the boy’s face to see two little pinkies waving back at him.  “Ugh.”

                “I know,” replied Pepito.  “Aren’t they awesome?  So, Santa, what do you have for us in your sack?  I doubt it’s a bike…unless it’s a magical sack.”

                Grady groaned softly to himself as he blindly reached into the bag.  Quickly, he pulled the first bag out and glanced for the tell-tale name tag.

                “Okay Pepito,” Grady said, while reading.  “Looks like Santa brought you a…kidney this year.”

                Grady shoved the bag into the child’s waiting hands.

                A frown crossed Pepito’s face.  “A kidney?  So, not a bike?”

                “Not this year.”

                Pepito groaned.

                Grady ruffled his hair.  “Cheer up, little guy.  If you’re extra good this next year, and you take extra good care of that kidney.  Then maybe, just maybe, Santa will bring you a bike next year.”

                “Ah,” Pepito groaned a little more.  “Okay, Santa.”

                Then it was Julianna’s turn and Santa brought her a new bladder.  And, after that, Santa brought lucky Ferdinand a brand new (as far as he knew) set of lungs, which he clutched lovingly next to his own. 

Finally, as Grady was reaching into his bag to retrieve Mirabelle’s gift, a lady’s voice rang out.  “Children!  Children, where are you?”

Pepito clutched at Grady’s skinny arm.  “It’s Sister Carly.  She’s so mean to us.”

“Yeah,” agreed Juliana.  “She makes us stay up extra late while she reads books to us.”

“And she tucks us in, brings us water and kisses us at night too.”  Ferdinand said.

“Hey,” said Grady.  “She sounds alright to me.”

“She also makes some really gross rice pudding.”  Mirabelle added, conspiratorially.  “It’s super gross.”

Grady nodded.

Mirabellle shoved Pepito toward the door.  “Pepito, go find out what she wants and stall her.  Julianna and Ferdinand, you go too.  I’ll stay here for a moment and make sure Santa gets off okay…after giving me my present.”

The remaining children nodded obediently as they filed out of the room. 

“Oh, there you are children.”  They heard Sister Carly say in the next room.  “And look, there’s a nice policeman here who would like to ask you children some very important questions.”

Grady attempted to run but was held up fast by Mirabelle’s iron grip. “Just hold on a minute, Santa.  He doesn’t know you’re here.  Just listen.”

“Greetings and felicitations, young children.  My name is Patrolman John Holman.  I’m looking for a known felon.  Can anyone tell me what a felon is?”

Grady’s further attempts to run were again cut short. 

“Not yet, Santa.  You still haven’t given me my present.”

“Uh…”

Mirabelle pulled Grady’s face down close.  “Relax.  Look, I know you’re not the real Santa.”

“You do?”

“Sure.  I may be blind but I’m not an idiot.  Plus, I’m pretty sure the real Santa doesn’t smell like you do.  Or hand out weird presents like you do.  But you made our Christmas this year pretty special.  And that’s cool.”

She relaxed her grip.

“So, uh,” Grady stammered, “can I go?”

“One minute,” Mirabelle said.  “What about my present?”

“Um…”

“I know what you have in that bag.  Like I said, I’m not an idiot.  I’m just really hoping you’ve got a pair of eyes in there.”

Grady gulped.  He sure wished he had a pair of eyes in the bag as well.  There were only a couple galloon sacks left in the bag.  And he was pretty sure at least one of them was a brain.  Felt like a dang cabbage. 

So, Grady dug his hand in past the cabbage and slid past something else that felt like a nose with legs and finally rested on the smallest of the galloon bags.  Slowly, he pulled it up and triumphantly held it up in front of the girl.  She reached out tentatively and squeezed the contents of the bag.  Slowly, a smile crossed her lips.

“It’s perfect.  Thanks, Santa.”

“Yeah, sure, kid.”

Grady moved toward the door, rested his hand on the knob before turning back to the little girl.  “Hey, thanks for the Christmas miracle, little girl.  You sure saved my bacon.”

And then he was gone and his stench left with him.

Mirabelle turned away from the backdoor, gripping the galloon bag tightly.  Santa didn’t have any eyes in that magic bag of his this year.  But the index fingers he gave her would place her one peg above Pepito, and that was good enough for now.