Magenta Monster

Alex hated his life, his home, his family, they had become a millstone around his neck, they were demanding and lovely and he hated them, even his five year old daughter Nina who would spend her days painting him beautiful pictures.

His wife had insisted he take the children to see Santa Cluas. He couldn’t see the point, surely all it did was foster silly ideas in their heads, but he had smacked Milissa again and she couldn’t take them as she couldn’t show her face in public. Guilt and loathing racked him and so he took the three kids with their runny noses and sticky hands to the shopping mall.

Nina was bouncing visibly with excitement at the glittering and annoyingly flashy lights. What a waste of time and resources – this was not going to be teaching them how to save the planet. Inside there was a Santa Grotto surrounded by bored looking students in elf hats and ears and a very very long queue. He sighed and tagged them onto the end.

‘Daddy?’ Nina asked quietly, he ignored her, ‘Daddy? Why don’t we go see the other Father Christmas?’ She tugged incesently at his sleeve. He looked into the old covered market annexed to the new shiny mall and there was indeed another grotto.

‘Oh yes please Dad!’ Jeramy said. There was no queue and it looked like it would be a lot cheaper, made of wood with some grey looking fake snow that did not glitter.

He conceeded and they headed over to it. The gotto was constructed of silvered wood that looked like it belonged on a beach rather than in a shopping centre, there were shutters with no glass or perspex in the windows. No Christmas lights and just a few pine bowers dropping needles forlornly on the floor intertwined with some viscous looking holly denuded of its festive red berries.

‘Oh wow real reindeer!’ Cheryl his eight year old squealed and begain patting the smelly creatures, Alex’s nose begain to sting from the cold, the air con must have been switched on to get rid of the animal smell – well, it wasn’t working.

There were no cheery elves either; just an old woman dressed drably and bulkily in coarse looking material; she smiled, but still looked like she had eaten far too many of her own home made pies. Alex asked her how much it cost and was pleased to hear it was free, but when he saw Santa he was not suprised that there was no queue.

The man looked more like a lumber jack in a similar brown ‘dress’ to Mrs Claws. He had a dirty looking flowing beared and a mass of white yellowed hair cascading from a fur lined leather hat. Bright beetle black eyes glinting in grooved skin, crinkling his whole face in loud silent laughter. The man was repulsive. The kids however flocked to him, in his large wooden… throne.

Nina smiled at him. ‘Can I have a happy mummy?’ she said quietly. Alex caught the words and angry shame flared in him. He glared at his little daughter. Santa boomed a laugh and fixed him with a stare. Alex felt even colder and stomped his feet impatiently.

Santa reached into a rough brown sack and brought out a snow globe which he handed to the delighted child. She cradled it as if it were a new kitten. ‘Daddy what are you going to ask Santa for?’ she said innocently.

‘For you lot to fuck off.’ he said meaning it. Ninas brown eyes brimmed with tears, Santa’s dark ones where studying them both, the old man smiled mirthlessly at Alex.

Alex dragged the kids home feeling unsettled, especially as he’d noticed one of the riendeers had been deformed – six legs. Creepy. Maybe he’d had too much whisky last night after all.

…

That evening he took his guilt out on his pasty faced wife with her puffy eyes and limp hands. She looked a sight when he’d finished and the kids lay silent and wide eyed in their beds, holding their breaths till they heard their mothers sobs.

The stupid snow globe was on the mantle piece with its light-house and seashell resin base. It was, to his suprise made of actual glass and quiet heavy. He threw it at his fucking miserable wife.

The world twitched and jurked, he felt like he was falling.

…

He awoke to the sound of the sea, there was a chill in the air, dazed he looked around him. Was he in the attic? His head felt a bit odd but he stood up. He could smell something like electricity. Milky white light was streaming in. A large beveled glass triangle took up most of the room, giving him the strange impression a fish was looking at him from three different directions at once. Puzzled, he noticed a door and stepped out onto a circular balcony. The sky was a wierd distortion of colour making him dizzy. He looked over the rails to a sea of white below.

Breathing hard he looked into the sky once more. A pair of large brown eyes clouded the sky, distorted… and then they where spinning, now they were upside down; now just shuddering across the sky.

The sky settled again but his view of it was obscured by the large white flakes that swerled in instant blizzard around him. He retreated shivering inside – where the hell was he?

…

Nina put her snow globe back on the mantle piece watching the white swerl, it was strange but she thought there was a person in the lighthouse, she hadn’t noticed them yesterday when Santa had given her it. Mrs Nelson from next door was fixing them some dinner. Mummy was still in the hospital and the police hadn’t been able to find her daddy. Nina felt sad but also hopeful, she felt sure it had been the real Santa they’d seen yesterday and somehow she felt both her parents had got what they wished for.

Posted: Thursday, December 31st, 2009 @ 2:12 pm
Categories: Uncategorized.
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