The Boy Who Hated Santa Claus
by Douglas T. Araujo

Santa Claus killed my mom.

The thought came suddenly to Billy’s mind while he was in front of the little table his daddy had put near the Christmas tree. This wasn’t a new thought. It had been rolling inside his mind since his mother died three years ago, repeating itself again and again and again. That thought was like a bug imprisoned on Billy’s mind, flying and buzzing about. Sometimes the bug would get tired and rest; at these times when the buzzing would stop, Billy could almost forget everything and would almost be a normal kid again. But the bug never left completely. It never died. And soon or later Billy would remember Christmas, that Christmas, and the buzzing would resume.

Obviously, Billy had never told anyone about how this little thought kept buzzing on his mind. Not even to Richie, his best friend, or to his father, who was the person he trusted most in the whole world. If he had done so, maybe his father – who was a psychologist – would have noticed that Billy was really obsessed by that idea. If this had happened, maybe everything would have ended differently.

But Billy never told anyone. And he never did for a very simple reason: he never realized there was something wrong with that repeating thought. After all, he was only a six-year old boy; he hadn’t the slightest idea of what an obsession was.

Santa Claus killed my mom.

The thought repeated itself, as if to reassure the argument.

Billy stood in front of the little table for almost a minute, staring intently at the glass of milk and the bowl of cookies sitting on it, his hands trembling and his heart thumping fast in his chest. There was such an expression of anger on his face that if any grownup had entered the room at that moment and seen him, they certainly would find it difficult to believe that such a hate could exist on a six year-old boy’s face. But there weren’t any grownups in the house except for his daddy, and he was already in his bedroom, watching TV.

Billy’s gaze was fixated on the cookies. Chocolate cookies. It was a kind of family tradition, Billy knew it: every year, his daddy would put them beside the Christmas tree for Santa Claus, as a way of saying thanks to the old man for the gifts he had left them. Santa seemed to like it, because the next morning the glass and the bowl were always found empty.

Billy didn’t think they had anything to thank Santa Claus for after what he had done to his mom, but he had never dared to say so to his daddy. Now, he was glad he didn’t say anything. The cookies and the milk would help him with his plan.

He had had time to plan. Three years since his mom had died; that was a lot of time for a child. A lot of time to think. A lot of time to wait for revenge.

To tell the truth, the revenge idea had come to Billy no more than ten months ago, although he probably didn’t know what the word "revenge" meant. He only felt that something needed to be done to compensate for his mom’s murder, but he didn’t know exactly what.

The idea had occurred to him one day at school, when a police officer had come to talk to his class about the dangerous things that existed in everyone’s home, and why children should avoid playing with such items. The man spent a whole hour talking about medicines, matches, housekeeping products and more. At the end of his speech, when the officer dedicated fifteen minutes to talk especially about some common poisons that most people keep at home, the idea came to him. Billy was listening to the policeman, sincerely interested, when he remembered suddenly the glass of milk and the chocolate cookies, and the way they would always find the glass and the bowl empty at the next morning after Christmas. This memory produced a feeling, it was as if lightning had struck his brain, as if a dam had ruined. Instead of water, however, what flowed from behind that dam was an image. Maybe it had been there all along, hidden away in the corner of his mind, keeping company to the bug who lived there, just waiting for the anger and hate to build until it hit a point when it could

(explode)

show up.

It was the image of what he should do. An idea for revenge. Simple and innocent and terrifying, as only a child could conceive.

And along with the idea, came the plan. This took longer to become totally clear in Billy’s mind, of course, but not too much longer. In a week he had it completely finished. Once the idea had come, the rest seemed to fit into place.

With his plan ready, Billy waited for December. He waited for Christmas to come. During this wait, the bug inside Billy’s mind buzzed as never it had before. When Christmas approached, the buzzing seemed to grow in intensity, as if the bug inside his brain was growing also. Changing into a gigantic bug.

Then December finally arrived, and Billy started putting his plan into action.

First, he needed to make sure that Santa Claus was coming to his home this Christmas. His whole plan depended upon that occurring. And how he could assure that?

Very simple. He would ask Santa to do so.

His father seemed a little surprised when Billy asked to talk to Santa Claus at the Shopping Center, because Billy had been totally averse to anything which reminded him even slightly of Santa since his mother’s death. But in his mind – he was a psychologist, remember - Bill’s daddy concluded that his son was finally putting aside the painful memories of the accident that had caused his mother’s death, and his heart filled with hope and joy.

And there they went, Billy and his daddy on a Saturday evening, to see Santa Claus at the Shopping Center.

Billy stood in line in front of Santa Claus’ chair, holding his daddy’s hand. He observed the other children in line, the way they seemed anxious to talk with Santa, and he couldn’t avoid thinking they didn’t know how that man could be evil. If they knew what he had done to his mom...

Santa Claus killed my mom.

The thought buzzed inside his head again.

He felt the rage and the pain growing inside his chest while the line moved slowly, but he somehow controlled himself. He needed to, if he wanted his plan to work.

Finally, it was his turn to talk to Santa Claus. His daddy smiled and motioned for him to go there. Billy went and sat on Santa Claus’ lap, as if nothing had happened three years ago, as if that wasn’t the man who had killed his mom. He needed a lot of courage to do so, and the thought of his plan kept him from running away.

Once in Santa’s lap, Billy looked at him closely, and noticed two things almost immediately. The first one was that the old man seemed a little bit thinner than he had been the night his mom had died, three years ago. His cheeks were also paler than before and he seemed somehow older, and Billy wondered if maybe what had happened three years ago had affected Santa Claus after all.

The second thing he noticed was that Santa didn’t smell of whisky, as he had on the night he had murdered his mom.

"Ho, ho, ho," Santa Claus giggled, and asked, "What’s your name, son?"

"Billy. Billy Carpenter." The boy looked at the old man’s face, wanting to see if his name would bring any expression of surprise, or disgust, or even guilt. But it didn’t. Santa continued smiling, and Billy felt sure his mom’s death didn’t mean anything to that man after all. His name meant nothing to him. He probably looked thinner and older only because Billy himself had grown up. It was only a change in perspective, nothing else.

Billy’s stomach churned with pain and hate.

"And what do you want me to give you this Christmas?"

"I want

(to kill you, you bastard)

a Spiderman. Not the Spiderman alone, but the one with the Spider-Cycle."

"Were you a good boy over this year, Billy?" Santa Claus asked.

"Yes, I was."

Then suddenly Santa’s face assumed a serious expression, as he asked:

"Are you sure you really were a good boy this year, Billy? You aren’t hiding anything from me, are you?"

Billy’s heart froze in his chest, and he didn’t know what to say. His mouth dried and a crazy thought crossed his brain, that maybe Santa Claus had the power to read minds, maybe he already knew all that he had been planning, all that he had been thinking. Now he could see Santa putting him back on the floor and asking his daddy to come here and then he would tell him all that Billy meant to do, all that he had planned, and how bad a boy he had been this year...

But Santa Claus didn’t do anything like that. Instead, he just winked an eye and giggled again.

"Okay, okay," He said in an amused tone, "I will bring you a Spiderman with a Spider-Cycle, don’t worry."

Billy felt his whole body relax. Santa Claus couldn’t read minds after all. Thank God.

"Now, give me a kiss," Santa Claus demanded.

Billy kissed the old man’s cheek, felling his stomach churn. He felt as if he was kissing a snake.

"Now, go back to your daddy..."

This was the moment Bill was waiting for. That’s why he had come here and sat on the murderer’s lap, after all. With a false smile on his lips, he said the sentence he had elaborated and had repeated to himself a hundred times before.

"Santa Claus, I’m going to put chocolate cookies and milk beside the Christmas tree for you on Christmas. Make sure you eat them, they will be delicious."

"Chocolate cookies and milk?" Santa’s smile widened. "I love chocolate cookies and milk. You can be sure I will eat everything you leave there for me."

This statement was all that Billy wanted to hear, and he went back to his daddy with a sincere smile on his lips, the first one since he had arrived at the Shopping Center.

The first part of his plan was complete.

Next came the second part of his plan. It was a little bit riskier, but Billy went on the same way. At the end, it became the easiest part to accomplish.

Billy knew where his daddy used to put the poison for ants. It was always in the closet under the bathroom’s wash-basin. Billy had express orders from his daddy to not handle anything that was under the bathroom’s wash-basin, but he thought he would make an exception this time.

Billy broke the rules one evening, after he had finished bathing. Before he went out of the bedroom, he opened the wash-basin’s closet, took the box of ant poison from inside, and put a generous amount of the white powder into a plastic bag he had brought with him. He closed the bag’s mouth carefully – he didn’t want any of the poison spilling throughout the house – and put the box back in its place under the wash-basin. Then he hid the plastic bag inside his T-shirt and went to his bedroom.

Once there, he took a good look at the transparent plastic bag. The powder was very similar to sugar, and that made Billy feel exhilarated. He looked at that white powder in his hands for a while, wondering about the power that was contained in that plastic bag.

The power of life and death.

He hid the plastic bag behind the pile of comic books in the third drawer of his wardrobe. He knew nobody ever touched his comic books drawer without his permission. Even his daddy wouldn’t dare do so.

The second part of his plan was complete.

Now all he needed to do was wait for Christmas, for the chocolate cookies and the glass of milk.

And finally it arrived.

Tonight.

Now.

But now that he was finally here, looking straight at the cookies and the milk and listening to the sounds from the TV in his daddy’s bedroom, his mind insisted in going back to that night three years ago.

The night Santa Claus had killed his mom.

He remembered it very well, although he was only three years old at the time. He remembered going with his mom to the Shopping Center, the same way he had gone with his daddy less than a month ago. He remembered sitting on Santa’s lap, and feeling the strong smell which emanated from the old man as he spoke. He recognized that smell immediately, from a bottle his daddy kept inside the kitchen closet, from which he sipped from time to time. Whisky. Santa Claus smelled of whisky. He remembered being a little surprised – after all, he was Santa Claus – but that was soon forgotten when Santa asked about the toy he wanted that Christmas.

After visiting Santa, his mom took him shopping for a while. He didn’t remember for sure how much time they spent shopping, but it seemed too long for him. He was a young boy, and he was tired and hungry. He begged his mom to go home. Finally, she agreed.

After that his memories were not so clear. He remembered leaving the Shopping Center, his mom holding his hand. He remembered the sound of brakes and the smell of burning rubber. He remembered his mom pushing him, a hard push that made him fall some feet away. He remembered of someone yelling to someone else to call an ambulance, for God’s sake.

All of his memories appeared like flashes in his mind, as a high speed movie from which some parts had been cut. But there was one image that he remembered very, very clearly. It had been frozen there like a picture.

When he looked up from where he had fallen after his mom pushed him away from her, there was a car where his mom and he had been an instant before. A big blue car. He watched, his three year-old mind not yet comprehending what had really happened. The car door opened and a man stepped out of it.

The man was Santa Claus.

Billy’s heart jumped inside his chest. Even from where he was laying, some feet away from the car and from the man, he could sense the smell of whisky. The same smell he had sensed minutes before, when he had sat on that man’s lap and asked innocently for a new toy.

At that moment, even while he was fallen in the street, even being a three year-old boy, Billy understood everything that had happened. And for the first time it came to him, that thought which would change into a bug over the years, a gigantic insect growing inside his brain.

Santa Claus killed my mom.

Now, with hot tears rolling down his cold cheeks, Billy got the plastic bag he had taken from behind his comic books. He opened the bag and put it on the rim of the glass, ready to dump all its content into the milk.

Then, for the first time since he had listened to the policeman’s speech about things children weren’t supposed to handle at home, Billy hesitated.

But it wasn’t fear or remorse that made him stop. Nor was he afraid of being caught. This possibility had never crossed his mind. What made him stop was a thing that Richie – his best friend in the world – had said to him only three days ago, when they were playing at Richie’s home.

Richie had told him something that he had learned from his cousin Eddie, who was eleven. According to Eddie – and to Richie, who believed with a blind faith in everything his cousin Eddie said – there wasn’t any Santa Claus. Yes, that’s it. According to them, Santa Claus didn’t really exist. It was only an invention of grownups, a mythological being just like elves and fairies.

"But what about the gifts that appear every Christmas? If Santa doesn’t exist, who put them under the tree?" Billy asked, his eyes widening at such amazing an idea.

"Our parents, of course," Richie answered, with his best matter-of-fact voice. "And that Santa Claus at the Shopping Center, he is only a man with red clothes and a false beard. He is paid by the Shopping Center to pretend to be Santa Claus and amuse the children."

Of course Billy hadn’t believed what Richie had said, but it was such an amazing thought that it kept coming to Billy’s mind again and again, exactly the same way that other buzzing thought did. During those three days, Billy had given that thought careful consideration. Finally, he had dismissed it as the biggest lie he had ever heard in his whole life.

What made him reach this conclusion was, as curious as it may be, the chocolate cookies. Because if Santa Claus really didn’t exist, his father should be eating the cookies and drinking the milk, and Billy knew that couldn’t be true. His father hated chocolate. He had bellyache every time he ate it.

At that moment, with the plastic bag full of ant poison resting on the glass border, Billy thought of his talk with Richie once more. And once more the remembrance of his father’s bellyache stopped his hesitation.

Billy threw all the white powder inside the glass. With a spoon, he stirred the milk, and gave it a closer look. He couldn’t see any difference at all.

Suddenly, a strange calmness came over him, and he felt very tired. His hands weren’t shaking anymore. Relief washed over him, and he felt as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He had done what he had to. His mission was accomplished.

He sighed and went to bed, knocking on his daddy’s bedroom door and wishing him good night and Merry Christmas. Less than ten minutes later, he was fully asleep. For the first time in three years, he dreamed of his mom. In his dream, she held him in her arms, kissed him on his cheeks and said to him she was very proud of what he had done.

Forty-five minutes after Billy had wished him good night, Billy’s father decided it was time for him to perform his part of the Christmas theatre, as he used to do every year. Silently, he got the package containing Spiderman and his Spider-Cycle, which he had hidden inside his wardrobe, and went slowly to the room. He stopped only one time at Billy’s bedroom door and listened closely. The only sound he heard was Billy’s snore.

More confident, Billy’s father put the packages under the Christmas tree and smiled to himself. Then he went to the small table near the tree, where the cookies and the milk were.

The cookies and the milk had been Beverly’s idea. It was their secret Christmas ritual: he would put the package under the tree and Beverly would eat the cookies and drink the milk. They had done so since Billy was a baby.

Now Beverly was dead. She had been killed by a stupid son-of-a bitch drunk driver in a Santa Claus costume.

He missed her.

After Beverly’s death, Billy’s father had decided to continue with their ritual. During the last three years, he had put the packages under the tree and, with tears in his eyes, he ate the cookies and drank the milk. He always had a bellyache after that because of the chocolate, but that didn’t matter. Somehow that single act was able to make him feel closer to Beverly, make her part of his Christmas. The pain didn’t matter, even when his belly kept aching all night long.

Thinking of his dead wife, Billy’s father ate the cookies and drank the milk. He thought it was a little bitter, but in his sorrow he didn’t pay much attention to that.

With weeping tears, Billy’s father entered his son’s room and kissed him on the forehead. Then he went to bed, to wait for the bellyache, which would surely come.

And it really came.

But this time it didn’t last long.

©2002 Douglas T. Araujo

Douglas T. Araujo is a chemical engineer who lives in Brazil with his wife, two children and a dog. He is 31 years old and has been writing fiction – mostly in the horror genre – for two years. His first piece published was named "Zombies" and appeared at www.the-phone-book.com.