A short story by Craig Cormick
Luke reaches into the large dusty box and pulls out a detached arm. He wrinkles up his nose in distaste and throws it back in again.
"This job is the worst!", he says. "The worst job ever!"
Paul, wrapping a small childlike body on the workbench behind him, hears him and turns away smiling to himself. Luke looks at him, but Paul won't let him catch his eye. He is on court-appointed community work as well.
Luke is about to tell him what he thinks of him too, but Hearse, the supervisor, strolls into the workroom, carrying an automatic rifle under his arm. So Luke reaches back into the box. He grabs a hold of another doll. This one is whole. He lays it on the bench beside the board game and wraps them both.
Hearse, or Mr Hurst, as he asks them to address him, lays the toy rifle on the bench and looks over at Luke.
"What've you got there?", he asks him. He talks like a bloody policeman.
"Girl five and boy six", Luke replies sullenly.
Hearse nods his head, pulls a biro out of his top pocket, puts it under the fastener on his clip board and walks back out to the front office. "Keep 'em at it Nick", he says as he disappears out the door.
Nick doesn't even acknowledge him. It is Nick who runs the workshop. Hearse doesn't have a bloody clue. Anybody can see that.
"Not a bloody clue", Luke mumbles to himself.
Paul nods quietly in agreement.
The first few days in the workshop, Luke had thought the wrapping had been the worst, but now he feels it is easier than scrabbling through the boxes trying to find suitable toys. After a few hours your brain stops being able to think clearly any more. What would a nine-year-old girl want for Christmas? Would a soap set be best — or perhaps a Barbie?
It gives Luke a headache. And he resents the fact that the presents are so expensive. Better than what his own kids usually get. He was making up the last lot, and Nick had thrown in a couple of NBL basketballs. "Just for extras", he said. "Any family that big deserves a bit extra at Christmas." There were five kids. Those balls cost heaps.
But what really pisses Luke off is when Hearse comes and lectures them on the need to make the right choice of presents. Talking to them like he is ticking off a little kid. Telling him about the need to understand the needy. The need to try and imagine their need. As if he didn't know.
"That wanker hasn't even got any kids", Luke says out loud. "He wouldn't have a clue what kids want for Christmas."
"That right?" asks Nick, puffing on a small thin cigarette. He asks it as if he couldn't care whether Luke answers or not. But Luke isn't so sure. He can't figure Nick out. He looks like a crim — tattoos up his arms, scars on the nicotine-stained hands, and the cautious, blurry eyes set deep in his tough face. He looks like the type he'd met on the inside. But here he was playing — what? — Santa?
Luke had been watching him carefully all week, trying to figure him out. But he couldn't. Yet Nick had him figured straightaway. On the first day, about mid-afternoon, when he thought he was going to explode with the job, Nick suddenly turns to him and says, "Whadya reckon a five-year-old boy'd like, Luke?"
Luke replies straightaway, "Well my little fella's five, and he's right into Power Rangers. Loves 'em."
"Izzat right?", asks Nick.
"Sure", says Luke. "His name's Adam. And that's the name of the black Power Ranger."
Nick leans against the bench, slowly rolling a cigarette, while Luke goes on telling him all about Adam. And it isn't until he has talked himself out that he realises that Nick has set him up. He feels he should be pissed off with Nick for that. But he isn't. He feels better for it. He's shrewd, that Nick. Something cunning in him.
Some days they have young kids there helping out in the workshop. They're sent there to keep them out of trouble in the holidays. You had to keep an eye on them to stop them nicking things, though. But most days, or for large bits of the days, it is just Luke, Paul and Nick.
"What'd ya do if we hadn't got nabbed?", Luke asks Nick. "Yud have no-one here to help you."
But Nick says, "Nah. There's always someone getting nabbed. I just gotta tell the court my needs. Give to the needy, y'know."
"Ha-bloody-ha", says Luke.
The afternoons in the workshop are the hardest. The heat in the small room is stifling. They have a fan on, but they can't turn it up too high, because it sends all the dust flying and blows the order slips away.
An old lady from out the front office brings the slips in every now and then. Luke has no idea where they come from — nor much interest in finding out. Somebody has written on them the family's name and the age and sex of the children. They have to find the presents and wrap them, then they are taken out the front again and somehow find their way to the family. Happy bloody Christmas!
The judge had given him three months. And with Christmas only two weeks away, he'll have to do several weeks of something else after this. Just as well too. It'd drive a fella mad over too long. Perhaps that's what happened to Nick. He went a bit mad wrapping toys for little buggers he's never going to meet.
"Where do all these things come from?", Luke asks him on the second or third day?"
"People give 'em", says Nick.
"Bullshit", says Luke. "You mean people just buy expensive stuff like this and give it to somebody they don't even know?"
"Yep."
But Luke is dubious. "Where do they give it?"
"They buy it. They give it. All over. Giving trees in the shopping centres. At the front office. All over."
Luke can't remember ever having seen a giving tree in the shopping centres. But he's usually been pretty broke at Christmas time. Or been on the inside a few times.
He looks over at Paul to see what he thinks. But Paul isn't giving anything away. Like the day Hearse came striding into the room and spilled the parcel on the bench. "This is just not good enough", he says. "Not good enough at all. Who packed this?", he demands.
Luke looks over. It is one of his. He recognises the big brown bear and the cricket bat.
Hearse looks at him, but Luke just returns his gaze.
"What's the matter?", asks Nick quietly.
"A mother has just returned this. She said it was quite inappropriate for her children."
Nobody says anything.
"She has a boy 11 and a girl 3, and considers these inappropriate for her children."
Hearse looks at him down the length of his nose. Luke feels like spitting on the lino next to him.
"Well it ain't mine", says Luke, daring Hearse, or anyone, to tell him it is.
Nick just carries on with his own parcel. Hearse glares at him, his face slowly going red. But then Paul steps up, takes the slip and the parcel and looks it over carefully.
He nods to himself a few times and then slowly walks down the line, and gets new toys to replace those Luke had selected. He puts them in front of Hearse, ignoring him, and rewraps them. Then he goes back to the job he had been doing.
Hearse gives a loud sniff, picks up the parcel and says, "That's much more like it. Much more", and strides out to the front office again.
"He's an arsehole", says Luke, to Paul, as a way of thanks. But Paul doesn't even look up at him.
Yeah. It was a shit job. But it was better than being locked up. The windows in the workshop all had bars on them — but you got to go home in the evenings.
Luke's son, Adam, won't stop asking him about it. But Luke doesn't know what it is he wants him to tell him.
"It's just a shit job", he says.
But Adam can't stop asking. "Tell me about it again. How many toys are there? How do you know what to choose?"
Luke doesn't know what to say exactly. "It's well — it's like some sort of — like a workshop — but just full of toys."
His son sits there in front of him. Rapt. Eyes open wide. Full of wonder and full of pride. Luke can't quite comprehend the enormity of the look. But he can't get enough of it either.
"It sounds like Santa's workshop", Adam says.
"Yeah", says Luke, "only we ain't no elves."
And then it is almost Christmas. Yeah. Happy bloody Christmas. The days are hotter and longer. The slips come in by the dozens, and the shelves and boxes are getting lower all the time. They fill 'em up regularly — but never as fast as they empty them.
Some kids had to get leftovers, or toys that they hadn't given away last year. The older ones miss out the most. Bugger 'em, thinks Luke. They can get a bloody teddy bear and be happy with it. But when Nick is watching him, he scrapes together some set of smaller toys, or assorted matchbox cars or something, to try to make a bigger present out of lots of little ones. Why does he do that when Nick is watching him? And Nick is always bloody well watching.
They are going flat out when Hearse wanders back into the room. He puts a few slips on the table and then turns and clears his throat a little and asks Nick what he'll be doing on Christmas Day.
Luke watches them out of the corner of his eye. Nick sort of shrugs a little, but doesn't really answer him.
Then Hearse sort of squirms a little and asks, "Will we see you at the Christmas party this year?"
Nick gives a short, sharp nod.
"Good", says Hearse, clapping his hands together a little. "You're the most popular Santa Claus we've ever had. I don't know why — but the kids love you. They do."
Nick gives another short, sharp nod. Hearse rocks on his toes a while and then strides back out to the front office. Luke puts his stuff down on the workbench and looks squarely at Nick. "How long you been doin' that?", he asks.
"Forever", says Nick, without looking back. He just keeps wrapping presents.
And then it is Christmas Eve. He shoulda been out the pub somewhere with his mates — but they havta work late. The bloody boxes are just about empty, and they walk back and forwards in despair, trying to find something to make a parcel out of when there isn't anything really to find.
"How long we gotta go on for?", Luke asks Nick a few times.
"Until we're done", says Nick, until Luke stops asking him.
It is well after five now. Stinking hot in the workroom. Dust all over the place. Arms and feet ache in the heat. The blood's real thick and slow. Luke's head hurts something terrible. With the boxes all ripped and bent and near empty, the workroom looks lousy. It makes Luke want to get out of there. He's had this shitty job — but at least he'll be home for Christmas. He hasn't thought much about that before — but it makes him wish he was home now. With his wife and Adam. Yeah — Christmas. Shit! He hasn't even got Adam a present yet!
Then Nick is beside him. "Here", he says. "Last one, I reckon. Three-year-old girl and a five-year-old boy. They're out the front waiting. Can you do it and take it out to them?"
Luke picks up the order slip and reads the details carefully. "Boy five and girl three", he says to himself. "Sure."
He walks along the shelving and looks into the boxes. They look even more desolate than they had when he'd just done the last order. Some are completely empty. Some have a few bits of broken plastic crap in them. But if you tunnel down under the paper and stuff, you sometimes find something. Or sometimes not.
He goes through three boxes before he finds it. A super-duper Power Ranger set. It is a beauty. He looks it over slowly as if he can't believe he has really found it. It has two figures, and some rocket ship contraption and they all fitted together to turn into a big robot transformer. He's seen one of these before on TV. He remembers that and it makes him stop.
He just stands there turning the toy over in his hands just looking at it.
"What is it?", asks Nick.
Luke doesn't say anything. But Nick won't be put off. He just stands there patiently waiting for a reply.
"My little fella wanted one of these for Christmas", he says.
"Is he going to get one?"
Luke thinks for a moment that Nick is going to give it to him. He is about to laugh. Like a little kid. But then he sees the look on Luke's face and he knows. "Nah. Can't afford it", says Luke.
Nick watches him carefully. Watches his fists. They are tight and shaking a little.
"I'm not poor enough, I reckon", says Luke.
Nick disregards the venom in his voice and says, "Put that in the parcel with one of these teddies. Its fur is a bit scungy, but we haven't got anything else. I reckon it'll just have to do."
Luke wraps it together and sticks the label on it. He looks at the name. "Drazevic".
Shit! He can't even pronounce it.
"They're waiting out the front", says Nick softly. Luke has heard soft voices like that before and knows it is a warning.
He takes the parcel and walks out of the small workshop for the last time. The front office is deserted, except for a mum with two kids. One is in an old rickety pram and the other is running around at her feet.
She looks over at Luke, regarding him. She has eyes like Nick. Careful. But less certain.
He feels suddenly very awkward, and lifts up the parcel and tries to read the name, "Drazo ... Drazav ... Drazavik."
The woman nods. "Drazevisch", she says with a thick accent.
And suddenly Luke feels he has to explain about the teddy bear and the Power Ranger toys. Has to tell her why he is there and how hard they've been working and how hot it is and how they have no more toys left, but he found that one, and it's that same that his son Adam wants, and that it is the last real toy left, and that it was all they had. All they had.
But the little boy jumps between them. "Where is Santa?", he shouts. "Where is Santa Claus?"
Luke steps back a little. The kid is looking at him, but he won't come too close to him. Luke is holding the parcel tightly, like it is his own. The kid can tell. Luke tries a smile. It doesn't come easily to him. The boy can tell that too, he reckons.
"Where's Santa?", the little kid asks his mother. But she doesn't know. Doesn't know what to tell him.
She looks up at Luke and gives a small shrug. Just a movement of the shoulders — but it is an appeal for help.
And all Luke can do is to hold out the parcel to her. "Happy Christmas", he says.
The boy wants to grab the parcel. Luke can see that. But he is in awe of it. The mystery of it. The miracle of it. And then Luke realises that he's a part of that miracle. Suddenly feels it. And it's all that matters.
The boy looks back at him. "Is he Santa Claus?", he asks his mother, pointing at him.
"No", says Luke. "But I work for him."