The Family Fang - Kevin Wilson [71]
Now a part of the line, they waited patiently for their turn. Annie happily played with the straw from the Orange Julius drink as they edged closer to Santa Land; stuffed reindeer, heads bowed, apparently eating snow; overflowing bags of toys; and the bellowing, disembodied “Ho, ho, ho” of the store Santa, still unseen from their vantage point, which never failed to startle the Fangs. Caleb found himself uttering sounds in groups of three, “Har, har, har,” and “Hee, hee, hee,” and “Hey, hey, hey,” and “How, how, how,” until Camille shushed him.
Finally rewarded for their patience, the Fangs stepped beyond the velvet rope that separated the chosen from the not-yet-chosen and followed a bored teenage elf up the stairs to Santa’s chair. “Ho, ho, ho,” Santa shouted, seemingly genuinely pleased with his station in life. Caleb hung back with the elf while Camille knelt beside Santa and carefully placed Annie in his lap. “Now what does this pretty little—” and before he could finish his sentence, Annie unleashed a shrill, glass-shattering wail that seemed conjured by the dark arts, the image of the tiny baby and the sound emanating from her so incongruous that Caleb at first seemed unaware that his own child was the source of the chaos that enveloped Santa Land.
“Good Lord,” Santa shouted, his leg spasming as if trying to shake the baby off his person. Camille was shocked by the seismic shift in emotion that crossed Annie’s face, her mouth open so wide it seemed possible that a horde of demons might fly out. She knew she should take the child into her arms and comfort her but she did not move from her position on the floor, a small part of her unwilling to come into contact with the baby until she was sure that Annie was not going to burst into flames.
The elf behind the camera, five minutes from a cigarette break, calmly stared through the viewfinder and prepared to take a photograph of the historic meeting. Caleb looked over at the scene, Santa’s face a rictus of terror, the baby nearly purple with rage, another elf covering his ears with his hands, and Camille, puzzled, confused, as if listening to a foreign language in which she could discern elements of her own native tongue. Down the entire length of the waiting line, as if Annie’s fit was a kind of wildfire, other children began to scream and shake. A few parents had to drag their possessed children away, giving up their places, which caused the children to scream even more. The people who remained in line looked at Caleb and Camille and Annie as if they had personally ruined Christmas for all time. It was, Caleb realized, amazing. “Hurry up and take the photo,” Caleb said to the bored elf and there was a flash of bulbs, the click of the captured image, and Caleb quickly ran toward Santa, plucked the child out of the terrified old man’s lap, and hugged his daughter, feeling the radiating warmth of her unhappiness now happily in his possession. Annie, her eyes red-rimmed, her lips quivering, aftershocks of the disaster, began to calm almost immediately. Camille finally joined the two of them, Santa Land temporarily shut down, grinding to a halt, not a single person in the twisting line wanting to step forward. “It’s okay,” Caleb whispered to Annie, “you did great.”
“I want that photo,” Caleb said, turning to the elf.
“Five bucks,” the elf replied.
“We don’t have any money,” Caleb said, shocked by the realization.
“Well, we don’t barter.”
“Let’s just leave, Caleb,” Camille said.
“I need that picture,” Caleb answered. “I’ll come back tomorrow and pay you.”
“I won’t be here tomorrow,” the elf said. “Thank god.”
“Please,” Camille said, everyone staring at them, Santa Claus shaking uncontrollably, his head in his hands.
Caleb felt the spark of inspiration and quickly handed the baby to Camille. “Five minutes,” he said. “I’ll have your money.”
He left his wife and child and sprinted to the Glass Hut, the discarded receipt from earlier in the afternoon flapping in his hands as he ran. When he reached the entrance, he slowed, adjusted his demeanor, and slipped