“Let me see what fresh mess is in my inbox,” I tell Sara. “I’m a soft maybe right now.”
“Fair enough,” she sighs. “Get cracking. The boys are expecting the best Christmas Town ever.”
Something about the way she says it makes my Hermey senses tingle. Hermey is the dentist-turned-head-elf in the old Claymation Christmas special Dad still makes us watch every year, maybe because Dad is a dentist who would secretly love to be a Christmas elf. But at six-foot-two, his Christmas elf dreams are doomed to disappointment.
“What’s wrong, Sara?” I ask.
“With what?”
“You sound stressed about the boys and Christmas Town.”
Oh, Christmas Town. Imagine a snow globe of an idyllic smalltown Christmas. A quaint Main Street, the shop windows glowing and stuffed with holiday goodies. Wreaths and ribbons hung on all the streetlamps. A large Christmas tree, decorated to perfection, rising in the town square, shiny ornaments catching the light of the setting sun, families gathered together to admire it, carolers in the background.
Now imagine that whole thing comes to life with a town parade that starts at one end of Main Street, then proceeds to Creekville’s actual town square with its actual thirty-foot-tall Christmas tree, Santa bringing up the rear of the parade. In a sleigh. Pulled by reindeer.
Yeah. Real ones.
Because that happens. And when Santa gets to the town square exactly at dusk, he meets Mayor Derby on a dais while all of Creekville watches as he declares Christmas Town open, and then he turns a key that lights the square from the streetlights to the enormous tree.
That town square will have—since that morning—been the site of mad construction, a great deal of confusion and cursing, shouted hellos, and merry Christmas greetings flying between friends and neighbors. Everyone will have been rushing to build and erect their Christmas Town booths because this istheevent that puts Creekville on the map with the largest Christmas market in the region. Local businesses and clubs put together an entire temporary town of wooden facades painted to look like an alpine village, each fronting a booth selling handmade goods and food for thousands of visitors who flood in Friday night and all day Saturday before Christmas.
It’s been a town tradition since before I was born, and two years ago, I was the brave and stupid soul who volunteered to take it over when Glynnis Hunsaker decided she was ready to step down from running it after thirty years.
Not only is it a key part of the holiday season for hundreds—maybe even thousands—of families, it’s also a major economic boost for the local small businesses, and a key fundraiser for some of the local teams and clubs.
It’s a whole thing. A thing that will be the death of me, but a thing I love with all my heart. A thing I plan to make bigger and better than ever now that I’ve had two years of doing it Glynnis’s way to get my bearings.
That’s why Sara comes in most days to give me time to work on the many details involved in Christmas Town. There’s only a week to go, and each day brings a new crop of crisis emails, but none of them matters more than the troubled look Sara is trying to hide.
“Sara?” I prompt, determined to get the truth out of her.
She sighs. “Last year was the first year the boys fully understood Santa and Christmas. They’ve been looking forward to Christmas Town since Thanksgiving.”
“Don’t worry, it’s going to be awesome.” Right after I solve a dozen new problems the day has brought me, including a fight between the gardening club and the Wiccans, who the gardening club is accusing of copying their booth design.
“I know,” Sara says. “That’s not the problem. It’s Rome. He’s so bought into the idea of Santa and Christmas magic that he won’t tell anyone what he wants for Christmas. Says he’s saving it for Santa.”
“Just go into Roanoke,” I tell her. “Have him tell a Santa there. Boom, done.”
“I wish. But Rome is a skeptic who wants to believe. I suggested that already, but he’s adamant that only the Christmas Town Santa is real. Mr. Groggins is too good, and the reindeer and sleigh only make the point more.”
Mr. Groggins plays Santa every year, and he takes it seriously. He keeps his snowy beard year-round, and he owns his own Santa suit that is so glorious, I’d bet it’s trimmed with real ermine. And if it isn’t—and I hope it’s not because I’d be sad for the ermine even if they’re homely weasels in real life—I bet itcostsas much as if it were trimmed in real ermine. It’s gorgeous crimson velvet with a real leather belt and boots. He always smells like pipe smoke and peppermints, and every year I see him as Santa, I half believe in him myself.
“I get that,” I say. “But Mr. Groggins is excellent at passing on kids’ requests to the head elf who gets it to you. You’ll have time to get Rome’s gift.”
“It’s a gamble,” she says. “Even if I get the twins to see him on Friday night—”
“I can make that happen,” I tell her, my eyebrow arched. “I’m somewhat connected.”
“Fine, they’ll get front-of-the-line passes for Friday night,” she says with a tight smile. “But Christmas is that Monday. That gives me two days. What if Rome wants a toy that’s sold out? What if I can’t even get it in time with overnight shipping because it’s the weekend?”
She rubs her temples. “Sorry. I sound like a lunatic. But Dean’s deployment has been so hard on them, and Rome is fixated on telling ‘real’ Santa what he wants and having it appear on Christmas morning. I have a feeling if I can’t make it happen, it’ll be one disappointment too many for him.”
I wrap her in a hug, and she rests her head on my shoulder. “You’ve got this.We’vegot this. I need a Tata and Twin night, and I’ll worm it out of him.”
Tata is what the twins called me before they could say my name. It’s not ideal, but it was too cute to keep correcting them. Eventually, even when they could say my name, Tata stuck. I look forward to the day they find out what ta-tas are and are horrified.
Sara squeezes me back. “Keep reminding me it’ll be okay. Sometimes it’s these little things that make me lose perspective even when I’m keeping all the big stuff together.”
