Naughty Elf: Sugar, page 2
Three weeks passed. I went to Elmberry every day, asking if there was other work, especially in toys. He always said no.
Another three weeks passed. Dishes were a dead end. I could see that now. I wasn’t working toward anything or learning about toys. I wanted to quit, but I couldn’t do that to Father. What would he think? What would he say?
Seriously, though, I had no intention of staying at this job if it didn’t amount to anything.
No one complimented me on my work, so I let things slide a little. I didn’t rinse before loading the dishwashers anymore. I let pans soak until the water went cold and slick, and I escaped out the back door for long periods to the game room on Ornament Avenue or visited the bakery on Cookie Street to eat fresh donuts in the summer sun. I took long walks. I returned to work just in time to deliver half washed cookware and take my lunch hour, which I now spent away from the warehouse and out at any restaurant I could find. I lingered at lunch, often getting back to a full sink where dinner prep dishes were waiting.
I refused to put in overtime, so I cursorily washed whatever was around and stored the rest, still dirty, in cabinets.
Cardamom came to me several times saying, “There have been complaints. The dishes need to be a bit cleaner.”
I didn’t argue. He was right, of course.
After about the fourth time Cardamom spoke to me, there were no more lectures. A few days later I was called into Elmberry’s office.
Elmberry did not have cocoa waiting for me this time. Nor did he ask me to sit.
I stood, my hands in front of me, as he spoke.
“Cardamom has written you up.”
“Okay.”
“Do you understand why?”
“He said I wasn’t getting the dishes clean enough.”
Elmberry looked down at his tablet. “He says you’ve been missing from your post a lot, too.”
“Sometimes I have errands on my breaks that take a little long,” I lied.
“All right. But don’t let it happen again. Back to work now.”
I walked out of his office, shaking my head. I’d thought he was going to fire me. Then I’d have an excuse to never come back to this warehouse again.
Nothing happened to me. No one yelled at me. I continued my shoddy job at doing the dishes and played most of the day away in posh restaurants and the game room. So what if dishes didn’t get cleaned on time and super perfect. It wasn’t the end of the world.
One day, I’d leave the job anyway for something better. What that was, I didn’t yet know, but it would happen.
At dinner one night, Father said, “Sugar, you’ve been written up twice at work. Why?”
I glanced up from the wonderful spaghetti Sno had prepared. “What? I thought it was only once.”
“Twice,” he repeated.
“Why do you know anything about it?”
“Because that is my toy factory and Elmberry reports to me, in detail, every day about what is going on there.”
“Oh.” I kept eating, not looking up.
“Are you unhappy?” Father asked.
I could see without looking up that Sno glanced from me to Father with wide eyes.
“Unhappy? About doing dishes every day when we don’t even need the money? Hell, no, Father.”
Father blinked at me. “This isn’t about the money, and you know that. It’s about learning responsibility.”
“I know, but it’s the worst job in the whole place. And what’s even more demeaning is they all know I’m your son and I’m sure they’re laughing about it.”
“No one is laughing, Sugar,” Father argued.
He didn’t know. I could feel it even if they hid it from me. No one had even attempted to make friends with me at the factory.
Later that evening, Father passed me on the staircase. “Sugar, work builds character. That’s all I’m saying. You’re young. You certainly won’t be doing dishes for the rest of your life.”
I fumed. Who was he kidding? “Easy for you to say, Father. You have the greatest job of all. And you have magic to help you. What do I have? Chapped hands. And the legacy of nothing but living in your shadow for the rest of my life.”
“Excuse me?” He puffed out his chest, his long white beard ruffling under his heaving breaths. “I work twelve-hour days.”
“Yeah. I know. Which is why Sno raised me and not you. Sno, who’s a hundred and two now and has cooked and done dishes his whole life.”
His eyes stopped their usual Santa twinkle and nearly popped from his head.
I wasn’t going to stand on the steps like a fool waiting for his response. I scurried to my room and slammed the door.
The next morning, Elmberry called me in. There was cocoa waiting for me on his desk again. He even smiled.
“Looks like we have an opening in stockings,” he said. “Are you up for it?”
“Stockings?” That involved presents. Toys. “Yes. I am!”
Had my father arranged this? I was both excited and ashamed if he had. But at least I wasn’t going to be doing dishes.
The stocking department didn’t smell of old food and greasy dishwater. Instead, peppermint, chocolate and orange aromas filled the air.
I faced stacks of different colors and sizes of stockings, some plush, some silken, all beautiful. Different stacks had different instructions printed on them.
I got to work, collecting toys and candy from various bins around the room to fill each one. I had so much fun, I finished early and went to lunch, staying out a little late to celebrate.
When I got back, Elmberry and two older elves stood by my worktable with their arms crossed. Not a nice greeting after all my hard work.
I shrugged and gave a little wince. “I had an errand to run so took a longer lunch. Sorry. I won’t take my afternoon break to make up for it.”
There were a thousand stockings, all piled neatly, all done. What was their problem?
“Sugar, this just won’t do,” Elmberry said.
“What?”
“The stockings must all be redone.”
“Why?”
“Did you not read the instructions? These are the diabetic stockings. You put regular candy and bubble gum in all of them.”
“What? I didn’t see that on the instructions.”
Elmberry grabbed one of the gilt list sheets, thrusting it in my face. I blinked. He pointed at the very top. In large, bold letters it said DIABETIC STOCKINGS. The words were not in the list itself, but at the very top.
Elmberry threw the list on the floor. “With a name like Sugar, you’d think it would register.”
He was right, but in all fairness to me, the word was sort of off my radar. Elves didn’t get diabetes.
“You are fired.”
My throat closed up. I couldn’t speak. Could he do that? Santa Christero was the real boss. But when I thought about it, my father probably would have fired me long ago.
I turned without a word and ran outside. There was nowhere to go but home.
When I came in, Sno started to greet me. “Sugar, what are you doing home so early?”
Without replying, I ran upstairs to my room and buried myself under the covers of my bed. I was hopeless. A very bad elf. It was a truth that couldn’t be denied. Once I accepted that, I fell into the deep slumber of escape.
I woke to voices, one loud, one soft. Then clomping bootsteps on the stairs. My bedroom door flew open without warning.
“Get up!” Father’s tone was serious.
I poked my head out from under my blankets.
“I said, get up!”
I’d never seen my father so angry.
I pushed myself out from under the covers and stood before him, my hair in my eyes.
“You were fired! Do you understand that? Do you know how that makes me look?”
I gulped, feeling anger building inside me again. Nothing was fair. It wasn’t my fault.
“It was my first day in stockings. I made a mistake.”
Father shook his head, disappointment radiating from his entire magical being. And what a magical being he was, my father, twice my size with beautiful white hair and a beard down to his belly. Santas in the human world were depicted as heavy, but Father was pure muscle all over with a strong jawline and brilliant blue eyes. I was nothing compared to him, puny, without magic, omega to his powerful fatherly alpha presence.
“You keep making mistakes. You don’t pay attention. You don’t take responsibility for anything.” Father’s voice rose. “I don’t know what to do with you anymore. Everything you touch becomes chaos.”
That wasn’t fair. But then again, regarding the job, he was right. And as I started to think about it, he was describing my entire life.
Father began to pace, his hands curled into fists, his breaths coming in noisy huffs.
“You need to learn a lesson.” He turned, his blue eyes like flames. “And you can’t be here to learn it.”
“What? Are you throwing me out?”
“You’re nineteen.” He waved his hand in front of me. “Go find your life!”
Suddenly, my entire body froze. I could still see and hear, but I couldn’t move. And everything in the room looked bigger. Huge. My bed. My desk. The windows. Father himself looked like a giant as I gazed up at him.
I heard a voice at my door. “What are you doing?” Sno asked.
“He needs to learn!” Father said, waving his hand again,
Everything went black, their voices muffled. Sno and Father spoke back and forth, then silence.
I blinked in the new darkness and tried to move my arms. Nothing happened. I was frozen solid. Around me, there was a slight rustle as if I was caught up in a big swath of tissue paper.
Father’s voice rose again until I could understand him. “Go out into the world and find yourself. Santa’s Village isn’t for you, Sugar. Find yourself. Find love. Find your mate. You have until Christmas, or you will become an elf figurine forever.”
I heard soft crying. Sno. “You can’t do this to him. It’s too much.”
“He’s strong. He’ll figure it out.”
“What if he doesn’t?” I’d never heard such a sound come from Sno. Like a wail.
My father’s voice softened. “I am a Santa. Trust my magic.”
Then I felt movement outside the darkness. Whatever I was encased in was being lifted or—was I flying?
Time passed. I was very afraid. After a while, I slept. I woke. Nightmares and fear ruled. I never felt hungry, but the flying sensation seemed to go on for days, and the loud sound of wind filled my frozen ears.
When it finally stopped, everything went still. I heard nothing.
After what seemed like hours, there was a sudden loud pop. Snow surrounded me. I still wore my red elf suit from the toy factory, but no boots. No coat. No hat.
Before I could lift my head to look around, dizziness overcame me and once again I was plunged into the dark.
2
Grant
“Come on, Velvet. Let’s go!”
The Aussie shepherd came bounding through the snow, flurries flying all around her. Her brown and black coat was stark against all that white.
I remembered when I first got her as a puppy from the shelter. She was so soft, like velvet, and the name stuck.
We’d bonded immediately. I could finally text my worried cousins back at the North Pole the truth. I’m not alone. I have a companion. Her name is Velvet.
Together, Velvet and I walked through the forest of snow-covered firs back toward my cabin. Through the trees, I could already see the brown wood siding and big windows overlooking the mountains to the north.
Velvet and I took a midmorning walk every day together. It was good exercise for the both of us, and lots of fun. I might’ve departed the North Pole for good, Santa’s Village like another life left behind, but I still loved snow and pine and Christmas. I still loved the scents and sounds of the arctic autumns, the snowstorms, the northern lights, the cold.
As a reindeer shifter, cold didn’t affect me much. In my human form, I loved a warm fire and hot mug of cocoa as much as the next guy, but I didn’t suffer from a bit of ice. Living off by myself was not a hardship. I wasn’t some mountain man, tree-cutter, hunter. I simply liked being by myself. I could have food delivered. Even though I couldn’t fly, I had enough knowledge of the outdoors to make rural living easier. And I had Wi-Fi. What more could I desire?
Jet and Siel, my twin cousins and good friends, thought living alone outside any town was unhealthy.
“Reindeer live in herds,” Jet insisted.
“We’re herd animals,” Siel echoed.
Easy for them to say. They could fly. They weren’t odd or different. They were real alphas with real strength and agility. They both looked the part, too. Six-five and with silver hair to their asses. They’d be pulling one of the Santas’ sleighs someday. I knew it. While here I was, just shy of six feet—short for an alpha reindeer shifter—and my chaotic curls wouldn’t grow much past my shoulders.
If you couldn’t fly, the most you could hope for in the North Pole at Santa’s village was an elf job. Those jobs weren’t bad, but the good ones were competitive and required college degrees and PhDs.
I did go to college earning a degree in graphics and design. But I preferred to work for myself anyway and freelanced. Here, in the lower world mixed in with the humans, I didn’t have to deal with all the hierarchies and the Santa team jealousies and politics that went on. Humans had their own major dramas, but I felt apart from that, so they didn’t affect me much.
I glanced about the beautiful landscape. The snow made everything silent. Cushioned. It smelled fresh and sweet. This was the life. Velvet and I were quite content.
We came to a clearing beneath some trees where the snow wasn’t as deep. The cabin was in full view from here. Velvet went dashing off when she heard the twitter of some bird. Probably a thrush. I heard her barking merrily. Then sudden silence.
I could no longer see her, but when she began to bark again, the tone had changed.
I shuffled along the path she’d made, trying to hurry. When the tree canopy broke showing a heavy gray sky, the snow became thicker again, up to my knees.
I came around a group of trees and saw my dog. She was barking uncertainly at something under one tree. At this point, all I could see was a snow-covered lump lodged against the trunk. I shuffled up behind her.
“What have you found, girl?”
She looked up at me, whined and began digging in the heap of snow.
I leaned down, brushing at the ice with my bare fingers. A specific shape began to appear. Human.
“Dig faster,” I ordered, and fell to my knees to heave more off the body. Velvet dug faster.
When I saw the red suit, I recognized it immediately as elfwear direct from Santa’s Village. The body looked male.
Even though he wasn’t human, I needed to get him dug out fast. Most elves were used to the cold, but still much more susceptible to it than shifters. He could already be suffering from hypothermia for all I knew.
In a minute, Velvet and I had mostly uncovered him. I put my palm to his cheek. It was like ice.
I grabbed his shoulders and tugged, dragging him up over the ice hole that had formed around him. His eyes stayed tightly shut, the eyelids nearly purple. Strangest of all, he had on socks but no boots.
How had he gotten here?
I heaved him up and over my shoulder. His body sagged which was a good sign. If he’d been frozen stiff, I would have had a dead body on my hands.
“C’mon, Velvet,” I called.
We headed as fast as we could toward the cabin.
When we got inside, I placed the elf on the rug closest to the fire. Velvet lay down next to him and began licking his face. Already, his cheeks were getting a pink glow back.
“Go easy on him, girl,” I said.
She looked up, ears pricked.
I got rid of my coat and boots, then brought out a stack of extra blankets from the hall closet. I grabbed a pillow off the couch, stuffed it under his head, and began the task of getting his frozen clothes off.
The pants and blazer were tailormade from the finest of wools. These clothes did not belong to the average middle-class elf. They would have cost as much as one of them made in a month.
Small of stature, he was easy to maneuver. When I had him completely undressed, his socks drying on the hearth, I rubbed him down with one of the blankets. His head moved slightly, and he moaned.
“It’s all right,” I said. “You’re safe.”
Velvet watched closely, wide ears canted forward in concern.
One by one, I piled the blankets over him. I added more logs to the fire, then sat and watched him for a long time.
His shaggy blond hair fell across the pillow. His mouth drew down like a sad pink bow. He had long eyelashes, golden in the firelight, and they brushed against the tops of his soft cheeks. A pert nose gave him a more fairy look than elf. But fairies had long vanished from the magical world as I knew it. He looked young, not much more than eighteen, and the scent of him was definitely omega.
I couldn’t help but be intrigued.
Why had he come here? And how? Without boots or a coat? It was as if someone had dumped him under that tree and left him to die. Who could be so cruel?
I put my hand under the blankets to see if his skin had warmed at all. He was still cold, but not like ice. I adjusted the blankets tighter around him.
After about ten minutes, I got up and set about making hot cocoa. I knew elves loved the drink. Their systems responded to sugar for energy and strength. Unlike humans, where high amounts were toxic and caused disease, elves thrived on sugar. Shifters loved it, too, and I always kept plenty of cocoa supplies and other sweets stored away.
The wonderful cocoa aroma filled the open kitchen and wafted into the front room where Velvet still guarded our patient by the fire.
I brought over a tray with two mugs and set it on the coffee table. I’d also brought a meat treat for Velvet, who wagged her tail and took it to her bed by my favorite big chair.
