The Truth about Santa

By Daniel Morrison

I thought they would have gone away by now. Still, they stood on the corner, pouring in the street, screaming, chanting, waiving flags and signs. Someone had a bullhorn. I’d looked up what a couple of the flags were before and it made me depressed. Others, I didn’t need to look up. If you looked too long, they’d shout at you. If you didn't look at all, they screamed louder and louder until you had to look, sitting at a Florida light that never ends.

As a child, my mother would tell little lies. “If you don’t put your toys away, you’ll never get another,” or, “You need to be in bed now or Santa will skip our house.”

They didn’t really hurt and I mostly listened. More importantly, they helped her get what she wanted. But imagine if I had known the truth about Santa? Then, maybe, I would have yelled and screamed and shouted, even though Christmas still came and went and I got all the presents I’d wanted in the first place. If I’d known I’d been lied to, then I might have felt cheated, and then who knows how I would have acted?

My eyes met one of theirs. He was younger than me, screaming about whose fault everything was. The light turned green and I sped off. He stayed there.

______________________________

Dan Morrison is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, where he earned a B.A. in English and a Letter of Specialization in Creative Writing. He currently lives in Central Florida and works as a college football writer. In the past, his work has been published in journals like Space City Underground, Flash Fiction Magazine, and The Wild Word.