A Christmas Tale.
Young Alfie was wearing a concerned and confused look as he stood in the kitchen. “Come on, young man, make your mind up.” His mother was standing impatiently behind him, she was keen for Alfie to go to bed, Lord knows what ungodly hour he’d be up at in the morning, and she had a number of jobs to polish off, hopefully in time for her to get an early night in an attempt to compensate for what was bound to be an early start.
Alfie bit his bottom lip as he slipped his teddy bear, complete with jaunty Santa hat, into his dressing gown pocket. “I don’t know, Mummy.”
His mum sighed and placed a reassuring hand on her young son’s shoulder. “Well, a glass of sherry and a mince pie is the usual option.”
Alfie gave a little whine. “But Mum, we did this just last week, there’s no safe level of alcohol, just one drink could give him a heart attack, and he’s got to visit. . .” He tried to work out how many houses he had to visit over the course of the night and gave up, there were well over a dozen houses with good little boys and girls in his street alone, how many streets were there like his in this town? How many towns in the country? How many countries in the world? “. . . loads of houses. He can’t drink all that sherry, it’d be really bad for him, and he’s got to drive the sleigh, he can’t drink all of that. And those minced pies are full of sugar, and he’s quite fat already. How will he fit down the chimneys? What if he has our glass of sherry and has a heart attack here?” Alfie looked at the small table that had been set up by the hearth, a small red paper tablecloth with a holly leaf border design had been placed over it and Alfie had already left a card giving sincere thanks for his gifts in advance. Tears that had welled up began to trickle out.
His mother gave his shoulder a squeeze and made a reassuring shussing noise. “Hey, it’s OK Alfie, we can leave him something else, what about a glass of milk and a nice ham sandwich?
Alfie reflected on the proposal. “I don’t know if he can drink milk, there’s Emma, this girl at school, she can’t drink milk, not even goats milk. She’s allergic to it, it brings her out in blotches, she can’t have ice-cream or custard or anything, what if he’s allergic? What if he can’t have bread like Harry? What if he’s vegetarian?”
Her patience was starting to wear thin now. “I suppose I could go down to the corner shop, that will still be open. I could get some soya milk and a rice cake and leave him a small dish of olives.”
Alfie stuck his tongue out. “Yuk! I tried some of Emma’s milk and one of Harry’s rice cakes, they were horrible. What if we leave that and he doesn’t like it? He might not leave me any presents.” He gave a groan and stamped his foot out of sheer frustration. “And I’ve been so good this year.”
He turned round, the tears now flowing unashamedly. “I don’t know what to do, Mummy. We can’t make him drunk, he’ll get alcohol poisoning. The mince pies could give him diabetes. The milk could make him blotchy and itch. The bread could make him really tired and the ham could make him angry. The soya milk and rice cake will be horrible, and who likes olives?”
“Well, the Greeks like olives.”
“Yeah, and Dad has been watching the news telling me that they might not be able to have any Christmas presents this year in Greece at all.”
Alfie’s mum looked in the fridge in desperation. “We could leave him a glass of water and some celery.”
“But that’s really mean. He’s been working so hard all year, he remembers me, he lands on the roof, he squeeeeeeezes down the chimney and leaves me a present and all he gets is a glass of water and some celery? That’s not fair!”
“Well, it’ll tell you what, how about we leave the sherry and the mince pie, the milk and the sandwich, the soya milk and the rice cake, and the water and celery, and leave him a little note telling him he can take what he wants?”
Alfie dabbed at his tears with the towelling belt from his dressing gown. “Suppose he makes the wrong choice? He lives at the North Pole. We have a lady who comes in and helps Ms. Goddard to tell us what we should eat and drink, I don’t think they have those at the North Pole. He might not know that sherry is bad for him.”
“But he’s grown up, Alf, he can make his own mind up.”
“No, the lady that helps Ms. Goddard also tells the mummies and daddies what they should eat and drink, you didn’t come to that after school club. I had to say you were feeling poorly when you didn’t come. Ms. Goddard had to write something on a clipboard.” He added glumly.
“Well we can’t rely on someone to tell us what’s right all the time, you have to make your own decisions sooner or later. What if the lady that helps Ms. Goddard is wrong?”
“Oh no, she’s always right, she’s got this book.” A smile broke across his face. “She gave us a booklet about food at Christmas time!” He skipped over to his school bag which was hanging over the end of the bannister and removed the booklet which he then placed with great care on the table. “Yes, we’ll leave him everything, he can read the book and then choose.”
His mum gave a sigh of relief as she filled a glass with water and snapped off a couple of sticks of celery from the bunch in the fridge salad drawer in preparation for the feast. “OK, I’ll go down to the corner shop when your Dad comes back in.”
Alfie nodded his approval. “Now, what do we need to leave for the reindeers?”
His mother opened her mouth and found she had nothing. “I’ll call the zoo and find out, they’ll know.”
“OK,” Alfie said brightly. “I’m going to go upstairs and try extra hard to go to sleep.” He bounded up the stairs, slamming his bedroom door behind him.
“Goodnight.” Said the mother, certain he hadn’t heard him. She poured a glass of sherry and picked up a minced pie en route to the sofa. Taking care to leave a few crumbs on the plate as she ate the minced pie so it could be sat on the little table, she drained the glass of sherry and wondered if it would be better to tell her six year old son the truth about Father Christmas before next Christmas rolled around, rather than trying to wrestle with the truth he was told on a daily basis.
From
here. 
