The Christmas Wish - a short story

I wrote this story one evening after reading about a Christmas Story competition closing the next day, with a specific word count. It didn't win, perhaps Santa was being a bit too dark in the tale!  

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No presents at Christmas, that’s what was going to happen if Lucas didn’t share his toys and be nicer to his little sister Emily, his mother told him. 

“Santa Claus only delivers presents to good boys and girls,” she said.

Well, he would go and live in the igloo he built in the garden. Santa would find him there.

Lucas pulled on his hat and scarf and trundled down the stairs, scowling at his mother and Emily who were putting the last of the decorations on the Christmas Tree.

“Where are you going Lucas?” his mother asked him.

“To live in the garden,” Lucas replied, slamming the front door loudly.

He could hear Emily asking their mother if she could play outside with him. Quickly, Lucas shuffled through the snow, crouched down and crawled into his igloo, hiding from them.

He pulled a pen and paper out of his pocket, it was tricky holding the pen in his winter gloves.

“Dear Santa,” he wrote, “for Christmas this year I will be living in my igloo that I built. Please deliver all my presents here. From Lucas Crosby. P.S. Can you take my sister away she is really annoying.”

Lucas folded the letter, and wrote “To Santa Claus, The North Pole” on the front. He put the paper down beside him, and suddenly it was whisked into the air by a gust of wind, blowing right out of the igloo.

“How strange,” said Lucas.

He sat for a while longer, and began to get quite cold. If he had his duvet out here, he would be warmer. He crawled out of the igloo and walked to the house. He stomped the snow off his boots and looked into the living room, but his mother and Emily weren’t there. And neither was the Christmas tree, it was gone.

Lucas walked into the room and looked around in surprise. His mother came in behind him.

“Mum, where’s the Christmas Tree?” he asked her.

“We aren’t having a tree this year because you don’t believe in Santa Claus anymore, remember?” she said.

“But we chose the tree yesterday? It was the one Emily wanted,” Lucas said.

“Who is Emily darling?” his mother smiled.

“Emily’s my little sister.” he stammered.

“I think you’ve been out in the cold too long darling, it’s just you and me as its always been.”

Lucas ran from the room and up the stairs. He stopped at Emily’s bedroom door. He pushed it open. None of her things were there, not her silly pink wallpaper, or her stupid pony posters, or her stuffed teddies, or her favourite doll that he used to pull the head off to make her cry. Instead, in the room there was a desk and chair, and a running machine.

Lucas felt very frightened. Where had his sister gone? He went into his bedroom, closed the door and paced backwards and forwards. He looked out of the window and saw the igloo in the garden, and remembered that he had just wished his sister away in the letter to Santa Claus.

He told his mum that Santa didn’t exist, that he hated Christmas. That he wanted to go and live somewhere else, with another mummy who was nice to him and let him choose the tree, not Emily, all the time.

There was a knock at the door, he looked up, worried, and his mother walked into the room, holding a cup of hot chocolate.

“I thought this might warm you up,” she looked lovingly at him, holding out a steaming mug of hot chocolate.

Lucas took the cup in his hands. Usually his mother would tell him off for not saying thank you, but she just smiled and left the room. The house was so quiet without the noise from Emily running around. And if there wasn’t a Christmas tree, where would Santa leave the presents?

“Mum?” Lucas called.

“Yes dear?” she said, coming back into his bedroom.

“If there’s no tree, where are the presents going to go?” he asked.

“Presents? But we don’t do Christmas at all anymore, you’re too old for it. You told me that so often last year that we decided this year we weren’t going to bother with it all, remember?” His mum said.

“Oh. Yeah.” 

Lucas remembered. He remembered saying that a lot last year. He felt tears well up in his eyes, how was he going to fix what he’d done?

He looked out again at the igloo. It was changing! It was beginning to melt in front of his eyes, he could see the drips of water shining in the daylight.

Somehow, he knew, if the igloo melted completely then the world would be stuck like this, without presents, without Christmas, and without Emily in it.

He grabbed a scrap of paper from his desk and ran outside, hastily throwing on his boots and not bothering with his coat. He crawled into the melting igloo. Once inside, he pulled out his pen and paper and wrote, “Dear Santa, I didn’t mean any of it, I’m sorry.” He folded it up and put the paper on the ground. Nothing happened.

He hastily wrote “Santa Claus, The North Pole,” on the outside, and the paper lifted into the air from his fingertips and blew right out of the entrance.

Lucas felt very cold, and very scared. Without meaning to, he fell asleep.

When he woke up, the first thing he saw was the Christmas tree with lots of presents underneath it, his mother was standing over him looking concerned, he had a blanket over him.

“Are you okay Lucas, you fell asleep in your igloo?” She asked.

“Where’s Emily?” he asked.

“Emily?” his mum frowned.

Lucas gulped.

“She’s lying sleeping right next to you.” 

Lucas looked along the sofa and there she was, his little sister, fast asleep. He leaned over and gave her a great big hug. He wouldn’t be mean to her ever again.

The End.