"The Death of Fables" - A Serialized Collection of Flash Fiction (Part 4: Christmas)
My first attempt at writing a cohesive collection of flash fiction was this strange, satirical (and often dark) look at the holidays. Not only the holiday, but the special days throughout the years as well; birthdays, 9/11, the changing of seasons, etc. I've done absolutely no editing on any of the original texts, so hopefully they're not too terrible and I hope you enjoy.
I’ve been working for the fat man for years. I could complain, but it wouldn’t do any good; the pay is the best I’ve ever had, even if the job conditions are less than exemplary. My first job for him was my first one ever. I don’t know how he found me or why, but 40 years later and I’m still his best clean-up guy.
The call had come in the early morning, two hours prior to my coffee pot automatically turning on, if I remember right. I wiped the sleep out of my eyes and flicked it to the floor as I wrote the message down. I showered, packed up my equipment, and left the apartment in an Armani façade to try to blend in with the rat-racers up as early as I was. At least I looked good.
I didn’t meet him or talk to him that first day, but instead met with one of his assistants. I thought it odd to have a midget as a head secretary, but I’d also never had much interaction with munchkins. I’ve probably walked past a good number of them, but I couldn’t tell you for sure. They posed no threat to me, so they didn’t set off my internal alarms.
The deal was this: the fat man had been bangin’ some broad he’d met years earlier. He had a penchant for younger women and this one just ended up “goin’ all commitment” on him, which he thought would cause problems with his marriage. Smart guy. They had met at some mall when she was 16. “I reeked of nog and she smelled like virgin,” he said. “I couldn’t help myself.”
There was really no legal way to keep her away from the fat man at the time, so I was the next logical conclusion once she started sniffing too close to home. One of the stable hands had caught her sneaking around, trying to find a way in and somehow got her off the grounds with the help of some coworkers. Weeks later, the fat man found one of her letters mixed in with the usual November influx of mail and had me start tailing her.
I didn’t have a picture of her, so I was hoping I had found the right girl. It was a slow two week process, but my game was on point and I had finally gotten her to open up to me. We were sitting in her car one night after dinner. She’d had the eggplant parmesan and her breath flowed heavy over to my side of the car. We were drunk on good port and her tongue had come loose, giving drunken pasta kisses and information she thought was irrelevant.
She had told me about an affair she had had with a married man. An older, married man. Fat men usually turned her off, she said, but something about this one was magical. He had an infectious smile and a twinkle in his eye like he knew the greatest joke in the world. She smiled when she thought about the night she told him his belly could cause earthquakes the way it shook when he laughed.
I lit a cigarette and inhaled slowly and smiled, pulling out the poisoned candy cane. The fat man had said she liked to suck on them after sex, so I carried this one with me when she and I went out. It was quick and quiet and gave me a good alibi as it would take about 20 minutes to kick in. She continued to talk as her eyes got droopy. I put a finger to her lips and shushed her. “The fat man says you get coal in your stocking this year. Nothing personal, he just doesn’t want the missus to find out.” Her head slumped against the driver’s side window and I took out my digital camera.
Mrs. Claus pays me twice what the fat man does if I bring back proof.