Page 38 of All I Wank for Christmas

Holly

“Who’snext?”Iask,clapping my hands and rolling my shoulders.

I’m pumped. Amped. Ready to take on the world. I could run a marathon or punch through a wall. My second wind hit me around the time Jasper pulled up his pants, put on his suit jacket, and flexed his fingers like he was absorbing an ancient magical power that turns him into the world’s best cat burglar.

Which is kind of what he is, except he puts stuffina house instead of taking it out.

“Blaze Morgenstern. Age eight. Small red box,” Jasper says, switching from navigation to a spreadsheet on his tablet.

“Got it. Is this a video game?” I ask, holding the present to my ear and shaking it.

“Most of them are. Spoiler alert. I look forward to getting lettersnotasking for some kind of video game. I think they’re quaint.”

I pass him the present from my spot standing on the ladder at the back of the sleigh, and he disappears down the Morganstern chimney, only to appear a few seconds later.

“Next up, Lane Morris.”

I duck down to the bin below me that contains presents for the children of South Dakota, which is our current location, and I don’t even hold on for dear life when the sleigh takes off again. I’m getting used to the jostle of takeoff and landing. Add that to things I never thought I’d be able to say.

I rustle through the bin until I find Lane Morris’s gift – a large package that rattles when I shake it. It’s heavy and definitely not a video game.

“Here you go,” I say, popping up into the night air again. I’m not even getting sick when I look down. Funny how a time crunch and adrenaline rush can do that. “What is this one?”

Jasper closes his eyes and smiles. “Chemistry set. This girl likes science and has a propensity toward blowing things up. Let’s just hope nobody gets hurt this year.”

“Huh. I think I rather like this little girl,” I say, handing him the gift.

Jasper takes the package, lands on a two-story apartment building, and jumps out to go through an upstairs window. He’s back out of the building before I can blink. “How are you doing that so fast?” I ask.

“Once I’m in, I just drop it on the floor under the tree and get the fuck out. I’m not filling anyone’s stockings tonight. No time.”

“Fair enough.”

“Oh, I brought you cookies.” Jasper unfolds a paper napkin with poinsettias on it to reveal two chocolate chip cookies and three sugar cookies that were clearly made by a child, judging by the spotty icing and clumped sprinkles. “Best perk of the job.”

“Did you bring me milk?”

“Do you want me to steal the glass?” he asks with a smile. “I can’t have you bailing me out again for something little. South Dakota police don’t have punch cards to the parlor. We can’t risk it, especially since Lane Morris’s father is the mayor around here and her mother is a police officer. I’m not risking stealing their dishes.”

I take a bite of one of the chocolate chip cookies and suck on the chocolate that’s still slightly warm. These are no store-bought cookies. I nearly swoon. I shouldn’t be this excited about a cookie, but it’s all I’ve had to eat for hours except a few licks of a candy cane.

“Let’s get this done so I can take you for a proper breakfast,” Jasper says, taking the reins and making the takeoff noise he uses to spur on the reindeer. “Next up in the bag is Leti Lee Lightfoot. Another video game.”

“Bacon or sausage?” Jasper asks, holding out a stack of sandwiches on top of a drink carrier containing coffee in paper cups. One sandwich is marked as sausage. The other two are marked with a bacon sticker.

I’ve never been so tired, not even after the bus full of ministers on the way to the revival. Even thinking about going to work in a few hours is surreal as I watch the sun rise over the shower station for truckers next door. It’s hard to believe what’s happened in the last several hours when I’m sitting on the curb outside a gas station outside of who knows where.

Jasper and I are both exhausted. If his face mirrors mine, I must be a clusterfuck wreck. His hair sticks out in every direction, and his beard stubble isn’t stubble any longer as it gets close to a full-on beard. His eyes are droopy with dark circles under them, and his suit hangs loosely off his shoulder like he just did a triathlon in it. In a way, we did.

He still looks yummy enough to eat, even after working our asses off for the past few hours. Well, it’s been hours for the world. To us, even with manipulating time a bit, it’s felt like an entire day.

We did everything we were supposed to do. We hit every house. Sure, we did it half-assed. Jasper threw the presents where he thought they had the best chance of being found, ignored the stockings, and left the cookies and milk alone at most houses.

But we got it done. Every last kid has a present. Something akin to pride fills my chest that I helped every nice kid in the world who was good and wrote to Santa. Somewhere a kid is opening their gift right now and excited because Jasper was there.

“Always bacon,” I say, grabbing the wrapped breakfast sandwich. I deserve bacon, preferably the type that’s crispy and almost burnt.

Jasper shoves a small bag in his pocket and sits down next to me on the curb, briefly glancing at the lot across the street where the sleigh is parked behind the in-progress construction site for a dentist’s office. If people think it’s odd to see a man dressed as Santa outside a gas station at five in the morning, they don’t comment on it as they walk around us. They’ve probably seen weirder shit at a gas station this time of day, even on Christmas. I’ve certainly seen weirder shit tonight.

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