Santa Steps Out: A Fairy Tale for Grown-Ups (23 page)

Then the goddess's mouth went to her chest, her teeth tearing away wrappings of pain. Her swift tongue stanched the bloodflow, replacing throbs of hurt with the pulse of healing. The lake resolved into a mirror indeed, the goddess into Anya. Rachel felt her kind lips, insistent with life, close upon a nipple. Through half-shut eyes, she pictured Santa's wife wrestling with death, who now conceded Rachel's torso but shifted his firepower to her loins, a wide battlefield of trauma and devastation.

Letting her eyelids fall, Rachel saw a distant light, alluring beyond this earthly plain of suffering and sadness. She drifted toward it, feeling the hooks lift free of her body. It would be so easy to cut loose of the torment, so much nicer to go into the light, to join Frank there. But down below, the waves lapped against the shore of her thighs, thudding down insistent beneath the moon that hung like a huge breast in the night sky. That moon opened its mouth in a sad O and spoke to her of womanly matters—of childbirth, of tides, of desires long kept under. The rhythmic slap of waves sounded below. Foam fizzed and sizzled against the shore, glistening silver in the moonlight.

Rachel opened her eyes to Anya's naked flanks where she knelt beside her, one knee resting warm against her ribs. The older woman's arms angled along either side of Rachel's hips. Her head was lowered to Rachel's parted thighs, the bun of her hair tightly curled and circling. Inside, the unbearable pain of violation still seared. But now, it felt as if Anya's healing tongue stretched clear up into Rachel's womb, licking away all traces of suffering.

Life surged anew into Rachel's veins. Life, yes, and something more: an impelling desire for physical love, to affirm life, to tie her more completely to it after nearly losing it. She rested a hand upon Anya, below the rounded curve of one buttock.

"How are you feeling?" Anya's glasses were gone and she looked ancient and beautiful. Her face was rusty with blood, Rachel's blood.

"Don't stop," she whispered. She felt whole again and glowing, and her vagina throbbed now for completion. She caressed Anya's neck, gently coaxing her back down between her legs as she had often done with Santa when he teased her with stopping. Down went the tight white head and again Rachel felt the amazing gift of Anya's tongue on her sex.

Rachel felt doubly weak, from loss of blood and from her gathering arousal. Yet it was as if Anya's healing tongue were speeding the manufacture of new blood as well as stimulating the old. Life surged through her from her moistening nexus. Running her fingers along her savior's lovelips, Rachel coaxed Anya's parted thighs down over her mouth and feasted on the fluids that flowed there. Dark and rich their flavor, like blended herbs steeped on stone hearths, an elixir for all the world's ills.

For an eternity, naught existed but licking and being licked. Anya's moans mumbled upon her labia. When climax claimed them, it brought with it for Rachel the sweet painful wrack of rebirth. Stretching every limb beyond its limits and gasping gloriously for air, she felt at once born out of her own birth canal and out of Anya's, washed head to toe in a glow of sweat and lovejuice.

At last, they rose and threaded their way past dark puddles of gore and torn tufts of fur, washing the blood off one another in the shower, and spending hours of magic time in bed. Rachel apologized over and over for the suffering she had caused Anya, to which Anya tearfully regretted her own stubborn jealousy. Then both of them praised to the stars Santa's exquisite taste in women and dove into one another's arms for more.

"You know what I can't wait to see?" Anya asked as she fondled Rachel's right breast.

"What?" said Rachel, offering up a silent blessing to God for inventing nipples.

"The look on Santa's face when he finds out."

*****

As Santa neared the Pole, his sleigh passed abruptly from the blizzard that whipped furiously about him into the mild winter of his domain. But he paid the transition no mind. His shouts to Lucifer and the others, his
pro forma
whipsmacks over their heads, unfolded on automatic.

There was far too much else to think about.

For one thing, the Tooth Fairy had not shown up once on his rounds. He had braced himself for his worst trial yet, certain that this time he would withstand her wiles. It unnerved him, her not attempting to seduce him along his route. The Tooth Fairy was not, he knew, the sort of creature to give up easily.

Then there was the sorry situation awaiting him at home, his two lovely wives who ought to adore one another but did not.

It hurt Santa's heart, the sadness of it all.

Wendy and Rachel's impending absence shrouded him in gloom. God knew how long it would last, that gloom, and how Anya would respond to it. Would their marriage ever be whole again? Did it matter?

The sleigh's runners skimmed the tops of snowy pines, throwing up clouds of mist that sparkled like diamond dust in the sunlight. Out from the elves' dormitory swarmed hundreds of dark dots. The dark dots did a slow curl around the skating pond, then scattered everywhichway across the commons. As Santa swooped lower, they grew greener and sprouted distinguishable legs and heads. More came tumbling out of workshop and stable, all of them headed for the expanse of snow before his cottage.

There on the porch was Wendy in a bright red dress, waving wildly up at him. Beside her on the railing sat Snowball and Nightwind, legs tucked under, patient black and white pods.

Behind them stood Anya and Rachel, holding hands and waving like twins, broad smiles lighting up their faces. Santa dropped the reins in shock, then groped forward and grabbed them again.

When Wendy leaped into the roil of elves that swarmed the sleigh, Santa lifted his radiant stepchild out of the turmoil—as though he plucked a holly berry from a cluster of leaves—and squeezed her tight. Her kisses warmed his cheek. Then his helpers closed in and one beloved face after another came into focus. Hearty handclasps and hugs besieged Santa on all sides. Wendy laughed in his arms and clasped him round the neck.

"We're staying!" she shouted.

When the green sea finally parted, Santa's wives were waiting on the porch. He bounded up and hugged them both, Wendy giggling as he crushed her against her mother. Anya he kissed first, tasting a new flavor of frisk and frolic there that pleased him greatly. Then, still puzzled, he bent to Rachel; her full lips parted and her lovely scent captivated him anew.

In the commons, the crowd went wild with cheering.

Later, in the living room, Santa heard the laundered version of what had happened. "Mommy got attacked by a giant animal," Wendy blurted out. Then, skirting around the details they later provided, Anya and Rachel painted the broad picture of what had occurred and how it had brought them together. Santa had noticed the bare floor in the hallway and the dried trail of egg running down the mirror. "Several of the elves have volunteered to weave us a new carpet," Anya told him, which left the larger question unanswered, "and the egg residue simply refuses to yield to conventional methods of cleaning, so we're leaving it there for now. More on that later."

When he had showered and was robed in red, soft black slippers hugging his feet and a long thin clay pipe wreathing aromatic wisps of smoke about his lips, Santa sat back in his easy chair and let Christmas unfold before him. On his return trip, he had dreaded this final round of giftgiving, the funereal mood that would surely pall every attempt at merriment. Now it was all he could do to keep from laughing out loud, things having fallen out as he had always dreamed they would. There was Wendy in a beautiful gingham dress Anya had sewn for her, once more assuming responsibility for delivering the gifts, pausing before him once to stick out her lower jaw and wiggle her first loose tooth in more than a year. ("Be sure to let someone know the instant it comes out," he cautioned.) There was his dear wife Anya, rocking and knitting and beaming as he hadn't seen her beam in ages. And there was Rachel, young and zesty and full-breasted, an arm draped over Heinrich's nearest shoulder where he sat, all six of him, bunched up on the couch, barely able to contain his glee.

At long last, after the eggnog had vanished but for a filmy residue at the bottom of the cut-glass bowl, and the large plates piled high with gingerbread men held only a stray crumb or two, Santa put on his holiday best and they adjourned to the elves' dormitory for festivities and giftgiving that lasted until dusk.

By nightfall, Wendy began to nod and Santa brimmed with a delicious mix of curiosity and lust. She drifted asleep in his arms as they watched elf after elf whiz by on the ice. With a twinkle of his eye, Santa summoned Fritz to his side.

"Fritz, I think you understand how much Wendy and her mother mean to me."

"Of course, Santa," Fritz assured him, watching the sleeping girl's head loll against the crook of Santa's arm as they made their way across the commons. "All of us, to the last elf, feel the same way."

"Good. That's good, Fritz. Now I want to tell you something. Get the door, will you?"

Fritz opened the front door of the gingerbread house, turned on the hall light, and stepped aside to let Santa through with his precious burden.

"Now, Fritz," said Santa while the sleepy girl was in the bathroom brushing her teeth, "Wendy and Rachel are not like us. They can be hurt. They can be killed."

"But Santa," Fritz scoffed, "who'd want to hurt—"

Santa held up a finger. "Never mind who. I'm afraid they may be in danger of further attack. You saw the rug. You heard what happened."

"Yes, but—"

"Then you know as much as you need to know. Keep an eye on Wendy tonight. Don't relax your vigilance for an instant. Will you do that?"

Fritz, puzzled and frustrated, stood by the picture window and looked out across the commons at the skating revelers. "She'll be safe with me, Santa."

"Thank you, Fritz."

Tucking Wendy in, Santa laid a fatherly hand upon her brow. "Go back to sleep now, darling. Fritz is here to look over you, and I'll see you in the morning." He bent down and kissed her.

"I love you, Santa," said Wendy with a yawn.

"I love you too, Wendy," Santa replied. "Sleep well, dear one."

Wendy smiled and her eyelids closed.

Santa paused at the door, his face soft but fearful. "Remember," he whispered to Fritz.

Fritz mouthed renewed assurance, and Santa headed back to his wives.

Hours later, when the festivities were over, Anya took one of Santa's hands and Rachel took the other and they led him beguilingly to his bed, stripped him naked, and demonstrated beyond the power of words how much love they had in their hearts for him and for one another. Hour after hour they dallied, these three, exploring with delight the new instance of matrimony they had become. Three hours shy of dawn, his arms full of contented woman, Santa drifted off at last into sleep, feeling safe and cozy and warm, drained and happy and, by any measure, complete.

*****

"G'night, Fritz," Wendy said. The next moment her eyes blinked open and everything was dark and silent except for the soft glow of her nightlight and the breezy snores of her guardian elf curled up in a chair by the window. Snowball and Nightwind lumped dim and immobile at the foot of her bed. Outside, snow stretched in a silent blue roll across the commons past the gleam of the skating pond.

Too much hot apple cider. She needed to go tinkle. She had to leave her warm cozy bed and lift her nightgown above her waist and sit on the cold potty seat. Yes, but then she would get to nestle back under the covers again and that would feel wonderful. Nothing to be done. Wendy angled back her blankets and stepped down, chill air upon her ankles. She eased open her bedroom door so as not to disturb Fritz, crossed the hallway, and snapped on the bathroom light.

Loud knock of potty cover against the bright white tank; white seat cold on the backs of her legs; a sudden spray of tinkle hitting the water, and the easing of her discomfort within. Nightwind craned his head around the door and yawned up at her. Wendy worried the loose tooth with her tongue. She felt it give. Raising a hand from the seat, she brought it out.

It glistened between thumb and forefinger, jutting up thin and white and almost smooth, a pinched drop of red at its root end.

In her mouth she tasted blood.

She wiped herself and flushed the potty, then stood at the sink. Santa had said to let someone know if it came out. Should she wake Fritz? She set the tooth on the countertop and stared at it. No need. She was fast approaching eight, a big girl. What had Mommy done the last time in their old house? Stood next to her, an arm around her shoulder. Suggested she rinse her mouth out. Set the tooth beneath her pillow and tucked her in.

Anya told her often what an independent young lady she was becoming. They would be proud of her the next morning when she told them she had taken care of things herself. There might even be more dimes in it, assuming the Tooth Fairy rewarded such efforts. It was worth a try, anyway.

Wendy sloshed warm water about in her mouth and spat out the pink fluid, washing it down the drain. She did it a second and third time. Then she closed her palm around the tiny tooth, flicked off the bathroom light, and ushered Nightwind back into her room, shutting the door as quietly as she could behind them.

Fritz snored. He looked cold, Wendy thought. She tipped up the pillow and centered her prize beneath it, then pressed it firmly down around the tooth. She lifted a confused Snowball off the bed and set her on the floor. "Sorry, Snowball," she said. Her top blanket, light blue and pilled with age, she took off, draping it around Fritz and tucking it behind his shoulders so that he looked as if he had fallen asleep in a barber chair. A smile came to his lips. At last, Wendy crawled beneath the covers, savoring the mommy-like warmth that wrapped her in its arms, and drifted down into deep slumber.

13. The Tooth Fairy Takes Her Revenge

When immortals dream, death and disfigurement come surprisingly often into play. And yet not so surprising when one considers their indestructibility in waking life. Upon the deadly playground of a dreamscape, the agonies of separation and irrevocable loss are theirs at last to claim and be claimed by.