santa's own holocaust

Dead thought: Santa starts his own holocaust tonight. It was a cold day and his wife had upset him.

- You silly old man!

One thing after another, one drink after another. A dirty beard on top of it all. Into the special cupboard, the locked cupboard. Here is the shotgun. Here is the carving knife.

- Shouldn’t you be getting ready for work, dummy? Have you been drinking, thicko? Brush that beard, ugly chops! Every year you sorry bugger gets the credit for his Christmas delivery! Where would you be without me, brainless? I’ll tell ya: Fucked Street!

BANG! BANG! The shotgun echoed around the kitchen and a fist full of wife brains went onto the ceramic green tiles that started at the sink and ended at the breakfast bar. Angry face even in death. She never finished the sausage roll preparation. An advance list of the weeks projected ironing fell out of her apron pocket. Santa shot her again, in the stomach this time. A trickle of guts smelt like black pudding. He trod on her fingers. They were coarse against the lino. Her thatch of nasty hair mopped up some of the blood, blown off from the scalp. One of her eyes wasn’t there anymore. It would turn up.

Nasty woman. Santa picked up the carving knife and cut off her head. He put it into a gift box with a red ribbon and bow. It could be a present for the mother-in-law. He threw the rest of the body out of the back door. Two elves watched curiously. Santa shot them fast through the neck and climbed into his 1958 Chevy. He threw the head in the box onto the back seat and put the shotgun onto the front seat. He loaded a small revolver and tucked it into the waistband of his faded jeans. It purred like a butterfly as he ran over his flock of reindeer. They fell down expectantly.

He played a song on the stereo and sang along for a few lines.

People underestimated the stress of being Santa Claus at this time of year. The violence on Oxford Street on Christmas Eve wouldn’t even compare. Without psychiatric input he had been a ticking bomb just counting down until something like this happened. He had to stop the children from carrying on.

The car was stopped at house after house. He slipped down the chimney’s and unloaded round upon round into the innocent heads of children and their parents. He looked at the brandy left for him but didn’t drink it. It was going to be a long night. White sheets turned dark red with blood, almost brown. The smell was like an abattoir. Beautiful blonde three year olds who couldn’t sleep:

- Santa!

- BANG!

- Mummy, Santa’s made Kerry’s head come off!

- BANG!

- Stop sobbing Timmy!

- What terrible parents… BANG!

The bloodshed continued into the very small hours of the ongoing night. No sleigh bells here but screams and gunshots, the whooshings of houses catching fire. There was blood in his beard. His fingernails stuck with gore. His eyes glistened like a jolly old man in the middle of a job well done.

But look! A police car! Tearing towards the scene.

- Halt it, Santa! Even a formerly good man can’t kill this many children.

Santa pulled the trigger of his revolver into the nearing shoulder of the officer with the megaphone. He fell from the car window. Santa shot him again and again and again. Four bangs: you’re a dead bastard!

A mob of angry neighbours who weren’t yet murdered in this grotesque holocaust shot Santa in the back. He fell down, but still managed to unload a couple of shots on the way. Two imprecise men fell victim. More police stood now over the injured Santa, smoking aggressive cigarettes. They shot him in the guts.

- Used to be such a good man.

- Yeah.

- Helped the kiddies.

- I hear ya.

They squared him in the balls. They hit him about the chops. What a violent Christmas surprise. They stamped his neck until air whistled through the broken shards of windpipe. They mangled his face until it looked like a dishcloth. What a heinous Christmas Eve killing.

- Yeah, real nice guy once, that Santa. You know, I blame loneliness.

- I blame drugs.

- I blame TV.

- I blame film.

Those proud men of the law. Walking off into the bloody street, cracking their bruised knuckles. Santa gurgled out blood. He was like a mistaken Halloween decoration. Someone pressed the wrong button on the plastic mould. A little girl stood over him. She was confused.

- Santa?

He mustered enough strength to punch her, a desperate last violence, funny and indiscriminate. The gnarled cadaver still lies in the street. There is shouted sex with the corpse, photographs too. People don’t know why they do it, but something comes over them. He is Santa. Was. Maybe. A man.

The mayor:

- An example is required of a nonce.

The newspaper:

- Holocaust.