Mouthful of Birds

SANTA CLAUS SLEEPS AT OUR HOUSE

The Christmas when Santa Claus spent the night at our house was the last time we were all together. Mom and Dad stopped fighting after that night, but I don’t think it was because of Santa. Dad had sold his car a few months before because he’d lost his job, but he said a good Christmas tree was important that year, and he bought one even though Mom was against it. The tree came in a long, flat cardboard box, along with an instruction sheet explaining how to fit the three parts together and spread the branches open so they looked natural. Once the tree was assembled, it was taller than Dad, really huge, and I think that’s one of the reasons why Santa slept at our house that year. I had asked for a remote-control car for Christmas. Any would do; I wasn’t after any model in particular. The problem was that almost all the kids at school had them, and when we played at recess, the remote-control cars did nothing but crash into the regular toy cars like mine. So I had written my letter to Santa, and Dad had taken me to the post office so I could mail it. And he told the guy at the window:

“We’re mailing this to Santa Claus,” and he handed him the envelope.

The guy at the window didn’t even greet us because there were a lot of people and you could see he was tired from so much work. The Christmas season must be the worst time of year for those guys. He took the letter, looked at it, and said:

“Zip code’s missing.”

“But it’s for Santa Claus,” said Dad, and he smiled and winked. You could see he was trying to make friends, but the guy said:

“Won’t go out without a zip code.”

“Now, you know Santa Claus’s address doesn’t have a zip code,” said Dad.

“Won’t go out without a zip code,” said the guy, and he called the next person.

And then Dad climbed over the counter, grabbed the guy by his shirt collar, and the letter went out.

So I was worried on Christmas Eve, because I didn’t know if my letter had made it to Santa or not. Plus, we hadn’t been able to count on Mom for almost two months, and that had me worried, too, because the one who took care of things was always Mom, and things worked well that way. But one day she stopped caring, just like that, from one day to the next. She went to see some doctors; Dad always went with her and I stayed next door at Marcela’s house. But Mom didn’t get better. Then there were no more clean clothes, no more cereal and milk in the mornings. Dad dropped me off late wherever I had to go, and then he’d be late again to pick me up. When I asked for an explanation, Dad said that Mom wasn’t sick and she didn’t have cancer and she wasn’t going to die. That something like that could very well have happened, but he wasn’t such a lucky man. Marcela explained that Mom had simply stopped believing in things, and that that was called being “depressed.” It made you not have any desire for anything, and it would take a while to go away. Mom didn’t go to work anymore or get together with girlfriends or talk on the phone with Grandma. She just sat in her robe in front of the TV and flipped through channels all morning, all afternoon, and all night. I was in charge of feeding her. Marcela left food in the freezer with the portions labeled. I had to combine them: I couldn’t, for example, give Mom all the potato casserole and then the whole vegetable tart; I had to combine the portions so her diet would be healthy. I thawed out the food in the microwave and brought it to her on a tray, with a glass of water and silverware. Mom said:

“Thank you, dear. You stay warm now.” She said it without looking at me, without taking her eyes from the television.

When I got out of school it was Augusto’s mother, who was beautiful, who held my hand and waited with me. That worked as long as Dad came to pick me up, but later, when Marcela started to come instead, neither of the women seemed very happy, so I waited alone under the tree on the corner. Whoever came to pick me up, they were always late.

Marcela and Dad became very good friends, and some nights Dad stayed with her next door, playing poker, and Mom and I had trouble going to sleep without him in the house. Sometimes we’d run into each other at the bathroom door and then Mom would say:

“Careful, dear, don’t catch cold.” And she’d go back to the TV.

Marcela spent many afternoons at our house, cooking for us and straightening up a little. I don’t know why she did it. I guess Dad asked her for help and since she was his friend she felt like she had to, because the truth is she didn’t look too pleased about it. A couple of times she turned off Mom’s TV, sat down across from her, and said:

“Irene, we have to talk, this can’t go on…”

She told Mom she had to change her attitude, that things couldn’t go on like that, and that she, Marcela, couldn’t keep doing everything. She begged Mom to react and make a decision or she’d end up ruining our lives. But Mom never answered. And finally Marcela would leave and slam the door, and that night Dad would order pizza because there was nothing for dinner, and I love pizza.

I told Augusto that Mom had stopped “believing in things,” and that she was “depressed,” and he wanted to see what she was like. We did something really bad that sometimes I’m ashamed of: we jumped up and down in front of her for a while, but Mom only moved her head a little when we blocked the TV. Then we made a hat out of newspaper, and we tried it out on her in different ways. We left it on her all afternoon, and she didn’t even move. I took the hat off her before Dad got home. I was sure Mom wasn’t going to say anything to him about it, but I felt bad anyway.

Then Christmas came. Marcela made her baked chicken with horrible vegetables, but since it was a special night she also made french fries for me. Dad asked Mom to get up off the sofa and eat with us. He carefully moved her to the table—Marcela had set it with a red tablecloth, green candles, and the plates we used when company came—sat her down at the head of the table, and took a few steps back without taking his eyes off her. I guess he thought it might work, but as soon as he was far enough away, she got up and went back to her sofa. So we moved the food out to the coffee table and we ate in there with her. The TV was on, of course, and the news had a story about a place with poor people who had received a ton of presents and food from people with more money, and so now they were really happy. I was nervous and I kept looking at the Christmas tree the whole time, because it was almost midnight and I wanted my car. Then Mom pointed at the TV. It was like seeing furniture move. Dad and Marcela looked at each other. On TV, Santa Claus was sitting in his living room, one arm hugging a boy sitting on his lap, and the other around a woman who looked like Augusto’s mom. The woman leaned over and kissed Santa, and Santa looked at us and said:

“…and when I get home, I just want to be with my family.” And the logo of a coffee brand appeared on the screen.

Mom started to cry. Marcela took me by the hand and told me to go up to my room. I said no. She told me again, this time in the impatient tone she used when she talked to Mom, but nothing was going to drag me away from that tree. When Dad tried to turn the TV off, Mom started to fight with him to get him away. The doorbell rang and I said:

“It’s Santa.”

Marcela slapped me and then Dad yelled at her. They started to argue. And though Mom managed to turn the TV back on, Santa Claus wasn’t on any of the channels.

The doorbell rang again, and Dad said:

“Who the hell is it?”

I hoped it wasn’t the man from the post office, because Dad was already in a bad mood and I didn’t want them to fight again.

The doorbell rang again, a bunch of times in a row, and then Dad got sick of it and went to the door, and when he opened it, I saw it was Santa Claus. He wasn’t as fat as on TV, and he looked tired. He had trouble standing up, and he leaned for a second against one side of the doorway, then the other.

“What do you want?” asked Dad.

“I’m Santa Claus,” said Santa.

“And I’m Snow White,” said Dad, and slammed the door in his face.

Then Mom got up, ran to the door, and opened it. Santa was still there, trying to hold himself up, and she hugged him. Dad had a fit:

“This is the guy, Irene?” he yelled at Mom, and he started to say bad words and try to separate them. And Mom said to Santa:

“Bruno, I can’t live without you, I’m dying.”

Dad got them apart, and then he punched Santa and Santa fell backward and then just lay there on the stoop. Mom started screaming like crazy. I was worried about what was happening to Santa, and also because all of this was delaying the car, but I was happy to see Mom move again.

Dad told Mom he was going to kill them both, and Mom told Dad that if he was so happy with his friend Marcela, then why couldn’t she be Santa’s friend, which seemed logical to me. Marcela went up to Santa, who was starting to wake up on the ground, and reached out her hand to help him up. And then Dad started to say all kinds of things and Mom started to yell. Marcela was saying, “Calm down, let’s go inside, please,” but no one listened. Santa Claus brought his hand to the back of his neck and I saw he was bleeding. He spat at Dad and Dad said:

“You fucking fag.”

And Mom said to Dad:

“You’re the fag, you son of a bitch.” And she spat at him, too. She gave Santa her hand, brought him into the house, led him up to her room, and closed the door.

Dad stayed there like he was frozen, and when he finally woke up, he realized I was still there, and he yelled at me to go to bed. I knew I was in no position to argue; I went to my room without Christmas and without a present. I waited in bed until everything was silent, watching the plastic fishes of my nightlight swim on the wall. By then I knew I wasn’t going to get my remote-control car, but Santa Claus slept at my house that night, and that meant a much better year for all of us.