I was awoken by the sound of a loud thump on the roof. “It’s Santy” I thought. I really wanted to get up to greet him but I decided not to as I didn’t want to spook him so I stayed in bed and listened. I heard his footsteps on the roof approach the chimney. I heard the bang of him landing in the fireplace after coming down the chimney. I heard the rattling of the presents he was placing under the tree and I heard the sound of his chewing as he ate the cookies my brother and I left out for him.
My brother, 9 at the time and I, 11 at the time shared a room. Our beds were right beside each other, only a bedside locker between us. He always had a night light on.
Anyway, after the chewing stopped, I expected him to ascend back up the chimney and fly away to deliver presents to another child. I was kind of hoping that’s what he’d do because I was super excited to see what he brought me and I wanted to get up and take a quick gawk but I heard his loud footsteps approach my room. I closed my eyes to pretend to be asleep. He entered my room and approached my brother’s bed.
“Stephen, you’ve been a good boy this year. I’ve brought what you wanted”
He then approached my bed
“Gary, you’ve been a naughty boy this year, I’ve brought you no presents”
I sat up quickly and rubbed my eyes. I got a good look at him. He was like what the media portrays. A large beared man with a red coat.
“That’s not fair” I said. “I’ve been very good this year”
“Ho Ho Ho, is that so?”
He took out a long light green poece of paper and scrolled down through it
“Hmmm, Gary, born March 17th 2000, currently aged 11 has been naughty boy as of this year.
Some naughties Gary committed this year are as follows
“I know I haven’t been the best this year but I’ll promise to be good next year”
“Splendid. Then you’ll get presents next year”
“Ah come on Santy, don’t be like that now”
“Ho Ho Ho, young Gary, it’s been a pleasure meeting you, and I hope to bring you presents next year. Now dear boy, go back to sleep. It will be a long night. Goodbye”
He left my bedroom
“Absolute cunt he is” I thought
I gave a gawk over to my brother to see if he was still sleeping. He was but he looked unusually still and as if he wasn’t breathing. I got out of bed and walked over to him.
“Stephen” I whispered “Stephen, wake up”
Not even a peep out of him. I started shaking him.
“Stephen, Stephen, come on boy, wake up will ya”
No good. I was starting to get worried. I ran out to see if I could catch Santy before he left to ask for his help. He was just about to go back up the chimney before I stopped him.
“Santy, it’s Stephen, he’s not breathing”
“Gary, my dear child. Your brother is perfectly fine”
“Look even, he’s not breathing”
“Go back to bed, he’ll be as good as ever in the morning”
“FUCK YOU THEN YOU USELESS FAT CUNT”
“Goodbye, Gary”
He flew up the chimney and I heard the sleigh fly off. I ran to my parents room to tell them about Stephen.
“MAM, DA, WAKE UP”
But there wasn’t a peep out of them either
“COME ON, WAKE UP WILL YE”
No luck. Them and Stephen shared the same fate. My mam’s phone was on the locker beside them so I picked it up and dialed 999. Beeeeeeeeeeeeeep.
I dialed again. Beeeeeeeeeep
Again. Beeeeeeeeeep
Again. Beeeeeeeeeeep
“Fucking useless bastards”
I ran back to my room and threw on a pair of shoes. “Maybe the neighbours could help”. I ran down the hallway to the front door. When I unlocked it I got a bit of a fright. The snow was frozen mid air. Not just the snow though, but the barn owl that flies over my house every night screeching like a banshee. A car driven by a man that looked to be heading home for Christmas. The moths hanging around the light over the front door. Everything. It was like time froze, and everything froze with it except me. I cried iut for help in hopes someone, anyone could hear me.
“SHUT UP, BOY WILL YA” I heard a few doors down from me so I ran in that direction.
It was the village asshole who bullies everyone. He was leaning out his bedroom window.
“Can you tell me what is going on exactly”
“You’ve been a bad boy, that’s what”
“What has that got to do with what’s happening?”
“That fat piece of shit of a man freezes time in order to visit every house in one night. The bad children are immune to this. It’s his way of teaching them a lesson. But I enjoy the peace it brings, but now you’ve ruined it”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Nope”
“At all?”
“Absoloutely fuck all”
“So what now?”
“Enjoy it. Now can you please fuck off or I’ll kick that skinny arse of yours”
“Fine”
“If that’s true than Santy was right, It was going to be a long night” I thought. “Or maybe not. Maybe this is a dream”
I pinched myself as hard as I could. It hurt and I still wasn’t awake.
“So I’m not dreaming, that bastard”
I wasn’t good at maths but I knew if time was going to be Frozen until his done delivering presents to every house in the world, it would feel like forever.
“I guess I’d better make the most of it”
I ran back home and started watching some inappropriate movies. Well, a lot. After a while, that got boring so I ran down to the kitchen and ate a tonne of sweets which gave me a massive pain in my stomach. After the equivalent of a day going from bed to toilet, I got better and decided I wanted to learn to drive. I took the keys of my dads van from the kitchen and sat into it.
“How did he show me? Oh yeah. Clutch down, start the engine, put it into first gear, release the clutch slowly and gently press the gas”. I did all that and ended up driving through the garage door as I should’ve put it in reverse. I was fine, thankfully but I said “y’know, maybe I’ll learn to drive another time”. I then decided to go for a walk. A long walk in fact. Since everybody was Frozen, it was safe.
I had bever seen the world so peaceful. “Maybe this won’t be all bad”. I walked around the village, through the woods, and even into some of my neighbours back yards to pet their also frozen dogs. This eventually became a routine for me. Every, what felt like 24 hours I’d go for a long walk. When I got home I’d sleep. I’d then wake up and watch some inappropriate movies and eat a tonne of shit. But as you can probably giess, the food didn’t last long but that wasn’t a problem. I could just break into the store and take the food from there so I gave a walk down to the small grocery store in the village but
“FUCK”
The windows were broken and most of the food was gone, well all the nice stuff anyway. All that was left was vegetables. Yuck, but I was starving so I knew they’d have to do. I took a few bags from beside the counter and filled them up with the vegetables. It took a few trips over and back before I managed to get them all back home with me. As expected they tasted rank but they did the job for a few….what felt like a few days. The next thing I had to do to get food was break into the houses in the village and gather up their food. It was strange being able to easily break into people’s homes without any consequences. I’d never done it before but from what I’d seen in movies, the owner would run out with a gun and threaten the thief but obviously that wasn’t the case. I wished it was though.. I spend ages gathering food from all the houses and bringing it back to mine. “I won’t go hungry for ages”.
The equivalent of a few weeks passed and all the food was gone.I decided to go visit that asshole neighbour of mine but his parents car was gone and he was nowhere to be seen. He must’ve left the village to find food somewhere else I thought. If I was going to survive this long arse night, I had to do the same. I decided to give driving my dad’s van another go. I’d say I hit almost everything in sight before I actually got going on my search for food.. I knew the directions to the nearest town so I drove extremely slowly to it. When my parents drive, it takes 10 minutes. It took me 40. When I arrived though everything was gone There was windows broken, doors broken, shit everywhere. The naughty kids in this town had the same idea as I, and since they were nowhere to be seen, they must’ve ran out and went looking for food in other places. Every town and village I passed through was the same. It was like what you’d see in those post apocalyptic movies.
. I needed to eat. Water was an easy resource to obtain but food was difficult. I wasn’t going to be able to eat nice food anymore. Now I had to hunt for my food. Well, hunt isn’t the right word to use since everything was frozen. All I had to do was slice up the animals I see that were frozen, cook them and eat them. I didn’t want to eat animals such as dogs and cats so I went to local farms where there was plenty of livestock to eat. One cow would last me days and with the amount of cows around the place, I knew I’d be sorted for ages. Sometimes I’d cook chicken for a change, sometimes I’d grab fish from the river and eat them for a change. I was now sorted in the food and drink side of things but the loneliness was getting to me. I had no one to talk to. I tried talking to some of the frozen people but it was as if I was talking to one of my toys. It wasn’t the same. The constant darkness was starting to get to me too. I just wanted someone, not frozen, to talk to and to see daylight again.
“SHUT UP, BOY WILL YA” I heard a few doors down from me so I ran in that direction.
It was the village asshole who bullies everyone. He was leaning out his bedroom window.
“Can you tell me what is going on exactly”
“You’ve been a bad boy, that’s what”
“What has that got to do with what’s happening?”
“That fat piece of shit of a man freezes time in order to visit every house in one night. The bad children are immune to this. It’s his way of teaching them a lesson. But I enjoy the peace it brings, but now you’ve ruined it”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Nope”
“At all?”
“Absoloutely fuck all”
“So what now?”
“Enjoy it. Now can you please fuck off or I’ll kick that skinny arse of yours”
“Fine”
“If that’s true than Santy was right, It was going to be a long night” I thought. “Or maybe not. Maybe this is a dream”
I pinched myself as hard as I could. It hurt and I still wasn’t awake.
“So I’m not dreaming, that bastard”
I wasn’t good at maths but I knew if time was going to be Frozen until his done delivering presents to every house in the world, it would feel like forever.
“I guess I’d better make the most of it”
I ran back home and started watching some inappropriate movies. Well, a lot. After a while, that got boring so I ran down to the kitchen and ate a tonne of sweets which gave me a massive pain in my stomach. After the equivalent of a day going from bed to toilet, I got better and decided I wanted to learn to drive. I took the keys of my dads van from the kitchen and sat into it.
“How did he show me? Oh yeah. Clutch down, start the engine, put it into first gear, release the clutch slowly and gently press the gas”. I did all that and ended up driving through the garage door as I should’ve put it in reverse. I was fine, thankfully but I said “y’know, maybe I’ll learn to drive another time”. I then decided to go for a walk. A long walk in fact. Since everybody was Frozen, it was safe.
I had never seen the world so peaceful. “Maybe this won’t be all bad”. I walked around the village, through the woods, and even into some of my neighbours back yards to pet their also frozen dogs. This eventually became a routine for me. Every, what felt like 24 hours I’d go for a long walk, pet some frozen dogs and go home. When I got home I’d sleep. I’d then wake up and watch some inappropriate movies and eat a tonne of shite. But as you can probably guess, the food didn’t last long, but that wasn’t a problem. I could just break into the store and take the food from there so I gave a walk down to the small grocery store in the village but
“FUCK”
The windows were broken and most of the food was gone, well all the nice stuff anyway. All that was left was vegetables. Yuck, but I was starving so I knew they’d have to do. I took a few bags from beside the counter and filled them up with the vegetables. It took a few trips over and back before I managed to get them all back home with me. As expected they tasted rank but they did the job for a few….what felt like a few days. The next thing I had to do to get food was break into the houses in the village and gather up their food. It was strange being able to easily break into people’s homes without any consequences. I’d never done it before but from what I’d seen in movies, the owner would run out with a gun and threaten the thief but obviously that wasn’t the case. I wished it was though.. I spend ages gathering food from all the houses and bringing it back to mine. “I won’t go hungry for ages”.
The equivalent of a few weeks passed and all the food was gone. I decided to go visit that asshole neighbour of mine but his parents car was gone and he was nowhere to be seen. He was nowhere to be seen for ages actually. He must’ve left the village to find food somewhere else I thought. If I was going to survive this long arse night, I had to do the same. I decided to give driving my Da’s van another go. I’d say I hit almost everything in sight before I actually got going on my search for food.
I knew the directions to the nearest town so I drove extremely slowly to it. When my parents drive, it takes 10 minutes. It took me 40. When I arrived though everything was gone There was windows broken, doors broken, shit everywhere. The naughty kids in this town had the same idea as myself, and since they were nowhere to be seen, they must’ve ran out and went looking for food in other places. Every town and village I passed through was the same. It was like what you’d see in those post apocalyptic movies.
More will be posted in seperate posts throughout the coming days. There’s a lot to this story
I knew what I had to do next if I didn’t want to starve. As an animal lover, the idea of having to kill innocent animals myself for food sickened me but it was the only way. I drove to a small farm with about 20 cows that were frozen. I knew they’d last me ages but killing them wasn’t going to be easy for me. I took a knife from the farmers kitchen and approached a cow. I placed the knife to her throat but I couldn’t do it. “Do you want to starve?” I asked myself. I really didn’t. “You can do it, you CAN DO IT”, hyping myself up. “The cow won’t feel a thing” I closed my eyes and slit the cows throat. Blood started spilling everywhere. I almost thew up. The cow was still standing as it was Frozen so I pushed and pushed and pushed until it toppled over. Next was skinning it.
I didn’t know how to skin a cow. To be honest I think I made an arse of it because I ended up cutting chunks out of the cow with the skin. It was horrible. There was blood everywhere, blood on me. I couldn’t wait to change out of these bloody clothes. I cut some chunks off the cow and cooked them in the oven of the farmers house. While they were cooking, I took off my bloody clothes and put on the farmers clothes which were much too large for me. He like everyone else was frozen in bed. I decided to take a look around and found out this farmer had a wife who looked to have died of cancer not too long ago.
I could start to smell burning. I ran downstairs and noticed the meat was burnt to a crisp but I ate it anyway. I stayed there for a few weeks as the cows provided plenty of food for me, but killing them never got any easier. Food wasn’t an issue anymore but there was a few things I missed. Daylight and people, well awake people. While I was at home, I would often sit at my parents and brother’s beds and talk to them. I’d tell them what I got up to that day and how much I missed them. I even talked to the farmer who owned the house I was staying in, but it wasn’t the same. It was like I was talking to mannequins
Once all the cows were gone, I drove off to find another farm to keep me going for a few days but the one thing I forgot about before going on this journey was to stock up on diesel. The van ran out of diesel on an empty motor way so I had to abandon it. There surely had to be a farm somewhere along the way. I started walking anyway and I was walking for a few “hours” before I came across a small farm, only this farm had no cows. I decided to look around but it was completely empy
Then
“Who are you?” I heard someone ask
I turned around and couldn’t believe my eyes. There was a girl, who looked to be a few years older than me unfrozen
“I’m Gary” I replied. “Are you real?”. I was hoping I wasn’t hallucinating.
“Yes, I am real”
“Is this farm yours”
“It is my fathers yes”
“Can I stay with ya? I’m incredibly lonely and I need food”
“Fine. Come in”
I entered the girl’s house. There was perfectly cut chunks of meat all around.
“Sit” she said pointing at a couch
My legs were killing me from the walk so it was nice to be able to rest them. She brought me over a plate with a perfectly cut and cooked piece of meat and than sat beside me. I took a bite out of it and it was delicious. It was the best food I had in weeks.
“What’s your name I asked?”
“My name is Karolina”
“Your accent, you’re not Irish are ya?”
“No, I am Polish”
I took another bite of the meat
“Is this your first year being frozen too?” I asked
“No. I think this is my fifth”
“YOUR FIFTH”
“Yesl”
“Did you not learn your lesson after the first?”
“Yes. But, I have my reasons for this”
“For Peace?”
“Kind of”
“Do you know where the other kids are”
“Yes and no. I know they have a meet up spot somewhere. I never cared to find it”
“Do you not get lonely?”
“Yes but I like it this way”
“What about the constant darkness?”
“I’ve always been an night owl so I don’t mind”
“Fair enough”
“Stop talking and eat please”
“Sorry”
I ate in silence until I was finished
“How old are you?” she asked
“11, yourself?”
“I am 16. I was your age when I first experienced this”
“Why, what did you do”
“I put my dad in the hospital”
“WHAT? Woah. Why?“
“I do not want to talk about it, besides, I don’t think you would understand”
“I would. I’m mature for my age”
She laughed
“I am sure you are. What about you? What did you do?“
“I was an arsehole”
“Fair. Have you many people in your family”
“There’s four of us. Me, my younger brother, my man and Da”
“Are they good?”
“Yeah”
“Hmm, you must miss them”
“Yeah. I just…I just wish, I did..I guess I deserved it”
“No no no no no. You did not deserve this. No child deserves this. This is a cruel punishment for anyone”
“Yeah but I’m still tryna figure out why you would do this every year”
She sighed
“Fine, I will show you”
She led me upstairs to what looked to be her younger brother’s room. There was her brother frozen in bed and her dad, standing over him, holding a belt”
“Oh”
“Yes. He is a cruel man. I do this to escape him every year”
“What about your brother?”
“My dad is a bad man but his punishments are better than this one”
“Is there a way to get frozen like everyone else?”
“No. This ends when Santa delivers his last present”
“So there really isn’t a way out of this?”
“No”
“Have you any advice for surviving the whole night?”
“Yes. Stock up on food. Avoid the crazies”
“The crazies, what are they?”
“Cannibals?”
“They eat people?”
“Yes. They be naughty every year and spend this night killing and eating other naughty kids because they know they can get away with it”
“Have you ever came across them yourself?”
“Yes, twice. They travel in packs and will hunt down any kid they see until they finally catch them”
“How did you escape?”
“They didn’t see me. I saw them chase other children but I was too afraid to do anything”
“Yeah you were probably better off”
“So, with all the looting and destruction caused every night, how is everything so normal the next day?”
“Santa reverses the damages”
“Does that include animals killed during the night?”
“Yes”
“So what if an unfrozen person was to die, would things be normal the next day for them? Like, would they be brought back to life”
“No. Me and my friend had the same theory. I wanted to stay and she wanted to leave. They thought by killing herself she’d wake up the next morning fine. She was never seen again when the night was over”
“So that’s not gonna work then? Bollox”
“No, unfortunately not”
“Are you gonna make me go back out there myself?”
“No. I think you should stay with me. It is safer for you”
“Thanks a million. I really didn’t want to go alone again“