Susan was already sat up in bed and had her arm outstretched when the alarm went off. She rose quickly and, checking her house keys were in her pocket, she clipped the lead to the dog’s collar. Christmas morning, but still she stuck to the routine. Usually on these walks she relished the silence which electrified the morning air with the thrill of being the only person awake in a slumbering street. Today, there was a hum of activity, lights on in usually dark houses like the newly opened eyes of puppies. She felt the chill metal of keys in her hand as she closed the door behind her.
Early rising children wobbled past on new bicycles still trailing ribbons and bright paper scraps while parents watched from windows, clutching large mugs and each other. In some houses, the hysteria had already given way to tantrums and Susan heard the echoes of her own chaotic childhood through the windows opened to let out the smoke of a rare but necessary cigarette. Susan stuck to her usual morning route.
Back at home – and back in her pyjamas as a little gift to herself – she put a large cushion on the floor and sat in front of the tree to open presents. They had accumulated over the last month and no compulsion other than her own ensured she waited until today to open them. She worked her way through the presents from siblings and well-meaning in-laws with a sigh. Three of those teapot-for-one sets with an impractical, oversized cup and saucer. As if a life lived on your own meant a destiny of tea for one, and the only kind thing is to make the best of it by drinking from a novelty cup. In her mind, she already saw these gifts in the box headed for the charity shop. There were homemade gifts from nieces and nephews, the double helping of glitter and crayoned kisses marking her out as a favourite. Luxury hair treatments from her best friend, who ran the salon she went to every six weeks. A brightly coloured, blank-paged journal from her friend in the writing group. Panettone from her Italian tutor. A book about local pub walks from the man who ran the kennels where her dog stayed when she went on her weekends away; she hadn’t bought him a gift, and felt uncomfortable by the gesture and what it might mean.
She should have finished, but one present remained under the tree. She looked across to the pile of opened gifts – everyone she knew, every present she’d collected from pre-Christmas gatherings and placed under the tree was already there. This was new, unexpected. A box wrapped in glossy red paper with white ribbon; she checked the label which bore her name, written in an old-fashioned script in gold ink. Rather than recalling the magic of Christmas, her first thought was of those unopened presents under the tree that year he never came to see her, the year she found out about his wife and children. But this wasn’t a gift she’d bought and wrapped for someone else, it was for her. She walked around the house, checked the windows and tested the lock on the back door. She left the gift under the tree while she put the other presents away, the glint of gold ink under the coloured lights catching her eye.
She asked her family when they called, but no one admitted to sending it. Her friend knew her well enough to not plan such a surprise. No one else came to the house to have been able to hide it. From time to time, she picked it up to test the weight as if that would hold some clue, and then she’d replace it under the tree. After an afternoon walk with the dog, passing along the same early-rising streets now muted with a bloated exhaustion, she placed the parcel in front of him. If it was edible, he would know, but he sniffed it once and walked disinterested back to the fire to curl up and sleep. She remembered something she’d heard at the police station at work, and carefully carried the box to the kitchen table and balanced it on the edge. Bombs could never balance from every angle, but this box didn’t fall. She shook it, but there was no sound. She poured herself a glass of wine. A present still unopened on Christmas afternoon. It nagged away at her and the feeling of intrusion stopped her from opening it. She thought about her childhood, and wondered when Father Christmas had become a monster under the bed.
