We were somewhere over Vermont when the drugs began to take hold. I remember saying something like “who’s driving this thing?” And suddenly there was a terrible roar and the sky in front of us filled with the nose of a jumbo jet. “Holy Jesus!” a voice screamed.

Then all was silence, the jet engines drowning out every noise until they passed over our heads. “Did you see that?” I said. “It was right there, coming to smash our skulls and you were…”

“I was what?” Santa growled, pulling his head back into the sleigh and wiping the vomit from his beard. “You filthy little elf, are you accusing me of something?” No point telling him, I thought. The jolly bastard will realize soon enough we’ve wandered into commercial air traffic lanes.

It was almost 3 a.m. and we still had more than a million houses to go. Very soon, I knew, we would be completely twisted. But failure was not an option, Christmas can’t be canceled. We would have to work with the drugs, use them to our advantage and remember the mission: deliver the damn presents.

“Quick, I need my medicine!” I yelled. Santa opened his sack, “What d’ya want? We’ve got a bag of mistletoe, 25 holly berries, three sheets of high-powered gingerbread, a whole galaxy of multi-colored candy canes, a snow globe of pure Alaskan powder, and a pint of raw eggnog.”

The only thing that really worried me was the eggnog. There is nothing more irresponsible and depraved than two elves making a merry Christmas in the depths of an eggnog binge. And I knew we’d get into that rotten stuff pretty soon.

Both of us took a blue and red candy cane. How long can we maintain? I wondered. How long before one of us succumbs to the drugs and goes screaming over the bend? Becoming a deranged elf intent on making Christmas a celebration of anarchy.

The lead reindeer sneered at us. Shining the bulbous, red nose of a degenerate drunkard in our faces. Have to remember to kill that bastard when this night is over, I thought. Or maybe I’ll hide all his booze, let him spend New Years dancing with delirium tremens.

---

We stopped on a roof in the suburbs of Burlington. “Are you sure this is the place?” I said. There was a thick line of Alaskan powder on top of a present in Santa’s lap. He was cutting it with a Christmas card. “Don’t ever doubt me,” he said. Snorted, and the white stuff was gone. “I’m fucking Santa Claus!” The vibrations were turning nasty. Something ugly was about to happen.

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

The first slug of eggnog didn’t help. But the second hit me in the knees and I knew I was ready. Have to be careful with a dangerous drug like eggnog. It likes to sneak up from behind and tear your head off. Laughing and gnawing on your skull while the rest of you dances the junkie jitterbug.

A shot of eggnog for Santa, a handful of holey berries for me, and we went down the chimney. In the darkness I stepped on something that meowed. “Shut that thing up!” yelled Santa.

It was too late. The light flicked on and there was a little boy standing in the door. “Merry…ah… happy…” said Santa. He looked around the room. No Christmas tree. No blinking lights. No stockings. No milk and cookies. Just a menorah. I could see in his eyes he was trying to decide if he was hallucinating or worse, was it really happening. “Happy Chanukah?” he mumbled. Ye gods. What bad craziness have you wrought upon us?

The kid didn’t say anything, just stared at us with big horrible eyes. “It’s ok, I’m not really Santa,” said Santa. Will he believe us? Two jabbering elves, suffering from facial twitches and an acute loss of balance brought on by the mixture of multiple dangerous drugs. Or would he rat us out? If Mrs. Claus hears of this she’ll run us down like dogs. Rip out our innards and play “The Carol of the Bells” on our ribcages.

We’ll just have to take the boy for a ride in the sleigh. Yes, it makes sense. It’s him or us. No one’s fault. No one is to blame. The world is a savage place. And when we drop him over the Atlantic, it’ll be quick. Hypothermia. He won’t feel… much.

Jesus! Did I say that? Or just think it? Was I talking? Did they hear me? I glanced at Santa, but he seemed oblivious, busy reasoning with the boy. “We work for the Department of Holiday Security,” he explained. “We’re undercover agents.”

The boy kept staring at us with a blank look on his face. “Have you seen anything weird in the neighborhood? Snowmen that move? Heavily armed perverts singing Christmas carols? Old ladies with ninja swords giving away fruitcakes? Postal employees?” I said.

Still no reaction from the kid. How much eggnog would it take to damage his memory? Could he handle it? Or would scorched synapses gush from his nose? I began to feel the fear.

“A chicken head named Scarlet Jones gave us a hot tip,” Santa snarled. His hand went into his pants and came out holding a hunting knife. He waved it at the dark corners of the room like a man who meant to cut something. “She said they were going to ambush the real Santa here!”

The boy’s face suddenly was a mask of pure fear and bewilderment. O Christ, I thought, we’ve gone too far. Abandon hope ye who enter here. “No more of that talk,” I said sharply. “Or I’ll put the leeches on you.” Santa grinned, seeming to understand. He lowered the knife. It made ugly movements in his twitching hand.

The boy vanished. War drums were beating. Are they in my head? I thought. No! People are running down the stairs! “Flee you swine!” I yelled at Santa.

---

I could hear Santa grinding his teeth as we sped north over Canada. “Edge work… always risky,” I said. He stared at me for a moment then turned away. The drugs had shifted gears on him. The next phase would probably be one of those hellishly intense introspection nightmares. Poor bastard.

I laughed and took another drink of eggnog. The lights of Toronto started to turn on below us. We were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. The madness of the Christmas spirit was spreading all around us with the dawning of the sun.

Little Bobbies and Suzies were waking and rushing to the Christmas tree to see what Santa brought them. All the pent up anticipation of the year exploding in one brief orgy of materialism. Shredded wrapping paper littering the floor. Strange and terrible visions of lizards chewing on Barbie dolls and GI Joes.

With the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark. That place where the Christmas spirit finally broke and rolled back. Until next year…

“God damn!” yelled Santa. “I need something to relax.” I stuffed a pipe with mistletoe, sparked it and passed it to him. Ignore the nightmare. Dry hump the dream until it bleeds. “Merry Christmas!” I roared at the city below.