I remember when I found out that my dad was Santa.

Every Xmas my parents would toss us kids out of their room (that opened into the living room) and we would agree to go to bed and stay there all night. Then they would wrap presents and then, they told us, stay out of the living room so Santa would come.

I knocked on the door, one Xmas Eve and was told it was fine to come in. I needed something, fuck knows what it was, but they said it was fine for me to come in. Except I spotted my father sneaking off with a huge bag of trash, with wrapping paper that my parents never used sticking out of it.

The next morning I saw that paper over the gifts that “Santa” had given us.

It’s not that I ever firmly, 100% believed that Santa Claus came and gave us gifts, but still. You know?

I didn’t let on until I was in college. I mean I never told them when I worked it out or how until then.

Of course we never had a fireplace and I didn’t get how Santa was supposed to break into the apartment and grope around until he worked out that we had hung the stockings on the piano without too much care.