The Three Christmas Misfits | Winter Holiday Story Series

It’s a cold, icy December day, and outside there are near white-out conditions as the North Pole experiences a blizzard of the century, and it is getting progressively worse. Inside, wrapping paper, tissue paper, bows, and toys fly around Santa’s workshop in a scene of complete chaos. Clearly, there is a problem at Santa’s workshop, a place that was designed to bring joy to all. Off in the distance, you can hear the chattering of some not-so-happy people.

“I’m the most loved character for the Christmas season!” Frosty screamed as he throws a teddy bear at the Grinch.

“Well, aren’t you full of yourself?” Rudolph exclaims. “You end up melting at the end of your story, so everyone has forgotten about you anyways.”

“Rudolph, you have no reason to be talking right now; you have a red nose that makes a screeching sound,” says the Grinch. “I am a completely different person than who I was before, with a changed heart, so obviously, the kids love me the most.”

Just then, Rudolph sprints toward the Grinch lowers his head, and rams into him, which sends the Grinch flying across the room where he lands on the conveyor belt, ultimately stopping all toy production. The system automatically alerts Santa and the head elf that toy production has come to a stop. Regardless, in the heat of the moment, the Grinch grabs a nearby hairdryer that was on a desk, and he points it in the direction of Frosty. Frosty, still annoyed by the comment of Rudolph, continues to defend his original comment that he is the most loved character of the Christmas season. He has no idea the Grinch has a hairdryer in his possession.  Within a matter of minutes, Frosty slowly begins to melt, and on the floor of Santa’s workshop, there is a puddle of water that keeps getting bigger and bigger, and it becomes obvious that Frosty is running out of time. That is until Santa and the head elf show up at the workshop to troubleshoot the lack of toy production and unknowingly walk into Frosty slowly melting away.

 

48 HOURS PRIOR

 

As Christmas day is approaching, Santa is preparing for his busy holiday season. He has presents to make, reindeer to feed, elves to hire, naughty and nice lists to make, and oh so much more. One day, while Santa is preparing the Naughty List, his least favorite task of the season, he has a thought.

“What if, instead of worrying about all of this myself, I bring in some help from the most well-known characters associated with Christmas time! What could possibly go wrong?!”

In order to call all of these characters to the North Pole, Santa decides his best idea would be to write all of them letters soliciting their services and mail them overnight. But first, he knows there are a lot of iconic characters associated with Christmas, that he must narrow that list down to his top three characters.

“How could I possibly choose?” Santa ponders this thought for more than a minute. “There are so many characters that I absolutely adore, which will make this choice nearly impossible… I know! I will choose out of a hat!”

Santa Claus put countless names in the hat, including Frosty, Scrooge, Rudolph, The Little Drummer Boy, the Grinch, Charlie Brown, etc. He wanted to make sure his selections were as fair as they could be, so he enlisted the help of dear old Mrs. Claus. He decided it would be best if she were the one to choose the names because how could he possibly do so?

With much enjoyment, Mrs. Claus agrees and picks the first name out of the hat. It is none other than Frosty the Snowman, which is quite a funny pick considering they are using a hat that looks exactly like the one he wears on his head. The second pick was perfect as Rudolph’s name was picked. It seems so fitting that he got picked since he and Santa have been through so much with one another, and this would not be the first time that Rudolph was needed to help Santa out of a bind. Finally, Mrs. Claus has one final name left. With much anticipation, the last name to be drawn is… the Grinch!

There you have it! These three lucky individuals get the pleasure of meeting Santa Claus in his home and his workshop to discuss the future of Christmas. With these names finally known, Santa begins writing their letters so he can send them out by tonight.

My Future Guests,

I am writing to you to extend an invitation to visit me in the North Pole. This is strictly a business trip as we have a lot to discuss. Christmas is approaching very quickly, and I am in need of some help in getting ready for thisvery special day. The elves are working tirelessly to get all of the presents wrapped and loaded on the sleigh but due to some of the elves getting COVID and having to quarantine, we don’t have as many as we have had in years past. Please meet me at my house at 123 Elf Road, North Pole 88888, by 5 o’clock tomorrow evening.

See you soon!

Mr. C

After signing his last letter, Santa puts all of them into separate envelopes, addresses them to his recipients, and puts them in the mailbox. Luckily, Santa doesn’t have to worry about them getting there on time since he has his very own mail carrier. Now that the letters have been sent, the last thing to do is to wait.

The letters were clearly all successfully delivered as the next day, the Grinch, Frosty, and Rudolph all arrive at Santa’s house eager to be any sort of help they can be. Since Santa didn’t tell the guests who else would be there, they are all shocked once they realize that they’re not the only ones that Santa invited.

Mrs. Claus directs each of the characters into the dining room, where she has prepared cookies and milk for them as a snack.

“Santa isn’t quite ready for you all yet, but I know each of you has traveled far, so enjoy this snack as I take you next door to Santa’s workshop.”

Once they get over to the workshop, Mrs. Claus shows them around and then tells them, “I have to get back to putting the finishing touches on Santa’s suit for his upcoming trip. Santa will be here shortly, so you all can hang out hereand talk amongst yourselves until Santa gets here. I am sure you all have plenty to talk about since Christmas is finally approaching.”

With that being said, Mrs. Claus leaves the room and allows the guests to get settled. Everything is going great until the characters start talking about what order Santa invited them in and who is most important to Santa. They had no idea their selection was random.

“Well, I was obviously the first one. I lead Santa’s sleigh every Christmas, so how could he not choose me first?” Rudolph says proudly.

“You are only needed when it’s cloudy or foggy out since you have a flashlight for a nose,” the Grinch explains. “I, on the other hand, have had tremendous growth, and this is definitely my reward for finally understanding what Christmas is all about.”

“I bring so many kids joy! I have a catchy song, and so many kids build snowmen and name them after me, so there’s no way Santa didn’t pick me first,” Frosty argues.

The argument then begins to shift from who Santa picked first to which of the three of them is most loved by the children. As the argument continues to heat up, slowly, a smile creeps across the Grinch’s face. The Grinch whispers to himself,  “I know how I will show that I am the favorite. I will eliminate the competition, so all that Santa has is me.” This thought provokes the Grinch, and just then, without a second thought, the Grinch grabs a roll of wrapping paper sitting on the table next to him and throws it directly at Rudolph.

Luckily, Rudolph sees it flying at him and ducks just in time for it to nearly miss his head. In the act of frustration, Rudolph picks up the toy doll next to him and throws it at the Grinch. His aim was a lot more off than he was expecting, and instead of hitting the Grinch like he intended, he hits Frosty right on the head.

It is now a scene of complete anarchy. Wrapping paper, stuffing, toys are all flying through the air, breaking pictures on the wall, leaving dents in the ceiling, and destroying kids’ presents. In the chaos, the Grinch finds a hairdryer and turns it on, and points it right at Frosty. As more and more of Frosty is melting into water, none other than Santa Claus himself walks in the room and gets hit with a flying cookie from the plate Mrs. Claus left for them to eat.

Frosty looks down and realizes what the Grinch has done. The Grinch realizes that his actions could result in permanent damage, so he turns off the blow dryer, picks up Frosty, and takes him outside in the snow. Although Frosty is mad that it had come to this point, he is thankful that the Grinch realized how much his actions would have hurt him.

 

“THAT’S ENOUGH! EVERYONE SIT DOWN NOW,” Santa screams as his face rushes with blood. “Have we all forgotten the reason we’re here right now? It’s not about who the children love most. It’s about spreading holiday cheer and making sure these kids get the best Christmas of their lives.”

“Well, I wasn’t trying to argue with anyone; I was just explaining how all of Maryland has a national Grinch day 5 days before Christmas,” argues the Grinch. A sigh of disappointment fills the room as The Grinch’s smirk widens ear to ear.

“I don’t care what any of you thought you were doing or why you were doing it,” Santa explains. “I invited you all here because you each represent a special message to kids all over the world. You are supposed to be role models, and instead, you’re fighting with one another and not doing anything productive. If only the kids knew what you guys were doing. You should all be ashamed of yourselves.”

All the characters look around the room in shame for the way they’ve acted towards one another. A small, whimpered voice from the back of the room began to utter the words, “Santa’s right, guys.” The crowd splits as Rudolph begins to walk towards the front of the room. “We need to put aside our egos for the sake of the kids.”

Frosty, Rudolph, and the Grinch all apologize to one another and finally sit down with Santa to discuss what kind of help he needs, and they are all eager to get started. They all learned a valuable message today that it doesn’t matter what kind of disagreement is happening; fighting will only make the problems so much worse and will only create more problems in the future. More importantly, the characters also learned how much value they have to kids all over the world and have a newfound respect for themselves and for each other.

As the conversation comes to a close, all of the characters start cleaning up the mess they created so that they can get to work helping Santa plan Christmas. Now that Frosty, Rudolph, and the Grinch are all friends again, it’s time to get back on task and accomplish the task that brought them all here in the first place… SAVE CHRISTMAS!

Santa leads them into a back room which is overfilling with toys, games, stuffed animals, and so much more. The catch is, though, none of them are wrapped.

“We have got a lot of work to do, my friends,” Rudolph says as his eyes wander around the room, wondering how they would possibly complete such a daunting task.

“Where do we even start?” asks the Grinch. “There is so much stuff in here we can barely move as it is.”

“Let’s just all pick a corner of the room, and we’ll meet in the middle,” suggests Santa.

With that being said, all the characters frantically start wrapping the gifts, putting name tags on them, and placing them in Santa’s bag. Once again, wrapping paper, bows, and tissue paper are all flying around the room, but this time, in a positive manner.

6 hours later, and finally, there is just one present left for each character to wrap. Final bows are being placed, and final ribbons are being wrapped.

“Do you see what you can accomplish when working together rather than fighting?” Santa asks the group. “I want to say thank you to all of you for putting your egos aside and helping me save Christmas. I would never have been able to do it without you guys.”

“You’re welcome! And thank you for teaching us all such positive lessons today. I think we all took something out of today,” says the Grinch.

Now that all the presents have been wrapped and the task is complete, Santa invites everyone into his family room to watch a Christmas movie and relax until they all journey home tomorrow.

10 minutes into the movie, Mrs. Claus walks in to see how everyone is doing, and all four of them are sleeping on the couch.

“Must have been a tough day,” Mrs. Claus says, smiling as she shakes her head. “I’m proud of them.”

THE END

 

Rebekah Taylor, a.k.a., Bekah, is from Forest Hill, Maryland. She is a junior Health Communication major, with a minor in Business Administration.