The Day the Magic Died

It happened
on his ninth Christmas.

The boy had written
to Santa Claus
and had asked for
a basketball.
But there were no
spherical shapes
under the tree that night.

He examined his present ─
a flat, rectangular box
wrapped in Christmas colors.
He knew it was his, because
it came with a card
from Santa Claus,
addressed to him.

He read the card,
and began to
notice the note's
handwriting; clear
printed letters
slanted at a certain angle,
and the way the letter G
looked like the number 6,
and the way the Z was written
European-style,
with a small bar across it.

Inside the boy's head,
several little worker elves
began turning the cogs,
gears, and wheels
in his brain.
And then the elves
suddenly vanished
in a puff of smoke,
leaving the boy with
a sinking feeling in his stomach,
when he realized that
Santa Claus's handwriting
looked exactly like his mother's.