Elf And Safety

I would have been all right, Louis thought, if his parents' farm had stayed the size it was.

He could have worked as he'd done for them before, winter weekends for the past three years, stashed the earnings, and nobody would be any the wiser.

But his mum and dad had made a success of the enterprise, to the astonishment of the rest of the family, and this year they had 1,500 Christmas trees for sale, up from the 500 they'd started with.

"By 2025, this will be our main source of revenue," Louis's dad had said.

To make a proper living while growing the farm, they still did some freelance.

PR and marketing jobs, but they longed to live full-time off the land.

It was the first Saturday of December. Customers would start flooding in shortly to choose their tree.

If his mum and dad had had Louis doing what Pavel did every year, just flogging the trees, that would have been fine.

He knew the facts which dropped needles, which ones needed regular watering, how much to discount a tree which had a flat back or wonky top.

Pavel got to walk up and down the aisles of the big open-sided warehouse and

be a spruce and fir expert.

Louis had to dress up as an elf and hand out candy canes to children.

"Love, this is not just a retail environment," his mum explained when he protested, that first year.

"This is an aspirational space where fantasy and family meet sales, and atmosphere is everything." Louis told her that a donkey pooing on the straw while children squealed with horror and delight was not atmosphere.

A loop of "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas"

on the speakers was not atmosphere, either.

"And how many years did you spend in a major PR and marketing company, Louis?" she asked him.

"None," Louis muttered.

This was an argument that he would not win.

His parents had worked together at the major PR and marketing company, and were probably good at selling stuff.