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Santa and Snowman sat in Second Class sharing sandwiches and a bottle of Coke. It was Christmas Day, and it wasn’t snowing. Since passing through Wanstead, Santa had needed a piss badly, but the thought of the British Rail toilet lapping with seasonal vomit kept him in his seat. Snowman felt windy on the Coke bubbles, so that a putrid steamy mist hung around the pair like stale slippers.
Santa passed a Marmite sandwich to Snowman. ‘Hot, isn’t it?’ said Santa. ‘Hot enough to bake a crumpet and still have hot left over.’
Snowman sucked on his Marmite. The saltiness was bad for him, but it was too late to be bothered by that. ‘Hot enough to press trousers without an iron,’ he said, slightly smeared in brown sticky. So saying, his finger slipped plaintively down his tie, landing in a pool in his lap. ‘Well, look at that. My finger’s fucked.’
‘Ho, Ho, Ho,’ said Santa badly.
Two hours later, the train stopped. Santa and Snowman stayed on board and waited for the guard, but he didn’t come. He was probably out guarding with other guards, they thought; and they waited some more. Eventually no one came, so they pissed out the train window playing furthees. Santa won, of course, because he had a longer cock and that made hitting the stingers easier. Santa celebrated with a punch and a swig of Coke that ran down his beard like tar.
The train clicked and creaked in the heat. The seats breathed dust, and the floors sweated oily sick-brine. Outside were stingers, nothing but magnificent stingers. Tall as trees and thick as rock, they punctured the sky with flowery barbs while ragged worker rats pecked at the vicious fruits. England is shit.
It is Christmas 2040, and most of us are dead. Our ships and shoes are dead, and our books and our poems are dead. Our animals are manimal: part person, part creature; like the worker rats and the Fondles. Only our favourite characters survive: Thomas the Tank, Jane Eyre, Eeyore, Jill who went with Jack, and, of course, Santa and Snowman. They live under the unrelenting sun in the shade of the stingers, while the planet pants and stinks of baked flesh, Marmite, and Coke.
January 1, 2017