A cheap present causes a shocking accident.

I used to love Christmas, especially when I woke up on Christmas day and saw a bulging stocking at the foot of my bed. Even when my grumpy middle sister informed me Father Christmas didn’t exist, I continued to be excited. Before I realised that boys were a different species, one of the best and worst Christmases I ever had was when Mum and Dad gave my two sisters and myself a hoola hoop for Christmas. The hoola hoop craze had just exploded, and it was one of the happiest moments in my life when I woke up and saw my shocking pink hoola hoop lying at the foot of my bed. My sisters were also given one, and Mum even bought one for herself. So, there we all were hoola hooping like crazy and whooping like there was no tomorrow.

After all the excitement, Mum cooked the most enormous goose, and a bucket of roast potatoes cooked in goose fat for lunch. If all that wasn’t stomach churning enough, dad then poured so much brandy over the Christmas pudding, it caught fire and for a horrible moment I thought that we would have to call the fire brigade. But luckily, dad ran out into the concrete garden, carrying the flaming pudding, still on its silver tray and threw the pudding onto the ground. Mum was furious as she had made the pudding herself, and we all ended up eating tinned peaches, but I didn’t mind as I didn’t fancy burnt pud, thank you very much.

In the evening my two sisters were chasing me round the room and pushed me on top of a dolls pram, which my grandmother had bought me for Christmas. It must have been very cheap as the pram had knife-sharp edges, and although I didn’t know it at the time, the side of my face sliced open like a split watermelon. Funnily enough, I didn’t feel a thing, but I knew something was disastrously wrong when I ran into the kitchen and saw Mum drop the frying pan (she was warming up the chestnuts).

Poor Mum almost had a heart attack. She was so shocked, she couldn't even scream, but looked all peculiar - like she had seen a ghost. She had the sense to turn off the gas, and then wrapped my face in a tea towel. Luckily, she had a doctor friend who lived in the neighbourhood, and called him up pronto. Even though it was Christmas day, he agreed to see me straight away. Poor Mum drove like a maniac to the doctor’s house, managing to hold my face together with the tea towel. She probably would have been arrested these days, as she only had one hand on the steering wheel.

The doctor was very nice and cracked stupid jokes, while he stitched me up. He said I was very brave and gave me a huge helping of homemade Christmas pudding, which he said was full of coins. I found loads of them and was so happy, although Mum wasn’t, as the doctor had stitched up the side of my face like it was a piece of leather or something. In fact, Mum and Dad wanted me to have plastic surgery to make the bumpy stitches look smoother, but I was having none of it. Nobody could see my stitches anyway unless my face blew out after I had eaten a lot of walnut cake. Then, they bulged along my jawbone like a pink row of mangled chewing gum.

After the accident, my parents made a huge fuss over me, and my sisters were full of remorse. They even gave me their precious packets of lemon sherbet which had been stuffed in our Christmas stockings as a treat. So, all in all it had been a very profitable Christmas even though I must admit, I did end up looking a bit wonky.

Copyright: Frances Lynn, 2006