"For Santa," she said. "Steady hands, clear voice, open heart."
The tea smelled like cinnamon and something else—something that made me think of sleigh bells and snow-covered pines.
"What's in this one?"
"Nothing you don't already have." She winked. "I'm helping concentrate it."
She vanished into the chaos before I could ask what that meant.
Ben appeared at my elbow a moment later, a screwdriver in one hand and sawdust in his hair. "Set piece is fixed. Turns out one of the carpenters' marks had... shifted."
I sipped Holly's tea. "Shifted?"
"Hard to explain. It's like the wood was waiting for permission to do something." He shook his head. "I've seen a lot of strange things during the Twelve Nights, but this year is next level."
Around us, the chaos continued: costumes being pinned, lines being run, and last-minute crises being averted through sheer force of community will. Standing there with Ben, I felt something I hadn't expected.
I was ready.
The dressing room door clicked shut behind me, and the chaos fell away.
Silence rushed in to fill the space—the dense, anticipatory quiet of a held breath. The room smelled of old woodand decades of greasepaint, traces of every performer who'd prepared within these walls. A single bulb surrounded by a ring of dead ones cast an amber glow.
The Santa suit hung waiting on its padded hanger.
I crossed to it slowly, letting my fingers brush the velvet. The red had deepened with age and use—not the garish crimson of mall Santas, but something richer—Wine-dark in the shadows, warming to holly-berry in the light. The white fur trim had been replaced more than once over the years, but the coat itself was original. Noel's father had worn it—his grandfather before that.
And now me.
I undressed methodically, folding my street clothes and setting them aside. The first layer went on easily—the padded undershirt that would give Santa his comfortable bulk. It settled around my torso with surprising weight, not uncomfortable but present. A reminder that I was building someone new over the framework of myself.
The pants came next, heavy wool with perfect pleats that spoke of Mrs. Brubaker's careful stewardship. The suspenders. The wide black belt, polished to a warm gleam, with its brass buckle.
I saved the coat for last.
The velvet whispered against my arms as I slid them through the sleeves. The weight of it settled across my shoulders like a mantle. I fastened each button slowly—mother-of-pearl, Mrs. Brubaker had told me, harvested from the river that ran through the valley a hundred years ago.
In the mirror, a stranger looked back at me.
Not quite Santa. Not quite Alex. Someone in between—in the process of becoming.
I retrieved Ben's cherry wood carving from my discarded henley and slipped it into the coat's inner pocket, positioningit over my heart. The warmth spread through the velvet immediately, subtle but unmistakable.
Maybe I'm not pretending anymore.
The thought arrived without fanfare. For fifteen years, I'd built a career on transformation—becoming Danny Zuko, becoming ensemble member number six, becoming whoever the role required.
This time it was different.
I wasn't putting on a character. I was letting something out. Something that had been there all along, buried under technique and ambition and the desperate need to prove I deserved the spotlight. The part of me that had sat on my grandmother's floor as a child, believing in magic. The part that had sung "Silent Night" to a theater full of strangers at age six, finding her face in the crowd and meaning every note.
A soft knock interrupted my thoughts. The door opened a crack, and Ben's voice came through—"Decent?"
"Depends on your definition." I turned from the mirror. "Come in."
He slipped inside and stopped, something flickering across his face. Surprise, maybe. Or wonder. He stood there looking at me in the half-buttoned coat with the beard not yet attached and the hat still on its hook.
"What?" I asked.
