The Secret Santa Project

Chapter 5

Jolene couldn’t have been more excited, if also slightly nervous, as she carefully unpacked her personal laptop from her bag the following Monday morning.

She’d spent the whole weekend preparing her presentation. She hoped her idea would go down well. In the absence of any clear direction on what they would be discussing regarding Christmas in the team meeting, she’d decided to think about how she could contribute to the celebration of Christmas within the department. She thought this would be a really good way to show she was a good asset to the team. That she was keen to get involved and fit in. And she was good at organising stuff like that. She’d been social secretary of her college and she’d done a great job of it. Everyone said so. She’d taken care to avoid the usual ways she envisaged that co-workers celebrate Christmas in London. Ice skating at Somerset House, themed party nights in Soho restaurants, listening to carols in St Paul’s. Surely someone would have come up with one of those ideas already. No, she needed to complement whatever plans were already in place, not tread on the toes of someone who may already have organised something.

She’d looked in the mirror before she left. She’d put on what she deemed to be a subtle Christmas jumper today since she’d not spotted anyone else in the building wearing any festive attire on her first day. This one had silver snowflakes and gold baubles on it and was devoid of any Disney magic. Much more discreet. She’d save her more full-on Christmas clothing for closer to the big day.

‘Morning everyone,’ said Diane, once they had all gathered round the small meeting table in her office. ‘When did you go for a Starbucks?’ she asked Jerry, when she spotted his branded paper cup.

‘I got it on my way in. I think I’m going to talk to the Union rep about getting the kettle in the kitchen reinstated. I’m going to be bankrupt and very fat by the end of the year if I keep going to Starbucks and buying their Eggnog Latte. I could sue! It’s just outrageously priced, but outrageously good.’

‘Can I try some?’ asked Yang.

‘If you like,’ shrugged Jerry.

Yang took a sip and pulled a face.

‘Does it have egg in it? It tastes weird.’

‘I doubt an Eggnog Latte has egg in it, no.’

‘I don’t even know what eggnog is,’ said Yang.

‘Typically, in America, it’s rum or brandy mixed with beaten egg, milk and sugar. But I suspect in Starbucks it’ll be fake stuff and no alcohol,’ said Jerry.

‘So fake egg, fake milk and fake sugar and no alcohol – so not really eggnog then?’ said Yang.

‘No,’ replied Jerry. ‘Us Americans are pretty good at faking everything, including Christmas!’

‘Right, shall we crack on?’ said Diane. ‘Good to see you back in, Barney. Did you do anything special with your day off?’

Barney leaned back slowly in his chair, blinking at Diane. As Jolene had correctly surmised, he was in his sixties: a short, rotund man in a short-sleeved shirt and a sleeveless jumper. Jerry had introduced them earlier, Barney greeting Jolene with a grunt and a pointed repositioning of the framed photo on his desk. Jolene had been moved to sit at the meeting table in the corner whilst they awaited news of her own desk from Facilities. The chair she had been given was hard and unsupportive, and she was already missing Barney’s cushioned high-backed chair with headrest. She wouldn’t complain, though. Especially not to Barney. She hadn’t seen him smile yet.

Barney coughed. ‘I went to the cemetery,’ he said.

Jolene watched as everyone at the table looked at each other rather than Barney. There was an awkward silence.

‘It’s three years,’ Barney finally said, looking down at the floor.

‘Oh God,’ said Diane, ‘I’m so sorry. Is it really?’

‘Barney, that’s terrible. I’m so sorry,’ added Jerry.

‘Three years already?’ gasped Stacey. ‘Sorry, Barney.’

‘I’m really sorry,’ said Yang, momentarily putting his hand on Barney’s shoulder.

Barney nodded, not raising his head.

‘Er, I’m sorry too,’ said Jolene. ‘Whatever it is, I’m so sorry that you’re sad.’

‘Barney’s wife, Linda, passed away three years ago,’ Diane told Jolene.

‘Oh gosh,’ said Jolene, her hand leaping to her face. ‘So sorry. So, so sorry.’

Yet another awkward silence.

‘Right, well,’ said Diane eventually, ‘as I said, glad to have you back in, Barney.’

Barney nodded and took a sip from his tea mug.

‘OK, so we’d better begin,’ sighed Diane. ‘Lots to get through, including Christmas. So shall we start with you, Stacey? This week’s numbers on utilities, please.’

‘Yes, yes, of course,’ said Stacey, fumbling with a folder. She passed a spreadsheet round and proceeded to talk through it. Jolene desperately tried to follow what she was highlighting, but the acronyms came thick and fast, and she looked up at one point, at a loss as to what was going on. Diane caught her eye and she held her hand up to halt Stacey mid-flow.

‘After this meeting, Stacey, will you take Jolene through this sheet separately, explain the KPIs and give her a glossary of the key terms?’ she asked.

Stacey looked at Diane with her mouth slightly open. Then gave a very small sigh. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Of course.’

‘Gosh, thank you,’ said Jolene. ‘I am struggling to keep up.’

A multitude of spreadsheets containing a maze of numbers were passed around over the next hour. The foreign language continued to be spoken, interspersed with deep sighs and puffing of cheeks, so that Jolene assumed, whatever the pages of numbers told them, it was not good news. She made notes of anything that she was able to grasp, but she doubted any of them would make sense when she read them back.

Eventually they seemed to come to the end of the spreadsheet extravaganza. Diane turned round in her seat and dumped the sheets in her in-tray. Then rolled her sleeves and said the magic words.

‘Right, let’s get onto Christmas, shall we?’

Jolene perked up in her seat and smoothed down the snowflakes on her jumper.

‘So, as you know, the leader of the council has asked us to review the budgets for next year as we need to find some serious savings. All sorts of measures are being looked at, but he’s asked us particularly to do a review of what we’re spending on Christmas this year and analyse if we think we’re getting value for money.’

‘Does that mean he’s considering cancelling Christmas out of next year’s budget?’ asked Jerry.

‘Yes,’ stated Diane. ‘I believe so. Unless we can prove that it’s essential expenditure.’

Jolene gasped. Her hand even flew to her mouth.

‘But you can’t cancel Christmas,’ she said.

She watched as Stacey gave a small smile, Jerry looked away, and Yang and Barney raised their eyebrows.

She turned to Diane for an answer, panic rising in her throat.

Diane stared back at her for a moment, then carried on.

‘We will conduct a full and fair audit of this year’s Christmas spend, assessing all expenditure to include the High Street lights and decorations, wage bill for erection and dismantling, electricity costs, the Christmas tree in the square, the light switch-on event, including marketing, security, fencing, litter collection, cost of celebrity switch-on …’

Yang burst out laughing. ‘I’d hardly call the first person to get chucked off Love Island a celebrity,’ he said.

‘Oh, Henry was just unlucky,’ Jolene couldn’t help saying. ‘He was the nicest one in there by far, just that no one fancied him.’

‘Right,’ said Diane. ‘Thank you for that, Jolene. Where was I …?’

‘Because he was ginger,’ added Jolene. ‘All the girls were very shallow this year.’

‘Right, thank you,’ said Diane. ‘So would you say the thousand-pound fee we gave him to switch on the lights was a good use of taxpayers’ money?’

Jolene had no idea.

‘We spent similar on an expert who occasionally appears on Antiques Roadshow , last year,’ said Stacey. ‘I mean, who watches Antiques Roadshow ?’

‘I do,’ said Jerry.

‘Oh, right,’ said Stacey. ‘Sorry.’

‘We don’t have antiques in the States,’ said Jerry flatly. ‘You have no idea how lucky you are.’

‘Anyway – moving on,’ said Diane. ‘Stacey and Yang, can you two set up and complete the audit? Get all the costs in and don’t forget to include the out-of-season costs, such as storage and maintenance. And then you need to look at how we evaluate the return on our investment in Christmas. What does all that cost achieve? There will of course be tangible benefits, such as increased traffic to the High Street, increased revenue on switch-on night, but you will also need to look at more intangible benefits such as media coverage, satisfaction scores and anything else you can think of. Any ideas anyone?’

Everyone stared back blankly apart from Jolene, who looked at each of the faces in confused wonder.

‘Jolene?’ said Diane. ‘You look like you’ve got something to say.’

‘Well, er, it brings happiness, doesn’t it? That is surely a major benefit.’

Everyone looked at her as though she had two heads. Apart from Yang.

‘I mean, I don’t celebrate Christmas, as you know,’ he said. ‘But I always thought that was the intention: to bring happiness.’

‘Of course it is,’ said Jolene. ‘And … and … what better thing to spend taxpayers’ money on … than bringing happiness?’

Diane, Jerry, Stacey continued to look at her as though a reindeer had just appeared in the building.

‘She does have a point,’ said Yang. ‘Really no one can complain about spending council tax income on happiness, can they?’

Diane threw her head back and laughed. A hearty, throaty laugh.

‘I can really see that justification going down a storm at the next council meeting. “Sorry, guys, we’ve got no money because we’ve spent it all on happiness,”’ she said. ‘Get a grip, Yang. You should know better. No one wants to see a headline that we’re all more cheerful because we put fairy lights up in the High Street. They want to see lower waiting times at hospitals, better school facilities, lower car parking charges. In any case, we can’t put a value on happiness, can we?’ Diane looked directly at Jolene.

‘Is that because it is priceless?’ she uttered, thinking that Diane was waiting for her to comment and she didn’t know what else to say.

Diane blinked back at her.

‘I guess it is,’ she said quietly.

‘Linda always loved the lights in the High Street,’ said Barney, looking far into the distance. ‘When they used to be good, of course,’ he said. ‘Back in the day they were amazing, a sight to behold. Not any more. They’ve hardly been worth having since the last time the budget was slashed.’

‘Thank you, Barney,’ said Diane. ‘That’s exactly what we need to try and assess. Are they worth having? So, Stacey, Yang, you get cracking. I suggest you get out and about and walk the streets. Take some inventory photos in situ. Get an assessment of the impact of the decorations. Might be worth going to some neighbouring boroughs. See how we compare. How do we stand up against our other councils? You should also talk to your counterparts in other areas, see what they’re spending. That would be a useful comparison. Do you want to do that, Yang?’

‘Sure,’ said Yang, writing in his notepad. ‘I’ll phone Craig over at Westminster. He’ll be able to give me some numbers.’

‘Make sure they are actual figures, not just Craig figures,’ piped up Stacey. ‘You know what he’s like.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked Yang, looking confused. ‘What is he like?’

‘Averagely good at his job. That’s what he’s like.’

Yang shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘He’s a really smart guy, actually. If you spoke to him you’d realise he’s really nice.’

‘Oh, yeah, really nice. He took the job I wanted.’

‘I’m sure he didn’t do it on purpose,’ said Yang.

‘Perhaps not. But he only got it because they wanted someone full time rather than flexitime. He had an unfair advantage,’ said Stacey.

‘What do you mean, unfair?’ asked Yang.

‘Because he’s male, of course.’

‘He can’t help being male,’ replied Yang, looking round the table for support.

‘That’s what they all say, these males,’ said Stacey. ‘They can’t help it when they give a totally unfair advantage to all men in the job market by creating working conditions that totally exclude all the women out there who are desperately trying to have a career whilst also trying to raise kids. You have no idea how lucky you are to be born male,’ Stacey said to Yang.

Yang bit his lip. ‘I’m sorry for being male,’ he said, swallowing. ‘Truly I am.’

‘I don’t think you need to take it out on Yang,’ interjected Diane. ‘I keep telling my counterparts in other councils how offering more flexitime can work wonders for recruitment, but it’s a slow process.’

‘I know, I know,’ said Stacey. ‘I’m sorry. And I can never thank you enough for allowing me to work the hours I do. You get it. But that’s because you’ve been through it. You understand that I can’t leave after 4 p.m., even if it is the most important meeting ever. I can’t leave my daughter at the school gate wondering where I am. It just winds me up that men don’t get that. They still don’t.’

‘Well, we’re not going to solve the problem of what men don’t get at this meeting,’ said Diane, gathering up her papers and tapping them on the table. ‘Now, can you two, Stacey and Yang, play nicely and I’d like to see a full report on the value of Christmas on my desk before we finish for the holidays. The powers that be are looking to us to make a recommendation as to whether or not to cancel Christmas next year and use it as a major cost saving. So the review must be thorough and robust. Understood?’

‘Yes, Diane,’ they both muttered.

‘Right. Is there any other business or are we all done?’ Diane asked.

Jolene looked around desperately. Was that it? Was that the Christmas discussion? Surely not? That the department she had arrived in was looking at whether to cancel her beloved Christmas? This was a total disaster. And weren’t they going to talk about what the department was going to do to celebrate Christmas? She so wanted to be a part of it all and it hadn’t even been mentioned!

‘Yes,’ piped up Jerry. ‘Speaking of Christmas.’

Jolene held her breath. Maybe this was it. Maybe this was the Christmas discussion she had been waiting for.

‘We need to make sure the office is covered between Christmas and New Year so—’

‘Please don’t put me on over Christmas,’ said Stacey. ‘I might hate it but I at least want to spend it with my daughter.’

‘I’ll do it,’ said Yang, looking furtively at Stacey.

‘You did it last year, Yang. I’ll do it,’ said Jerry. ‘I’ll be on my own anyway, so I might as well get paid to be lonely at Christmas.’

‘I said I’d do it and I’ll do it,’ said Yang firmly.

Everyone looked at the floor. There was an awkward silence.

‘OK,’ said Diane. ‘Shall I call this meeting to a close?’

Jolene could feel her heart beating really fast. She was starting to panic. ‘But … but … what about Christmas?’ she said.

‘We’ve done Christmas,’ stated Diane.

‘No, I mean, what about what we’re going to do for Christmas? I mean … I was assuming that when you said Christmas was on the agenda then we’d be talking about how you … we celebrate Christmas – you know, as a team?’

‘Oh,’ said Diane, looking startled. ‘Well, of course, yes. Well, we all have coffee together on our last day before we break up. Yes, we have Christmas Coffee, which you will of course be invited to. Oh, and we do all try to wear a Christmas jumper that day, don’t we?’ she added.

‘I thought we decided to ditch that idea after last year,’ moaned Jerry. ‘It was such a pain finding one that matched anything I owned.’

‘Christmas Coffee?’ questioned Jolene.

‘Oh, and we also said we’d have Eggnog Lattes this year,’ said Jerry. ‘Last year’s mulled-wine-flavoured herbal tea really did not hit the spot.’

‘I don’t think I can drink that stuff,’ said Yang, pointing at Jerry’s cardboard cup.

‘Can we claim it on expenses, because I can’t afford fancy coffee at Christmas? Not with everything else,’ said Stacey.

Jolene couldn’t believe her ears. A Christmas coffee? That was their sum total of celebrating Christmas with the people they spend the majority of their lives with. This could not be right.

‘Don’t you go for an evening out or ice skating or something like that?’ asked Jolene tentatively.

‘We used to,’ said Jerry. ‘Then we could never get a night when everyone was free or agree on what we wanted to do, so we gave up.’

‘It just got too hard,’ said Diane to Jolene. ‘Everyone is so busy. It’s such a frantic time of year.’

Jolene felt like crying. Last year with her college friends, on the last day of term, they had all hired elf costumes and done a pub crawl around York before descending on a cinema that was showing her favourite film ever – Elf . It had been a brilliant night. One of the best. And now here she was, her first Christmas in the world of work and she wasn’t going to celebrate with her new colleagues. Her absolute favourite time of year. All offices celebrated Christmas together in some way, surely? How could they dismiss Christmas so readily?

‘Of course, if you’d like to organise something then I’m sure everyone would be willing,’ Diane said to Jolene.

‘Oh, yeah,’ said Stacey, ‘but just bear in mind that I can’t get a babysitter for love nor money, and I can’t afford anything fancy. I mean, there is literally nothing I would love more than going to one of those party nights laid on for Christmas – you know, one of those really fancy ones in a London landmark – but I just can’t.’

‘Yeah, and as I said before, I don’t really do Christmas, so nothing too Christmassy, you know,’ said Yang.

Jerry nodded. ‘I don’t do cheesy or tacky, so please no weird stuff with elves or anything. Actually, I think I might have a phobia of elves, so please just avoid elves, whatever you do.’

‘And nothing that takes a load of time,’ added Diane. ‘Christmas is frantic when you have kids arriving home, relatives making demands, a husband who quite frankly is as useful as a chocolate elf. No, nothing that takes time up. I just haven’t got time!’

‘OK,’ nodded Jolene, taking a deep breath. ‘So cheap, not time consuming, not too Christmassy and no elves.’ She paused. ‘I think I have the perfect thing,’ she said, opening up her laptop and turning it round to face the team.

They stared back at her open mouthed. She took a deep breath and began.

‘I know I’m new at this whole workplace thing, but I thought we would be discussing how, as colleagues, we might celebrate the festive season, so I kind of did a bit of thinking myself.’

Her co-workers mostly looked confused and vaguely exasperated.

‘I mean, it does seem now that in actual fact none of you are very keen on Christmas, but maybe you have forgotten the real meaning of Christmas. I mean, it is the season to be jolly, after all,’ she pressed on.

Diane looked at her watch. Jolene thought she had better hurry along.

‘Anyway, I had an idea. As my contribution to the Christmas celebrations. I thought maybe we could do something as simple as …’ she paused before she pressed the button to display her first slide, ‘… THE SECRET SANTA PROJECT.’

Everyone groaned, apart from Yang.

‘I thought I said cheap,’ exclaimed Stacey.

‘Bloody hell,’ said Diane, putting her head into her hands. ‘Not another present to buy!’

‘We tried it a few years ago,’ said Jerry. ‘Do you remember? I put my tin of Christmas-pudding-flavoured tea bags straight in the bin. What a waste of time and money.’

‘I remember,’ said Barney, nodding. ‘I got Clare, who used to work here. She was very upset with the chocolate-covered peanuts. How was I to know she had a nut allergy? She accused the whole department of trying to kill her.’

‘Oh, I remember now,’ added Diane. ‘It was an utter disaster. Somehow Jack got missed out and got really upset. You found him crying in the loos, didn’t you, Jerry?’

‘That’s right. Took me forty minutes to get him out. I thought I’d never get the smell of urine off my clothes. We said never again, didn’t we?’

‘We did,’ said Diane. ‘Never again.’

‘What is a Secret Santa Project?’ asked Yang.

‘Well, this is a bit different from the normal Secret Santa,’ said Jolene, feeling her heart pounding in her chest. She flicked to the next slide. ‘Just let me explain. It’s not like the one you tried, which I’m guessing you all put your names in a hat, each picked one out and then bought that person a gift under a certain price limit?’

‘Pwoaff,’ said Barney. ‘No one sticks to that. The chocolates I got I’d seen in Poundland and everyone was supposed to spend a fiver.’

‘A fiver!’ shrieked Stacey. ‘Can’t we all just go to Poundland?’ She adopted a sulky frown. ‘Jesus, this is all I need. I still haven’t sorted Grace’s donkey tail.’

‘You don’t even have to go to Poundland,’ said Jolene. ‘In this version, rather than buy a gift, you do some act of kindness for the person you pick out the hat. Doesn’t need to cost anything at all. Christmas shouldn’t be about spending money on pointless presents nobody wants. You must know each other really well and I bet you can all think of something that costs nothing but would bring one of your colleagues some Christmas joy.’

‘I’d rather go to Poundland,’ said Stacey flatly. ‘I really don’t have time for this.’

‘You have time to go to Poundland and buy some cheap tat that absolutely no one needs, but you don’t have time to think of something nice to do for a colleague?’ said Jerry, turning on her. ‘I don’t want some cheap body spray in plastic packaging that will live in a drawer until next Christmas, or some chocolate that tastes like soil, or a mug with a dodgy logo on it that will sit at the back of a cupboard until the end of time. If I get you,’ he said, pointing at Stacey, ‘I know exactly what I could do for you that would bring you a huge amount of joy.’

‘What? How? How can you have thought of something already?’ replied Stacey.

‘Because I listen. I know you. I know what you need. Dead simple,’ replied Jerry. ‘I could probably make your Christmas and it would cost me nothing at all.’

‘That’s exactly it!’ exclaimed Jolene, beaming at Jerry. ‘When you know each other well it’s dead easy to think of something that would bring real cheer to your lives. Not with gifts but with a kind thought. A gesture. A promise. Don’t you think?’

Jolene looked round expectantly. Jerry looked up for it. He clearly got it. Stacey looked extremely pissed off, if a little curious that Jerry potentially held the key to making her Christmas. Yang looked worried. But maybe that was what his resting face always was. Barney had zoned out. He was gazing at the floor, twiddling his thumbs, clearly having decided he’d made his contribution to the conversation and any further input would have no impact at all so he may as well not bother. As for Diane? Well, Jolene couldn’t tell. Diane looked deep in thought. Her brow was deeply furrowed under her perfectly made-up face. Perhaps she had thought of what would make her Christmas and it was nothing to do with expensive gifts or outings.

‘OK,’ said Diane eventually. ‘Let’s do it. You’re in charge, Jolene. Make sure everyone is aware of the rules, set out your terms of reference, deadlines, etc. Let’s have a go at seeing if we can make each other’s Christmases, shall we?’ She raised her eyebrows.

Jolene clapped her hands together in joy. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I’ll manage it, don’t you worry. Provide support, ideas, whatever it takes. Shall we do the draw now?’ she asked, unable to contain her excitement.

‘Yep – let’s get it over with,’ said Diane. ‘See exactly which members of the team we’re going to deliver Christmas joy to.’

Jolene wasn’t sure if she was being just a tiny bit sarcastic.

‘Great,’ said Jolene, ripping a sheet of A4 paper off her pad. ‘Six names, right?’

When she had written everyone’s name on a scrap of the paper, she folded up the six pieces tightly. She put them in the middle of the table. ‘So we each pick one.’

‘What happens if you pick your own name?’ asked Yang.

‘Oh, I’m not sure,’ replied Jolene.

‘I’d keep quiet if I were you,’ said Stacey. ‘Save yourself a load of hassle. You’ll have done yourself a favour pulling your own name out of a hat.’

‘We’ll just start again if that happens to anyone,’ said Diane. ‘Right, shall we get on with it? I do have another meeting to go to. I’ll go first, shall I?’ She reached out and grabbed a piece of paper. She opened it up and nodded, putting the piece of paper behind her on her desk without showing any emotion at all.

‘I’ll go next,’ said Yang.

‘Why you?’ exclaimed Stacey.

‘Oh, I’m so sorry, would you like to go next?’

‘No, you carry on, Yang,’ she said. ‘Put yourself first.’

He awkwardly reached out and took another piece of folded paper. ‘Oh shit,’ he muttered when he read the name. He blew his cheeks out, looking terrified.

‘Hope that wasn’t me,’ said Stacey, reaching for one of the remaining names. She opened hers.

‘Bloody hell,’ she said. ‘Utterly impossible.’ She glared at Jolene and folded her arms in a huff.

‘Go on, Jerry,’ said Jolene, giving him a nudge. ‘Your turn.’

‘Not sure I want to know, given the reaction of the previous two,’ he said, unfolding his piece of paper. He shook his head slightly when he read it. ‘Could be better, could be worse,’ he said.

‘Barney?’ said Jolene.

He gave a huge sigh and selected one of the two pieces of paper left. He looked at the name then screwed it back up and put it in his trouser pocket. He returned to studying the carpet whilst twiddling his thumbs.

Jolene picked up the remaining piece of paper and unfolded it. She kept a poker face and folded it up again. She would have to wait and see what she could do with that one.

‘Are we done now?’ asked Diane rather impatiently.

‘So just so I’m clear,’ said Yang. ‘We need to think of something that will make the person’s Christmas. And it shouldn’t be a physical present and it doesn’t need to cost anything?’

‘That’s it,’ said Jolene. ‘An act of kindness. Something that will bring some Christmas joy.’

‘Mm,’ said Yang, deep in thought.

‘I can’t believe we’re doing this,’ said Stacey.

‘Oh, and we should decide our deadline for exchanging our Secret Santa good deeds.’

Diane stared back at her. Jolene knew that look. Bizarrely, she often saw it on the faces of people she was talking to and she didn’t really understand why. It was the look of someone losing patience very rapidly.

‘How about over Christmas Coffee, on our last day? Let’s do it then?’ suggested Jerry.

‘If it’s something that is better done before then, then that’s fine,’ said Jolene. ‘It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that you do it.’

‘OK, done,’ said Diane, getting up and grabbing her things.

‘Just one more tiny thing?’ said Jolene quietly.

‘What?’ said Diane, raising her eyebrows to a whole new level.

‘Merry Christmas.’