As a child, magic was everywhere I went, especially when I was with my younger sister and our cousin, who lived with us in our early years. We were as thick as thieves, seeking thrills wherever we could. In department stores, we would hide between racks of clothes or under display tables, pretending these were slivers of shelter in a strange world. In the attic on the third floor of our house, where fairies or monsters lived, depending on the day. But most of all, at Christmas, when houses were dressed to the nines in candy canes, star-shaped lanterns, and twinkling lights.

The most magical part of Christmas was Santa Claus, of course. We were middle-class kids, spoiled by our parents to the best of their abilities—but we also understood that some toys were just too expensive. Whenever we pointed at a particular doll or robot or box set, our mothers would say, “Masyadong mahal, anak.”

("It's too expensive, anak.")

It was the early 2000s, and our toy budget was one hundred pesos each. My mum recalls me at five years old in Toy Kingdom, shouting at the top of my little lungs, “Mommy, ito oh, 99 pesos lang, mas mababa sa 100!” She said she was equal parts embarrassed and amused that I didn’t seem to mind broadcasting her thriftiness for the entire store to hear. For the toys we couldn’t afford, we were told to put them on our lists for Santa Claus.

("Mommy, this one is only 99 pesos, it's less than 100!")

As kids, we fully believed in the jolly, red-clad man who rewarded good children with the toys their hearts desired. Santa didn’t worry about price tags in our magical little world. He didn’t have to budget or apologise for not affording what was on our wishlists. Maybe that’s why, when we received those once “impossible” toys—Baby Alive dolls, Hot Wheels race tracks, Barbies in fancy outfits, Play-Doh sets—our belief in Santa only grew stronger.

After all, how else could we get those things when our mums themselves said they couldn’t afford them? It helped that the cookies and milk we left out on Christmas Eve always vanished by morning, crumbs scattered across the placemat, the glass drained.

Then I turned eight, and everything changed.

My family went through a rough patch that overturned everything I thought was solid. We left our three-storey house on the aptly named Rainbow Street. My sister and I said goodbye to our cousin Karlo and our aunt Ninang Malou, and we moved into a studio apartment. We left our private Catholic school and transferred to a nearby public school. Everything seemed to shift too fast for my little brain to make sense of it.

Where would I look for fairies now that we didn’t have an attic? Would games still be as fun without our cousin?

We moved mid-year, and amid all the instability, I looked forward to Christmas more than ever. I believed I had been a good kid that year. I took the move in stride, consoled my little sister when she cried the first time Mommy left us alone in the apartment to go to work. I learned to cook rice and fry eggs, lopsided and oversalted as they were. I felt grown-up. But maybe, just maybe, Christmas would let me be a child again.

It was nighttime when my mum told me the truth. She had just come home from work, exhausted. I remember the cold air and the thin blanket in the bed that we shared, with my sister between us. Mum asked if I was excited for Christmas. I said yes, even if things were different. Surely Santa could find our new address.

She gently said, “Anak, hindi naman totoo si Santa Claus. Kaya tayong tatlo lang sa Pasko. Wala nang regalo galing kay Santa.”

("Anak, Santa Claus isn't real. So it's just going to be us three for Christmas. And there won't be a present from Santa.")

I didn’t understand at first. How could we have received those presents before, then?

She explained that she had saved up to buy us what we wanted, and that she would have happily done so again this year. But we were struggling with money, and she couldn’t afford to buy two gifts for each of us: one from her, and one from Santa.

I let a few tears slip, but I didn’t want to cry. I was a big girl now. I shouldn’t cry over something as silly as Santa. But looking back, I wasn’t really crying about the loss of gifts. I was mourning the end of a magical chapter. The last thread to a brighter, more secure time had snapped.

Worse, I felt betrayed. It was probably the first lie my mother had admitted to telling me.

As a child, finding out your parent lied to you can feel earth-shaking. What else had they hidden? Suddenly, the world isn't as bright. Santa wasn’t real. My mum had lied. Life could change in the blink of an eye, with real houses crumbling faster than gingerbread ones.

But growing older brought a new kind of understanding and a deeper kind of magic.

I realised that maybe magic was real. Not in a bearded man from the North Pole, but in the way my mother worked tirelessly to make Christmas feel special. In the way she scrimped and saved to buy us the toys she never had growing up. In the way she set up the cookies and milk, read our wishlists, and paid attention, not just to what we wanted, but to who we were becoming.

Even now, as I write this, my mother is out helping at a family store for the holidays. She's still supporting us, working as an accountant. I’ve graduated. I have a job. But she’s still here, still holding it all together.

And I feel more blessed with Christmas magic than I ever did as a child.

Who needs Santa, really? In my humble opinion, that old chap is a bit overrated. He gets the credit for gifts that parents, ninongs, and ninangs worked hard to buy.

Give me my mum any day. She's as jolly as Santa, as sweet as Christmas cookies, and as bright as the lights that dance on the eaves and stairways of every home that’s ever held love.