LETTER TO SANTA
Dear Santa,
Today my best friend Chris came to me and told me that his mom and dad are making him move away. He is my best friend in the whole wide world. I only want one wish, and I will never ever ask you for anything ever again. I wish that you would make my friend's parents want to stay here so we can stay together forever Santa. Please, I love my friend and I don’t want to live without him.
Jamie
P.S. My mom says you are diabetic so she put out sugar free cookies and a bottle of water for you, but don’t worry, as soon as she goes to bed I will put out some real cookies that look exactly the same. She’s the diabetic one but she isn’t eating them so it won’t matter. I know you aren’t diabetic. I will also add some sugar to the water, but that is the best I can do for you.
P.P.S. My mom also says the reindeer don’t need anything to eat as they eat only magic dust but that doesn’t make sense. I went into her greenhouse and chopped up as much as I could of all the plants she was growing in there. I think they were called orchids, but she won’t mind. They are pretty and the reindeer might appreciate them. Mom says they are the rarest of all orchids, so something that special has to be close to magic, right? Anyway, I climbed up on the roof earlier and put them in eight different boxes so each reindeer could have their own plate.
Jamie
Jamie read the letter twice to make sure it was fine before he finally folded it up and put it in the envelope. He got a little papercut on his tongue when he licked the envelope flap, but he considered it a small price to pay for such an important request to Santa. Since his daddy had died two years before in Afghanistan, Jamie was feeling a little desperate because all he had left now were his mother and his best friend Chris.
Life is hard when you are eight years old and everything is constantly changing. First his daddy died, then they had to move out of their house to a small trailer park. His mom had managed to save her small portable greenhouse and her flowers and moved it with them. Chris had to ride his bike to come see him now. Jamie couldn’t go over to his place anymore because mean Mr. Johnson had run over his bike when they first moved and his mother couldn’t afford to buy him a new one. His mom had told Mr. Johnson he should buy Jamie a new bike, but the man had just sneered at her before he slammed the door in her face; all while he was shouting for her to go away before he shot her with his shotgun.
In a town of only four thousand people, there was no semblance of privacy which meant that even while everyone felt sorry for the McCormick family no one ever really bothered trying to help out. They were always too busy trying to help themselves. Jamie was made fun of at school now for being poor, having a dead daddy and a best friend who loved to pick fights with people, especially those who picked on little Jamie.
Jamie, however, did not pay much attention to these things because at least he still had his mom and his best friend Chris.
That is, he did have his best friend until a week before Christmas.
***
Jamie was outside stringing up a small set of lights around the silver metal Christmas tree his mom had thrown away. He had rescued it from the trash and was now decorating it with some of their leftover Christmas decorations. They had too much to fit inside their little trailer and most of it was left in boxes. His mom said she would take them to their storage unit later when she could afford time off work and could borrow a car. As it was she had to walk two miles every day to get to work at the diner as well as the two miles to get home. She would sleep a few hours, then go to her part-time job at a seedy little motel that was just down the road from their trailer park. She cleaned the six rooms before going home and returning to sleep.
Eight-year-old Jamie would open a can of vegetables or ravioli or whatever was available at
Dear Santa,
Today my best friend Chris came to me and told me that his mom and dad are making him move away. He is my best friend in the whole wide world. I only want one wish, and I will never ever ask you for anything ever again. I wish that you would make my friend's parents want to stay here so we can stay together forever Santa. Please, I love my friend and I don’t want to live without him.
Jamie
P.S. My mom says you are diabetic so she put out sugar free cookies and a bottle of water for you, but don’t worry, as soon as she goes to bed I will put out some real cookies that look exactly the same. She’s the diabetic one but she isn’t eating them so it won’t matter. I know you aren’t diabetic. I will also add some sugar to the water, but that is the best I can do for you.
P.P.S. My mom also says the reindeer don’t need anything to eat as they eat only magic dust but that doesn’t make sense. I went into her greenhouse and chopped up as much as I could of all the plants she was growing in there. I think they were called orchids, but she won’t mind. They are pretty and the reindeer might appreciate them. Mom says they are the rarest of all orchids, so something that special has to be close to magic, right? Anyway, I climbed up on the roof earlier and put them in eight different boxes so each reindeer could have their own plate.
Jamie
Jamie read the letter twice to make sure it was fine before he finally folded it up and put it in the envelope. He got a little papercut on his tongue when he licked the envelope flap, but he considered it a small price to pay for such an important request to Santa. Since his daddy had died two years before in Afghanistan, Jamie was feeling a little desperate because all he had left now were his mother and his best friend Chris.
Life is hard when you are eight years old and everything is constantly changing. First his daddy died, then they had to move out of their house to a small trailer park. His mom had managed to save her small portable greenhouse and her flowers and moved it with them. Chris had to ride his bike to come see him now. Jamie couldn’t go over to his place anymore because mean Mr. Johnson had run over his bike when they first moved and his mother couldn’t afford to buy him a new one. His mom had told Mr. Johnson he should buy Jamie a new bike, but the man had just sneered at her before he slammed the door in her face; all while he was shouting for her to go away before he shot her with his shotgun.
In a town of only four thousand people, there was no semblance of privacy which meant that even while everyone felt sorry for the McCormick family no one ever really bothered trying to help out. They were always too busy trying to help themselves. Jamie was made fun of at school now for being poor, having a dead daddy and a best friend who loved to pick fights with people, especially those who picked on little Jamie.
Jamie, however, did not pay much attention to these things because at least he still had his mom and his best friend Chris.
That is, he did have his best friend until a week before Christmas.
***
Jamie was outside stringing up a small set of lights around the silver metal Christmas tree his mom had thrown away. He had rescued it from the trash and was now decorating it with some of their leftover Christmas decorations. They had too much to fit inside their little trailer and most of it was left in boxes. His mom said she would take them to their storage unit later when she could afford time off work and could borrow a car. As it was she had to walk two miles every day to get to work at the diner as well as the two miles to get home. She would sleep a few hours, then go to her part-time job at a seedy little motel that was just down the road from their trailer park. She cleaned the six rooms before going home and returning to sleep.
Eight-year-old Jamie would open a can of vegetables or ravioli or whatever was available at
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