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On the last day before Christmas, I hurried to go to the supermarket to buy the gifts I didn’t manage to buy earlier.
When I saw all the people there, I started to complain to myself: ‘It is going to take forever here and I still have so many other places to go…’
Christmas really is getting more and more annoying every year. How I wish I could just lie down, go to sleep and only wake up after it was over.
I started to curse the prices, wondering if kids really play with such expensive toys. While looking in the toy section, I noticed a small boy of about 5-years-old pressing a doll against his chest. He kept on touching the hair of the doll and looked so sad. I wondered who this doll was for. Then the little boy turned to the old woman next to him: ‘Granny, are you sure I don’t have enough money?’
The old lady replied: ‘You know that you don’t have enough money to buy this doll, my dear.’
Then she asked him to stay here for 5 minutes while she went to look around. She left quickly. The little boy was still holding the doll in his hand. Finally, I started to walk towards him and asked who he wanted to give this doll to.
‘It is the doll that my sister loved most and wanted so much for this Christmas. She was so sure that Santa Claus would bring it to her.’
I replied to him that maybe Santa Claus will bring it to her, after all, and not to worry. But he replied to me sadly. ‘No, Santa Claus cannot bring it to her where she is now. I have to give the doll to my mother so that she can give it to her when she goes there.’
His eyes were so sad while saying this. ‘My sister has gone to be with God. Daddy say that Mummy will also go to see God very soon, so I thought that she could bring the doll with her to give it to my sister’. My heart nearly stopped.
The little boy looked up at me and said: ‘I told daddy to tell mummy not to go yet. I asked him to wait until I come back from the supermarket.’
Then he showed me a very nice photo of him where he was laughing. He then told me, ‘I also want mummy to take this photo with her so that she will not forget me.’
‘I love my mummy and I wish she doesn’t have to leave me but daddy says that she has to go to be with my little sister’
Then he looked again at the doll with sad eyes, very quietly.
I quickly reached for my wallet and took a few notes and said to the boy. ‘What if we checked again, just in case if you have enough money?’
‘Ok’ he said. ‘I hope that I have enough.’
I added some of my money to his without him seeing and we started to count it. There was enough for the doll, and even some spare money. The little boy said: ‘Thank you God for giving me enough money’ then he looked at me and added: ‘I asked yesterday before I slept for God to make sure I have enough money to buy this doll so that mummy can give it to my sister. He heard me. I also wanted to have enough money to buy a white rose for my mummy, but I didn’t dare to ask God too much. But He gave me enough to buy the doll and the white rose. You know, my mummy loves white roses.’
A few minutes later, the old lady came again and I left with my trolley. I finished my shopping in a totally different state from when I started. I couldn’t get the little boy out of my mind. Then I remembered a local newspaper article two days ago, which mentioned of a drunk man in a truck who hit a car where there was one young lady and a little girl. The little girl died right away, and the mother was left in a critical state. The family had to decide whether to pull the plug on the life-assisting machine, because the young lady would not be able to get out of the coma. Was this the family of the little boy?
Two days after this encounter with the little boy in mind, I read in the newspaper that the young lady had passed away.
I couldn’t stop myself and went to buy a bunch of white roses and I went to the mortuary where the body of the young woman was exposed for people to see and make last wish before burial.
She was there, in her coffin, holding a beautiful white rose in her hand with the photo of the little boy and the doll placed over her chest. I left the place crying, feeling that my life had been changed forever. The love that this little boy had for his mother and his sister is still, to that day, hard to imagine.
And in a fraction of a second, a drunk man had taken all this away from him.
