All He Wanted
For Christmas...
by Sandra Crook
For as long as
Billie could remember, he’d wanted a dog for
Christmas. Not a pedigree or anything, just a
plain old mutt. Didn’t matter what colour,
what sex…. just a dog, with a leg on each
corner and a tail.
When he was
nine or ten, he invented an imaginary dog, one
that slept on his bed, and he religiously mimed
the process of feeding it twice a day, stroking
it, putting its lead on and taking it for a walk.
His brother teased him unmercifully and his
parents just laughed.
Every
Christmas Eve he imagined that this was it. This
time, his Mum and Dad would eventually realise
that all the computer games and football strips
in the world simply couldn’t fulfil that
basic need he had. Every Christmas Eve, when his
parents went out, he was sure they’d gone to
the local dogs’ home to get one for him. He
knew there were hundreds there. He’d stay
awake, peering through the banisters when they
came home, to see whether there was a wriggling
shopping bag in their arms.
There never
was.
Then, one
Christmas Eve, their neighbours came round for a
drink, and, hiding on the landing, he saw them
carefully hand over a bulky container. A pet
carrier! A dog! He was sure of it. The neighbours
must have been hiding it for his parents.
He barely
slept all night, imagining how great Christmas
would be this year. Had they remembered to buy
dog food? A collar and a lead?
On Christmas
morning Billie and his elder brother waited
impatiently for their parents to tell them they
could come downstairs. As the clock in the hall
struck seven o’clock, the call came, and
Billie hurtled down the stairs into the sitting
room. There was a stack of presents under the
tree, including a large square container covered
with a blanket.
“Can I
Mum? Can I?” he shrieked, rushing over to
the tree.
He pulled the
blanket away with a dramatic flourish, startling
the green and yellow budgerigar in the cage
beneath.
Someone
shouted “A budgie! A miserable fuckin’
budgie! What was so hard about getting me a dog,
hey?”
Dismayed, he
recognised his own voice.
His Dad rose
and crossed the room towards him.
Christmas,
which had always been something of a
disappointment for Billie, would plumb even
greater depths this year.
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