The One who sees you – Part 1

Ever since my parents died, I have hated Christmas. And this year not even Erik wants to spend the feast of love with me. I put the glass with the crushed sleeping pills to my lips. “Ringgg, ringgg!” Who can be that? Can’t one have a moment’s peace at Christmas to…? I put the glass down on the coffee table with such a jerk that it falls over. The content pours out onto the floor. “What a bummer!”

Annoyed and curious at the same time, I open the door.

“Hello,” I say with a croaky voice to my new neighbour and his son.

The little boy looks at me scrutinisingly. “Are you sick?”

I think of all the hours I spent crying my eyes out. “Yes,” I lie.

“Then I have just the right thing for you!” the little boy beams at me and excitedly hands me a present.

“For me?”

“Yes. We’re playing a game: you give a Christmas present to someone you don’t know so well. And now it’s your turn.”

“Shall I unwrap it?” I ask touched. The little one nods eagerly.

Hidden in the crackling paper I find a cosy woollen scarf. “Thank you!”

My neighbour looks at his son. “Haven’t you forgotten something?”

“Oh, that’s right: you have to ask me my name.”

“What is your name?”

“Pauly,” the little boy answers. Then he claps his hand to his forehead and shakes his head.

“Oh, wrong: today my name is ‘The One who sees you’!”

“Merry Christmas!” they both shout and go back downstairs.

Confused, I close the door. As I wipe up the puddle of liquidated sleeping pills, my gaze falls on a bag of cinnamon stars I bought at the bakery.

I gently stroke the red ribbon on the bag. Old Mrs. Meyerling from the neighbouring house loves cinnamon stars as much as I do…

I quickly wrap my new scarf around my neck, slip in my winter coat and trudge through the snow to the little house next door.