Karen's Wish

  This book is for

  Eve, Bill, and Margot,

  who know why.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  1 Christmas Is Coming

  2 Christmas Here, Christmas There

  3 Christmas and Hanukkah

  4 Nannie’s Fall

  5 Karen’s Wish

  6 Nannie’s Call

  7 Eight Nights

  8 A Present for Nancy

  9 Hanukkah Shopping

  10 The Perfect Tree

  11 More Than Santa Claus

  12 Dreidels and Menorahs

  13 Countdown to Christmas

  14 Snow Day!

  15 Lighting Candles

  16 Christmas Eve Day

  17 Welcome Home, Nannie!

  18 Christmas Day

  19 Nancy’s Present

  20 Next Year

  Holiday Activities for You to Try

  About the Author

  Also Available

  Copyright

  Christmas Is Coming

  “Look! Look at that!” cried Andrew. “That is what I want for Christmas!”

  Andrew is my little brother. He isn’t even five yet. I am Karen Brewer and I am seven years old. I have freckles and wear glasses. My hair is blonde and my eyes are blue. Christmas is my favorite time of year.

  Andrew was pointing to something on TV. It was a commercial for Dyno-cars. Dyno-cars are little racing cars that explode when they run into a wall or something. Then you put them back together so you can explode them again.

  “Remember to put Dyno-cars on your list for Santa,” I told Andrew.

  “I will,” he replied.

  Andrew and I were at home. It was a school-day afternoon. In fact, it was almost suppertime. We were coloring pictures about Christmas. I was coloring a tree with presents under it. Andrew was trying to make a Santa.

  “Christmas is coming,” I sang as I worked, “the geese are getting fat; Please to put a penny in the old man’s hat; If you haven’t a penny, a ha’penny will do; If you haven’t got a ha’penny, God bless you.”

  “You know what?” said Andrew, looking up from his picture.

  “What?” I asked.

  “I don’t understand that song. What is a ha’penny?”

  “I’m not sure,” I replied.

  “Let’s sing a song we both know,” said Andrew.

  So we sang “Jingle Bells.” First we sang it the regular way. Then we sang, “Jingle bells, Batman smells, Robin laid an egg. Bat-mobile lost a wheel, and Commissioner broke his leg.”

  We giggled. But I stopped suddenly. Another commercial had come on TV. “There! That’s what I want!” I exclaimed. “Baby Grow-a-Tooth!”

  The next commercial was for an art kit. With the kit you could decorate hats and make badges. Both Andrew and I cried, “I want that!”

  Then I said, “Boy, it sure is hard waiting for Christmas.”

  “I know,” Andrew answered. “How many days, Karen?”

  “A lot,” I told him. “It isn’t even December yet. It won’t be December until the day after tomorrow.”

  “Boo,” said Andrew.

  “But think of all the things we can do before Christmas. We can buy a tree, we can make decorations, we can make presents to give to people, we can make Christmas cards —”

  “And Christmas cookies,” interrupted Andrew. He paused. “Where are we going to be on Christmas Day this year?” he asked.

  “Here. At Mommy’s house. Remember?” I replied. “We go to Daddy’s on the day before Christmas. We spend the night there. Then we come back here on Christmas morning. We will have two Christmases.”

  “I’m glad they will be on different days,” said Andrew. “I did not like having two Thanksgivings in one day.”

  “Me, neither,” I said. “That was awful. I will never eat turkey again.” Just thinking about turkey made my stomach feel funny. (A week ago, Andrew and I had eaten a Thanksgiving dinner at Mommy’s house, and another at Daddy’s house. All in one day. I ate so much I got a gigundo stomachache. Mommy and Daddy said we would never have two celebrations in one day again. I was glad they decided that.)

  Why did we have two Thanksgivings? Why were we going to have two Christmases? Because Andrew and I are two-twos, that’s why.

  Christmas Here, Christmas There

  Since not everyone knows what a two-two is, I will explain how Andrew and I became Andrew Two-Two and Karen Two-Two. It’s because of our parents. Our mommy and daddy used to be married. But then they decided that they did not love each other anymore. So they got divorced. Daddy stayed in the big house we used to live in. Mommy moved to a little house. Andrew and I went with her. The big house and the little house are both in Stoneybrook, Connecticut.

  Then Daddy got married again. He married Elizabeth. Elizabeth is our stepmother. Mommy got married again, too. She married Seth. Seth is our stepfather. Now Andrew and I live with Mommy and Seth at the little house most of the time. We live there with Rocky and Midgie, Seth’s cat and dog, and with Emily Junior, my rat.

  But every other weekend, Andrew and I live with Daddy and our other family. Our other family is big, so it is a good thing Daddy’s house is big, too. Here’s who lives at the big house: Daddy, Elizabeth, and Elizabeth’s four children. Her children are David Michael, who is seven like me; Kristy, who is thirteen; and Charlie and Sam, who are old. They are seventeen and fifteen. Charlie, Sam, and David Michael are my stepbrothers. Kristy is my stepsister, and I love her so, so much! She is like a regular sister. Sometimes she baby-sits for me. She is fun.

  There are even more people at the big house. There is Emily Michelle. She is my adopted sister. Daddy and Elizabeth adopted her. Emily came all the way from a country called Vietnam. She is two and a half. I named my rat after her. Nannie also lives at the big house. She is Elizabeth’s mother. That means she is my stepgrandmother. I love Nannie very much, too. She helps take care of the big house, and she watches Emily while Daddy and Elizabeth are at work. Oh, there are also two pets at the big house. Boo-Boo is Daddy’s old, fat cat, and Shannon is David Michael’s puppy.

  See why Andrew and I are two-twos? Because we have two of so many things. (I got the name from a book that my teacher, Ms. Colman, read to my second-grade class at Stoneybrook Academy. It was called Jacob Two-Two Meets the Hooded Fang.) Andrew and I have two mommies and two daddies, two houses and two families, two cats and two dogs. We each have two bicycles (actually Andrew has two tricycles), one at the big house, one at the little house. I have two stuffed cats, one at each house (Moosie at the big house, Goosie at the little house). We have toys and clothes and books at each house. That is so we don’t have to pack very much when we go back and forth between the houses. Guess what. I even have two best friends. Nancy Dawes lives next door to Mommy. Hannie Papadakis lives across the street and one house down from Daddy. (Nancy and Hannie and I are all in Ms. Colman’s class. We call ourselves the Three Musketeers.)

  It is fun being Karen Two-Two — most of the time. I like having two families. I especially like going to the big house. It is an exciting place. It is usually busy and noisy. But the little house is good for peace and quiet. (Andrew likes peace and quiet more than I do.) It is also nice to have two bicycles and two bedrooms and two birthday parties each year. And in a few weeks, Andrew and I would have two Christmases.

  But, sometimes I do not like being Karen Two-Two. Two Thanksgiving dinners in one day was no fun at all. Plus, I did not have two of my special blanket, Tickly. I tried bringing Tickly back and forth between my houses, but sometimes I left him behind. Finally, I had to rip Tickly in half, so I could have a piece at each house. I did not like ripping Tickly apart.

  Still, I feel pretty lucky.

 
I went back to my coloring. “Christmas is coming,” I sang.

  Christmas and Hanukkah

  “Jump! Jump!” I cried. “No, jump up —”

  “Game over!” Nancy announced.

  I was at the Daweses’ house. Nancy and I were playing Nintendo.

  “Boo,” I said. I had just lost another game. I am not as good a player as Nancy is. Maybe that’s because I do not have Nintendo. But Nancy gets to practice whenever she wants.

  “You know what?” I said. “Maybe I will ask for Nintendo for Christmas.”

  “I just want some more games for Nintendo,” said Nancy. “There are three that I want.”

  “It’s too bad you don’t celebrate Christmas,” I told Nancy. “If you did, you could get your games in just a few weeks. Now you have to wait all the way until your birthday to get presents.” I felt sort of sad.

  But Nancy said, “I don’t have to wait until my birthday. We get presents at Hanukkah.”

  “You do?” I replied. I did not know that. I knew that Nancy is Jewish. And I knew she celebrates Hanukkah. I just did not know how she celebrates Hanukkah. I guess that is because Nancy and I were not such good friends last year. Last year Nancy was in first grade. But I started out in kindergarten and skipped into first grade. And I was not even in Nancy’s room. We got to be best friends in Ms. Colman’s class this year.

  “Sure,” said Nancy. “I’ll get presents. And I’ll get them before you do. Hanukkah comes before Christmas. I can’t wait!”

  I smiled at Nancy. But I still felt sad. I was pretty sure Nancy wouldn’t get as many presents at Hanukkah as I would get on Christmas Day. Nancy would not have a tree with presents piled under it. And she would not have a stocking filled with presents, either.

  “I wish we celebrated the same holiday,” said Nancy. “I wish you celebrated Hanukkah. It would be fun if we both celebrated the same holiday.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. But I wished that Nancy celebrated Christmas, not the other way around. I could not imagine not celebrating Christmas. What would December be without tinsel and wreaths and decorated trees and holly and Santa Claus and cookies baking … and, of course, presents?

  “You know what else I want?” asked Nancy.

  “What?” I replied.

  “Baby Grow-a-Tooth.”

  “Really? I want Baby Grow-a-Tooth, too! She is gigundo cool. If you press her arms together, her front teeth grow in.”

  “Yeah. And she comes with her very own teething ring,” added Nancy.

  “I know. Plus, Andrew and I both want this special art kit. And I want a new horn for my bicycle, and lots of books. I want more books about Paddington Bear and more books about Doctor Dolittle. Oh, and I want The Polar Express, and of course I want more Bobbsey Twins. (Nancy and I love the Bobbsey Twins. We both have almost every Bobbsey Twins book there is.)

  “I want more Bobbsey Twins books, too,” said Nancy, “plus The Land of Oz and the book about witches by Roald Dahl. Oh, and a Spirograph.”

  Gosh, I hoped Nancy would get everything she wanted. But I wasn’t sure she would. I wasn’t sure I would, either, but I thought I had a better chance than she did. To be on the safe side, I decided to start writing my Christmas list as soon as I got home that afternoon.

  Nannie’s Fall

  Nancy and I were in the middle of an exciting game of Nintendo when I looked at my watch. “Uh-oh!” I cried.

  “What is it?” asked Nancy.

  “I have to go home,” I told her. “It’s after five o’clock.”

  “Boo,” said Nancy.

  “Double boo,” I replied.

  “Come over again tomorrow afternoon, okay?”

  “Okay!” I called as I ran down the hallway.

  I rushed out of Nancy’s house, across her lawn and my lawn, and into the little house.

  “Mommy!” I shouted. “I’m sorry I’m late. Nancy and I were —”

  Mommy waved at me impatiently. She was talking on the phone. And she was frowning. Was she mad because I had been too noisy?

  “I’m sorry I didn’t use my indoor voice,” I whispered.

  But Mommy just waved at me again. “Mm-hmm … mm-hmm,” she was saying. “Yes, I understand. Okay. Hold on. I’ll put Karen on.”

  Who could Mommy be talking to? I wondered.

  Mommy held the phone out to me. “It’s Daddy,” she said.

  “Oh, goody!” I replied. Then I spoke into the phone. “Hello? Daddy?”

  “Hi, sweetie,” said my father. “Listen, I’m afraid I have some bad news.”

  Uh-oh, I thought. “What is it?” I asked.

  “Nannie had a fall this afternoon. She broke her hip. Luckily Kristy and Charlie were home, so they called an ambulance. Nannie is in the hospital. I’m visiting her now. She will be there for several weeks. I thought you should know.”

  “Oh, Daddy!” I exclaimed. I began to cry.

  Nothing Daddy said made me feel any better. Finally, he asked to talk to Andrew. He wanted to tell him the news, too.

  * * *

  That evening I could not eat supper. I could not do my homework. All I could think about was Nannie. Mommy came into my room. She found me sitting on my bed, staring into space.

  “Why don’t you call Kristy?” Mommy suggested. “Maybe you will feel better if you talk to her.”

  I sighed. “Okay,” I said. So I called Kristy at the big house.

  “When will Nannie come home?” I asked her.

  “I don’t know for sure,” Kristy answered. “The doctors said in a few weeks. I guess that means about three weeks. Nannie broke her hip pretty badly. She might have to have an operation. The doctors might want to put a pin in her hip to help hold the bones together.”

  “Oh,” I said. An operation. I felt worse than ever. “Can I visit Nannie?”

  “I don’t think so,” Kristy replied. “I know you visited Emily Michelle when she was in the hospital. But Nannie is in a special part of the hospital. Kids are not allowed to visit there.”

  When Kristy and I hung up, I went back to my room. I tried to feel better. I told myself that hospitals make sick or hurt people well. So the hospital was the best place for Nannie. When I broke my wrist, I went to the hospital, and now my wrist is all better.

  But then I remembered something awful. I remembered Kristy’s friend Claudia. Claudia used to have a grandmother. But her grandmother got really sick, so she went to the hospital. Only she never came back. She died there.

  Please don’t die, Nannie, I thought. Please come home.

  Karen’s Wish

  One night, Mommy said to Andrew and me, “How about writing your Christmas lists this evening?”

  It was cozy in our house. Outside, snow was falling lightly. The wind was blowing. Seth had built a fire in the fireplace. I was feeling Christmasy.

  “Christmas lists?” repeated Andrew. “For Santa Claus? Can we send them up the chimney?”

  “Of course,” said Mommy.

  A long time ago, Mommy showed Andrew and me a special way to send letters to Santa. You do not put the letters in envelopes and write SANTA CLAUS, THE NORTH POLE on them. You do not stick stamps on the envelopes and drop the letters in a mailbox.

  You do something magic.

  This is what Mommy said to do. First we write our letters to Santa. Then we make sure we have a nice fire burning in the fireplace. Then we give the letters to Mommy and Seth. They stick the letters over the flames in the fireplace, and whoosh! The letters rush up the chimney and sail through the night sky to the North Pole. They probably land right in Santa’s workshop. (Andrew thinks they land on Santa’s desk.)

  “Karen, help me write my letter,” said Andrew. “Please?”

  “Okay,” I agreed. “And then I will write mine.”

  “Seth, will you keep the fire going?” asked Andrew. “We need that fire.”

  Seth smiled. “Don’t worry. It’s a special Santa Claus fire.”

  “Goody,” said Andrew.

&nbs
p; Mommy gave me some papers and a pencil. Andrew and I sat at the kitchen table. “Okay, I’m ready,” I told Andrew.

  “All right. Make the letter say,” my brother said, “ ‘Dear Santa, How are you? Fine, I hope. How is Mrs. Claus? How are your reindeer, especially Rudolph? How are the elves?’ ”

  “Slow down!” I cried.

  So Andrew did. Then he began a list of all the toys he wanted. The list was very long. When I finished Andrew’s letter, I wrote my own. This was my letter:

  “We’re ready!” Andrew and I called, as soon as I finished my letter. We ran into the living room. Mommy read our letters. She frowned a little, but then she and Seth stuck the letters over the fire. The letters disappeared up the chimney.

  “I want to see them fly into the sky!” cried Andrew.

  But Mommy said, “Honey, it’s too dark outside. Anyway, I want to talk to you and Karen. Sit on the couch with me.”

  Andrew and I sat down on either side of Mommy. (We made a Mommy sandwich.) Were we in trouble? I wondered.

  “You know,” said Mommy, “Santa can’t grant every wish. You might not get everything you ask for.”

  “That,” I replied, “is why I only asked for one thing.”

  I was afraid to ask for anything else. I was sure that if I did, I would jinx my one true wish.

  Nannie’s Call

  On Friday afternoon, Mommy drove Andrew and me to Daddy’s. It was a big-house weekend. Usually, I love weekends at Daddy’s. But I knew this one would be different. And it was.

  When Andrew and I opened the door to the big house, we found everyone waiting for us. There were Daddy, Elizabeth, Kristy, Charlie, Sam, David Michael, Emily, and even Shannon and Boo-Boo.

  But Nannie was not there. I missed her right away.

  At dinner that night I did not talk very much.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Sam. “Cat got your tongue?”

  I shook my head. But Andrew giggled. “Boo-Boo’s way over there!” he said, pointing.

  Everyone laughed.