something because they expect it. So I said I wanted a snowboard, even though that’s not what I really want.”
“Cool.”
“Cool.”
They had a stare-down. “So, are we gonna tell each other?”
“Better not.”
“Okay.” The snow was perfect for packing, just sticky enough but not too heavy. “Hey, I think my dad’s going to have a girlfriend,” he said. “I think it’s gonna be Darcy.” He’d already gone over this in his mind. Now he wanted to tell somebody, and Andre was the perfect choice. A best friend.
“She’s cool.”
“Yeah. Does your mom have a boyfriend?”
Andre added another chunk of snow to the wall. “Nope. Sometimes my dad used to come around, but... He’s not very nice to her.”
“That blows.”
“Yeah.”
Charlie felt bad for Andre. Charlie himself had a dad
Andre hesitated, staring down at the snow-covered ground. Then he said, “Okay, but the oath is unbreakable, right?”
Charlie thought about things that broke. Bicycle chains. Thin ice. Christmas bulbs. His parents’ marriage. Promises. Sometimes it seemed as if everything was breakable.
Not a friendship, though. Not when you were best friends.
“Right,” he said. “Let’s go inside the fort to make sure nobody hears.”
They crawled through the opening and settled into the icy darkness. Charlie pulled out his flashlight and stuck it in the middle with the beam shining up, lending an eerie bluish glow to the interior of the fort. It felt as if they were the only two kids in the world.
“Okay, do we solemnly swear to keep everything we say and hear a total secret? Forever?”
“I do.”
“Me, too.”
“A dog,” said Charlie. “That’s what I want for Christmas. A dog.”
Andre’s eyes lit up and a grin broke across his face. “Seriously?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh man. That is so rad.”
“I know. I used to have a dog named Blake. She died, and I thought I wanted to die, too. I miss her so much. I never believed I would ever be happy again. But then I saw this kid playing with a black Lab, and I started thinking it might be time to get another dog. See, there are other dogs that need me, other dogs that can be my dog. This is the biggest thing I’ve ever wished for.”
“It’s big,” Andre admitted. “Really big. What kind of dog?”
“Pretty much any kind, so long as it’s friendly and wants to play and likes to sleep with me at night. I don’t want to be too picky.”
Charlie’s heart sped up when he pictured himself with a dog. Playing and feeding, lying around, taking walks, games of fetch. With a dog of his own, he would never be lonely.
“I’ve been asking and asking,” he said. “My mom and stepdad said no after Blake died, on account of we’re moving overseas and we move a lot. And my dad said no because he’s always busy working and I’m not home enough. Yeah, right. I know deep down in my heart it would be awesome. It would be a dream come true.”
“That’s totally cool, Charlie. So you think Santa’ll actually bring you a dog?”
“If he’s real, he has to, right?”
“Yep.” They rolled snowball after snowball, and more walls went up. It was awesome, having a best friend, thought Charlie. You could talk, or just be quiet and work side by side. You could tell each other stuff. They finished the shelter, and it was like a dark cave inside, cold and small, a real fort to keep them safe in case of enemy attack.
“What about you?” Charlie asked. “What did you ask for?”
Andre’s smile sank into a line of seriousness. “Remember the promise.”
“I remember. I could never forget.”
“Good. Because the dog is the biggest thing you ever asked Santa for. My wish is the most
Charlie tried to imagine what kind of serious thing Andre was talking about.
“You know how we had to come stay with your dad because my mom went away for work?”
“Yep. That’s tough. I miss my mom when I’m away from her.”
“Yeah, but you have your dad. It’s different. I don’t have my dad. And I wouldn’t want him. He’s mean and he does bad stuff. So it’s nice how your dad is letting us come here. But my wish is about my mom.”
“You can’t ask Santa to bring your mom for Christmas. It doesn’t work that way.”
“I know. That’s not what I asked.”
“Then what?”
Andre drew his knees up to his chest and stared at the flashlight beam. “My mom didn’t go away for work,” he said in a very quiet voice.
“Then where did she go?” Charlie felt clueless, but he could tell Andre was building up to something big. Like last summer at Camp Kioga, in the cabin when Leroy Stumpf admitted he was scared of the dark.
Only this was bigger. Charlie could tell.
“She’s in jail.”
Charlie frowned. “Nuh-uh. You’re lying.”
“I wish I was.”
“Why is she in jail?”
“She got in trouble. My dad was doing something bad, and they both got caught. The judge sent her to a place called Bedford Hills Women’s Correctional Facility.” Andre repeated the big words as though he’d memorized them. “She has to stay there until February. It’s a jail. Prison. I looked it up online at the library. Angelica doesn’t know. No one is supposed to know. But I snooped. I heard her crying at night and I heard her talking on the phone, and I figured it out.”
“Oh man. That’s bad, Andre. That’s really bad.”
“You think I don’t know that?”
“Sure you do. And I know it, too.”
“I just wish my mom will be okay on Christmas. That’s all I wish.” Andre’s voice broke then, and he screwed up his face as though he was trying not to cry, and then he just let go and he cried hard, shaking all over.
“It’s okay, buddy,” said Charlie, patting him on the shoulder the way his dad sometimes did when Charlie was sad. “Maybe it sucks now, but it’s going to be okay.” The news made his stomach hurt. He wondered if he should send Santa another letter
“Do you think Santa will grant my wish?” Andre asked, dragging a mittened hand across his face.
“If he doesn’t, then there really is no Santa.”
“But he’s really real, right?”
“He’s real. So all we gotta do now is not screw up, and we’ll get our Christmas wishes.”
“Okay, let’s make a pact. We have to be good. We have to not screw up.”
“So, are we still going to stay up all night on Christmas Eve and wait for Santa?”
“Sure.”
“What if he doesn’t come?”
Charlie punched a window into the wall of snow. “Then we’ll know.”
