![]() He put his head on his knees and wrapped his arms around his legs. The boy sat down in the little house and leaned up against the cardboard wall. The Christmas music stopped, and the only noise was the hum of the refrigerators and freezers. “A&P shoppers!” said the man over the loudspeaker. He couldn’t explain it to her-what a big waste of time it would be to believe that anything like that could happen, that a rabbit and a mole could be friends and sit around in front of a fire talking. “It’s all just made up, isn’t it? It’s just a story.” ![]() The school librarian had seen the boy staring at the poster and asked him if he would like to check out the book. The boy liked the dizzy way the picture made him feel-as if there were worlds hidden inside of other worlds, going on to infinity.Īt the bottom of the poster were the words on a winter ’ s night. The other picture was of the rabbit and the mole in front of the fire, just as they were in the poster. She was smiling down at the fireplace, looking at the mole and the rabbit with approval. One of the pictures was of an older mole lady, wearing glasses and a lace shawl. Two pictures hung on roots emerging from the dirt wall of the room. Steam was rising out of the mug, glittering in the light of the fire, and the rabbit’s whiskers and ears were outlined in the same light. And he looked like he was listening to what the rabbit was saying. The mole was wearing slippers-green ones. The rabbit was talking to a mole, who was standing in front of the fire, stirring something in a big pot. He was sitting in an armchair in front of a fireplace, and his big, furry feet were up on a footstool. The rabbit had a plaid blanket wrapped around his shoulders. The boy had once seen a poster of a rabbit in a burrow on the wall of the school library. There was nothing inside.īut what if he had gone through the green door and found a warm room with a fireplace and a fire? And what if in front of the fire there had been a big, overstuffed chair? And what if there had been something cooking over the fire, like a stew or some soup? It was flimsy, made out of cardboard, and it opened onto a dark interior. The boy climbed over the rope and pushed on the green door of the house. A velvet rope was strung around the house and the chair, and there was a sign on a pole that said, santa has gone to feed the reindeer. The house had green shutters and a green door and a brick chimney and a wooden chair out front. To the right of the meat counter was a little wooden house. The Christmas music started up again, and the boy made it to the end of the aisle, all the way to the meat counter, without stepping on a single white tile. We wish you and yours a merry Christmas.” A man’s voice came over the loudspeaker and said, “A&P shoppers! We will be closing in five minutes. The boy made his way down the aisle slowly, stepping only on the red tiles. The floor of the A&P had white tiles alternating with red tiles. ![]() The boy reached out and touched one of the walls. Next to the canned ham display was a gingerbread house resting on a cloud of cotton balls. She was clasping her hands together, beaming at the ham in ecstasy. The girl seemed particularly out of her mind with joy. Each can was decorated with a picture of a family-a father and a mother and a boy and a girl-all sitting around a table with a ham on a platter in the center of it.Įach member of the family was looking at the ham and smiling like they had never seen anything as amazing and beautiful, as miraculous, as a ham on a platter. The pile of stacked cans went halfway to the ceiling. “We’re closing soon.”Ĭhristmas music played over the loudspeaker and a big display of canned hams sat right at the front of the store. “Hurry up, hon,” said a woman at the register. ![]() The boy walked down into a ravine and across the deserted parking lot and stood in front of the store’s automatic doors until they opened and admitted him. He said it happened one Christmas Eve many years ago.Ī boy was walking alone alongside a highway and saw the lights of the A&P grocery store ahead of him in the darkness. ![]()
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