The little penguin

By Cecilia Valetti

The large toy store was full of lights and decorations. Jenny was walking around with her mother and looking at the toys on the shelves. There was everything a child  could desire. There were building bricks, toy cars, dolls, books, crayons and board games, colourful puzzles and big doll houses….

Her mother was observing her to see if there was anything she wished for Christmas. It was the first time Jenny spent Christmas in a real home with a real family. She had been adopted just a few months before. Her eight years of life were a blur in her mind…  She had been taken away from her abusive father when she was six and she had spent some years in an orphanage. She just remembered the beatings and the shouts of her father and then the kindness of the nuns and the volunteers at the institution …Then one day a man and a woman had come, they had started to talk to her and …. In her new family she had a father, a mother and an older sister, Margaret. They were very kind to her but she was still afraid of making them angry, she still feared they would shout like her father…

She stopped in front of a shelf where some plush toys were displayed. She looked timidly at her mum. She smiled at her encouragingly… Jenny stretched a hand and caressed a little plush penguin with a beret and a scarf. Her mum took it gently and let the girl touch it. Then they put it back on the shelf….

***

On Christmas day Jenny was so excited. She had never really celebrated Christmas… She got up and went to the living room. They were all watching her when she entered and she approached the decorated tree. At the foot of the huge tree there were packets, carefully wrapped in colourful paper with red and green ribbons. Her dad, her mum and her sister sat down on the floor and encouraged her to look for packets with her name…She walked slowly around the tree and she found three packets. Her mum told her: ”Come on, Jenny, open your gifts…” She was confused. They were the first gifts she had ever received. She opened a big packet and there was a beautiful red sweater and matching grey pants. In the second packet there was a large box of crayons and a colouring book. The third packet had a funny shape and it was soft. She opened it carefully and … tears came to her eyes when she saw the little penguin, with his woollen beret and scarf and a little tag bound around his neck: ”Hello, my name is Caesar …” Caesar became her best friend and the remainder of the first Christmas in her real, affectionate family…

Cecilia Valetti was born and raised in Italy. She has been an English language and literature teacher for almost three decades. Her first cosy mystery: “A new beginning: Miracle High School Mysteries” will be published shortly by Pegasus publisher. She lives in a village in the north of Italy with her husband.