Brielle looked down at the little Santa in her hands. She turned it over. She ran her thumb over the brass key. He watched her understand, slowly, where this was going.
"Is this one his, too?"
"Yeah, baby. That one's his."
Her bottom lip pushed out. Her eyes filled. She was six, and it was Christmas, and she had been told the toy was hers, and it was a good toy, and he did not blame her one bit for the two fat tears that rolled down her cheeks. She did not throw it. She did not hide it behind her back. She just held it and cried, quietly, and he loved her so much in that moment that it hurt.
"I know," he said. "I know. It's hard. You can be sad."
"I didn't know," she said, through the tears. "I didn't know it was his."
"I know you didn't."
"Mommy said."
"I know."
She sniffed hard and wiped her nose on her new pajama sleeve, and then she did a thing he would think about for a long time afterward. She did not hand the Santa to her brother. She knew better than that; she had seen how he was holding himself. Instead she set it down on the rug in front of Terrence's knee, carefully, upright on its little black boots, and she found the brass key in its back with her fingers and wound it, crick, crick, crick, the way she had seen the pharmacy lady do it once. And she let it go.
The little Santa waddled forward across the rug. Its bell swung. Ting. Ting. Ting.
Jonah took his thumb out of his mouth.
The Santa walked until it bumped into Terrence's pajama leg, and stopped, and rocked, and fell gently over on its side, its legs still going in the air.