The Twenty-Fifth Door

On the first of December Jonek was given an advent calendar that had been used before. They took it out of a box on top of the wardrobe; it was creased at one corner, had a stain shaped like a small country, and smelt of paper that has lain a long time in the dark.

«It was your grandmother's,» said his mother. «She made it herself, out of card and paper, when I was your age. The trick of it is that the little doors open and then close again, and every year somebody puts something new inside. That is why it still exists, and why it looks like that.»

Jonek counted them, twice, because the first time he lost his place. Twenty-four little doors, in four rows, neatly numbered, every figure written by hand. And then, at the bottom right, half hidden behind the frame, there was one more. Smaller than the others and with no figure on it at all.

«That isn't a door,» said his mother when he asked, and straightened the calendar on the wall. «It's a fault in the paper, something went crooked in the cutting.» She said it kindly, but a little too quickly, and immediately wanted to talk about something else.

From the first to the twenty-fourth of December Jonek opened one little door every morning, always before breakfast and always with his thumbnail, because the doors were old and tore easily. Behind them lay small things: a pencil, a sweet, a folded note with something to do that day, and once only a dried leaf that nobody could explain.

And every morning, before he opened that day's door, he first glanced down at the bottom right to see whether the door with no figure was still there. It always was. Nor would it open when you pulled at it — not, at any rate, in a way that made you want to pull any harder and tear the paper.