One day mother didn't come home. Two sisters and their little brother waited patiently at first and then impatiently for her but she never came. They were alone in the house, their father had left two years before that. In their short lives that was such a long time and they'd forgotten him completely.
The only remaining family was a lady who stayed with them for a few days when mother stopped coming home and who eventually sent them to live with grandpa. She said he was their daddy's daddy and that it were better for them to go and live with him rather than being separated and living with foster parents. They did not understand what that meant, but they were glad to stay together.
She put them on a bus that took them to grandpa's village. They didn't know anything about him, they hadn't even known they had a one; mother had never mentioned him. But he was very nice; he waited for them at the station, took them to his house and they all lived together since. There was not too much room for all of them but they didn't have many things anyway, and neither did grandpa. They only had some clothes from home, and a few more from that nice lady. And a puppet, too, she gave it to the little boy before they got on the bus and said was sorry she could not afford to give them more. But they liked it a lot, they hadn't had other toys before.
Among the few things in grandpa's house there was a big painting on a
wall, with some trees in it, like the trees in the garden. And among the trees
there were two large animals. They had yellow fur and black stripes. The children didn't know what those
animals were. The children were little and did not know many things. The eldest sister was not even old enough to go to school yet. And the boy hadn't even started talking
yet, he could not say thank you to the nice lady for the puppet.
Not much has changed for the children since they arrived at grandpa's place, but in his house there were no loud noises from the street or from the building like it used to happen at home, and they could sleep at night without anything waking them up. And here they had grandpa's dog, too. The children liked him a lot, he was big and would take care of them when grandpa was at work. They didn't get to see grandpa much, but they had not seen mommy much when they lived with her, either. During the day she was at work, and during the nights when she was at home with them she used to fall asleep right after dinner or even before she was done eating.
At least grandpa came home every evening and played with them, but he was very tired, too, and would fall asleep quickly. The dog was there to keep them company all day long, though. And at night they had the small puppet to play with, too. The dog was not allowed to stay inside the house.
One day during winter grandpa came home earlier. The children did not have many warm clothes to play in the snow and had to stay inside. They were glad to see him, there was not much to do because the puppet had broken some time ago. He took the children and sat them at the table. Then he lit a candle under a small painting on the wall. It was a painting of a sad woman and her little baby. The children did not know who that woman was, but their mother had a picture just like that at home, too.
Grandpa told them he came home earlier because they would celebrate a very special day.
During dinner one of the girls asked grandpa what were the large animals in the big painting and he said they were tigers. The girl asked what a tiger was and where they lived. Grandpa said they lived in Africa and in India. She then asked if that was far and if they would eat their dog. He smiled and said they lived far and their dog was safe. The girl carried on and said she would like to go and play with the tiger one day.
Grandpa went to his bag and took out a small cake to celebrate that special day. The children were delighted; it had been a very long time since they had had cake or spent so much time with grandpa.
Grandpa smiled with them, but he was sad. He was sad because he could not give his children a new puppet for that special winter day. And he was sad thinking the children would never travel far enough to see a tiger.
