Advent calendars

We finally knew the date again: our jailer had given us Advent calendars, handmade from plain grey board, a ballpoint drawing behind each window. There was disagreement among us about whether he had given them out on the last day of November or the first of December. There was disagreement, too, about whether we could trust him at all: perhaps, out there in the light, it was midsummer. But the scratchy, uncertain star behind the first window was all the promise I needed.