Jenna-Thatcher Who was so sad and so blue. She knew that once Christmas was over, there was little she could do. Every single year after year it was the same. Hibernation - comatose – eyes practically glued closed; nothing could awaken the Who's of Whoville once there had begun the melting of the snow.
Christmas was a grand ole time – everyone was all of a bustle. Nothing could be heard more loudly or more proudly than the paper wrapping rustle. Sales on bells and sales on seashells – sales on snow globes and sales on canoes; why even sales on chimneys to affix to your Who-roof!
Money a' plenty and smiles oh-so pleasant – so many friends, family and even mere acquaintances to give unto them presents. Gifts galore and trees tinseled so lightly – stars and angels affixed on top of trees and strings of lights shining brightly!
Up near the housetops, along the snow-capped roofs, a' many a' Who man and Who woman stood on ladders, stapling lights the best they could. Whether it was lights of many colors, or a stellar silver and gold, you could count on every single house owner to try to outdo one another, no matter how young or how old.
Now while all this was grand and fun for its time, it was for a week and a half precisely that the Who's of Whoville could celebrate this Christmastime. Long lost to folklore and burnt records on its behalf, scarcely lived a Who old enough now to remember how or why the cause for the hibernation sans Christmas bash.
The aforementioned Jenna-Thatcher, daughter of Jim and Jin Who, had spent many hours at the sole library in Whoville, trying to uncover the Who-truth. Scarcely a scrap of Whonewspaper was at all to be found, and when she got excited about finding a lead, it tended to lead to the beginning - right back around!
On a cold, chilly evening, when night has arisen to the sky, Jenna-Thatcher closed the last Whoreference book in the entire library with a sigh. With the next morning sky would come Christmas itself, and after that came the Who Rareroast Beast feast, and then would come the part that Jenna-Thatcher dreaded and couldn't stand in the least.
She knew of one Who – er, What? Whichever – a soul who solely avoided the hibernation – oh, she couldn't even begin to fathom how clever such a person, be they Who, What, Which, or why, to manage to survive through the Rareroast Beast feast and keep open both their eyes all the while.
Year after year she'd heard legend and folklore; "One lives atop the mountain and he is a sight for eyes which are sore! He hates Christmas, wants nothing to do with it!" And Jenna-Thatcher thought to herself, Then that must be how he does it!
If this Being atop the mountain had naught to do with the entire Christmas season, then he mustn't either give presents or be present at the dinners in the evenings. This soul they called sad – this soul they'd named Grinch – was not a soul that made Jenna-Thatcher Who flinch.
Why certainly no! she'd have loved nothing more than to climb up the mountain and knock on his door. She wished to learn all his secrets, how he could stay awake while they slept – why they all wasted away their lives and he alone got to be exempt. This grinchy fellow, why, he could enjoy Spring, Summer and Fall! He could gleefully run about and celebrate in the glory of them all!
How jealous was she, this little Jenna-Thatcher, soon-to-be-fourteen and had only ever witnessed Christmas after Christmas after Christmas – she certainly had only one prayer, which was for this sleeping curse to be dismissed. Whatever the Who's did or why, she honestly couldn't have cared less – she just knew that they'd brought misery in the form of all its Christmassy best.
At a very young age she couldn't quite see – why was everyone was so overdriven with glee? It was only Christmas, and the gifts were all nice, but after the present exchange and the Rareroast Beast feast, no one thought twice. No one seemed to question why a sleep fell upon them all – a sleep that they, indeed, could not wake from at all.
No emergency – no fire – no storm and no wind; nothing could cause these Who's in Whoville to stir until the week and a half before Christmas came around once again.
By the age of twelve it was quite clear to Jenna-Thatcher – Christmas was so exuberantly over-done once and for all, for it was the only time they were awake and coherent to enjoy anything at all. Through springtime and warm summer winds and autumn leave changes they stayed in their comas, only rising with the fall of the first winter snow and even then, they all knew they had little time.
"Let us go buy gifts before it's too late and we fall back into our comatose minds."
It was sickening – it was disturbing – but it made all too much sense . . .
And one thing alone was clear to Jenna-Thatcher Who this very year – she was going to escape the Christmas aftermath by going to stay with the Grinch.
Waking up earlier than even her six younger brothers, Jenna-Thatcher slipped into boots and a coat and ran fast as she could for the mountain, using the density of the forest trees for cover. Before she knew it, she'd reached the foot of the mountain, and with a look of fierce determination, she leapt upward in one, big bound.
Grabbing onto jagged-edged rocks, she clawed, climbed, slid but recovered, thinking with only minimal guilt of how disappointed would've been her mother. But nevertheless, Jin and Jim had their six other young ones, plus one on the way. Jenna-Thatcher wouldn't be missed for all too long, should she decide to befriend this Grinch fellow and stay.
After at least an hour and a half, the brunette-braided Who girl reached the top of the mount. Pulling herself fully up to her feet, she gave a start and a shout. Rickety and old-fashioned stood before her a house; it gave off a stench of eggs stewed in onions and pickles, along with old socks and even brustlesprouts. Atop it, off to the side, was affixed the crookedest little pipe chimney, and from it emitted a smoke so dark and grimy that it could've eclipsed the very sun itself in a jiffy.
Holding a forefinger and thumb to pinch at her nose, the teenaged Who girl still went forth, nose red and cheeks rose; Knock! Knock! Knock! rapped her mitten-covered hand against the door, and it wasn't until just then that she thought to give a shiver, for surely she had no clue for what she was in-store.
"Who is it now that dares to go there?" replied a snarl of a voice, and a teeny, tiny peephole door was slid open from the inside with much caution and care.
"M-m-my n-name," Jenna-Thatcher stuttered, before clearing her throat and better finding her voice. "My name is Jenna-Thatcher Who, daughter of Jim and Jin Who, and before them, Lou, Betty-Lou, Edgar and Daisy Whazoo."
"Enough with your family tree!" snarled the Grinch in return. "It is not something I wish to hear about in the least! Be gone with you now, if that's the best you can do, is to list the family line of the Who's and Whazoo's!"
"No, sir – Mr. Grinch – I implore you to lend an ear! It is with a reason and most prudent purpose that I have indeed climbed the mountain to come here!"
For a moment there was naught but silence on the other side of the door, but then slowly and surely, it was opened and therefore, Jenna-Thatcher Who slowly stepped her way inside to get a glance around at the house that few others had both witnessed and left afterward still in their right-mind.
"Well, get on with it, kiddo – why are you here?" The Grinch asked this of Jenna-Thatcher as he folded his arms and gave her a sneer.
Without preamble, she gave him her story – how she had no Earthly idea why all of Whokind celebrated only Christmas and then lapsed into everlasting sleep; by the end of her sad story of confusion and frustration, the poor teenager had even begun to weep.
The Grinch was not one to let bleed his heart, though he did take, perhaps, a fraction of a fraction of another fraction of an ounce of pity on this one girl's part. Though he didn't find it necessary to say so or share his thoughts, this young Who girl reminded him of another from his childhood gone past, and though she was no Martha-May, the resemblance was enough to make his sympathy last.
"You see," said the Grinch, patting a furry, green hand on Jenna-Thatcher's shoulder. "There is some strange spell that seems to take over all of Whoville once the Christmas time has come and then dissolved – it seems they're not to be happy unless it is Christmas in the first place – so they say to themselves, why bother to stay alert when it's not Christmastime at all?"
"That is a sad and strange thing," agreed the Who girl, who had a frown on her face that would've made the cheeriest of Whos' hair curl. "Oh, might I please stay here with you this year, and escape the dreadful sleep? I promise I won't be much of a bother to keep."
Sighing just slightly, the Grinch then said, "And if I let you stay here, you'd certainly lose your head. You'd miss your family – you'd want to go back – and if the sleep overtook you during the trek, you'd freeze and they'd find you the next Christmastime – dead. See, try as you might – try as you wish to become as I – there can be only one Grinch, and that Grinch happens to be I."
Shuddering at the dreadful frozen-death thought, Jenna-Thatcher thought again of her mother, who always had her hands full with Father and her own younger, Who brothers. Surely her mother would need her help some of the time, even if it was only in the season of mistletoe and jingle-chimes.
Seeing the look of sadness on the Who girl's face, the Grinch rolled his eyes and made a grumpy face. "Oh fine, alright, I'll make you a deal. After every year's gift exchange you may climb up the Everest of a hill; you may come up here and stay awake all through the night without so much as nodding off – staying wide awake while not a single other Who in the whole wide world is not."
"And what if the sleep becomes me regardless, Mr. Grinch?"
"Why, I'll carry you down, safe and sound, to your home in Whoville in a cinch."
"Oh, thank you, oh thank you, even if only for a night, I shall forever be grateful to have this special privilege as a delight!"
Rolling his yellow eyes again, the Grinch gestured toward the door. "Go on and exchange your gifts and then you may climb uphill once more. Just for one night a year – remember the promise – and do try to be less cheerful about it, for the cheerfulness makes me feel rotten."
Smiling, Jenna-Thatcher gave a small little wave goodbye to the Grinch, before leaving his house and finding a slippery slope to slide down to reach the foot of Whoville just in time for the Who's of Whoville to begin exchanging gifts.
It might not have been everything a heart could desire, but it was a special thing that Jenna-Thatcher and the Grinch alone would be privy to, and that set on her heart a happy fire. She'd have one extra night to spend that had nothing to do with Christmas – it would be her own special day, and not for all the Who gifts in the world would she have missed it.