In "A Christmas Memory," seven-year-old Buddy's best friend is his "sixty-something"-year-old distant cousin, a woman Buddy describes as "still a child." The implication is that she is unable to live on her own and must be looked after by other relatives with whom they live and whom he calls "those who know best." Buddy and his cousin are closely bonded and interact with the others as little as possible. In later adaptions of this semi-autobiographical story she is called Sook, but in the original story Buddy refers to her only as "my friend." Buddy narrates the story in the present tense, but at the end he has grown and left their home for a military school and keeps in touch with his friend through letters and packages until she slips into dementia and eventually passes away.
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