All 10-year-old Elena Anisimova wants for Christmas is a puppy and a party when she turns 11 on Christmas Day. But her mother Olga is holding a letter from the Minister for Justice which says there is no place for this family in Ireland this Christmas. After almost two years in Dublin, the Anisimovas heard last Monday they had two days to leave.
This period elapsed at midnight. From today, they can be deported at any time if, as John O'Donoghue's letter puts it, it is deemed "conducive to the public good to do so".
The Anisimovas are the first of thousands of asylum-seekers who could face deportation over the next year. Theirs was a test case in which the Supreme Court decided they could not apply for asylum here because they passed through another EU state.
These days Elena finds it difficult to sleep. "She's scared that someone might come in the night, to take us away," says her mother. Last week they were in the post office when someone called her name: "Elena tugged at me and we ran. It was only when I got home that I realised they were trying to return my benefit book, which I'd forgotten."
Behind the legal landmark is the small drama of a mother trying to provide a decent life for a young child. If Olga Anisimova were stupid, she might have stayed at home in Moldova, where violence flared after independence four years ago. Much of it was directed at ethnic Russians like her.
"It wasn't Bosnia, but it was a war. There was fighting, shooting in the streets. Once I was entering an elevator to our home when a man attacked me. He sprayed tear gas in my face and shouted `go home, you Russian pig'.".
For the Russian minority, jobs and houses became increasingly hard to come by.
Olga's husband absconded rather than be conscripted, and they divorced. The last straw was when Elena was refused admission to a state-run Moldovan school because she had a Russian surname.
None of these facts was considered by the Irish authorities before they decided to deport her. The Department's position is that their application for asylum should be heard in the UK because this is the "first safe country" the Anisimovas passed through. Amnesty International claims these procedures are unfair and over-secretive.
Olga Anisimova decided to flee. But she was unable to return to her home town in a diamond-rich area of Siberia because it had been declared a "closed area".
"One day, I saw on television how some Belarussians flying to Cuba had looked for political asylum in Shannon. At the same time, I heard that England had problems with immigrants and was not happy to accept them."
So Ireland it was. "I knew that it was a small country, English-speaking, but not much else."
She acquired an entry visa for Britain and they arrived in the Republic via Holyhead in February. "At first, we were upset and cold, but that's life. We were glad to have a roof over our heads."
After a few months, Olga found a one-bedroom flat in a modern city centre apartment block. The rent is £350 a month, of which the health board pays about £250. She gets about £80 a week in supplementary welfare allowance.
Elena is a spirited and independent-minded girl who corrects her mother's English in an Irish accent. She sings at school and skates with a club. An economist by training, her mother learns French in the ILAC when she isn't receiving legal notices in the post.
"I've had only good experiences here. People have done so much, without being asked. But they were just ordinary people and they couldn't do anything." She had plans to spend Christmas with an Irish family until Mr O'Donoghue's letter arrived.
Her solicitor has appealed to the Minister for humanitarian leave to allow her stay. Meanwhile, she is unlikely to be deported, so she just waits.
Yesterday she spent packing - just in case. "I doubt, but I hope. Everyone hopes till the end, don't they?"