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❄Charli's POV
The Christmas Spirit was dead. Every single year, it died down to the point where it seemed it never existed. They're right, you can't bring things back to life. No matter how much I tried to bring up the Christmas spirit, no matter how many times I tried to celebrate Christmas with my parents, they'd always push me away and go back to their business work.
They honestly didn't care for me at all. They only noticed me when I messed something up or I'd get something lower than a 90% on a test. I know they get upset and mad at me, but they handle it in the wrong way. And as people say, it's not fair to me. I think otherwise, but they can have their beliefs.
Today was Christmas Eve, and I was really excited. Even though we didn't have a Christmas tree set up in the living room, I had a small, skinny tree with very thin branches that looked like they were going to fall off any second. There were small, colorful ornaments that I had found hanging off of the thin branches.
I sat next to the tree and looked at all of the sparkly lights that were glowing a warm white color. To complete the tree, there was a small, plastic gold star. Looking at the bottom of the tree, I smiled thinking about all of the presents that would be under it tomorrow.
"CHARLI!" I eyed my door. "GET DOWN HERE, NOW!"
Sighing deeply, I slowly stood and adjusted my orange dress with white ruffles at the bottom. I grabbed the doorknob and creaked open the door slowly. I walked out of my room and slowly stepped down the stairs.
When I made it downstairs, I saw my mother and my father sitting at the kitchen table, my dad holding a paper in his hand. 'Oh no,' I thought to myself as I approached them. I don't know how they found it! That paper was the test that I flunked. I completely failed that test, no matter how much I studied.
I walked up to the table and over to my father, "Yes? Is there anything you need?" I felt imaginary sweat roll down my forehead.
"What is this?!" My father exclaimed, holding up the test paper. It was a "78%" circled in red at the top right corner. "What the hell did we say about grades and tests?!"
I spoke softly, "Try your hardest..."
My mother sighed, "If you were trying your hardest, then why did you fail?"
"I- I studied the wrong things and not the things on the test." I could feel my palms becoming damp. I wiped them on my dress.
My father rested his fingers on the bridge of his nose. "You can never do anything right, can you?! HUH!?"
