Quote:
"It's not what's under the tree that matters, it's who's gathered around it."
You know that feeling that you get when you wake up on christmas day.
The house is filled with an aroma of cookies and you can feel the temperature dropping because of how cold it is outside.
Well that's exactly how I'm feeling right now.
Some people enjoy Christmas because of the gifts, the snow or maybe even the Christmas movies.
But I love Christmas for another reason. Th feeling that you feel when you're surrounded by all your loved ones. Everyone's there celebrating the occasion with you and you wouldn't change a thing. That's what I love about Christmas.
The fact that you have an all you can eat buffet is a bonus.
I look out the window to see that the entire street was filled with abundance of snow. It hadn't stopped showing since the day we all went to the mall together.
The snow meant snowball fight and snowmans, which was exactly what I had been doing the past week. Everyone had been too busy buying Christmas gifts but I had done all my shopping online.
"Yo gruffalo! Wake up." Jake slams a pillow on my head.
"Jake! What did I tell you about HITTING ME WITH PILLOWS?" I scream the last part.
"Not to do it?" He asks.
"Exactly." I grit the word through my perfectly whitened teeth. "Now get out." I throw the pillow back at him.
Swiftly, I brush my teeth, wash my face and put on my fluffy slippers before jogging down the stairs.
Normally, every year aunt Carol and grandma used to travel to our house on Christmas day.
However as I enter the living room, I realise that they weren't here.
"Where's Granny and aunt Carol?" I ask genuinely being upset.
"Unfortunately, because of the weather they weren't able to make it." My mum replys.
"Stupid snow." I mutter under my breath.
Weren't you the one that prayed for snow?
I tell my subconcious to shut up before grabbing a gingerbread man and stuffing it in my mouth.
"Which is why this year we will be celebrating Christmas with our neighbours." Frank says.
"Mr and Mrs Johnson. I swear they're jewish." I ask.
"No. We will be celebrating with Joanna and Zach." My mother smiles enthusiastically.
"So, Mr and Mrs Johnson aren't jewish because I wouldn't mind spending Christmas with them...." I rant until Frank cuts in.
"If your mother says we're celebrating with them then we are. End of discussion." Frank says.
"But.." I whine.
"Nah." He says.
"What if..".
"Eh.".
"How about..".
"No means no." Frank has the final say and continues to munch on his cookie.
"Can I at least go to Mia's for a while?" I ask her.
"Sure. Don't take too long, you have to help me with the dinner when you come back." She permits me to leave.
I quickly go upstairs and enter my room ready to get changed.
Browsing through my closet, I pick out an oversized sweater, some jeans and a beanie.
After putting all my clothes on, I grab my keys and head out the door.
After reaching the end of the block, I remeber that I had forgotten Mia's gift.
Twenty or so minutes later and I had sprinted to my house, grabbed the gift and had reached Mia's residence.
After knocking once or twice, nobody had answered so I push the handle down and entered her house.
"Mia." I screamed her name.
"Upstairs." She tells back.
After running up a flight of stairs, I enter her room to see her putting on her make up.
"Where is everyone?" I and about her family.
"They're at the neighbours." She points at the house next door.
"Well before you carry on putting your make up on, I want to exchange gifts." I take the brush out her hand and put it down.
"Ok, let me just get your gift." She gets up to get a few wrapped gifts.
"Why are yours so large?" I look at the sixe od her gifts in comparison to mine.
"It doesn't matter, now let me open my gift." She says and I hand her the boxes.
"You might not like them." I state.
"You being my best friend will only buy what you think I'll like, so I think I'll like it." Sha answers before she begins to open the gifts.
"You got me Make up!!" She screams. "I love you do much Andy." She hugs me.
I had bought her lots of make up seeing as that's the only thing she loves.
The gift consisted of Kylie cosmetics, KKW, Fenty beauty and Huda beauty.
Although her gift alone was $400 or so, I didn't really mind because I knew she'd love it.
"I so have to snapchat this!" Mia squeals.
"Ok, now my turn." I wait anxiously.
"Wait, I want to capture your reaction on camera." She says as she begins to film me.
I open my gifts in order. The first not was a pair of classic dark blue and white nike trainers.
The second consisted of a bunch of hoodies mostly in black and khaki.
The last gift was a black acoustic guitar.
"Mia..." I cried. "This must've cost so much." She wipes my tears.
"Well I know how much you've wanted a new guitar for. And we all know you love hoodies so much you can't live without them." She laughs and I tightly embrace her with with hug.
"Mia. Hurry up and come say hello to your neighbours." Her mother calls for her.
Coincidentally at the same time Make had also texted me with a 'Hurry Up!' text.
We both leave her house where we are greeted by her mother.
"Hey Carla." I greet Mia's mum.
"Nice to see you Andy. Would you and your family like to spend Christmas with us?" She asks.
"Sorry, we've already got plans with our neighbours but I will tell her you
asked." I say.
"No problem. Have a good Christmas Andy and if you feel bored then pop by again." She bids farewell and I make my way back home.
By the time I reached my house my arms were killing.
"How's Mia and Carla?" My mum asks the moment I set foot in the house.
"They're fine. And no I don't need help with all these clothes and the guitar. I got it." I sarcastically reply.
After placing all the gifts in my room, I return in the kitchen ready to help my Mum with the dinner.
"Just chop these vegetables." My mother hands me a bunch of different vegetables.
I chop them all one by one until I'm finished. Soon after I am ordered to make the roast which I do.
"Ok, you can go clean up." I leave the kitchen.
"And grab your gifts, we're heading next door in a while." She informs me.
After watching an episode or two of Grey's Anatomy and placing my new trainers on, I grab all my gifts and head downstairs.
"What took you so long?" My mum asks.
"I couldn't hear, sorry." I apologize.
"I told you she was deaf." Jake says.
"I had my earphones in you dimwit." I roll my eyes at him and we all leave the house to go next door.
We knocked on the door a couple times before someone came to answer.
"Mrs Taylor, come in." Zach greets us.
"I like the outfit." he whispers in my way before he winks at me.
"Joanna, it's so nice of you to invite us over." My mum hugs her.
"No problem. Zach and I needed some company anyway." She smiles.
"What didn't you guys go to Alabama?" I voice my thoughts.
"Sorry." I apologize.
"No problem. We just couldn't find a flight in this sort of weather. Everything has been cancelled." She explains.
"Oh." I realise.
"Why don't Zach and you go hang out upstairs?" My mum suggests as she shoots her imaginary daggers at me.
"Great idea." Zach supports the suggestion and guides me to his room.
"I know where your room is so maybe you should remove that hand that's comfortably placed on my waist." I allege.
Instead his grip tightens as we walk to his room.
"If you want your gift then I suggest you do what you're told." I flash him an evil smile.
He removes his hand and we both climb into his bed where we sit face to face.
"So...how's Rose?" I try to make coverstaion.
"She asks about you, you know?" He continues. "She's always ranting on how I shouldn't tease you." He laughs.
"Well maybe you should take her advice." I chortle also.
"We always celebrate Christmas with them. It's tradition. We can't celebrate without our family." He looks upset.
"At least you have me." I try to lighten up the mood.
"At least I have you." He repeats the sentence.
As we sit in the comfortable silence I look up until I see a mistletoe hanging over us. A blush creeps up into my face and I look down hoping Zach doesn't see it.
"What? Does sitting this close to me make you get all flustered." His breath fans my neck.
"Nope."
"Then what is it?" He looks up and begins smirking.
"You know what that means." He means in closer. "We can't let tradition down." His voice turns into a whisper and my eyes voluntarily begin to shut.
"Yo amigos. The 'rents are calling us down to set the table and I ain't doing it alone." Jake opens the door and interrupts us both.
I quickly pull myself from the trance and try to act as comfortably as I could.
"You're doing the cutlery." I point at Zach. "You're doing the Christmas crackers and napkins." I point at Jake.
"And what exactly will you be doing?" Zach raises a brow looking down as my lips as I bite them.
I still can't understand how people do that.
"I will be searching on YouTube 'a tutorial on how to lift one brow.' " I answer honestly.
"People make tutorials on that sort of thing?" Jake asks.
"You should see the things people do nowadays." Zach states.
"I think I'll pass." Jake continues to place the napkins on each plate.
"Look, what a nice job you guys did." Joanna enters the room.
"I really want you guys to have a good Christmas so I tried my best." I smile at them.
"How nice. Boys..take note." Frank looks at the pair of them.
"But..." Zach begins but gives up.
"Now why don't you guys take a seat while Amelia and I grab the food." Joanna looks at all of us including Frank.
"Hey Frank, you ok?" I ask as he looked a bit..well..drunk.
"I think it's the eggnog." Frank replys and I take the cup out of his hand.
My mother and Joanna had brought all the food in and it looked amazing.
Just as I was about to dig in Zach speaks.
"Should we say grace?" He smirks at me.
"We never give grace." Joanna says confused.
"I just think because it's Christmas we should thank the Lord for what he has given us." He smirks again.
"I think it's a good idea. Now join hands." My mother says.
"Andy, join hands with Zach." She speaks.
I angrily squeeze his hand and pray that I can finally eat however I couldn't help but feel the shock of electricity I felt once his soft fingers brushed mine.
"Lord, thank You for the food before us, the family and friends beside us and the love between us. Amen." Frank says and a bunch of amens are muttered before everyone begins to eat.
Halfway through the meal I feel something or more like someone kicking me.
Instead I ignoring it I retaliate and I kick him back.
"Ow." Zach hisses in pain.
"Karmas a bitch." I mouth at him since my Mum was seated on my right.
"So..Andy...Zach here tells me that you won the local skateboarding competition last week." Joanna says.
"Well he finally said something right for once." I reply and she laughs.
"What did you do with the money?" She inquires.
I swear this is a Christmas dinner, not 20 questions.
"I used some of it to buy a ticket for my friend Jonathon to come California with us on our trip after mid-year examinations. And the remaining cash, I used it to buy my christmas gifts." I answer her.
"You never told me you bought Joanthon a ticket?" Zach says.
"It was meant to be a surprise." I say in a 'duh' tone and we continue to eat.
**********
The table had been cleared and everyone was sitting in the lounge ready to excahnge gifts.
I loved exchanging gifts. Not only was it nice when you received a gift you wanted, but it's nice to see other people's reactions when they open your gift.
"Ok, Mom we wanted to give you this and we really hope you enjoy it." Jake says and hands her the gift.
Inside the box was a frame, some beauty products which our mum adores and a MOM bracelet from Pandora.
"Guys....Thank You." She hugs the pair of us before I take out Franks gift.
"Frank...this is your first Christmas with us as our step dad and we wanted to make it special. We really hope you like it." I hand him the wrapped gift.
He opens the gift which was a frame that said "You are the best dad in the whole world", a "step dad yoda best" mug and a hamper filled with random items such as a watch and other things.
"Our gift is nothing compared to yours. Thanks guys." He hugs us and we continue.
"Jake, I hate you so much but you are my brother and I can do nothing to change that so I kinda do love you and for that reason I was forced to buy you something for Christmas." I hand him his gift.
Inside was a unique brothers mug, some camouflage adidas trainers and a navy blue adidas jacket.
"Well for your gift Andy I decided to go Vans themed." He hands me the gift.
Every year Jake gets me a trio of the same brand. Last year he did puma and I guess this year he had done Vans.
"You really do love me." I tease him and ruffle his hair.
"Andy, this year we decided to get you something you might actually use." Frank says as last year they had got me sundresses since they thought I would wear them.
They hand me the gift and inside was 15 or so beanies, a pair of grey beats headphones and the classic black on white bikes.
"Have I told you guys how much I love you?" I hug then both and place the gift on my pile.
Joanna and Zach had said that they had already exchanged gifts before hand so all that was left was Zach and I.
"Maybe we should go clear up the cutlery?" My mum suggests and the adults follow them.
"I'm leaving peeps. I've got a girl and a bed waiting for me." He recieves a high five from Zach.
"Did not need to know." I say and he leaves.
"So as much as I loathe you Zach I thought that out of the goodness of my heart I should get you a gift." I place half of his gift in his hand.
He opens it and inside were a paor of navy blue adidas trainers alongside some ray bans.
"You know how much I love my ray bans." He laughs.
"That's not all." I speak.
"What do you mean?" He asks.
I grab the other half of his gift and place it in his lap.
He opens it and immediately his eyeballs pop out his eyes. Metaphorically.
"You bought me a Bell Vortex." He says surprised. "How can you afford one of these, they usually cost like $200." He asks.
"No problemo." I smile at him.
"Now time for my gift." I say happily.
He hands me a few boxes which I willingly recieve.
"Come to mama." I reply.
The first one was a pair of beetroot coloured adidas trainers which I was very thankful for.
The second was a make your own ice cream basket.
"You know me well." I laugh.
The final gift was a Plan B skateboard which are very expensive.
"How can you afford a Plan B skateboard? How?" I ask.
"That's not even the main gift. Look at the back." He says.
I turn the skateboard around to see that there was Rodney Mullen's signature.
"How in the world did you get Rodney Mullen's signature?" I tried not to scream.
"I have my connections." He smiles and I hug him.
"I love you so much Zach. You know that?" I say.
"You're the bestest friend a girl can ever have. Don't tell Mia I said that." I laugh.
"I won't, don't worry. Now get up and put your shoes on." He commands me.
"Why?" I ask curiously.
"Because we are going to have a nice long walk in the snow." He says.
"That sounds boring." I whine.
"Were going to have a nice, long snowball fight in the snow." He rephrases the sentence.
"Now that's my kind of style." I affirm and we both leave the house.
Rapidly, I throw a snowball at Zach which landed right on his face in order to declare war.
"It's on." He says and throws a snowball at me.
For the next half an hour we continued to throw snowballs at each other until Zach finally surrendered and gave in.
"Ok, stop. I can't let a little baby beat me at a snowball fight." He wipes all the snow off of him.
"I'm not a baby, I'm going to be 18 in a week." I state.
"What?" He says shocked. You're birthdays in a week and I didn't know?" He asks.
"We're going to be in California then anyways, don't worry." I reassure him.
"But you have to throw a huge party and one for new years." Zach says.
"What people mostly do is that they celebrate both of them at my party since my birthday is on the 31rst." I tell him what we usually do.
"How can I know so much about you but not know when your birthday is, some friend I am." He replys.
"Some friend you are." I say and that's when I feel snow down my back.
"You won't be alive to be my friend if you don't run." I warn him and chase after him.
**********
A/N
Happy Easter guys. It's quite ironic, it's Easter and I'm writing about Christmas.
I really hope you guys enjoyed the chapter and you will be receiving another chapter hopefully tomorrow.
QOTD:Who's gift did you like the best?
Vote.Comment.
ILY;)<3
T.-xx