TSFS: The Masquerade Striders

Merry Christmas

Madeline

5 months later...

Christmas, one of the best times of the year. The songs don't lie.

Christmas was a little different year, celebrating it with new people, and a loss of some people. This year was the first Christmas without Drew, but another one with Eli and Luna.

We all went to Hazel's for the special holiday, getting each other special gifts for each of us, and so far the night was going smooth.

The cold December weather hit my body every time I went outside. Christmas lights were hung outside, red and green lights dangled from the trees, and the edges of the house.

It was truly a sight to see, and in that moment everything seemed to be going alright. It was a magical night, a scene out of a movie where everything finally seemed to be going alright.

Since July, no big problems have started. Once Eli and Luna arrived back, we soon broke the news to them about Drew's passing. Eli was devastated by the news, parting from us for weeks, only talking to Luna.

We all felt back for him, in a way it was a horrible welcome home present, truly.

Speaking about Luna, she had actually changed in the void. The rest of us worked out our differences with her, while Bianca, Ashley, and I were still a little hesitant with her, but for the most part we had decided to put the past aside for once.

It felt good to do that. In a way we started fresh, new out of the blue.

Luna and Crystal were finally reunited, and started on their dating terms again. They were happy together, and also strong. After all of that, they were still glued together through the trauma and the homophobic comments.

In one way, Eli had at least mentioned to us about him being gay, which he has totally supported him with. We were happy for him regardless of who he was, and who he was with.

Delilah shared that she was surprised, she kinda assumed that was the case. She explained it was always weird how he never talked about being with a girl, or having a lot of girl crushes growing up. He kept quiet for the most part.

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Ashley

Inside stood me, Kira, Delilah, and Maya. We had all decided to work together to make a big ham for Christmas eve, taking our time prepping it with all of the sugary juices and smoked veggies that were placed on the good to give it the extra taste.

Kira had ended her first semester of 7th grade with all A's, which she was very excited about, and we had all celebrated her with some frosted cookies made from scratch.

While Maya and I worked on the main entree and sides, Delilah and Kira worked on the desserts. They planned on baking an apple pie with some sugar cookies.

Maya and I had just placed the ham in the oven, when Eli whipped around the house with a camera in his hand, and a smile plastered on his face.

"Smile for the camera." He jokes, bending down to get all of the different angles of our smiling faces. He took dramatic turns, capturing the "perfect" angles. "Perfect, yes get it queens!" He says, pointing at us and winking.

Kira lets out a giggle, licking some of the homemade frosting off of her slim fingers, "you are the best Eli." She says. Eli pats Kira on the back, dipping his finger into the mixed frosting, and landing it onto Kira's dark nose. "Thank you, you are the best Kira I've ever met." He jokes.