To Build A Home || c.h

Chapter 10

Calum's POV:

I make a snowball, which is way harder to make that it looks like by the way, and throw it back at her. She turns around just in time so it hits her back instead of her front, and she somehow manages to make a new snowball at the same time. She aims at me (I think), but hits Michael, who's standing behind me, instead.

"Oh, you didn't!" Michael yells as he quickly makes a snowball and throws it at her. Before I know it, we're all throwing snowballs at each other. Some other people have also joined us, but I don't mind, more people to hit, I guess. Oh, and the whole: "The more the merrier" thing.

I start running after Alaska to get revenge for all the snow she has thrown at me, but being as clumsy and uncoordinated as I am, I trip over and fall face-first into the snow.

"Oh my God!" Alaska laughs loudly, but I don't move. Even though my head I buried in snow, I feel my cheeks heat up. I'm such a f.uck up, oh my god.

"A-are you okay?" she laughs and gasps for breath, and I can only imagine her clutching her stomach because she's laughing so hardly.

"Calum, are you alive?" she laughs after a couple of seconds, and I give her a thumbs up before I finally lift my head up.

"I'm cold," I finally say, probably stating the obvious. Of course I'm cold, how can I not be?

"Time to get back inside, huh?" she laughs, not as hard as earlier though, and reaches out her hand. I just laugh and accept her request to help me. I get back on my feet and remove all the snow from my face. Most of it had turned in to water because of my overly heated up cheeks, I'm not going to lie. I blushed pretty hardly while laying there. Meanwhile, Alaska collects the rest of the boys.

"Our moms are at my house, we can just go there and pray that one of them makes us hot chocolate," Luke chuckles, and we nod in agreement before we go to his place.

I can't even describe how grateful I am when we get to sit in front of the fireplace with loads of blankets and hot chocolate. I'm still freezing cold, but hopefully my body will stop being a little b.itch soon and finally warm up. I don't regret anything though. Or, maybe I do. I had a lot of fun out there, but I just... I shouldn't be having fun, I don't deserve it...

"What happened to your hands?" Michael asks and brings me out of the negative thoughts that were nearly eating me up and bringing me back in to my overly depressed state.

"What? Oh, just a little accident, nothing big," I mumble. It wasn't anything big, I guess one can call it self-defense from my computers side. I hurt my computer, and it hurt me back to stop me.

Ashton gives me a sympathetic look, but I ignore him. I don't need his pity.

"Does it hurt?" Alaska asks quietly. I shake my head, even though it's a lie, it actually does hurt, but I'm not going to admit that.

"It looks like it hurts," Luke mumbles and I just look down at the cup I'm holding in my hands. I really don't want to talk about it.

"Uhm, Alaska told us you helped her out a lot with our gifts, so we thought we should thank you," Ashton smiles after a couple of seconds filled with an awkward silence, and the others nod in agreement.

"No problem," I mutter with a small smile without looking up.

"Calum?" I suddenly hear and turn my head towards the door where the sound came from.

"Ready to leave?" aunt Carol smiles and I give her a nod before I stand up. I mutter a small bye before I follow aunt Carol out to the hallway and put on my shoes. As I'm putting on my jacket, Alaska jogs out to me.

"I forgot to give you this," she smiles and hands me a gift. What the h.ell? Why is she giving me a gift?

"As a small thank you for your help with the gifts," she adds when she sees my confused expression. Oh. Of course.

"Oh uh- thanks," I mutter and look down at the gift before I send her a small smile. I think there are two different things in this gift, because it's soft on one side and hard on the other.

"No problem, merry Christmas Calum," she smiles and gives me a small hug before she goes back in to the living room.

On the way home I think about how Alaska has an American accent, while the other boys all have Australian. So she's from America? I guess I'll have to ask her some time.

Once we get back to aunt Carol's house, we decide to eat. I haven't been eating much since I got here, and it's upsetting aunt Carol a lot, so I'm just going to eat dinner with her and stuff today, since it's Christmas. I realized already the first time I ate here that aunt Carol was right when she stated that she was a great chef, her food really is amazing. It's like having a mouth-gasm, and coming from me, that says a lot. I haven't really enjoyed any food for months now, but her food is just heavenly. You know, when I actually choose to eat it.

"Do you want to open presents?" she smiles once we're done eating.

"Okay," I mumble and shrug. We sit down by the Christmas tree and I look at the gifts. There are some small gifts under the tree, and surprisingly, more than just one of them has my name on it. Aunt Carol explains that I got some gifts from the others as well, which means that they felt sorry for me and got me some small, s.hitty gifts. I have one gift from Luke and his family, one from Ashton and his family, one from Michael and his family, one from Alaska's mother, and one from Alaska. I also have a bigger gift from aunt Carol and my own mom, so I guess they got something for me together.

I open up all of the small gifts first, except from Alaska's gift, and as I had previously guessed, they're all s.hitty. When I get to the big gift from my mom and aunt and find out that it's a new computer, a big wave of relief washes over me. Thanks god, I was feeling so guilty about ruining the old computer! Okay, I had honestly forgot all about it most of the time, but let's just pretend that I'm not the biggest a.sshole on earth. I hug my aunt and say a small thanks before I go to "my" room. I don't really consider it my room, but I still call it that because it's way easier.

I take out the gift I got from Alaska and look at it. I'm so curious as to what could be inside of this Christmas-themed wrapping with tiny penguins on it, and there's only one way to find out! I open it up carefully, as if I'm afraid I'll ruin the contents. Inside I find a small, stuffed kangaroo teddy bear and a Nickleback album. There is also a tiny note in there that says:

'In case you get homesick ;)'

I'm so glad I have some unpublished chapters for this story, I have a terrible writer's block atm and it sucks so much... 

It took me 10 days or something to write ONE FREAKING CHAPTER for my other story >:(((((

Oh well, it'll go over soon (I hope)...

Oh and guys, 300 reads! I'm so happy omfg! Thank you so much for reading my story, it means so so so much!

ily guys