Keys To The Hearts

Chapter Fifty-one

"Merry Christmas!"

The door burst open, and Faith was running inside the room she shared with Samantha, Holly, June and Keyara. Apparently, it was their tradition that they wouldn't sleep during Christmas night, so when Samantha offered to paint Keyara's nails, the latter agreed, albeit reluctantly. Samantha started with a transparent gel, then painted Keyara's nails with skin-tone polish. There was a tool that Samantha used that completely took Keyara by surprise.

UV light. 

It never crossed Keyara's mind that there was a tool to make nail gel dry faster.

Keyara watched her nails carefully, trying hard not to shake her hand when Samantha drew a round arch on her tips.

French tips, Samantha called. 

Keyara wasn't sure what she was more jealous of, whether it was the fine, thin brush Samantha used, or Samantha's hand which was way more stable that Keyara's.

She frowned at the perfect white tip Samantha drew on the thumb, lighting it up with the lamp later. It was perfect and identical to the rest of her nails.

Not fair.

Now, Keyara's heart came up to her throat when Faith lunged at her.

Samantha's face was horrified, wide eyes, jaw dropped and all.

The blonde yelled, "Her nails!"

Right in time, Keyara raised her hands. Faith took the redhead in her embrace, snuggling closer into Keyara's hoodie—it belonged to Keygan actually.

"Merry Christmas, Keyara," Faith said, her voice muffled by the green cloth.

Keyara smiled, slowly bringing her hand down to pat the girl's head. "Merry Christmas."

Then, Keyara turned to Samantha. "Merry Christmas."

"Aww," Samantha cooed. "Merry Christmas, my favorite tiny human."

Faith left Keyara to hug Samantha. When Keyara was sure that her nails were completely dried and hardened, she reached for her phone.

Dozens of messages flood her phone and she resisted a smile.

Merry Christmas, sis. Mom and Dad also told me to pass their wishes. Can we meet during New Year?

She wished Toby and his family back, and said okay to his request.

Since Devon's chat was dry as the Sahara, she wished him first and asked him to extend it to his boyfriend.

Vidyashree had spammed her text box, around ten messages. There was one long message at the top that Keyara took a whole minute to read it. Keyara replied it with a heart, replying that she was just as much as a good friend to her. 

Her heart said one little emoji wasn't enough, so with a sigh, Keyara typed another text to Vidyashree.

Merry Christmas. Thank you for wishing even if you don't celebrate it. And thank you for being a good friend to me. I never had a genuine friend before, not before you. 

To my first ever friend, thank you.

Keyara shot another heart to sound less serious.

In the group chat, texts after texts were drowning Keyara's screen, so she turned off her phone, promising to herself that she would reply later. Knowing Matias, he would send a photo of himself wearing the Grinch costume. 

Oh, how he loved to traumatize children.

Just as she placed the phone on the bed, screen down, another notification got through. The unknown number made her frown, but the message tugged a string in her heart.