Happy Holidays

Happy Holidays (3)

The baseball flew straight up, into the air, before cascading back down into Jeff's scarred hands with a dull thump. Up, and down. Up, and down. Jeff had been doing this for about 20 minutes now, and at this point the boredom was killing him.

There wasn't much to do in this mansion, Jeff had realized. He had come to this mansion- well, forced was the better word- under the order of the Slenderman, who had captured Jeff, multiple times, in fact, until Jeff had finally given up and became a proxy. He was the newest member, and had only been here for a few months. Masky, Hoodie, and Toby were the oldest members, and were usually trusted the most by the Slenderman. Jeff found all three of them to be vaguely mysterious. He didn't even know Masky and Hoodie's real names, nor what Hoodie's face looked like underneath the mask, aside from when he pulled it up past his mouth so he could drink or eat. And Toby, Hell, even Toby didn't remember too much about his past, aside from a few basic things.

To be honest, everyone in this house had a past, and it was an unspoken rule to never talk or ask about each others history. One could guess, however, by the words proxies spoke in their sleep. Toby had a fear of cars and often talked about some girl in his sleep, Masky often woke people up at night, his screams were so loud. Hoodie remained as mysterious as ever, until Jeff caught him burning tapes when he took a late-night walk into the woods. Every person in the house had a story, from Ben's look of terror whenever they went past a body of water, to Eyeless Jack's drunk rambling as he looked into the woods, muttering about a Chernobog.

Jeff sighed, and kept tossing the baseball into the air. He wondered if it was worth murdering someone, or if he should just stay in. It was fun and all, but when it was the only fun thing to do, you have to do it sparingly. He threw the ball up, and then the door swung open, startling Jeff, causing the ball to hit his face.

He grunted, sitting up and glaring at- who else- Toby.

"What?" He growled, annoyed, rubbing his head. Toby snorted, before asking, "Ben and I are making cookies. Wanna join?" Jeff pretended to think about it, "Eh, I guess it might be fun." He said finally, as if he had anything better to do today.

Toby led back to the kitchen, where it seemed any and all social interaction happened, where Ben was sitting on the counter, listing off ingredients to an increasingly frustrated Sally.

"Ok so if we want to make the mint ones we need peppermint extract-No! Wait, this one says it tastes better if you use Andes chocolates- wait, never mind, one person in the comment section said OP is a loser-"

"Augh! Ben, just pick a recipe and tell me what to grab!" Sally wailed in distress, visibly upset.

Jeff heard Toby's muffled laughter from behind his mouth guard.

Eventually order was restored, and Ben finally settled on a recipe, with Jeff's helpful advice ("Ben, pick one or I will bake you into these cookies.") and within 15 minutes their first batch were ready to go into the oven. Jeff put them in, closed the oven door up, turned to Toby.

"What do we do now?" He asked. Toby pointed toward the timer. "It takes 10 minutes to bake, so I guess we just wait." Jeff nodded, leaning against the counter. Ben jumped back onto the island counter with Sally, and they all started making conversation.

"I'm surprised that old grease bag hasn't come downstairs yet," Ben muttered, glancing towards the door. Jeff raised his eyebrow as Sally elbowed Ben. "That's not nice!" She said. Ben's eyes were angry again. "Well Laughing Jack isn't a nice person either!" He protested. Ah, so that's who the "grease bag" was. Toby scratched his chin. "Actually," He said, "I think he left for the month." Ben and Sally sighed in relief.

"Gone?" Jeff asked. Ben nodded. "Yeah, every December he leaves for a week or so. He doesn't usually leave this early though..." He turned to Toby, expecting an explanation. Toby shrugged. "I don't know what you want me to tell you. Masky says that we weren't gonna see him for a week, but yeah, you're right. He usually doesn't leave so early." He recalled.

Jeff frowned. "Why does he leave though?"

"No clue," Ben said. "I'm glad he does though, he's always more of a total dick than usual- Ow!" He yelped as Sally hit him again. She turned to Jeff. "We shouldn't be talking about someone like that when they can't defend themselves," She stated, folding her arms. Jeff sighed. Sally could be stubborn, and he didn't feel like talking about LJ anyway.

"What's Christmas usually like here then?" He asked. Toby's eyes widened with excitement.

"Actually, I'm Jewish, so I spend Christmas singing Hanukkah songs!" he said, doing jazz hands. Ben rested his head in his palms, "He also lights every candle in the house. It's annoying, and makes everything smell like "Wild Fig" or "Starry Night". What the hell are stars supposed to smell like?" He exclaimed.

"Not my fault Brian likes candles," Toby shot back. Jeff scrunched up his nose. "Why the fuck did you wake me up in the morning screaming about Christmas then? " He said, thinking back to the past week.

Toby smiled devilishly. "Why not?" He said. Jeff had never felt like murdering someone more than he had now.

"Anyway, we don't usually celebrate Christmas here," Ben interrupted. "I mean, this year we're decorating, but that's it. Well, I guess we're doing cookies too, but me, Toby, and Sally do them every year."

Jeff nodded, forcing thoughts about dismembering Toby out of his mind. "The others don't celebrate it then?"

Toby tilted his head from side to side, "eh, it depends. Eyeless Jack doesn't do much for it, I know one year I asked if he got me anything for Christmas, and he gave me a liver with a bow taped on it. Masky and Hoodie usually visit a nearby town and look at the decorations on houses and in stores, us three just watch a Christmas movie and that's about it."

"If you wanted a better present you could have asked," said a voice. Everyone jumped and turned to see Eyeless Jack sitting at the table. How long had he been there?

He stood up, "I guess since you hate my gifts so much I won't get you anything this year."

Toby scoffed," Everyone knows you hate the liver, you just didn't want to eat it." Eyeless put a hand over his heart dramatically. "Well, you never told me you didn't like liver," He responded. Toby smiled. "Who said I hated your gifts anyway?"

They continued talking like this back and forth, faking grief over badly-received presents. Jeff ignored them. He didn't know Eyeless too well, besides the fact that he was a smartass. The timer on the oven went off, and Jeff went to grab the cookies before Sally stopped him.

"Put on oven mitts, what are you doing?" She shrieked. Jeff jumped, looking at her like she was crazy.

"Um. Ok." He looked around the kitchen for a minute, before asking, "What do they look like again? "

She sighed, reaching for a drawer, and pulling them out. She put them on and pulled out the cookies. "You guys are like children sometimes," she muttered. Jeff decided not to comment.