The Guys on my Flat

Chapter Forty Three

School Holidays were finally here.

And that also meant something else.

Christmas!

Exams were a pain, but the rest of year12 is next year!

I love Christmas, more than anything in the world, and I believed I would love it even more this year because I now have a whole family to celebrate it.

I got up a little earlier and ran down the stairs to the Main Room and pulled out a Christmas tree from storage and started to set it up.

I was so short though.

I was putting the tree together; it smelled like dust, cobwebs and old plastic and tinsel. I looked around the whole Main Room, it really needed to be livening up a little bit. I knew Adam and Booker were excited about Christmas, something about Adam seeing his Mum, and Andy would rejoice at anything worthy of a party. Christmas was about two weeks away and everybody had been talking about it at school, parties and mixers and raiding toy stores and cookie jars.

The tree was growing too tall for me eventually and stared at the top of the tree, it was branch-less. I stared at the branches I had in my hand and stared back up at it. I could reach it if I got on my tippy-toes, but the branches there tickled me and made my skin itch.

I looked at the box of decorations I had found and stared at it as I tried to form an idea.

Five minutes later I was standing on the box on a chair reaching forwards, I was as steady as a fish out of water. The chair trembled under my leaning weight as I reached further forwards and clipped the remaining branches into the tree's base.

I grabbed the last piece, which was like the top hat of the tree, I leaned forwards and pressed it down until it too clipped and it actually looked like a Christmas tree. I felt that momentary proudness of me as I folded my arms and looked at my work.

Now I needed to decorate it, that was always the fun part anyway.

I looked around lazily for the box of decorations I knew were somewhere and found them behind me. When I turned back to the tree I saw Cassidy staring at it. Her silent presence made me jump and she smirked when she saw my surprise. "Gotta love Christmas," she began, "the decorations, the food, the presents, the jolly vibe that fills the air," she sighed, "and the mistletoe." She gave me a cheeky look and I looked up as almost a pre-caution.

Nothing hung above us though.

She found this amusing as she ran her fingers through the prickly bristles of the tree, "Haven't seen one of these in ages," she informed rubbing the dust off her fingers and taking a bauble from me, "need some help?" she offered.

Just as we both started, Adam came down, still in his pyjamas and bedhead. He still looked half asleep as he dragged his feet like a sleepy elephant as he made his way over to the lounge and face planted it.

Cassidy smirked, "well that's a bit cute," she said as she approached him and started tickling him. He was drowsy with his giggles at first but soon started squirming and squealing with laughter, "you awake yet, squirt?" she laughed as he attempted tickling her back.

He was blinky-bill for a moment before staring at the Christmas tree, "wow!" he exclaimed as he ran over, "are you gonna decorate it now or at night with everyone else?" he asked.

I was planning on just decorating it now, when I told him this he seemed outraged, telling me how I had to let everybody decorate the tree together. Soon Cassidy piled onto that, playfully calling me selfish and stuff.

I eventually heeded and was forced to wait an entire hour for everybody else to eventually get up and come down. Booker was the first down, mainly looking for Adam. Alex hadn't come down yet though.