Sheraton Academy

A Merry Little Christmas

Rating: G. Warnings: none

It was only supposed to be impossible to shop for someone who already had everything, Kong Yok had thought. JD certainly didn't have everything. Truthfully, neither of them had much compared to a lot of the other students, but JD never seemed to be in need of anything. Kong Yok knew presents weren't about what you needed, but what you wanted, but JD didn't seem to want much of anything, either. He was more content to spend an hour hanging out with friends than to receive an object of some kind. He liked things from the heart: handmade cards, mix CDs, a framed photo of a special time. The thing Kong Yok was the absolute worst at.

He was wandering Smithen Village, alone, his brother somewhere else looking for his own presents for their siblings and parents back home. They'd go back to Sheraton together, but for now, they had split. Kong Yok walked past yet another Christmas window display, little elves sorting letters for Santa Claus against a candy-colored backdrop. He put one gloved hand up against the window and his eyes darted over the little models with their green and red hats and shiny belts, then gently knocked his head against the glass and turned around, collapsing on his shoulders with a heavy sigh. Across the street was the movie theatre. He glanced between the posters of all the currently showing movies. He paused on one in the middle. A Batman film.

Batman. That was it! That was JD's favorite! And he'd said he had all the comic books except for... except for which one?

He'd have to get into JD's room to find out.

***

It was Gabriel's idea, and Kong Yok fully planned on pinning it on him if it didn't work. He and JD were in JD's room, watching an episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, which JD would occasionally mimic in perfect accent, even the more ridiculous faux-French and German ones. His phone vibrated. He didn't hear.

"Your phone's going off," Kong Yok said. JD leaned back on the bed and scooped it up from the pillow.

"H'lo?"

"Hey! JD, it's Gabriel. I, uh, I locked myself out of the dorms. Could you come downstairs and let me in the common room?"

"You're ridiculous," JD laughed, but nonetheless, he said, "I'll be right down." He stood and slipped his phone in his pocket, looking over his shoulder to tell Kong Yok, "I'll be right back. That dork Gabriel locked himself out again."

"Okay," Kong Yok said, and with a wave over his shoulder and a "Back soon," JD was gone.

It would only get him minutes, but hopefully it would be enough time to go through the comic collection on JD's bookshelf and figure out which issue he was missing. They were all in order, some brand new and plastic sleeved and others well worn around the corners and read numerous times, but finally he found the blank space: Julius Schwartz, Issue 181. An older one, judging by how early on in the collection it was. Kong Yok pulled out issue 180 and jotted down any relevant publishing information he could find, and just as he slid the folded paper in his pocket and put the comic back on the shelf, JD re-entered the room.

"Looking at the comics?" he asked. Kong Yok stood and turned back toward the computer, where the Monty Python DVD was still playing. "You can borrow them if you want. Even the collector's ones. I know how careful you are with your things. I trust you."

"It's okay," Kong Yok said. "Thanks, though."

***

Kong Yok spent the next week trawling the internet for anywhere he could buy a copy of that comic book for JD, but there was a reason he didn't own it. In the rare occasion he could even find it, it was impossibly more than he could afford, so he decided to look for the next best thing.