//------------------------------// // A Christmas to Remember // Story: A Christmas to Remember // by TwiPON3 //------------------------------// Sunset was walking down the snow-covered street when she spotted a pair of boxy headlights, not unlike those used by some cars of the 1980s, going down the street, so she jumped out in front of it. She had no hopes for Christmas after Anon-a-miss, so she thought she’d make everyone’s lives better. Maybe she’d get hit and killed. Meanwhile in the station wagon/RV, cousins Seth and Autumn Blaze were singing to a Christmas song they had put to the tune of the East German National Anthem, Seth driving. From our slumber, we’ve awoken; Christ-mas-time, this glo-rious morn’; To the hol-i-day we wel-come; Let us be al-to-gether! May your joy, be spread, to a-all; On this won-derful day!; For our fam’-i-lies’ ha-ppi-ness; Share your joy to all people; On this Christ-mas morn!; On this Christ-mas mo- “SETH STOP!!!!!!!!” Seth slammed on the breaks just in time so the car wouldn’t hit Sunset too hard, though it still knocked her on her back. “Jesus Harold Christ!” he said as they got out, “Are you okay?” “What happened!?” Autumn asked. Sunset envisioned herself in a padded room if she told the truth. “I was on my way home,” she said, pointing the direction she was running. “To an old warehouse? At 11:30 at night? On Christmas Eve,” Autumn asked, knowing exactly what Sunset was referring to, based on her appearance, “I don’t think so.” “My cousin’s right,” Seth said, “You’re having Christmas with us.” “Where are you going?” Sunset said as Autumn put her in the car’s front seat with her and her cousin. “Home,” Autumn responded as Seth started the car again, “Where we have food and heat and COZY!” “You don’t even know me!” Sunset yelled, but was overwhelmed by the engine’s loud roar. “Sorry!” Seth said, revving the engine to get it to warm faster, “Soviet cars of the 1980s need to warm up first, and two-stroke engines are the loudest! In 1995, they swapped over to more modern four-stroke engines, but I don’t think that the new Soviet cars are all that. I’m more the retro-type!” Sunset turned around to see that it was indeed being used as an RV. “You don’t even know me!” Sunset said as they were headed back to Seth and Autumn’s house and the engine wasn’t spinning at near-lethal speeds. “Well, we change that,” Autumn said, “I’m Autumn Blaze, he’s Seth, and you are?” “Sunset Shimmer. Where do you live?” “A few miles away,” he replied, “In a small but nice house.” A few minutes later, they were at the cousins’ house, where a cobalt-blue Yugo and ruby-red 1999 two-door Honda Civic was parked. Seth parked in front of the garage even though it was starting to turn into a light blizzard. To Sunset, it was a mansion, but decorated more in red and gold instead of green and red. The inside of the house was an open-concept living room/kitchen with five doors: three bedrooms, the bathroom, and the basement. “This is nice.” “It’s not much, but it’s what we have.” There were strings of lights attached to the counter, a small fiber optic tree sat atop the counter with a crystalline, red star lined in yellow as a topper, and odd ornaments were hanging off of it. The living room of the house had a couch and an armchair facing a 40-inch television, switched on to a YouTube video of a static picture of a Soviet flag and Christmas tree next to each other behind a Kremlin Star, playing Soviet Christmas Music, something that was unfamiliar to Sunset. Next to the setup was the big Christmas tree, a color-changing star as its tree topper, but still with the odd ornaments. Under it was twelve boxes wrapped in unique paper for each: A bird on a branch, doves and hearts, hens, birds in groups of four, yellow rings, geese, swans, cows, women dancing, men in suits jumping, flute players, and drummers, along with two others. It was obvious to all three that Sunset was about to fall asleep. “Let’s get you a bed,” Autumn said, walking Sunset to the third bedroom, then coming out just a few minutes later, “Let’s go back out for Sunset.” “Gotchta, dude,” Seth said, grabbing the keys to his Yugo and both of them leaving together. “Sunset was asleep before I even made it to the door with her,” Autumn said as the Yugo started. “Whoa, that’s bad.” “I know. What’s the plan?” Seth started to back out of the driveway and onto the now-white road. “We get her some clothes and Best Buy first, then go from there. If we can’t find anything, she’s still joining our ‘Twelve Days of Christmas’.” “I like the way you think.” At fifteen miles per hour, the drive to the mall took forever. Neither of them said anything until they made it to and inside the mall. “Where to?” Seth said. “I’ll go have clothes made, you hit up Best Buy, then we’ll go from there and hopefully not get caught up in this blizzard.” “And not hold back.” “Got it,” Autumn said as they both split, “Meet up at the food court!” At Best Buy, Seth was surprised that they had everything he wanted to get Sunset: a HP Elite x3 set and some studio-quality headphones. “$2,000 even,” the cashier said, boxing the stuff up, “Last minute Christmas?” “Yeah, and one more thing,” Seth replied swiping his debit card. “Hm?” “Can you wrap it?” After it was wrapped, Seth procured a sharpie from his jacket and wrote Сунсет Шиммер on the box. “Merry Christmas!” he said, carrying the box out. On the other end of the mall, Autumn was getting designer clothes for Sunset. She’ll love these!! “$93.95,” the cashier said, “Thank you for shopping at Ross. Dumbass Nirik.” “Yeah and a Merry Christmas to you, too,” Autumn said, hiding her offense to the term ‘Nirik’ as she swiped her debit card and left with her bags, running to the food court where she met with her cousin. “Boy or girl?” Seth said, knowing the familiar expression Autumn shown when she was called a Nirik. “Bitch,” she said through clenched teeth. “Guess I’m not beating her teeth out because she’s a girl.” “Let’s go.” The snow had let up, but the drive back to their house was still close to an hour, which had to be done in complete silence. “Home free,” Seth whispered as they went in and closed the door as quietly as possible, “Are we going to wrap yours?” “No. It’s almost 2:30 in the morning and I’m tired.” “Let’s just set them next to the tree.” Autumn nodded in agreement as both set their gifts down and went to bed. The television had since changed from the Soviet Christmas Music to a blue, contemporary-style analog clock with no audio and captioned with Fröhliche Weihnachten. The next morning, Sunset awoke to the sound of someone playing piano music and a blizzard just outside. Wait, Sunset thought, Outside? “Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer; had a very shiny nose!; And if you ever saw it; you would even say it glows!” “You sound just like a Soviet, Seth!” “Spasibo.” “I still can’t believe that’s natural!” “Merry Christmas, Autumn. I hope Sunset’s gonna have a good time with us, too.” Sunset followed the sound to the basement, but noticed the time on the television at 5:52. “Time for one more?” “Oh, alright,” Seth said, playing the tail-end of one of the songs from the night before. “From our slumber, we’ve awoken; Christ-mas-time, this glo-rious morn’; To the hol-i-day we wel-come; Let us be al-to-gether! May your joy, be spread, to a-all; On this won-derful day!; For our fam’-i-lies’ ha-ppi-ness; Share your joy to all people; On this Christ-mas morn!; On this Christ-mas morn!” It sounded beautiful. “Let us celebrate the season; Cheer and jo-oy e-ver-ywhere; That all will be joy on this day; Christ-mas-time, this joy-ful morn’!; May your joy, be spread, to a-all; On this won-derful day!; Christmas is the reason for us; And your joy with all people; On this Christ-mas morn!; On this Christ-mas morn!” “And the tune is from the DDR Anthem?” “Yeah.” The next thing Sunset knew was that there was music playing from the TV with the clock 5:59 and 55... 56... 57... 58... 59... At 6:00, the nameless melody transitioned into Jingle Bells as the clocked flipped around to show a Christmas Tree in a wreath with snow falling on it. “If she’s up, let’s have breakfast.” Seth and Autumn came up the stairs and caught Sunset dead in her tracks. “Breakfast?” Autumn asked, “or presents?” Autumn was getting giddy, so she ran and got a pop-tart for Sunset from the kitchen, “Oh I can’t wait! Let’s have Christmas first, then I’ll fix something!” “Or I could” “No! Seth, you are not going into that kitchen and making something that’s SUPPOSED to be edible! The last time, you doused pasta in alcohol and set it on fire!” “Yes, Mommy,” Seth replied not managing to hold back his laughter as he put on a Christmas playlist, continuing from last night, “Sunset, let’s do this.” Sunset, predictably, didn’t think she’d get anything. “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me,” the two cousins sang, giving the box wrapped in birds on branches to Sunset, “a partridge in a pear tree!” “What?” Sunset said, taken aback by this. “We started this this thing where on the thirteenth,” Autumn said, “one of us gets a present and wraps it like a certain day in the song Twelve Days of Christmas, then on Christmas, when the twelve presents are here, we open ‘em. You got the one for the first day. Merry Christmas.” Sunset opened the box and found... “Cake batter?” she laughed, holding the box up. “Looks can be deceiving.” Sunset opened the box and found a copy of the movie RV. “Oh-ho, lucky!!” Seth said, “Robin Williams is the BEST!!” “Could we watch it later?” Sunset asked. “The DVD’s yours. You can watch it whenever you want. Now you join in with us, it ain’t right if you don’t.” “Okay.” “On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me,” the box with the doves and hearts went to Seth, “Two turtle doves!” It was a small, narrow box. “I hope it isn’t,” he unwrapped it to find a powerstrip, inciting laughter from everyone, ”Enslaved by my own gag-gift!” “On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me,” the box with hens went to Autumn, “Three french hens!” “C’me on!” she said, tearing open the paper, then squealing, “Oh my GOD!!! An XBOX One X!!” Seth and Autumn looked at each other, then at Sunset. “Merry Christmas, Sunset,” Autumn said, handing the ROSS bags from last night to Sunset, “They’re for you.” Sunset couldn’t believe all of the designer clothing that she had gotten, “Really?” “Yeah,” Seth said, pushing a box wrapped in brown paper with the words Сунсет Шиммер written across the top. “Me?” “You.” Sunset unwrapped the box to find it said “Best Buy” on it, so she opened it and couldn’t believe when she saw the tech inside. “Best Buy was my friend last night.” Sunset watched as Autumn and Seth exchanged gifts. Autumn had given Seth the original copy of Tomb Raider for Windows 95, while Seth had given Autumn a picture of them at an amusement park. “Merry Christmas, all!” Autumn shouted as loudly as she could, going into the kitchen, “Bacon, eggs, and bagels okay? Good because they’ve been on for the past hour!” “Another thing we decided earlier is that you can live with us, as a third gift,” Seth said as Autumn came back into the living room, “Merry Christmas.”