Chapter 15: Christmas Day

December 25 (Christmas Day)

My parents and I agreed, back when I was nine, to celebrate Christmas in a quieter fashion since I was growing up. I thought they just wanted me to let them sleep in and objected at first but getting to sleep in is a good thing for me now that I’m a teenager. Mom taught me to make pancakes that year, so the tradition has become that I cook breakfast on Christmas morning. Today I started cooking around eight. I was halfway through the batter I’d made and the sausage was nearly done when Mom came into the kitchen in a robe.

“Merry Christmas, John,” she said as she hugged me. “Thanks for starting the coffee.” It was a joking reminder that I used to forget to turn on the coffeemaker while I was cooking. I remembered after the first two years, but she still likes to rub it in.

“I’ve learned my lesson, Mom,” I retorted as I kissed her cheek. “I know how grumpy you get when you don’t have your coffee.”

“It’s a good thing it’s Christmas,” she laughed as she swatted my arm.

“Yeah,” I deadpanned, “it means you get pancakes.”

Mom grabbed two mugs and filled them up with hot coffee. As she headed out of the room, she asked how long I’d be.

“I’m about halfway through,” I told her. “Probably another ten or fifteen minutes.”

“Just yell when you’re ready,” Mom said as she walked away. “We’ll get our showers after breakfast and then open presents.”

That was part of the trade: no more pre-dawn gift opening in our pajamas. I know some folks might be appalled at how we wait to open our gifts, but as Mom says, Christmas is all about family and traditions. Since this is our family, we’re allowed to have our own traditions even if they don’t match everyone else’s. Dad jokes that he’s just waiting for me to get old enough so we can turn this into a champagne brunch.

I set the table, finished plating up the pancakes and sausage, and called up the stairs to Mom and Dad to let them know that breakfast was ready. They came down in a few minutes. They filled up their coffee mugs while I poured myself a big glass of milk and then we all sat down for our breakfast. A lot of the conversation around the table was last-minute teasing about the gifts we’d bought for each other, and Mom and Dad ribbed me about how much I’d agonized about the gift I’d bought for my ‘first real girlfriend’ and what to get her mother.

I don’t think I agonized too much. I went in knowing what I wanted to give them, but it took a while to find something I could afford to give them that matched my vision. I finally ended up with two nearly-identical necklaces; a fine gold chain suspending a small pendant with their birthstone. The backs of the pendants were engraved with their initials. Mom had helped me shop and she was impressed at what I’d found for Katie and Becky. She just liked to tease me about the ‘hours and hours’ I’d spent scouring the jewelry counter for ‘the perfect gift.’ Dad had gone back with me a few days later and I got another necklace for Mom.

Breakfast was nice. There weren’t any pancakes left at the end, so I’m sure the compliments Mom and Dad gave were real, since I didn’t eat them all myself. Mom cleared the table and wiped up the rest of the mess from cooking, and then we all got our showers. We ended up opening presents sometime after ten. Mom loved her necklace and Dad thanked me repeatedly for the book I’d gotten him. As for me, I got a couple of video games, a couple of nice sweaters and Mom’s traditional gift of some of the loudest socks she could find.

“Enjoy this while you can, Lily,” Dad told Mom. “When the grandkids come along, we’ll be back on the dawn patrol.”

“I’m sure we have a few years yet,” Mom shot back as she gave me a pointed look. “Don’t we?”

“Only because Becky doesn’t want to be a grandmother until she’s at least 40,” I laughed. “And besides, I’m not stupid enough to ruin my chances of sleeping in on holidays just yet.”

“Good boy,” Mom said with a grin before she turned to act upset with Dad. “Don’t you start giving him ideas, Buster. If someone’s going to call me Grandma, I want to be old enough to look the part.”

“Oh, God,” Dad moaned in a fake panic attack. “We’ll never have grandchildren!”

Normally, other than a nice lunch, that’s the extent of our Christmas ‘celebration’ but this year we were having guests. That meant that this year Mom went into hyper drive once all the presents had been opened. I was pressed into service to gather up the used wrapping paper, saving the boxes and bows for Mom’s stash in the guest room closet. Mom busied herself in the kitchen. Even Dad was drafted to quickly run the vacuum over the public parts of the house. Once our Christmas lunch was on the stove or in the oven to finish cooking, the three of us set the dining room table with the best china, silverware and linens in preparation for my girlfriend and her mother.

I don’t know how she does it, but my mother has an amazing sense of timing. We had barely finished getting everything ready when the doorbell rang, signaling that Becky and Katie had arrived. I was the first one to the door, with my parents right behind me, to welcome our guests. There were hugs all around, which was awkward because both my girlfriend and her mother had their arms full of presents for the three of us. Mom ushered them through to the living room where the presents were placed under the tree with our gifts for them, and finally Dad and I took the ladies’ coats and hung them in the entryway closet. There were more hugs after that, as well as a deep kiss from Katie.

Mom’s amazing sense of timing came through again as the kitchen timer went off shortly after all the greetings were exchanged, and Becky went with her to get everything dished up to go on the table.

Lunch was fantastic. Not only was Mom’s cooking delicious and appreciated by everyone at the table, it was a table full of the most important people in my life. My girlfriend, Katie, was seated next to me. Her mother, my sex tutor as well as someone that I genuinely enjoyed being around, was sitting opposite us. Mom was to my left at one end of the table and Dad was at the other end. We laughed and talked as we ate our fill.