Chapter 15

That year, Christmas fell on a Saturday and, while Pollyanna and Michelle still wanted to have our traditional lunch date, it was decided that day should be spent with family. As a compromise, we decided to have lunch that Sunday, instead. The anime club meetings had turned more into an excuse to come over and raid my collection after we had completed our fansubbing project, so there was minimal protest when I told them that I had to cancel that Sunday.

While my legend had been quite thorough, it did not mention whether my family opened their presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. Since both the Caspars and Rose opened theirs on Christmas Day, I decided that was when my family did, as well. I retrieved my gifts for everyone on the last day of school from Chuck. He had been willing for my gifts to be sent to his house to hide suspicion, since way too many questions would have arisen, if somebody in the house intercepted the mail before I did.

I securely hid my gifts while everybody was at the mall doing some shopping. I thought about hiding them down in the basement, but it was only a matter of time before Traci found the entrance to it. I had caught her the previous week looking for what she called the 'mythical' basement. Rose did not help matters when she mentioned that she knew where it was; she caught her mistake but, by then, it was too late. For the next few days after Rose's blunder, Traci had hounded Rose, trying to get the poor girl to give her a clue to where Traci should be looking for it. While I could still secure the gifts in the panic room down there (since only me and the CYA knew how to get into it), the risk of Traci learning the location of the entrance would be too great when I would have to go and retrieve it.

I was halfway through taping my gifts to the underside of my desk drawers when I had a flash of inspiration. I quickly gathered up the gifts, and went to Traci's room. The entire time she had been living with me, so far, she has always insisted with sleeping with me, even throughout her period. And Rose had just washed all the bedding a few days ago. Since I knew it would be safe until Christmas, I hid my gifts in the last place anybody would look: between the mattresses of Traci's bed.

I woke up before Traci on Christmas morning and retrieved four envelopes from my desk. I then went to her room, and locked the door, in case she came looking for me. After I wrote the names of all the women that were currently living with me on the envelopes, I retrieved my gifts from under the mattress, put it in the envelopes, and sealed them. I then left Traci's room and went to the living room.

Marge's Christmas tree was decorated with the Caspars' Christmas ornaments. We had a discussion, a few weeks prior, about buying a Christmas tree. I pointed out two issues on why we should not. One was that I did not want to have to have Rose always cleaning up the dead needles that fell off. The second was from an environmentalist standpoint, that trees should not be cut down just to decorate somebody's house. My third point I did not voice aloud. I had better things to do with my time than spending hours looking for that "perfect tree" that would only have to be discarded after a couple of weeks. I still loved shopping, but shopping for a Christmas tree seemed rather pointless. I could have agreed to one and just stayed home while the women looked for one, but that would have meant a battle, and as Sun Tzu once said, 'It is better to avoid the battle when facing overwhelming odds, especially if it includes three female teenagers'. Well, he would have said it, especially if he had met Rose.

The idea of using an artificial tree was settled when Marge pointed out that she could just pick hers up when she retrieved her Christmas ornaments from storage. The night that we set it up, Rose popped popcorn, and we used needle and thread to string them on the tree. Lori joked that I seemed to handle a needle quite well, for being a guy. I joked that it was because my parents were always busy with work that I had to learn to sew to make mends on clothes I wore. I do not think the actual truth -- that I had been taught how to suture wounds -- would have gone over well.

After I had placed the envelopes under the tree, I stood back and looked around the room. Marge had also reacquired a couple boxes of her Christmas decorations, had gone throughout the house, and decorated it in splendor. Christmas was not celebrated at the Compound. We, of course, knew about it, but it was merely one of many holidays that we had to be aware of. This was the first time that I would be giving and receiving gifts, excluding Rose's birthday gift, and some small trinkets that I picked up for Traci to mark certain dating anniversaries.

After a quick trip to the backyard to smoke three Camels, I went to the kitchen and started on breakfast. I figured it was the least I could do since I was up. I had just completed grinding potatoes for hash browns when Rose joined me in the kitchen. She did not even try to kick me out of the kitchen today. I thought to myself that she had been watching me and knew which battles to fight and which to withdraw from.

Traci was the first to finish breakfast -- seeming to think the faster she ate, the faster we would eat. That tactic worked on the other three women, who grew tired of the looks Traci kept flashing them, but I ignored her and ate at a leisurely pace. After I drank my last drop of orange juice, I suggested that we do the dishes before opening the presents. That brought out a cry of outrage from Traci, and laughter from the other three, before we all got up and headed into the living room.

"Hold on a second," I said to my girlfriend, who had reached for my gift to her. "Instead of being a free-for-all, why don't we all open gifts from the same person at the same time. That way, they can enjoy watching our reactions instead of being busy unwrapping their own bounty."

Traci gave me one of her small pouts, but it was Lori who asked, "How do we determine the order?"

"Rose, could you fetch the cards from the study?" As the redhead went to retrieve the cards, I explained, "Each of us will get a card, and we shall go from highest to lowest."

Rose came back into the living room and handed me the cards.

I took them out of the pack and started shuffling. We had played poker a week earlier and, when I had put away the cards, I had stacked the deck so that I could deal myself the two of spades. It didn't matter to me what order we went in as long as my gift was unwrapped last. However, after I dealt the cards, I was surprised to see that I had the five of hearts instead of the card I had expected. Somebody knew what I had been planning and changed the order of the cards.

I tried to figure out who could have thwarted my plan, but I found out my answer when we revealed our cards. I had not foreseen somebody using the deck between the last time we played poker and Christmas Day. It seemed that someone had played solitaire after I had stacked the deck, since the cards were put away in the pack from ace to king and hearts on top of diamonds, on top of spades, on top of clubs. It was pure blind luck that I still ended up with the lowest card. Lori had the king of spades, so she handed us her gifts to us. After all of us had our presents, we started to unwrap them. Lori watched us, biting her lip in anticipation.

"Thank you, Lori," I told her. She had given me season three of 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' on DVD and an Eminem CD.

Rose was next, and I had a sneaky suspicion of what it could be, since it was the same shape of my previous gift. I thanked her for giving me season four of "Buffy" and a Tatu CD.

I think that everybody had expected me to open Traci's gift first, since it was season one of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and a Kid Rock CD. I guess my plan had thwarted theirs.

"Season two of "Buffy" and a CD," I announced when Marge handed me her present. She rolled her eyes and asked, "Yeah, but what CD?"

"Prince?" I guessed.

That got a groan from all of the ladies. I guess they felt my music library was lacking in some variety, hence the Christmas presents. I had been correct on the DVDs, but the CD was AC/DC.

When I handed out my presents to the ladies, Rose gave a knowing grin. Both she and Marge knew I was planning a trip, but only Rose knew it was going to be overseas. The Caspar girls did not have a clue what could be in the envelopes, but the other two ladies had a good idea that it might be plane tickets. I nodded to let them know that they should all open the presents now.

"Tokyo!"

It was Rose who found her voice first after they had opened their envelopes. The plane tickets were for the Friday that we got out for Spring break and returning the Sunday that it ended. We would have eight nights in Japan.

"Chad, are you sure you can affor... Young lady, put that phone down right now! It's Christmas morning, for Christ sakes!"

A sheepish-looking Traci hung up the phone. Marge asking me her question had distracted me; otherwise, I would have tried to stop Traci myself. Stage 1 was completed: the girls had opened their presents. Stage 2 was tougher: to keep Traci away from a phone for at least twenty minutes.

I kept an eye on my girlfriend while I answered her mother, "Yes, I can afford it. Though, this also counts as your birthday, White Day, and any other presents for next year. I wanted to do something special for my friends. I also have always wanted to go to Japan, and I thought the trip would be more fun with my friends with me."

"White Day?" asked Traci.

"That's the opposite of Valentine's Day. Girls give guys chocolates on February 14^th, and then on March 14^th, White Day, the guys return the favor by giving gifts to the girls who gave them chocolates," supplied Rose. Once again, I was impressed how much she had picked up watching anime.

'Still, I don't know if we can accept this," Marge said, much to the disappointment of her daughters.

"Well, the tickets are non-refundable, and I'm still going. If you want to live with the thought of me getting lost and never seeing me again, so be it."

Marge snorted at my weak attempt at a guilt trip. "When you do something, you sure go balls-out, don't you," Marge said.

"And you always have to think too much about something. Just say yes, for now, so we can open the gifts that Santa brought us," I said, grinning at Marge.

She conceded for now, and we turned our attention to the remaining gifts under the tree -- the ones that were labeled "From Santa".

"How in the world did Santa know I wanted a letterman's jacket?" My sarcasm was thick enough to cut with knife.

I had to put on the dreaded jacket and model it for everybody. Across the back of it was my last name, and over the left breast was my first. They had already sewed my letter on my jacket, as well as having my year on my left sleeve, with my water polo number, 13, on my right. I vowed to hide the jacket somewhere where Traci would never find it. I do not brand my women.

"Are you going to open the gift that your family sent you?" asked Marge.

I decided I might as well, but I rolled my eyes when I opened the gift. Since my mythical family was currently in Africa, the CYA had sent me an African statue. After I had showed it off, I found a place in the living room to display it, making sure it pointed west. I was the only one in the house that knew it was a fertility statue. If I pointed it east, then I would have many children. If I pointed it west, then my 'seed would never see fertile ground'. I would make sure that I pulled Rose aside later and stressed that, if she ever had to clean it, or move it, to make sure it pointed west.