𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕤𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕠𝕟 || 𝘢 𝘱𝘰𝘭𝘢𝘳 𝘦𝘹𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘭𝘺𝘧𝘪𝘤

⋆꙳•̩̩͙❅*̩̩͙‧͙𝕔𝕙𝕒𝕡𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕤𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕟‧͙*̩̩͙❆ ͙͛ ˚₊⋆

"For some reason, I always thought that the houses would be made out of gingerbread." Jolly Boy leaned over to Harvey to state. "Kind of disappointed to see brick."

"Gingerbread would be highly impractical." Harvey held his nose high as he spoke. "The snow would cause it to get soggy."

Jolly Boy's smile didn't dip. In fact, Harvey wasn't sure he'd seen the boy upset the entire night.

"I know," Jolly Boy groaned. "But it'd still be kind of cool."

"It would be cool!" The Sweetheart girl (she was sweeter than the jelly beans they had eaten on the train) pitched in. "This year, I used M&M's to make the lights on my gingerbread house."

"Ooh, I've always used gumdrops!"

Harvey looked in between the two's nonsensical conversation about gingerbread house decorating. If they were going to discuss anything about gingerbread houses, they should be discussing the engineering required to create a structure that can bear the weight of 50 gumdrops, 10 licorice, a grandmotherly-sized handful of peppermints, and at least a thousand sprinkles, and the icing to go with it all. But no one ever thinks about that, and that is precisely why they fail.

He, Mama, and Mom never fail.

"Two columns, boys and girls! Even birthdays on the left, odd on the right!" The train conductor was saying. Harvey shuffled to the left, his birthday being an even number. Sweetheart fell in line behind him, and Jolly Boy settled into the line next to them. "Now, you do not have to hold hands, but please remain in your line while we are walking!"

Harvey was five seconds away from kicking the person shifting in front of him. It was Jolly Boy's twin from another mother, Cheerful Girl. She kept shifting and he could hear her telling the boy in front of her, the Indian version of Howl Pendragon, how excited she was that she couldn't stand still. Harvey Wadsworth could attest to that, unfortunately.

In her defense, they were standing about 300 yards from a huge Christmas tree. It was lit with bright white lights, and there was an enormous yellow star at the top. The ornaments on the tree were simple, generic ornaments, but looked to be about as big as him. It was very exciting, but that doesn't mean one should just lose all self control.

He leaned over to state this to Sweetheart, who simply laughed. Like he couldn't take on the girl. Pfft.

"Tickets, please!" The train conductor was checking their tickets once again. Harvey pulled his from his pajama pants pocket (that's right; his pajama pants have pockets); it, like everyone else's, is golden with the picture of the Polar Express on it and has two letters punched into it: I and E.

The only thing he knows about an I and an E is id est. Id est... what exactly? He'll never understand some people, honestly.

This time, everyone had their tickets. Everyone present that is.

"We're missing three, does anyone know where they are?" The train conductor called out. The Howl Pendragon looking kid answered him.

"Last I checked, they were still on the train."

Almost everyone turned back to look at the train where the three were still in the train car. Two were walking away, the other was bent down in between the seats, seemingly reaching for something. She tapped one on the shoulder and the two stopped walking and came to stand next to her.

"Do you want me to go get them, Mr. Conductor?" Harvey volunteered.

"If a passenger doesn't want to attend, they don't have to." The Conductor said, before turning away and leading them all away from the train.