Unexpected

• Chapter Thirty-Seven •

"Christmas isn't a season. It's a feeling." ~Edna Ferber

                             • • •

The next morning, I'm woken up by Zola and Nolan charging into my room and jumping onto my bed. But as if that wasn't enough, they had to scream loudly into my ear, practically bursting my eardrums.

"WAKE UP WAKE UP!" Yells Zola.

"IT'S CHRISTMAS!" Adds Nolan.

I grumble from their sudden outburst but push off my covers and give them tight hugs.

"Come on Keziah! Everyone's waiting for you!" Nolan pulls out of my hold to start tugging me off my bed.

"Why are you being so loud?" I groan to him.

"Because it's Christmas silly! And I get to have presents!" Zola claps her hands together in excitement making me smile.

"Fine I'm coming." Begrudgingly, I get out of bed and quickly head to the bathroom to freshen up. As soon as I'm done, I'm dragged down the stairs by Zola and Nolan to meet everyone in the living room.

"It's about time you joined us Keziah!" My dad says with a chuckle.

"Yeah, even I'm awake and I'm old!" Grams gripes.

Everyone except me laughs at this while I roll my eyes. I don't remember when loving sleep became such a big issue.

I take a seat on the floor with Zola and Nolan who are all too eager to get their hands on their gifts.

As I expected, my mum turns on the camcorder and places it on the stand closer to the back of the room to capture this whole morning. She says that one day, we'll appreciate all the videos she's taken and look back on all the happy moments we shared. It's not like I can argue with that; she's probably right.

The presents are removed from under the tree and passed round to the correct person; once that's been done, we all take turns opening our gifts starting with Zola first since she obviously can't wait that long.

Zola rips the wrapping paper off with high pitched squeals, hugging each item she receives. One of those things is that toy kitchen set she's been begging for; you know the one that every child has? I already know she's going to be spending her whole day with that thing.

Nolan on the other hand, gets a new basketball kit and a Lego set that builds various vehicles. He's really into building those things and even loves it almost as much as dinosaurs.

This continues on until it reaches to me; I open a box to find a pair of high heeled black boots that I've been dying over but were too expensive for me to get. I immediately look towards my mum with knowing eyes since she's the only I brought it up to. I open the rest of my gifts to find things like perfume, bath sets, clothes and jewellery. Overall, I'm pretty happy with what I got knowing I can put them all to good use.

Once we're all done, we start clearing up the mess that has been made and dump all the rubbish into the bin.

"Keziah, Marcel, Nikita, Andre and Tobias!" My mum yells. "Come help me with breakfast!"

All four of us head into the kitchen to find mum making many pancakes. "I need you guys to toast the scones and spread them with butter and jam." On Christmas, it's tradition for us to always eat scones with jam and sometimes even whipped cream. It's definitely a family favourite but we've decided to add pancakes simply because of how many of us there are.

While we're sorting this out, I start talking to Tobias who I haven't heard much from lately. "How have you been lately Tobs?"

Tobias pauses what he's doing for a second to give me a small smile. "Not bad Kez, just the usual stuff." He replies gently.