Habits

Last Christmas

December 24th. Part of the second best holiday of the year. The first is obviously a tie between Halloween and Día de los Muertos with the Cabreras.

Christmas has always been a weird trend for our family. Uncle Donald is always stressed out, Louie is always uninterested or, dare I say, greedy, Huey is trying to help Uncle Donald, and Dewey is, well... mourning, I suppose. And me? I don't really know what I do. I bring home coffee and Christmas treats from the bakery, I make sure everyone's homework is done, and I try to get everyone to sit down and watch a christmas movie with me.

Louie falls asleep, head in my lap, phone still in his hand. Huey eventually gets Uncle Donald to settle down. Uncle Donald passes out, 20 minutes into the movie, in true dad fashion. And Dewey... holes himself in his room, before finishing the movie with us.

Uncle Donald always tries his best. He makes us take ugly christmas photos, constantly dons his ugly christmas sweater, tries and fails to make eggnog, sings Christmas songs in English and Spanish, and occasionally Gaelic and basically annoys everyone in the most charming way.

During Christmas, it's like the dark cloud that hangs over us, as a family, lifts a bit. We're happy, bills are always paid, we always have presents. Everyone's content.

Except for Dewey.

I wouldn't go as far as to call it a depression, but he gets into a bit of a fog every year. It's hard to make any conversation with him or interact with him.

Which is understandable, I guess. We've all got a lot on our minds.

But hopefully this year is different.

~~~

Nerp. I don't know why I even try.

T'was the night before Christmas, and all through the house, everyone was awake, despite the lack of mouse.

Uncle Donald was outside putting up Christmas decorations, which I thought was very dangerous for him-

There was a loud CRASH! The whole house shook, and I nearly lost my balance. I walked towards the outside door to go check on Launchpad, dodging Scrooge on the way.

I heard the shrill sound of my Uncle cursing out Launchpad. I snickered. I guess I was right about Uncle Donald. I turned back around into the foyer, and might I say, it was quite a scene.

Webby swung from a rope she tied to the tree, and spread tinsel and ornaments upon the tree. It was... pretty bad, I'll be honest.

Louie seemed to be writing a letter to "Santa." In the most inconvenient spot, but oh well.

Ms. Beakley was setting... mouse traps? I think.

Duckworth was assisting in decorating the tree, and Huey was  moderating the scene.

Huey looked at the tree and then looked at a page in his JWG. He looked back up at Webby. "We need to talk about your ornament distribution."

Scrooge muttered to himself, storming past them.

I looked at Huey and Webby, then at Scrooge. I stood next to the pair.

"So, uh, what's his deal?" I asked them.

"Scrooge hates Christmas," Webby informed. "I figured you'd know that!"

I looked back at Scrooge, who grumpily crumbled up Louie's letter to Santa.

"He was a bit grumpy when I was younger," I admitted, "but he still celebrated with us. I wonder what's his problem..."

Speak of the devil, he let out a pained yell.