The Best Gift
Wordsworth wrote, "A simple child. That lightly draws its breath. And feels its life in every limb. What should it know of death?"
He'd always been told that walking out on the streets late at night, especially in pitch black neighborhoods, was dangerous and there was not a bright idea about it. Kai's neighborhood was a nice rich one, but there were little to no lights on in the whole street. The fact that no body quite liked the look of Kai's mansion due to its scary façade only made walking there all the more scary.
Max wasn't even sure why on earth he was going to Kai's place. The two of them had been great friends, but lately things weren't all that great so he didn't quite understand why the path he had gone on had led him to the stoic captain's home.
He stood outside and stared up at the house for a few minutes. The upper floors of the house were pitch dark, the only reason he knew that his friend was home was because of the warm glow there was coming from one of the front rooms downstairs. The warmth looked beautiful, a soothing golden glow as opposed to the dark freezing night that blew past him where he stood on the pavement.
The wind grew stronger and in the direction he was standing, covering his face in many tear-like droplets that the cold wind threw into his direction. With that in mind he headed up the steps to the front door, knocking hard on the heavy wooden door. Despite the weakness of his knock as opposed to the solid door, Kai heard it and showed up at the door, standing there with a glass of something in hand, Max assuming it was some strong Russian alcohol, not putting it past Kai to be drinking it so naturally. Max expected Kai to be mad at him for being there, but at first he just looked a little surprised, then frustrated when he pulled him in hurriedly by the arm and shutting the door with a loud banging sound.
"What the hell are you doing out in the snow and dressed like that?"
Out of haste Max had left his home without a proper jacket on, most of his shoulders and arms going mostly numb so having not really thought about it. He liked the feeling he currently got from the inside of Kai's house; he'd scarcely been in the place without his other team mates before so he took a moment to bask a lot of it in. The candles, the source of the golden glow, lit the whole hallway all the way to the main room, and for that he was thankful because they warmed up his shaking body.
"Max! What were you doing out there?" Kai asked again, setting Max down in a chair not far from the door.
The blonde shook his head a little, his hands running over his arms hurriedly to continue warming himself up, "Am I interrupting something?"
"What?"
"Candles…alcohol."
Kai raised an eyebrow at his friend, actually wondering if he'd lost his mind before realizing he was serious, "No. The candles are because every time lightning hits then the circuit breaker trips and the alcohol…well call me my grandfather but I like alcohol on a night like this."
Max smiled up at his friend, nodding a little in understanding. "I'm sorry for passing by so late, you were probably off to bed or something, right?"
"At 10:30?" Kai asked skeptically, "No way, I'm waiting for a relative."
The younger boy saddened at the sound of that. He supposed that the only real reason that he came to Kai with this was because Kai was in the same situation he was in; going through the Christmas holidays with no family to celebrate with. "So I am interrupting."
"If you were I wouldn't have hesitated to tell you that by now." He sighed with frustration, realizing that his young friend was avoiding the question, "What were you doing out there at this time? In this cold?"
"I needed to see someone…"
Understanding that Max just wanted to talk about something that was bothering him, Kai gestured for him to follow him to the living room. In a few minutes he let his friend settle by the fire to warm up and dry off, tossing him a towel too. He left him to clean himself up as best he could while he went off to make some tea, putting it beside Max on the stone base of the fireplace.
"So? What's the matter?" Unfortunately for Kai, it seemed to have sounded a lot more insensitive than he'd intended. "I can tell something is wrong Max; four years of depression sort of makes me more aware of the signs so talk, and sooner rather than later."
Max sniffled quietly, burying his face in his own shoulder which made things worse due to the soaked clothing. "I've never been so alone on Christmas before…"
"Your dad's here isn't he? And I thought you said your mom was flying in."
"Change of plans." Max exhaled noisily, staring into the thick flames of the fire, "Dad went away for five days with a friend of his, he said my mom and I could have time alone to catch up. It wasn't my favorite idea, I wanted him around but I was okay with it in the end. But then mom called yesterday night and said that she had to finish off some more work, new results or whatever came in and she had things to do and then today Tyson went on holiday with his family and Ray went to visit his own."
"You've never spent Christmas alone, have you?"
Max shook his head, then sat back and watched Kai relax on the sofa. There was so much he wanted to ask him right now that he felt stupid just sitting there and not saying something for so long. "Kai…how do you deal with being alone? This big house…all year long all alone aside from the help, no family and just friends coming around once in a while." He watched Kai sigh too, putting his drink down on the coffee table before joining him on the ground.
"Maxie…" he used his childish nickname to make things a little easier on him, "this thing with your parents, I don't think it was just coincidence that things turned out this way, they're not on good terms with each other any more and even I could feel the tension. Your dad…probably went away for the week so that he couldn't argue with her in front of you while she was here and your mom probably stayed in America because she didn't know that he was leaving the two of you alone." He reached out and brushed the tears off one of Max's cheeks as he shut his eyes tight to block them, "I'm…not trying to be hurtful, I'm just calling them how I see them." He watched the boy breakdown finally, curling up into a ball and sobbing in the small space between his knees and chest.
In the meantime, the Russian just sat there beside him, not interceding at all and not even setting a hand on him to comfort him. This was difficult for his youngest friend. Max had never dealt with this sort of emotional pain before, it was new to him. How could he expect a child who grew up with happiness all through his life, to handle the emotional pain of that falling apart? What could be more painful than watching the thing you thought was the happiest thing you've known your whole life, break down completely?
"I knew things were getting worse." He murmured softly and suddenly through the hushed sobs, "They got back together last time she was here for a year… they started arguing again, and I knew it was the reason she left but I didn't think I'd never see the two in the same room together again."
"When was the last time you saw your mom?"
"A year and five months."
Kai had to admit; this was a tough problem to talk Max into a better mood. Kai never saw his parents because they were both dead and buried but Max knew both his parents were alive, and they were all on good terms for a long time and now Max was watching everything he ever knew fall apart. Kai admired the fact that Max's parents had some sort of understanding and acted civilized, at least for Max's sake but now he wasn't sure, and silently he wished that they had broken up properly a long time ago and not drag it out like this. "I'm sorry…about all of this. I wish that you'd told me about it sooner; at least I could've told you to stay here with me for the holidays."
"I didn't want to bother anyone, but then today I just couldn't handle it so I thought I'd come over, at least just to say hi."
Kai shook his head a bit and finally made some contact with his friend, putting his arm loosely over his shoulders and tugging him a little closer to him, "Max, you have told me countless times that if I ever needed anything; company or help, that I could pass by your place at any hour. I, stupidly, have hardly ever told you to do the same thing but I mean it when I say that you could come over whenever you needed anything. Visits like these…don't bother me."
"Thanks for this, Kai."
Kai pulled his arm back off and stood up, putting out two hands to help his friend off the floor, "I prepared a spare bedroom for my relative; we'll go find some dry clothes for you to change in and you can use it for the night…and for longer if you'd like to stay here while your father is away."
Max blinked, staring up at Kai's seriousness, "What? No way Kai. What about your guest? And I'd be imposing anyway."
"You won't be imposing and I said it was a spare bedroom, meaning I have others so it's no problem. If you need some place to stay then you can stay here but it's up to you." He took in that broken look on his friend's face, looking like a kicked puppy. "Forget that. You're staying; I can't let you go out in that cold anyway."
"Thanks."
An hour later the two continued to sit in the living room, both staring at the fire. Max didn't want to go to bed so early, and Kai wanted to wait for his relative to show up. Max had to admit, he got a little curious when he said 'relative' because as far as Max knew, all of Kai's family was dead.
"Kai?"
"Hm?" Kai hummed, trying to shake off his sleepiness.
"Who's this relative of yours that's coming?"
Kai lay down comfortably on the sofa, tucking his arm under the pillow that he rested his head on, "Her name's Melora. She was adopted by my grandfather when I was about seven and she's about a week younger than me."
"Adopted? A week?"
"My grandfather didn't think I'd survive the accident in the Abbey. I was fine at the time but my body suffered and he wanted to make sure that if I died, and then he died too, that his wealth wouldn't go to the state. So he wanted to find a boy who was similar to me and would fit into the family; a Russian boy, young and he had to be born after me but not by a lot. The only person, who fit most of that, was a girl rather than a boy so they adopted her so that if anything happened to the family, she'd keep everything and use it the way my grandfather intended."
Max mouth continued to fall in an 'O' as he heard the story to its end, then nodding to assure he'd understood, "But you survived in the end."
"Which was a bad thing for her really; she was adopted into a wealthy family that was now known to be rather sadistic and then left with no money because I got it all." He reached up over the arm of the sofa, tugging open the drawer and pulling something out that he tossed to Max. "I never really spoke to her much as a kid, we were kept apart, maybe my grandfather thought that I'd remember what went on at the Abbey and tell her to make a run for it but I don't know. I just know now that she's a really great girl and making the best of her life. So every year we meet up for the holidays and just talk."
Max listened intently about Kai's missing family as he stared at the pretty photograph that he held tightly. The girl was quite beautiful, though having little to no similarities to Kai in physical appearance. She had long raven black hair, bright piercing green eyes and an attractive innocent smile and if anyone had seen Kai and her together they would've thought they were a couple rather than adoptive siblings. "She's pretty, Kai." Max mused aloud, handing Kai the photo.
"The photo is two years old; and it doesn't do her justice anyway." Kai sat up again, tucking the picture neatly back into the drawer.
"Do you look forward to seeing her?"
Kai shrugged a bit, crossing his arms and sitting back in thought, "I guess I do. I have little other reason to look forward to the holidays usually, so meeting her is great."
"That's nice." Max smiled brightly, "And here I thought you spent all your holidays alone."
"I'm glad I don't."
--Next Morning--
Max turned over, grinning and stretching in the large double bed of the spare bedroom. He turned over onto his side, curling up a little more beneath the heavy white sheets that Kai had set on the bed the night before. He sighed at the thought of getting out of bed so quick after waking up; he couldn't be bothered to lift his aching body from beneath the soft sheets. The cold that had started to develop late the night before hadn't seemed to take much affect on him just yet so he was thankful for that much. Actually, he was thankful for so much more. Thankful that he had a friend like Kai. Despite what Kai went through, how tough he was, he knew how to deal with Max and his emotions and regardless of what Kai's plans were, he still found time and room for his friend. That was a great gift.
He sat up a little after a few more perfectly silent minutes, seeing a note scrawled messily on a notepad on the nightstand. Kai's calligraphically perfect handwriting was bold and always stood out, so he didn't even need to pick it up to read it properly. 'Took Melora out for a very early breakfast. Relax; I'll be back by nine. Also, I didn't know what present to get you for Christmas but I hope to see you off. Enjoy.'
"Present?" He looked under the letter, a plain blank envelope under it. He opened it up hurriedly, actually curious to see what Kai got him; Kai never gave anyone a Christmas present before, as far as he knew. Tears had sprung to his eyes when he couldn't believe what he saw, in it was a simple plane ticket, upon closer inspection, set for late that evening and to the precise place his mom was.
Max had been dying to do that; go and see his mother ever since he found out she wouldn't be coming to see him. But with a limit on a bank account and his dad away for the next few days, there was little to nothing that he could possibly do.
Kai had now given him the best gift possible. He showed him that he could still be a good friend to him, even though it was always Max that tried to talk to and comfort Kai. And now he'd given him the chance to see his mom.
A/N: So this was random but I didn't quite mind it. Half way down it wasn't too great but then I think I worked some stuff out and it got a little bit better but not perfect. This was something I had thought of back at Christmas time, but a lot of stuff that I had started back then either got canceled or postponed(Blades Will Be Drawn had gone on hiatus and Stranger was postponed by a few weeks) so this was only thought out properly and fixed up now.
The quote at the beginning of the story just seemed appropriate so I thought I'd include it. It is in fact one of my favorite quotes and it related well to this story. It reflects that someone who grows up with naivety or with a lot of innocence or a lot of happiness, tends to know little about the opposite of it.
I hope some people on here liked this. Please leave a review and let me know what you think. Thanks for reading.