Everyone was planning what they were going to do for Christmas. Lily was staying with her dad, of course, and going ice skating with her sisters on boxing day. Rick was seeing his parents, too, and Faith was planning to spend time with her brother. Frank was staying with Liam and his brother, and Elektra with her sister. Harry with his aunt and uncle.
It seemed almost everyone had a relative somewhere who couldn't look after them but wanted to see them for Christmas. Tee and Johnny were fine, they had each other. So that just left Carmen, Tyler, me, Floss and Mo. Great.
I was fine with Tyler and Carmen, who are my friends, but Floss and Mo were seriously annoying. People always automatically grouped me with them and Harry as the "little kids" and expected me to play nice little games with them. As if! The only time I went near those weirdos was when I was playing pranks on them with Tyler.
Anyway, there we were. Christmas was not going to be great. Not that it wouldn't be an improvement on when I was living with my family. I hardly got any presents then, and my brother Kingsley always spoiled anything anyway. But still, I wished I knew what all those kids at school got so excited about. Christmas had never seemed like much of a big deal to me.
Everyone else was complaining, too.
"Don't get excited," Tyler was telling Mo. "Christmas here is pretty crap. Basically we all just sit around arguing, complaining about presents and being bored. Christmas dinner is good, though."
"Yeah," I agreed, "Last year there was a massive food fight. Elektra ended up with her head stuck in the turkey. Seriously, it was like a comedy show; "The Dumping Ground Christmas Special!" "
"Everything else is really boring, though," said Carmen. "It's just depressing."
"At least you're not spending Christmas in a prison, though." Rick said, glumly. "Lucky me!"
"Well, we might as well be."
"Oh, come on!" said Tee. "Mike works really hard every year, making it fun for us. You should be grateful."
"Since when did you become miss positivity?" drawled Elektra. "Are you trying to be the new Faith Davis?" Faith was in the kitchen, baking mince pies. We could hear her singing along to Christmas carols. If anything was depressing, that was. And Elektra wasn't the only person who was annoyed at Tee.
"At least you've got family," Carmen sniped. "Like Lily. It's not fair."
"Oh come on!" protested Tee. "Now you're being ridiculous." Suddenly, everyone was arguing.
"We really need to do something to brighten things up here." I muttered to Tyler.
"Yeah," he agreed. "This place needs a bit of fun."
"I heard that!" came Floss's voice. "And I'm telling if you don't -"
"Oh, buzz off, Floss." I said, annoyed. "Go help Faith or something."
"All right. At least she's having fun." And Floss stomped off.
"Great!" I said. "Now let's get on with making this the best Christmas ever!"