Tokyo, December 2014

„Kiss! Kiss! You have to kiss each other!"

The little girl snorted with laughter.

„What...?" Hajime asked confused.

„You and Souji, you have to kiss!" Tama eagerly explained. „Because you met under the misteltoe!"

Hajime didn´t understand anything at all. He wondered if this was also part of the „Christmas Madness"...

A few hours ago

Dusk was approaching as Hajime arrived at the doorstep of the home of his best friend.

At the very moment the door was opened, Hajime could sneak a peek to what was called „Christmas Madness" by Souji. The corridor and the stairs to the first floor were decorated with garlands of fir springs which in turn were draped with Christmas baubles and other Christmas ornaments.

„Told ya!" Souji greeted him. „Welcome to the Christmas Madness in our home."

„Well, I didn´t imagine it that excessive..." Hajime had to admit and followed Souji inside.

His best friend already told him that Tsune, his foster mother, had fallen in love with Christmas traditions when spending some time in Germany and USA during her studies. Since then she tried every december to create as much Christmas atmosphere as possible. As far as Hajime could rate this, she succeeded in this mission completely. Christmas decoration seemed to be in every corner of the house. There were all these things that Hajime only knew from foreign movies. Fairy lights and snow crystals at the windows, a huge Advent wreath on the table in the living room, figures of angels, many, many candles...to mention no more than the things he spotted when passing by the kitchen and the living room.

„Candy Cane?" Souji asked and picked one of the red and white sweets which were hanging on the fir spring garlands at the handrail of the stairs.

„No, thanks."

Souji put the candy cane savoring in his mouth while Hajime followed him upstairs. As expected there was also much Christmas decoration at the first floor . Only Soujis room was as messy as ever. Hajime put a stack of school books away and seated himself on a fluffy carpet in the middle of the room. Souji also choosed to sit on the floor, leaning with his back against his bed.

„Well...where shall we begin?"

Half an hour later they were still discussing if their „These movies are so fucking terrible, nobody wanna watch them – except us!" - night should start with „Sharknado" or „Mutant Kangaroo vs. Killer Bees".

Suddenly there was a knock at the door and Soujis foster mother Tsune entered the room with a troubled expression.

„Sorry to disturb you both...I´m afraid this evening will turn out a little different than we had planed."

What they were planning to do had been settled weeks ago. Because there was a Christmas party at Tsunes workplace (she was a teacher at the international school of Tokyo) which included also the spouses of the teachers, Souji had to serve as babysitter for four year old Tama-chan, Tsunes and Isamis daughter.

And since this was a rather stupid plan for a seventeen year old boy at a saturday evening he had been free to invite Hajime to stay overnight. As soon as Tama-chan was in bed, they wanted to start the said movie night.

Tsune played nervously with her hair.

„My collegue Haruka called me a minute ago. Unfortunately she had a car accident on the way to school and is now waiting for the breakdown service. Therefore nobody is at the school at this moment to meet the caterer staff and coordinate them in preparing the party hall. I have to go there immediately since there is no other collegue available. Isami will accompany me and we won´t come back until the party is over."

Souji and Hajime looked at her with confusion. That wasn´t something that would block their movie night at all ( given that Tama would be willing to go to bed on time).

„It´s no problem" Souji ensured her. „We will prepare dinner, put Tama into bed and -"

„Erm...there is one more thing..." Tsune disrupted him.

„I promised Tama that we would bake some Christmas cookies today. The pastry is already done and all the things needed are on the kitchen table ."

The two boys gave her a blank look.

„Well...would you two be so kind...?"

tbc

Sorry for my bad english, I´m not a native speaker . Hope you liked it anyway.