Christmas: Present Day
She's eighteen and the Christmas magic wore off long ago.
This isn't how she was expecting to spend her Christmas, as a half-orphan with no family around, and she doesn't have the heart to make the journey to her other relatives. Her main company is ghosts, her mother and Mona, and she almost welcomes the spectres because she isn't quite on her own – gets to talk to someone even if they're mocking or cruel.
(It's kind of a taste of her own medicine)
So Ghost-Mona hangs around and snarks at her and she snarks back, but it's a half-effort because for maybe the first time ever she feels drab, dull next to Mona.
It's her first real Christmas in years, the first one where she's at home and there are proper decorations up instead of sad tinsel in store windows and she's got all the plans for the Ice Ball underway. She should be feeling fabulous, but she isn't.
Instead of shopping, she's making two drab girls over into Spencer's likeness and when they turn to her, she muffles a snort of laughter because it's just ridiculous, twin knock-offs before her, but she can't alienate them because then she'll be left again with no-one. Instead of spending ages doing her hair and makeup, she rushes through them, not caring a lot about how she looks.
Christmas is supposed to be happy, but she feels nothing.
(There's ice in her, veins and eyes and teeth and she wonders if she'll freeze if she stands still long enough, so she makes sure to always keep moving, always be doing something to stop the ice circulating through her system)
The grand entrance is a mockery of her back-from-the-dead arrival at school, flanked by four people who are interchangeable in their dress and mask. She doesn't have the energy to stand out tonight, doesn't want to make herself a target any more than she needs to.
The five of them scatter almost as soon as they've reached the bottom step and her gaze is brought to the four girls she once called her best friends, clustered together. For a moment, she watches their body language: watches them lean close and talk quietly, silently contrasts them with her solitary stance.
CeCe remembers her though, comes with custom perfume and in a cloud of heavy makeup and she musters the gratitude she needs. It's too risky to take too long though, so they separate, having asked nothing and said less, and she doesn't look back as CeCe leaves. If she does, she'll just be seeing someone else walk away from her.
By the time she does turn and look CeCe is gone, and she knows that the girl is good at hiding. In a few hours she'll be off Rosewood's radar, drawing cash from somewhere untraceable and doing whatever she does when she's on the run.
She forces herself not to think about it and circulates some more.
(Pastes on a smile, pretends to be the gracious hostess – we are what we pretend to be and bites back the urge to leave, return to an empty house)
The time passes slowly, for her. She's bored and there's no-one to talk to, nothing to do. Still, this is better than the last Christmases.
Mona brings her the imagination of her true death, and she wonders if this is her foreshadowing, how her life will play out: a beautiful corpse going unmourned. The brief exchange rings in her ears, that her death matters only to her – that in this church, there are only flowers sponsored by her father or brother, and no signs of other mourners.
She can imagine it too clearly now: briefly mourned, and soon forgotten by most. A packed funeral, but no school tributes, no shrines like there are for Mona.
For a girl who once wanted immortality, the thought brings fresh ice into her veins.
And so she sneaks around, feels dull and bland in her plain jumper and jeans, watches at the window as her old friends and their significant others set up their Christmas dinner. Some part of her hopes to be noticed and invited in, but then she looks at them and herself. They are all carefully dressed, dresses and skirts and proper shirts, while she is dressed for movies and popcorn on the couch.
It's more than that though, she is on her own tonight, and it is a table full of couples. She watches as Spencer makes sure Toby is comfortable, watches Hanna lean into Caleb, and her stomach churns slightly at the thought of breaking up the scene before her. She would be the ninth wheel, the one sticking out. The table is perfect for eight people; a ninth would make it awkward. Despite the distance, she is sure she can hear a wish that Mona was there.
Mona, not her.
For just a moment she closes her eyes, listening to laughter and chatter and glasses clinking together. If she tries, she can imagine how everyone shifts to clink glasses with everyone else at the table, and she steps away a few paces.
They look like a family, despite the fact that there is no blood link between any of them.
The brightness of the house, the sparkle of the champagne, the colours of dresses and the imagined warmth get to her and she backs off the porch as though it's poison. This family, like her own, has no room for her.
She can be sure they are not thinking about her at all.
She leaves as silently as she came, not troubling to look behind her. There will be no-one at the door, no-one calling her name and imploring her to come in from the snow. Snow whirls around her, and she cares nothing for the chill on her face, makes no effort to protect herself further from the sharp winds.
So she returns home in her cloak of snow. The house is dark, empty and not quite cold. There is no fire going: there's no-one around to maintain it, no-one around to care. The tree stands, decorated and perfect, in the corner, but the presents are still there and for a minute she considers taking it all down, distributing the gifts to the appropriate rooms.
Instead of the usual Christmas dinner items, there are a few basics in the kitchen: ham and chicken in the fridge, a loaf of specialty bread in the breadbin, roast vegetables on a platter above the meats.
Jason isn't around and nor is her father. A quick check of her phone reveals no messages from either.
She fixes up a cold sandwich, makes a hot chocolate the way she thinks her mother made it (it's been too long, she doesn't remember) and retires to her bedroom, flicks on the space heater.
Ghost-Mona doesn't return – then again, she doesn't need to.