Chapter 1- One Hell of a Christmas

I started to notice my hallway was darker than usual as I headed to my mom's bedroom. I had no reason for barging in her room, but I felt compelled to go there.

Almost like a mosquito being attracted to a bug zapper.

The hallway stretched out far ahead of me, but last time I remembered the hallway wasn't as long as a football field. I ignored the strange hallucinations and finally reached my destination.

Mom's bedroom looked even stranger. The walls were striped violet and orange, which was funny, because Mom absolutely hated the color orange. Her bed wasn't made, and she wasn't in the room. The most peculiar thing in the room was the little blue door on the wall. It was about three feet tall and looked like I could crawl through the entrance.

"Was this tiny door normally here? I don't remember it being there."

It was also locked. But, I knew what to do. I pulled a little black key out of my pocket, and it fit into the keyhole perfectly. I reached to open it, but I hesitated and pulled back. What if there was something dangerous on the other side of the door? Like they say, curiosity killed the cat.

Maybe I'll open it tomorrow.

• • •

"Cora! Cora, wake up! It's Christmas!" My little sister, Margaret, hollered into my ear, which was a rude awakening. And not only that, her twin, Joshua, was also tugging my arm. Those two devils. Always up to their tricks.

"Ugh, you guys didn't have to be so loud." I sat up and rubbed my eyes. "Did you wake Mom yet?"

"Yeah," Joshua said, his big brown eyes locked on mine, "but she's being a slow poke." Maggie agreed.

A devious grin spread across my face. Maggie and Josh exchanged glances, which I think was some sort of twin thing. It seemed like whenever a mischievous plot struck one of them, the other would instantly know.

"Well, we just can't let that happen, am I wrong?"

We dashed down the hallway to Mom's room. A sudden moment of de ja vu struck me, but I don't really know what I had forgotten. My mother was sitting up in her bed, rubbing her eyes, her chocolate brown hair tousled all over the place. She yawned and smiled at the twins, and then she glanced at me and stopped. Mom stared a me for a brief second, and then went back to normal.

I knew why. I was a spitting image of Dad. The pointy nose, the freckles, even the straight, dark hair that almost looked blue in the sun. Whenever Mom laid her eyes on me, I just reminded her of painful memories. Luckily, the twins looked more like her. They only had my dad's eyes.

I shook my head and made my way to the Christmas tree. I was never too into the whole gifting thing, but I would always enjoy some new manga and maybe some winter gloves... However, Maggie and Josh were obsessed with Santa Claus. Since they're only seven, they still believe in Santa and I seriously don't want to be the one to tell them he doesn't exist when the time comes. The twins act as if Santa is their god or something, because they are just that obsessed.

Last year, they tried to stay up all night in the living room, (without telling Mom, of course), and the next morning, I found them sprawled out on the floor, passed out in their Christmas pajamas. We had to wait till noon before opening anything because Mom didn't want to wake them up.

"Alright, let's get this party started!" My mom cheered as she whipped out a video camera.

After an hour of tearing off wrapping paper and videotaping, I came to the conclusion that my mother doesn't know me at all whatsoever. Sometimes, you can tell how well one knows you based on the gift they get you. For example, if someone was a fan of sports, they would get sports related gifts. But this Christmas was way off.

For Christmas, I received about four new outfits, but I didn't even like clothes that much. I don't care what I wear. When you have pathetically low self esteem like me, you wouldn't care about your appearance, either.

Next, I got a cupcake calendar and a dream decoder book. Apparently, if I have a dream about rainbows, it means that I have hope to get over a major issue. Like I have dreams about rainbows. Please. I also got tons of novels, but none of them were manga. They were mostly teen chick lit, you know, the ones where girl meets guy and boom, they're in love. They're less realistic than fairytales. But, none of the gifts were nearly as weird as the last gift I received.

It was a stuffed rabbit, with matted velvet fur and was as big as a basketball. But, it wasn't an adorable rabbit. It looked like it came from a thrift shop! The toy had these big, bulging eyes with tiny black pupils, and its ears were drooping. It adorned a little red ribbon around its neck, and it had a heart shaped tag hanging from the ribbon that read, "Gor."

I mean, what kind of name was Gor!? Seriously, who in their right mind would name a stuffed rabbit, that was to be given to a child, Gor? The name fit its ugly looks perfectly.

Anyway, Christmas went by very fast. Mom and I argued over what I was to wear. All of my relatives came over, and my amazing aunt Jocy got my five volumes of Kuroshitsuji. I was in temporary heaven. Even though aunt Jocy was twenty-four years old, she was still my best friend. She was also a huge anime fan. Hell, we were both like two crazy otakus let out of the doghouse.

She introduced me to anime as a little kid, and I absolutely loved it. Even though she only showed me kiddie stuff like Pokemon, Tokyo Mew Mew, and Naruto. I was fascinated by the graphics, the unique plots, the character's exaggerated emotions and movements, their big, sparkly eyes. Only recently, both my mom and my aunt let me start watching other anime. That was even better. Within three years, I had watched maybe fifty different anime. I was 100% otaku.

And don't even get me started on the manga. Oh, you don't wanna know.

My other relatives bought me mostly clothes that didn't fit, and some manga. I even got this ugly neon pink robe with 3-D hearts on it. I didn't even like the color pink in general. It was pretty comfortable, though. And they didn't see me too often, so I don't blame them. Plus, they really didn't know what I liked.

Maggie got about a million Barbie dolls. She was obsessed with dolls. She got a Barbie house, tons of dolls, and at least fifty different Barbie outfits. Josh got some Legos, clothes, and a soccer ball. The ball reminded me of the time I kicked a soccer ball through the window. When I was eight, my interests were cartoons (no surprise) and soccer. I was extremely bored so I decided to play some indoor soccer. Long story short, I broke a window and Mom was furious. But my dad was the one who got her to stop yelling at me.

After presents, we gathered at the dinner table. The tension between Mom and I was very thick, which made everything awkward. I put my elbows on the table and sighed. Then, she muttered something about me being an impolite child and I snapped.

We argued for a whole twenty minutes, while our relatives stared in awe. I was actually very polite, but ever since my father's death, Mom and I weren't on very good terms. We would always fight. We just didn't get along. Also, she always talked about how she was over his death and how we should get over it, too.

But if she moved on, then how come I could hear crying down the hallway every night?

After I made my dramatic exit, I decided to go to bed. I glared at Gor as I brushed my teeth. Then, I read manga until I could no longer keep my eyes open. I was officially asleep.

Maybe I could finally open that little blue door.

(A/N: It's done, and it's fabulous! I added more backstory to the chapter cause why the hell not? Am gonna start chapter two now. This one NEEDS editing. Thanks for reading, y'all!)