Jack Kelly woke up Christmas morning with a grin already on his face for the first time in his life. Bing Crosby's 'Winter Wonderland' was blaring through the apartment already; he wondered who that could be blamed on. In the bunk beneath him, he felt Crutchie move, then heard a yawn. Before either of them could move, their door slammed open, bouncing off of the wall behind it to swing back into the person who had opened it with a thud and a yelp. Over in the other bed, Alan groaned and pulled his pillow over his head.

Jack propped himself up on one elbow and peered over the edge of his bunk as the door opened again, far more reasonably this time, and Alden stepped into the room, grinning sheepishly.

"Good morning," Crutchie said blearily. "Why?"

"It's Christmas!" Alden said. "Come on! Present time!"

A shriek and indistinguishable shouting came from the other end of the apartment, along with the sounds of some sort of struggle.

"Elaine's up," Alden laughed. "Come on." He walked across the room and yanked Alan's blanket off of him. "Let's go."

Crutchie was already on his feet, and used his crutch to reach up and poke at Jack. "Ah, stop!" Jack laughed.

"Don't make me come up there, Jackie boy," Alden teased, his face materializing at the end of Jack's bed.

"Okay, fine; I'm coming!" said Jack. "Move and let me down. And don't call me 'Jackie boy'."

"Sure thing, Jackie boy," Alan teased as Jack climbed down, darting out of the reach when Jack tried to smack his arm.

"Don't worry about getting dressed," said Alden as Crutchie opened the door of his wardrobe. "Christmas morning is more fun in pajamas, no matter how old you are." Crutchie grinned, and led the way out to the living room, where Elaine was seated cross-legged and looking sulky on the couch, Will on the floor in front of her. The coffee table had been moved away, shoved under the dining table and between the dining chairs there. A tree had been set up on Thanksgiving in front of the unused sliding doors that opened into the boys' room, decorated in brightly colored ornaments—lots of Target-bought felt animals, a pom-pom garland from Hobby Lobby, and a handful of colorful glass balls—and rainbow lights, topped with a crocheted star. They'd all tucked presents for each other under the tree, wrapped in a variety of papers—Elaine's were done in plain brown craft paper and decorated in yarn scraps, Alden had used metallic silver paper, Jack had refused to wrap anything and had put all of his gifts in bags, and so on—but there was also an extra set of packages, neatly wrapped in blue, silver, and white snowflake-patterned paper that had appeared a few days earlier that Jack was admittedly curious about.

Once they were all settled on the couch and floor, Alden and Will passed out the packages. Everything had been labelled with their names, and soon enough everyone had a little pile of gifts in front of them. "JD said he left his for us here and we're allowed to open them today, and he took all the ones with his name with him when he went home," Will said. "Because he knew we wouldn't have time to open them with him before he left, and didn't want to wait until he comes back for the next semester in January to open them together."

"Sounds about right," Alan laughed.

"And these are from our dad and stepmom," said Alden, passing out the blue-silver-white packages. "They sent something for everyone," he added, passing a pair of gifts to Crutchie and Jack.

"Wait, us too?" said Jack.

"Why?" asked Crutchie. "They don't even know us."

"Why not?" Elaine shrugged. "They sent one for JD and he's never met them either. He left before they got here, so he has to wait until January to open it, but they still sent him one."

"So how does this work?" Crutchie asked.

"We go around the circle and everyone opens one thing at a time," said Will.

"And then we eat breakfast!" Alden grinned. "I have French toast and sticky buns in the oven, and I'll make eggs and bacon and sausage too."

"I'll help!" said Elaine.

"We'll all help; it's Christmas," said Alan.

.*.*.*.*.*.

Two hours later, they were all back in the living room together. The discarded wrapping paper had been cleaned up, breakfast eaten and dishes loaded into the dishwasher, and they had all gathered together to watch Christmas movies. Crutchie and Alan had insisted on the Grinch to start, and Jack was now settled on the couch between the two of them, while Alden sprawled on the floor on a pile of pillows dragged down from the crawlspace. Will was seated in the saucer chair with Elaine sitting on the floor in front of him, leaning back against his legs and knitting.

Jack looked down at his legs. Alan, Elaine, and Alden's parents had sent them all matching pajamas—which they had all semi-reluctantly changed into to take a picture to send back to them—light flannel board shorts that were light green with little snowmen, reindeer, and strands of Christmas lights on them, matching short-sleeved button-down shirts, and snowflake-patterned socks. Beside Jack, Crutchie was snuggled under one of Elaine's handmade blankets, his head on Jack's shoulder, humming along with the song being sung in the movie. Alan was nodding off on Jack's other side, his head bobbing up and down. If Alden hadn't been kicking his feet in time with 'You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch', Jack would have thought he was asleep too. It was quiet and oddly still. Even Elaine was hardly moving, besides the knitting needles bobbing in her hands.

Jack smiled to himself and pulled the edge of Crutchie's blankets, snuggling further down into the couch. This isn't so bad, he thought to himself, for what was possibly the hundredth time—maybe even more—in the past months since he and Crutchie had come to Santa Fe.

This was their first real Christmas. They'd both grown up in foster care, in and out of homes, spending a few weeks or months—sometimes even as much of a year, if they were lucky—in a place before moving on. Jack couldn't think of the last time he'd had Christmas with someone besides just Crutchie. After aging out of the system, it had just been the two of them for years, and they'd never put much energy into holidays or even birthdays. Crutchie's birthday had fallen during the Les Mis run this year, and not only their roommates, but everyone they worked with had gone out of their way to make it a good day for Crutchie.

He thought about the gifts he'd received that morning. His roommates had definitely planned them out together: a high-quality sketchpad from Elaine, a set of drawing pencils and pack of charcoal from Alan, colored pencils from Alden, pastels from Crutchie, and a set of watercolor paints, brushes, and paper from Will and JD. Everyone had put thought into their gifts; they weren't just things that had been bought last minute because the giver just needed to find something to give. Jack had actually teared up a little a few times—and hidden it behind yawns each time—as he opened the gifts. He couldn't wait to experiment with the materials, to fill the sketchbook with art and really make it his own. His fingers were itching for the pencils; he was tempted to just get up and sit at the table and play with them, but didn't want to get up from the couch.

He heard Crutchie sigh and felt him pull away. "Go ahead," the blond yawned.

"What?"

"I know you want to draw. Go for it. Don't stay here because of me."

Jack laughed, wrapped an arm around Crutchie's shoulders, and ruffled his hair. "Thanks."

"Yeah, just draw me first! That's the trade-off."

"Fair enough."

Within minutes, Jack was tucked away in the back seat of the table with his new sketchpad, pencils and charcoal and colored pencils splayed out in front of him, positioned so that he could see each of his roommates. He stared down at the blank page, feeling suddenly intimidated by its unmarred-ness. After a moment of hesitation, he flipped to the next page, leaving the first empty. The first page has to be perfect. I'll decide what to put there later. He turned the pad sideways and chewed on his lip, then started sketching. Under his pencil, an image slowly took shape. First was the outline of the room itself, followed one by one by rough shapes of each of the people and pieces of furniture in it.

At some point, probably when they were switching movies, Alden got up to peer at what Jack was drawing. "Whoa, is that us? That's really good, Jack."

"Thanks," Jack mumbled, fully wrapped up in his work.

By the end of the next film, he was done. He hadn't used much color—only bits here and there as shadows and accents—and had instead relied mostly on the shading from the drawing pencils to capture the image in front of him. By the time the drawing was finished, people had moved: Crutchie had turned sideways on the couch to rest his feet on Alan's lap and fall asleep curled up against the back cushions of the sofa, Elaine had joined Alden on the pile of cushions on the floor, and Will had curled up into a tighter ball on the saucer chair. The drawing captured them as they had been when Jack started it. He'd considered trying to add himself in between Crutchie and Alan, but had decided against it, wanting to focus on the others instead.

He smiled to himself. It was a piece to be proud of. It had captured exactly what he wanted it to: the feeling of home.