A/N: Just a short little piece that hit me the other day while I was cleaning the house. I had never attempted to write a story in the second person before, and never imagined myself doing so, but for some reason this is how it came out. Review me, I love it!
Where you grew up holidays weren't joyous occasions like they are for Seth and the Cohens.
Watching their enthusiasm as they lugged that massive Christmas tree into their living room only reminded you of how different your lives were before you came to live with them.
For Seth, Christmas, or 'Chrismukkah,' as he so fondly referred to it, is this uber holiday filled with presents and 'miracles' and giant wreaths hung on pool house doors.
You can still remember the unexpected pang of jealousy you felt when you saw the excitement in his eyes.
You hated yourself for resenting him.
Where you're from, Christmas, more often than not, meant crying, drinking and cops. Each year the holidays approach, a feeling of dread starts deep in your stomach, steadily increasing until you're nothing more but a tangled mass of raw nerves when they finally arrive.
The few Christmases your dad was home started off okay enough. Your mother would lug in the 10-year old plastic tree from the garage. She'd load it up with tacky Christmas decorations and tinsel, trying to make it look like the ones featured in those Soap Operas she loved to watch and fantasize about. You still remember the hopeful look on her face as she'd asked you how it looked after she was done.
You never had the heart to tell her that it always fell short.
When you were younger, you and Trey would be so excited to open the few presents under the tree. You can still remember the excitement you felt, being able to stay up late to play with your new toys. For an hour or so you almost felt normal, like the families on TV, but then yelling would start as your father bitched to your mother about how he wasn't 'made of money' and 'why the fuck was she spoiling the kids anyway?' That feeling of dread and panic would start low in your belly and you and Trey would play louder to block the sound. Stomach tightening with each second that passed, you'd both try to drown out their raised voices with your own, but soon the screaming would turn into charging footsteps and startled gasps. Flesh hitting flesh and choked sobs. And the meager illusion you had clung to so desperately shattered around you.
After your father was arrested for armed robbery, you didn't celebrate Christmas anymore.
Your mother kept saying she didn't have the energy. She said you were getting older anyway and Christmas, trees, and lights were for children. While others were gathered in front of a tree, surrounded by friends and family, you'd be home alone with your mother. Trey would be out doing God only knows what as your mother lay in a drunken heap on the couch, fingers loosely wrapped around a cheap plastic juice cup filled with whatever alcoholic substance she managed to find.
You know that if you ever told the Cohens, they'd look at you with pity, but you actually preferred this scenario. Because while depressing to most, at least it was safer than the alternative.
Until mom's boyfriends started coming around...
'What did you guys do for Christmas at your house?'
A simple enough question, but it filled you with dread and you nervously tried to change the subject until finally telling them that Christmas in your house consisted of your mom drunk and you pretty much getting your ass kicked.
The pity in their eyes makes you cringe, even now.
No matter how grateful you are to the Cohens for taking you in, you don't want to be anyone's charity case, and you remember shrugging of their looks with an awkward smile before quickly leaving the room.
The Cohens joke about the fact that you're stoic and reticent, but where you come from, keeping your mouth shut was a form of survival. In your house, you never knew what innocent comment would set off your father or one of your mother's boyfriends. Something as simple as dropping a fork at dinner could result in an upturned table and a fist to the mouth and so you quickly learned to say nothing at all. And even then, that wasn't always enough.
How did you get here?
Good things hardly ever happen, especially not in your family. Your mother's an alcoholic, your father and brother are in jail and you keep wondering how you managed to luck out, living with the Cohens. You keep waiting for the other shoe to drop because nothing good ever happens without a catch. There's an hour-glass dangling over your head and you're not certain how much sand is left, but you keep waiting for the day it runs out and you're back out on your ass where you belong.
Each day that goes by and you still find yourself under the Cohens roof only serves to fuel that small glimmer of hope and that's dangerous. Because when the house of cards falls, like always, it will only hurt that much more.
Sandy, Kirsten and Seth all try to reassure you that things will be different this year.
You can't bring yourself to believe them.
But when Seth handed you the stocking today with your name on it, you'd been speechless. You'd expected Christmas to consist of you hiding out in the pool house while Seth and his family opened gifts. The stocking in your hand had been proof that they want you in their family and it took your breath away. You didn't know what to say as you held it in your hand. You could feel Seth's eyes on you as he mumbled something about it having a better fate than the wreath and you barely heard him as he left. You don't know how long you stared at it before reluctantly putting it down.
The only other person who seems to understand your hatred for the holidays in this Newport bubble aside from Julie, ironically enough, is Marissa.
Marissa.
You like her. A lot. At times you think you might possibly even love her, if only you where taught how to love. Love in your house consisted of yelling, screaming and hitting. That's why at 17, the only relationships you've ever had consisted of crawling from back seats or bedroom windows.
When you first met Marissa you honestly thought she was different from the girls in Chino. She was pretty and delicate and soft and that's what drew you to her in the first place.
But tonight you saw how wrong you were.
Tonight you got a good, long look at Marissa and what you saw made your blood run cold. You vowed to yourself a long time ago that you'd never lead your parents' lives. Yet despite all the miles distancing you from Chino and your old life, you've managed to fall for someone exactly like your mother.
Which is terrifying.
Drinking. Stealing. Suicide attempts. They all serve as a sickening sense of deja vu and you wanted to yell and scream and hit something tonight and that scared you even more.
'Stop, okay? You're scaring me!'
The words resonate, growing louder and louder despite your best efforts to shove them away.
The truth is, tonight you scared yourself.
As you had stood outside of that car, a tiny part of you wanted to hurt Marissa. To grab her, shake her and knock some sense into her. You'd wanted to yell at her and tell her to grow up because people had problems a lot worse than hers.
You instantly felt guilty because you like Marissa and hate seeing her so upset. But you hate the frustrated, helpless feeling even more. You've reluctantly witnessed the same thing in your mother and it wasn't going to happen again.
As everything spiralled out of control, you fought the urge to yell, scream and cry and instead, you took your frustration out on the door of the SUV until Marissa's scared words snapped you back to reality.
Taking deep shuddering breaths, you tried to rein in your emotions. To bury them, once more, deep within yourself and re-erect the stoic facade around you that had taken years to build.
As the salt air caressed your skin, you had felt open and vulnerable. Exposed.
You hated it. It made you feel weak.
Blinking back tears, your voice hoarse with emotion, you told her you weren't doing this again, that you'd left this behind.
You silently vowed that no matter how much you like Marissa, you wouldn't allow yourself to be pulled back into that endless void of destruction. You had come too far and worked too hard these past few months to go back to that dark place.
'Okay,' she whispered.
Your life up to now has consisted solely of broken promises and empty words and you've been let down too many times in the past to count. But despite this, a part of you longs for her words to be true and you found yourself nodding, ignoring the voice in your head that's screaming at you not to trust her.
The one that says she's lying.
The drive home was long and silent and unbearably tense.
She'd kissed you tentatively on the cheek before leaving the car and you tried not to cringe despite the part of you that wanted to lean into her. Turn your head, lose yourself in her lips and believe her words.
And now, lying in the Cohen's pool house, in their bed-- your bed, you awkwardly remind yourself, the day's events churn inside you in a myriad of conflicting emotions.
Distancing yourself from Marissa is probably one of the smartest things you could do, but something inside won't let you give up on her. It seems no matter how hard things get in your life, no matter how many times you've been let down, you refuse to give up on those you care about and Marissa is no exception.
Turning restlessly in your bed, the sheets tangle around you as the sun rises through the partially opened blinds, and highlights the sky in pinks and yellows. Sighing, you turn over, burying your face into your pillow.
"I hate the holidays," you mutter as sleep finally overcomes your senses.
End.