A/N: As Hondo prompted in one of my previous Bites, 20-Davids keep sharing their favorite and least favorite Christmas memory with each other. Luca, who couldn't love sharing with his teammates more, takes his go right away.

Luca's worst and best

My worst Christmas? Oh, man, easy to tell. I was like twenty-two years old, already working my way in the family industry, wearing my badge with pride, you know? And I couldn't feel better about it, with my gramps and my pops both in SWAT, kicking asses and making the history.

Well, the Lucas are a pretty tight family, alright? But we're not all that into the Christmas holiday and celebrating in a big way. It had never been easy with the kind of job we do and taking shifts and everything. Anyway, that year for some reason, my mom insisted on organizing this huge thing, right? With a sumptuous meal and spending all day together and stuff. We all tried to please her—we all love her so much—but while I got to be free on Christmas Day, my pops had to take a morning shift, hoping to be back before we finished lunch.

So we—Terry, my gramps, my aunts, uncles, and all my cousins, too—we were all reunited, having fun and enjoying the food. Okay, let's keep this between us, but the company was far more enjoyable than my mom's attempt for a turducken. Anyway, we were all there, waiting to eat dessert for my dad to come back and eat it with us, but instead, the phone rang.

There had been a shooting, and my pops was caught in the middle of it. We—and I mean everyone—we all jumped on our feet and rushed to the hospital. You know, there were all kinds of uniformed guys and detectives; people only there to wait for my father to get out of the operating room—he was quite the man in his good days. Man, the hospital was so crowded, we barely managed to speak to the doctor.

Dad was inside the OR for like half an hour, the longest half an hour of my whole life. But you know, guys, watching all that blue support made me feel that I was just going down the right road.

On the other hand, seeing my mom and all my family so worried about my dad scared me off more than anything in life. It made me doubt I made the right choice, risking putting my loved ones through that nightmare all over again every time I got out on patrol.

However, my dad's surgery was over, and he was transferred to a private room. We were told he would be okay, and everyone there raced to see him and cheer him up. At that moment, I just understood how this job tights people together and that I wanted that kind of legacy more than anything.

Yeah, okay, you're right; I guess I just transformed my worst memory into one with a happy ending, but hey, that's Christmas, right?

Do I still have to go for my happiest memory too? Okay, yeah, I think I found a good one to share.

I was fifteen. It was the year after I was diagnosed with dyslexia, and it was the very first time I could bring home some clean fall-semester grades. I even beat my brother's score in a couple classes. No, you fools, not just PE!

So, I was all proud of myself, you know. I was finally starting to believe I could actually do something meaningful with my life. I didn't even care about Christmas presents, you get what I mean? Having my pops being proud of me was enough. Anyway, that's just one side of the story.

That year, both my pops and my gramps got involved in this great charity event—the one that gave life to the annual toy drive we still do, I guess. And so my mom got the short straw somehow. She got crazy with her non-existent baking skills, but I tell you something, I've never seen her more flustered and overworked, but at the same time, she had never been as overjoyed.

Both Terry and I had a blast organizing everything with the old men, too. I mean, Terry was a bit younger, so I guess he couldn't truly grasp the purest sense of all that, but still. Man! The way all the Lucas worked together to assure that giving was central and that the whole event was accessible to as many people who needed it as it was possible… I don't know, guys, isn't that the whole point here?

I mean, you know me, right? The community, the people, that's what counts. I would do just anything for my family.