Chapter 3

A Useless Present

Kai frowned as he stared at the clock. It was one 'o clock and the second spirit was supposed to have visited him by now. First, Max was late by an hour, and his clocks were broken, but now he had another late spirit.

Frustrated and tired of waiting, he left his spot from the living room couch, and walked up the stairs towards his bedroom. And to think he stayed up late on a school night for that bloody spirit, never again would he wait for a spirit, it was clear they all had a bad concept of time.

Opening the door to his room, he felt his eye twitch at the sight.

Snow covered his walls and floor, and icicles hung from his ceiling. He couldn't even see what once made up his room because of how much snow filled the place, even his desk and bed were covered. Speaking of his bed, a snowman was standing by it with a smile made of coal, and a black top hat on his head.

Someone was going to die, and right now that snowman was the only thing that remotely looked like a person, so it would have to do. He walked up to it and punched it smack in the face, knocking its head clean off. He then proceeded to kick it, throwing in a punch every now and then, until all that was left was a deformed pile of frozen water in its place.

"I guess that means you don't like your new room?"

Kai turned on the owner of the voice, giving them the nastiest look he possessed.

The owner of the voice was unaffected, and shrugged off the look. He looked like a person who you could throw insults at, and he wouldn't burst out in a fit, in other words calm and knowing. Maybe it was the cat like features that made him appear that way, or his golden, all knowing eyes. It didn't matter to Kai. In the end he would get revenge on this person who decided to redecorate his room.

"I am Rei," the person spoke, his voice only helping his image of calmness. "I am the spirit of December Present."

"Hn."

"I'm here to help you change your ways," Rei tried again, assuming that Kai must not understand the situation if he was acting as if nothing strange had happened.

"Hn."

"I can't help you if you don't talk to me."

"Hn."

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"You're really stubborn aren't you?" Rei asked.

"Yup."

"…"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"Okay…" Rei started, deciding he'd just have to take charge of the situation. He held out his hand to Kai. "Take my hand and I'll show you your December present."

"Wouldn't December present technically be now?" There was a smug smile on Kai's face as he asked Rei this.

"Yes it is, but my boss says I have to show you what's going to happen later today."

"So you're showing me the future?"

"I don't make the rules, I just follow them," Rei said defensively, still keeping his hand out for Kai. "Now let's get this over with. Obviously, you don't want to do this, and truthfully I got better things to do, so let's make this quick."

"Fine." With that, Kai placed his hand in Rei's, and like with Max, Kai was no longer in his room, but some place else entirely.

He was outside his high school where kids were laughing together, bundled up in warm clothing laughing and joking with each other. He recognized the kids as the crazy people who enjoyed sitting outside during lunch on cold days, such as the one he was experiencing at the moment.

Rei let go of his hand and walked up to a group of kids, and sprinkled something on their food, the kids did not notice.

So they can't see us, Kai concluded mentally, while frowning as he watched Rei sprinkle more of that strange stuff on other teenagers' food. The stuff looked to be sparkly dust particles, which made him wonder if Rei was trying to kill the kids with death by dust.

"What are you doing?" he finally asked.

"I do this every year," Rei explained, adding more sparkly dust to people's food. "It makes people more happy."

Kai rolled his eyes. How would dust make someone happy? And an even better question, what was he supposed to learn from this? Throw dust on people's food so they'll like you? Talk about stupid.

"I'm going inside," Kai announced to the spirit.

"Okay," Rei said, rushing to another kid's meal. "Just get me when you're ready to go."

I'm ready to leave right now moron. Kai kept his thought to himself. He figured he could look around a bit, and see what he would need to be prepared for in the morning when he'd be at school.

He walked through the school's halls, glance in each classroom as he went. In every class there was a group of kids hiding out from the snow, laughing, and mingling with other kids they normally didn't talk to. Apparently that old saying, "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," was true in this case. Everyone hated the cold, so everyone was willing to be nicer to each other if it meant hiding from the cold. Of course by doing this they allowed themselves to be blackmailed later on by the people that at the moment were their "friend."

"One more day than winter vacation!" One student shouted.

"Can you believe it?"

"It feels like it's been forever!"

"What are you going to do during the break?"

Kai felt his disgust grow as he listened to the idiotic conversations. They were all focused around winter break, and people's plans that were always the same. Either the person would be staying home, or going out of town to visit their family, where they would receive gifts that would later be returned for what they really wanted.

"This pointless."

"So you didn't learn anything?"

Recognizing Rei's voice, Kai turned his head to see two small children hugging each of his legs. Blinking away his confusion Kai asked, "Who the hell are those two brats?"

"Ignorance and Want."

"Oh."

"Yeah…"

"That sucks."

"I know."

"Do you get paid to watch them?" Kai asked sarcastically.

Rei shook his head. "Nope, but at least I have someone to talk to while working."

"Hn."

"My point exactly."

"Can I go home now?" Kai asked.

Rei shrugged. "I don't see why not."

And like a dream, Kai was back in his room, which had returned to normal.

Jumping into his bed, Kai went to sleep, not bothering to think about the events that had just occurred.

X.X.X.X.X.X.