"Hey Rouge I'm hom-" Shadow walked in on the house being fully decorated in Christmas decorations. He sighed. "So it begins…" He took his jacket off and hung it on the coat rack next to the door. "Rouge?"

"In here!" Rouge called from the kitchen. She was busy making sugar cookie cutter cookies and was putting the cutters down in the dough. "I'm making sugar cookies."

Shadow walked into the kitchen. "Great…So it looks like you decorated."

"Yup."

He reached for a cookie that was cooling on a tray. "Can I have one-"

"NO!" She slapped his hand away. "These are for to take to work."

"Alright." Shadow backed away from her. "…How was your day off?"

The white bat continued cutting shapes into the dough. "It was good. I decorated, took a nice, relaxing bubble bath with lavender incense." She looked up at him. "It's really relaxing, the lavender, very therapeutic. You should try doing that sometime."

Shadow nodded. "Something tells me you need my help getting the tree up again?" He asked.

Rouge nodded to him. "Yes I do." She wiped her hands on her red striped Christmas apron. "After I finish with the cookies for the work Christmas party."

He nodded again and sat down on the couch.

"Have you thought about what you'll get Kris for the gift exchange on Christmas Eve?"

Shadow turned around to look at her. "No, not really, I've been focused on work and I-"

"You better hurry, Christmas Eve is only eleven days away."

Shadow sighed and looked down. "I know, I just wish I knew and-" He started to blush but the bat didn't see it. "Well, she does like Harry Potter."

"That's an idea!"

He got up. "On Saturday I'm going out gift shopping."

Rouge started to clap. "There we go!"

"Kris! Are you awake?!" Ky called up the stairs. "Come down here and help me decorate the tree!"

The snow leopard was curled up in her bed, under the covers, sleeping soundly.

"KRISTINA!"

Kris stirred and opened one eye, she growled a bit and yawned. "…That's it!" She got up quickly and rushed downstairs. "I know what to do for Shadow's gift!" She announced happily.

Ky was standing next to the stairs. "What?" He asked.

She smiled big. "I'm not telling you."

"Okay, great, so are you going to help me decorate the tree or no?"

"Yes."

"Then come on! I'm waiting for you. I could have got it done by now by myself."

Ky had already got the ribbon wrapped around the tree and had gotten the ornaments out. They were red and gold and shiny. Kris got a red shiny ball out of its box and hung it on the tree while Ky turned on some Christmas music. Soon both of them were dancing while decorating the tree with all the ornaments they had.

"There's a happy feeling nothing in this, world can buy, when they pass around the coffee and the, pumpkin pie!" Kris sang Sleigh Ride while twirling around the room. "It will even look like a picture print by Courier Endives! These wonderful things are the things we'll remember all through our lives, these wonderful things are the things we'll remember all through our lives!"

"Let's hear those sleigh bells jingling, ring-ting-tingling too, come on it's lovely weather for a sleigh ride together with you!" Amy and Sonic sang together in a duet and danced together in the middle of Tails' den. Sonic lifted Amy up in the air and pivoted around in a circle before putting her back down and taking her hand to twirl her out and back in again. Tails watched them dance and smiled. It was a wonderful thing to see them having fun together.

"Com'on Tails, dance with us! Join in!" Sonic called to his friend.

He shook his head. "No thanks Sonic, I'll just sit here and watch you two dance."

"Okay! But feel free to join in if you want to!" Sonic replied.

Sonic and Amy danced the night away to two whole Christmas CDs before they even thought about stopping to eat. Unfortunately all Tails had was instant ramen in Styrofoam cups.

"Today has been SO fun you guys." Amy told them when they were eating their ramen.

Tails smiled and slurped up some noodles. "You're welcome Amy."

"It's nice spending time together, you know." Sonic replied. "Especially around the holidays, when me and Tails don't have any family to be around." His voice turned sad at the last part.

Amy stopped eating. "That's right, you ran away from home, right?" She asked.

Sonic sighed sadly. "Yeah, I was really young too. I was still a kid, about Tails' age."

Amy gasped. "You were eight years old?!"

"Yeah." The blue hedgehog replied. "My dad, wasn't very nice to me, and blamed me for most things wrong with his life. My mom tried to get him to stop but he never did, my Uncle Chuck was like the father that I never had, her brother. I knew they both loved me but one day I just couldn't take my dad's abuse any longer and ran away from home."

Tails' ears went down. "Sonic, I never knew…"

"Me either…" Amy replied. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay you guys. I'm fine. You're my family now." Sonic replied and put his fork in his mouth. "I don't mind telling you more later. It feels good to get things off of my chest."

"Alright Sonic." They both said.

After they had finished their noodles Tails turned on a Christmas movie and made them all hot chocolate with marshmallows. Sonic and Amy sat on the couch together with a blanket over them. "What movie is this?" Sonic asked.

"It's one of my favorites." Tails answered. "The Santa Clause"

"That one with Tim Allen?" He asked.

"Yes."

"Oh, I've never seen this one."

"It's funny."

Tails started the movie and plopped himself down in a chair next to the couch with the remote and pressed MENU and then PLAY MOVIE.

Sonic and Amy snuggled up together and looked at the screen. After a few minutes Amy looked up at Sonic and gave him a peck on the cheek. Sonic slightly moved away at this but then decided it wasn't a big deal, they were Sonamy, weren't they?

After the Christmas tree had been decorated Kris was web searching on how to make snow globes. She found instructions on an old HTML website that hadn't been updated since the year 2000, but it was good for what she was trying to do. After reading over it carefully she got started with the base which was supposed to be made out of white plastic, which was easy to mold with her hedgehog forms' fire powers. She also made a little Space Colony ARK as best as she could do for the inside of the globe. After a while Ky just walked into the kitchen and looked over her shoulder.

"What are you doing?" He asked.

Kris grabbed the pieces and leaned away from him. "None of your business."

"What are you making?"

"A thing."

"What is the thing?"

Kris breathed out. "Shadow's Christmas gift."

"Oh, well what are you making him?" He asked.

"Leave me alone."

"Not until you tell me."

Kris sighed. "It's a snow globe. Now leave me alone."

"Cool." Ky did as he was told then and left her to do her work. After a while she had done all that she could do with what she had including painting the mini ARK with acrylic paint and covering it with a waterproof coating. She got up and called Ky.

"Ky! Do we have any antifreeze?!"

"No!"

"Okay!" They'd have to get some. The red hedgehog went upstairs to her room and flopped on her bed. She almost bounced her phone off of her bed but didn't. She got her phone and opened up her text messages. To her surprise there was one from Shadow (from two hours ago). This was weird because he hardly ever texted anybody, but Kris went back to her missed calls and saw that he had called her twice while she was making his snow globe. She went back to the texts and read Shadow's. It read:

Hey, do you want to go out or something? I have these coupons for this steak place and I was just wondering if you wanted to go.

Her heart fluttered for a second. He was asking her out on a date? Whoa! The hedgehog looked at her alarm clock to see what time it was. Hopefully it wasn't too late to respond. It was 5:50. Good, not too late. She went to typing out her message:

Sure, I'll go with you, what time should I be ready?

She waited for a response. He was typing.

Okay, be ready at 6:30, I'll come get you.

Kris texted back.

She got off her bed and changed clothes into something nicer that didn't smell like fire. A black tank top with black skinny jeans and a black belt. She put on a semi see through black quarter length sleeve shirt over the tank top and put on her black combat boots that she always wore and fixed her hair in the mirror and put on mascara and eyeliner. She finally put on her black gloves and went downstairs to get her purse. Ky was sitting on the couch and was surprised.

"Hey, where are you going all dressed up like that?" He asked.

Kris smiled at him. "Shadow asked me out on a date." She couldn't hide her excitement from him.

Ky got up and made an inquisitive expression. "Oh, he did, did he? Well, is old big brother Ky gonna have to give him the rules about dating his baby sister?" He walked over to her.

Kris laughed and playfully pushed him "Fuck you."

"Ha ha."

Soon Shadow had arrived at their house. Ky waved at them from the doorway as they left. "Take care of her, or else!"

Shadow rolled his eyes and picked his date up. "I'm going to get us there quickly, hold on."

He teleported.

"Whoa!" They appeared at the steakhouse a few seconds later. Kris' head was spinning as she was not used to Shadow's teleportation yet.

"Are you okay?" Shadow asked her.

"I'm just not used to this yet."

"Do you think you can walk?"

"Just put me down."

Shadow put her down and let her get her balance.

"Now?" He asked.

"Yeah."

The two hedgehogs walked inside the steakhouse and waited on the hostess to seat them. When she came back she lead them to a table and gave them some menus. Then the waitress came.

"What would you like to drink?" She asked.

"Water." Shadow answered.

"Water for me too." Kris answered.

The waitress nodded and left.

Shadow looked at his menu and up at Kris. He could tell that she was nervous by the way she was shifting in her seat and that she was messing with her hair. When she noticed that he was staring at her she started to blush.

"I-I'm so sorry, I'm just really nervous and excited."

"It's okay, is this the first time you've ever been on a date?" Shadow asked.

"Yes…"

"Relax, you haven't done anything wrong."

Kris breathed out, trying to calm her nerves.

"So, do you have a favorite pastime?" He asked.

"I like reading, and painting…" She answered.

The black and red hedgehog folded his arms across the table. "Oh, what do you like to paint?" He smiled slightly to make her feel more comfortable.

Kris leaned forward. "Well, I like to paint Landscapes and Still Life the most, but I also like to paint pictures of animals."

"Interesting. Do you ever paint portraits of people?" He asked.

"Sometimes."

"Hmm. Do you think I could see some of your paintings sometime?"

Kris smiled a bit that he was interested in her paintings. "Yeah, I could show you some, they're in a closet because I don't have anywhere to put them."

"Okay, great."

"We should probably see what we want to order before the waitress comes back with our waters." Kris suggested.

"Right." Shadow looked at his menu and scanned the different types of steaks that they had. Kris did the same.

When the waitress came back with the waters she asked if they were ready to order. They said yes and ordered. Kris ordered a filet mingoin and Shadow ordered a medium rare sirloin steak. The waitress took their menus and walked away again.

"What about you then?" Kris asked. "What do you like to do?"

Shadow sat up. "Well, I like to read."

"Just like me, well I would have guessed it because you said you were a Slytherin, so you must like to read Harry Potter." She replied.

"Yeah. The books are pretty good, but I like Historical Fiction more than fantasy."

"Oh."

"I also like to poke into some witchcraft books every once in a while."

"Really?"

"Yep., but I do like to make herbal medicines and incents too."

"Wow, you've never struck me as that type of person."

"Don't judge a book by its cover."

Soon their food came out and they started eating. Kris smiled as she watched Shadow eat. She had never seen him eat before. When they both finished eating Shadow looked at her.

The red female hedgehog looked back at him. "What? Is there something on my face?" She asked.

"No, I'm just looking at how pretty you look tonight." He answered.

Kris blushed. "T-thank you. You look handsome too."

A smile from Shadow. "Thanks."

When the check came Shadow paid for their meals and they left the steakhouse. The night was cold, and Kris was already regretting not dressing in something warmer, or at least bringing a furry jacket. Shadow noticed and brought her in close to warm her. They teleported back to her house and he brought her up to the front door.

"Thank you for taking me out to dinner." Kris thanked him.

Shadow bowed with his hand over his heart. "It was my pleasure."

Before she went inside Kris turned around and kissed him on the check. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight."