Chapter 14: Christmas presents
The next day is Saturday, so I wake up extra early and head towards the conference room, aka post office. I'm in a good mood, so I hum a folk metal song.
My taste in music has a wide range… I start sorting the mail, there is more than usual, probably since Christmas is approaching. I change to humming a song from Adele, as I start preparing the allowances as well. "Ah, Miss Ojousama." I freeze and turn to the door. There stands Professor Grabiner.
Oh right, the snow storm. "Good morning, Sir.", I greet him, before returning to my duties. This time without humming.
"I need to add a notice to all students that outings to the mall are cancelled.", he explains his actions to me. "Due to the snow storm, I assume. We won't be able to buy our Secret Santa presents…", I answer him, while continuing with the allowances. "That is not my concern. Good day." And with that he's gone.
I sigh and finish preparing the allowances, before I add the notice to the delivery.
As I return to the dorm room, Ellen is already up, while Virginia is waking up. "Mall trips are cancelled today, due to the snow storm", I inform them, while handing their mail and allowances to them personally. "But we haven't bought our presents to give!", Ellen exclaims. "Potsdam will think of an alternative.", I calm her down.
After that I spent the rest of the day drawing in the library and decorating the ceiling of our dorm room with a new illusion. Guess that counts as studying, since I didn't run into Big Steve. In the evening I run into Donald. "Hey, Elise. Wanna go out?" He wants to invite me to building a snowman with him? "Oh?" "Luke and I were gonna build a snowman, but he didn't want to get his fingers dirty." So I'm the surrogate for your friend? "So he's above playing with snow? I didn't know, it was such a dirty task.", I sarcastically remark. "Oh well, I enjoy playing with snow. Of course I'll come with you." "Great!" Donald seems to be honestly happy about that.
"Come on, over here. I don't want to pull up a patch too close by or it'll spoil the view." We start building the snowman and Donald takes out the vegetables he got from the cafeteria, which we use for the face of the snowman.
"So did you get to enjoy your Thanksgiving vacation in the snow as well?", I casually ask him. "Well, no. My family was there then." I just give him a questioning look. He will tell me about his strained relationship with his sister, right? "If I made a snowman, Urchin would probably knock it down." I tilt my head.
It does sound like her to immediately suspect it being booby-trapped – she has enough reason to!
"She'd assume it was booby-trapped. She'd get someone else to knock it down for her." I smile teasingly at Donald. "You'd make a damn good booby-trap, I'm sure of it.", I compliment him. Dedicated artists like him should get appropriately acknowledged.
"Maybe." He looks down, despite my compliment. He's tired of his own rebellion, isn't he? In the end, all what he wants is acknowledgement from his family,
but he thinks he wouldn't be able to get any, so he works hard to cause mischief, in order to be noticed. So to conclude, he suffers from an attention-deficit and reacts to it like most children do: cause trouble. "Aren't you tired of pranking her?", I ask out of honest concern for him. I don't look at him, while asking this question, since I'm sure, he doesn't want me to see his true emotions right now, even though he is opening up to me. "But if I didn't, my family would forget I exist."
I doubt that, but stay silent. It is not my place to tell him, what his family really thinks about him, since I'm an outsider, it would be too arrogant of me to do so.
"All my life I've been pushed out of the way. William's Mister Cool, even when he screws up. He's done much worse than I have and it doesn't bother anyone. Everyone's proud of him.", Donald continues complaining. Well, he seems like a great guy, apart from the fact that he dated Angela and Damien. Starting a fist-fight with Damien after being betrayed by him, is justifiable. So he has bad taste? That is one flaw, but everyone has flaws…
"And Virginia? My very first memories are of my mother giving her presents and telling me not to touch them. Or her." It's not unusual, that siblings think, that the other would get better treatment and grow jealous. But Donald's case is a severe one, since Virginia's parents fussed over her a lot due to her disease.
Donald's parents were careless in not telling Donald about Virginia's disease and not noticing his feelings of lacking appreciation. They should have paid him more attention. But I guess I'm not one to judge, as I haven't been a mother and noticing such things while being occupied with taking care of three children
(and work, whatever it might be they do for a living) might be perfectly excusable.
"Any time she even bumped her knee, Mom and Dad dropped everything and come running. Half the time I got blamed, even if I wasn't anywhere near her. Nothing was ever her fault, and once she figured that out, she could do whatever she wanted and leave me to get the scolding. She's lazy, she's spoiled, she's not smart and she was never going to get anything near the Olympics. She wasn't even state-ranked. There's nothing special about her.", Donald rambles on.
Ok, the parents are a bit incapable. Though Donald's view is probably tainted a lot due to his own feelings of under-appreciation and jealousy.
"Well, she is a bit spoiled, that much is definitely true…", I agree. "The only reason she didn't cause more trouble than she did, was that our parents practically followed her around, waiting on her. But when I ran away from home, they didn't even notice." "Is that true?", I ask him softly.
"Well, not for a few hours, anyway. Anyway, William is the successful eldest son. Urchin's the baby. I'm the trouble-maker. It's better than being nothing. Besides, it's fun to see how much trouble I can get myself into and still get myself out of it. It gives me a challenge." And with that Donald turns to the snowman to notice the 'blood effects' created by the beet-eyes. I decide not to press him further on the topic. The continue playing around for a bit, before we return inside.
The Sunday I spent like the last. On Monday we assemble in the gym. Seriously, we do that way too often! It's always so uncomfortable here, since it's crowded.
Can't they simply contact us in a different way? But then again, Potsdam enjoys talking to us personally, I think. She is a strange woman, which shouldn't be underestimated, but she cares about us students. There is definitely more about her, behind her Hippie-façade though.
Potsdam informs us about our alternative secret Santa, where we will handicraft some cards. We start making our cards. Since I have to make one for Virginia,
I choose white paper, which I decorate with Christmas sweets and cakes. I deliberate about trying to enchant the card, so that an illusion will pop out, when Virginia opens it, but I can't think of a good illusion to create. To combine the illusion spell with a trigger is a difficult task, though I'm able to do it, since I'm good at black magic as well, but the illusion in itself wouldn't have a good quality, besides, I'm still only able to do unmoving, 2D-illusions. 3D-illusions and moving illusions is something to learn in the sophomore year and illusions of touch and other senses are learned in the junior year. The seniors only learn how to combine the different properties into one illusion. In the afternoon, we exchange our Christmas cards and Virginia is satisfied with mine, as expected.
Thursday is the chorale concert and I attend, to support Ellen and Donald. Since the Christmas vacation is coming up, I deliver the mail on Friday morning.
At the conference room I meet Professor Grabiner, as he rummages through the mail. "Good morning, Professor.", I greet him, but he only replies with a grunt. Charming as ever, Grabby. He finally finds his package and leaves without saying anything else. "Notice me, senpai!", I jokingly cry out, before I start with my duties.
I wonder, if the Manus was in the package? I have to be careful, the next time I step into the post office. Though it should be enough, not to think about him at Potsdam Christmas speech. Should be easy enough. I attend one red magic class and one green magic class after finishing with my treasurer duties.
In the evening we assemble in the gym again, to receive our final blessing from Potsdam, before we go back to our parents for the holydays.
"Hello, my young students.", Potsdam greets us. No strange nickname for us? "The tradition of Christmas is one of giving and sharing. Most of you, who are returning to your homes will be exchanging gifts and spending time with friends and family. But while you're gone do not forget who you are. Do not forget all that you share with your brothers and sisters in magic. I have a special gift for you.", she finishes with a smile.
Ok, here it comes, do NOT think about Grabiner. Not his curly black hair and his brown eyes with a tinge of red. Not his dark but lovely voice, his British accent. …...Dammit. Should have taken the reverse psychology into account.
"Think of those that you care about. Think of a person that matters to you. If the person you choose is thinking of you as well, you will feel that connection, your affection being shared. I'll leave you to your thoughts." I sigh while I slightly feel his acknowledgement, before he cuts of the connection. I feel really stupid right now… Before I can think about anyone else, Potsdam climbs back on the stage and the spell fades.
"Have a happy Christmas everyone! We'll see you in two weeks!"
It's weird, but I anticipate seeing my parents again a bit. Even though the Thanksgiving vacation was so awkward, and I still feel distant to them.
It really doesn't make any sense. I give my mom a short hug, as she comes to fetch me on Saturday morning and we chat a bit on our way home.
In the afternoon I buy two coffee mugs from a local shop as Christmas present for my parents. I choose some with plain, white design, so that I could the inscription-spell to personalize them. I erase the old design, turning them completely white and wrote on the mug for mom 'guilty of being the world's best mom' in dark violet (her favourite colour) and on the one for dad 'best dad in the history' in dark green (his favourite colour).
I know, they're corny, but I want something, which reminds them of my existence.
I spent most of my Sunday with preparing the presents. After I finished with my magic, I controll that they look natural, as in 'produced without magic' and wrap them in festive wrapping paper. After opening my presents on Wednesday morning and thanking them, I give them theirs and they seem to like them. I'm relieved.
I got the painting utensils and music notes. I had mentioned missing music in my last vacation and how I'd like to play certain music.
For them to remember this… I'm touched.
I guess they also want me to continue playing clarinet. I spent the rest of my vacation mostly with practice: practicing the clarinet, practicing drawing, practicing painting and practicing green magic. Since the effects of the green magic are not visible, it is relatively safe for me to practice it. I use green magic on my own body, mostly for enhancing my lungs for playing the clarinet. But I also exercise enhancing my senses. Apart from practicing, I use the opportunity to listen to music on youtube, print some additional music notes from the internet and even spend some time with my parents. All in all, my vacation went surprisingly good, but I still don't feel very close to my parents.
Given their presents, I feel like a spoiled brat for feeling so distant to them.