Inspiration drawn from the episode "A Christmas Tori". I never liked how the girls ended up practically dressed in lingerie to perform Andre's song (seriously, it was "Victorious", not Victoria Secret!), so I went with a more childlike rendition on this.

This is not as "parent-y" as a lot of the chapters, but I felt like it fit here better than as a single story, so ... enjoy!

...

There are benefits of having extended family, particularly around the holidays. This is especially true when you do not have incredibly involved immediate family. But neither Jade nor Cat came from conventionally supportive families. Jade's family was shattered after the fissures caused by divorce and constant cycling of romantic partners. With her father mostly absent and her mother mostly terrified to cross her abrasive child, there was practically no parental involvement in Jade's day-to-day life. Beyond filling the occasional familial obligation, she was on her own. Meanwhile, Cat's family was stressed to the maximum by mental health issues and illness, both on the part of children and parents. Somehow the two girls had found one another, and together they made holidays more bearable.

Cat LOVED giving presents. There were so many kinds of presents out there that she could give - anything from a 25 cent gumball to a gift basket of sweet and savory snacks to a handmade costume for a prized role. There were limitless options. It could become so overwhelming that Cat would end up not only buying an abundance of presents for others, but also for herself (she had been told she had a shopping problem). Connected to that problem, Cat would have spent a great deal of her time and money on presents, if Jade and Beck did not caution her on the necessity of saving some of her money for herself and her future.

Speaking of them and their advice about presents, she was now looking for a present for Jade. Or two presents. Because, as always, Christmas-crazy Cat was excited to give Jade a present to open on Christmas Eve, when the two friends always met up. Neither of them had families with the strongest traditions. Cat's family would attempt to spend Christmas together with her Nonna, and occasional other relatives, but the ... "uniqueness" of her genetic pool combined with her brother's mental illness often cancelled out the ability to celebrate much beyond Christmas morning and the overstimulation that provided. Even Cat usually crashed by lunchtime, too excited from the delight of presents and treats to be able to function properly. Meanwhile, Jade's family was split. Her father generally could not care less, but the occasional step-mother would insist on Jade's presence in an ill-fated attempt to create a "fairytale" family, or her father would want her there to sell that same front to some visiting business partner. When with her mother, the focus was easily on her little brother who still retained an enjoyable delight in the season while Jade's cynicism and dislike of close contact to extended family often increased tensions between herself, her mother, and any current maternal boyfriend. Beck had never been around for Christmas day since he started dating Jade - his family insisting on his presence in their Christmas visits - but it was okay. Cat and Jade had their own tradition.

Thinking back, Cat could remember the first time she and Jade had celebrated Christmas together.

...

It had started when they were only nine. It was late afternoon on Christmas Eve, and neither of them had any celebrations in place. They both ended up at the park - Cat to run out her energy that was overwhelming her family, and Jade to air out the sulks that were irritating her very heavily pregnant mother. The two girls had been relieved to spot their best friend wandering around the largely deserted play structures.

Cat had been clutching a packet of gingerbread cookies, and Jade had wanted some.

"Give me five," she had demanded in what anyone else would have interpreted as bossiness.

"Yay! It's a Christmas feast!" Cat had cheered, clapping her hands and accidentally smashing several of the tiny cookies in her excitement at finally being able to "recreate" one of the happy Christmas traditions she had seen in many of the Christmas specials that had been on tv for the last week.

"It's not a feast. Those are dumb. They're just full of mean old business people who pat your head when you don't want them to touch you, or tell you that you look 'adorable, precious princess' when you wear a stupid dress your dumb ol' stepmonster buys you," Jade said in total disgust, sticking out her tongue at the reminder of what she perceived to be the humiliation of the previous night.

Despite everyone else thinking that little Cat Valentine was a crybaby or pushover, she felt confident enough in her friendship with Jade to stand up to her. "I said it's a feast, 'cause it is! Now sit down on your side of the teeter totter and I'll sit on mine, and then you can have the Christmas cookies, but we are sharing, 'member that? That means we both get cookies, not just you." Cat had been occasionally burned while "sharing" with less well-meaning children stealing from her.

Jade had huffed and rolled her eyes, but sat down on her teeter totter seat and waited for Cat to realize that the teeter totter was not an ideal environment for sharing, due to the imbalance. She folded her arms and tapped her foot impatiently. She just wanted some of those cookies. The asparagus and salmon last night had offended her young taste buds, but her father and "stepmonster" had refused to make allowances for her, insisting she was being "fussy" and "uncooperative". This morning they had forgotten to give her breakfast, and at home her mother - who was unlucky enough to have had morning sickness through the entire pregnancy - was feeling queezy and had simply given Jade a peanut butter and jelly sandwich when she got home. Jade was hungry for something good, a Christmas treat.

Cat had tried jumping up onto her end of the teeter totter several times. Although the weight difference would be noticeable more when they were older, they were still different figures, and Cat - dressed in a candy cane striped tutu with jingle bells all about her - looked like a little impatient elf as she bounced up and down, attempting her best shot at getting onto the teeter totter.

"Why ... is ... it ... so ... high?" Cat huffed as she attempted to climb up.

"Ready to go sit somewhere else? I'll move if you give me a cookie," Jade had said calculatively.

"Nooooo. Only cookies after we set up our feast," Cat had grumbled, nevertheless trotting over, grabbing Jade's hand, and tugging her behind her up to the highest spot on the playset.

"Hey, we're playing pirates here, and no icky girls allowed," a boy protested. He and his brothers - all freckles and copper curls - stared down the girls with open hostility. Although they all had Santa hats on, none of them reflected the jolly generosity of the depicted saint.

"Nuh uh! We want to have a feast! And we're not icky!" Cat had protested.

"Uh huh!" and "You are so!" and "Go have your stupid girly party somewhere else," the brothers had sneered back.

Jade, who had been on the verge of grabbing her smaller friend's packet of snacks and helping herself, was still affronted by this blatant display of bullying. She marched up to the oldest brother and glared at him, hard.

"Boys are the ones with cootie germs anyway, idiots."

"Ooooh, she said a bad word!" the youngest brother said with wide eyes and mouth.

"I'm gonna say a whole lot worse if you don't get your stinky butts away from us. We don't want you around any longer, so go home and cry to your mommy, and I bet Santa won't even visit you anymore!" Jade shouted. She, of course, was too old to believe in Santa, but she was not above fighting dirty. This seemed to be an especially effective threat on the youngest brother, whose eyes were now shimmering with tears and his lips were trembling. The middle brother was looking concerned, and even the oldest was looking uncertain.

"Yeah, Santa doesn't like mean kids," Cat said certainly. Her trust in Santa was still unshaken, even at nine, and Jade kindly ignored this. Although it was a weakness she exploit in others, she would not do that to her best friend. Jade had very few friends, and she rarely got past the initial repulsion experienced by other kids meeting her, so she had decided to protect the one friend that she did have. Cat's devotion overlooked any of Jade's multiple minor transgressions, so their friendship was sustained.

"Well ... well ... well, I think I hear our mom yelling for us. Our grandparents are coming tonight and bringing tons of presents and German chocolate cake and giant candy canes, so there!" the oldest brother, clearly the leader of the pack, shot back before leading a hasty retreat down the twisty slide.

"Ha! Jokes on you! We don't even care about presents or chocolate cake or candy canes!" Jade yelled down the slide before plopping down on the floor of the structure.

"Yeah!" Cat yelled down the slide, before sitting down a little more delicately next to Jade. She waited a moment before sadly saying, "I do kinda like presents and cake and candy." She peered up at Jade. "Do you?"

Jade shrugged, then quietly admitted, "Well, maybe just a little. Sometimes. Although I don't care about their stupid treats. I hope choke on them," she ended vindictively to balance out her own pitiful longing.

Cat nodded. "I wish my family brought treats at Christmas. Nick's at the hospital this year, so no one is coming to visit. And Nonna's in Italy, so no Nonna visits or presents until January." Even without looking at her, it was easy to see that this sad reiteration of a holiday was a bit much for the celebratory child to bear.

Jade had leaned back against the pole-based walls of the structure. She did not let her own lips quiver as she could hear Cat's were, but she did pout a little and blink a little harder as she added, "Well, my family's so excited that my mom's going to have a stupid baby that he's already getting more presents than me. He's got towers of them, and I only counted five for me! And I heard my parents arguing about where I would be for Christmas. The ugly baby is coming soon, and so Mom isn't sure if he won't come tomorrow - which would steal Christmas from me completely forever! And my dad just wants to go away to some tropical island with his new wife, and he won't take me with them and that is stressing Mom out because now she's not sure who I'll stay with since everyone is so busy. And I don't think anyone likes me anymore." The last sentence sort of slipped out, but she did not have to feel worried. Cat always listened, and never judged.

The two sad girls sat together for a few minutes in dreary contemplation. Cat finally opened her packet of miniature gingerbread men and divided them. They both got six, when all the pieces were combined back together.

"Merry Christmas, Jade," Cat had said, reaching over to squeeze Jade's hand, which was starting to get a little cold in the approaching evening chill.

"Merry Christmas, Cat," Jade had replied, her mouth full of the last of her gingerbread.

"Let's always celebrate together, so that we never don't get no Christmas," Cat said in a stroke of social genius, even if it was not in grammatical agreement.

Jade nodded, before reaching over and hugging her friend. That was her contribution to their first Christmas feast.

"Caterina Valentine! Where are you? It's time to go back to the house to get your brother's stocking. We need to visit him before the visiting hours are over," Cat's mom yelled from the edge of the playground.

"Will you be okay?" Cat asked, her wide eyes examining her friend.

Jade shrugged. "There's a horror movie marathon I found that happens on December 28th, so I hope the baby gets born then. If he has to be born around Christmas, I just don't want him born right then, you know? Because then he'll steal all the celebrations from me forever, and I'll hate him even more than I already do. But if he's born that day, then prob'ly no one will be watching me, at least not closely, and then I can finally watch that movie 'The Scissoring' that my mom didn't let me go to the theater to see this summer, all because of the stupid, dumb, idiotic, imbecilic age restrictions," Jade had said, sitting down on the slide. Cat sat down behind her, wrapped her arms around Jade's stomach, and down the slide the two "feast" attendees headed home.

...

Ever since, Jade and Cat had upgraded their Christmas celebrations extensively, and Cat looked forward to it every year. This year was even more exciting, because when Sikowitz had held out the hat and she had drawn a name for the school "Secret Santa" gift exchange, she had been delighted to draw the name of her very best friend!

She had already had her main Christmas gift for Jade for a whole month. It was a beautiful black dress with medieval-style sleeves with bats embroidered on them that Cat had designed and sewn herself. She was proud of the result, and was certain that Jade would adore it.

But now there was the matter of a second present. Sikowitz had insisted that they needed to have wonderful presents, and Cat felt up to the challenge. What could she do that would equal any of the wonderful presents she had gotten Jade over the years?

Maybe gingerbread, or a gingerbread-scented candle, like our first Christmas banquet. I remember that we ate gingerbread men, and then we left. And I had the saddest Christmas ever, because no one visited and Nick was in the hospital. And then Jade's mom had a baby that same week, and Jade watched "The Scissoring", and then she made me visit on New Year's Eve to watch it with her, and I never liked dark rooms again and Jadey was 100% sure she would be an actress when she grew up to be in horror movies, and not just be a singer or dancer or stage performer.

Wait ...

"The Scissoring" is something she really likes ...

I wonder if I could find ...

And from there, Cat found the best present Jade received in her entire childhood - a pair of scissors from Jade's favourite horror movie. It might not have been a conventional Christmas gift, but then they had never celebrated in the most conventional manner.

And it worked perfectly for them.