On Friday morning, everyone was filing into homeroom and taking their seats, placing their wrapped secret Santa gifts on their desks as they did so. Soon after, the homeroom teacher entered the room, wearing a Santa hat and appearing in quite a cheerful mood.
"Good morning, fellow Santas!" she greeted as she clasped her hands together.
"Good morning, Mrs. Z," everyone's voices rang out in unison.
Mrs. Z took a look around at all the students' desks before grinning in satisfaction.
"Well, it looks like all of you have remembered the assignment," she said. "Let me just take roll call real quick, and then the fun can begin!"
And so the homeroom instructor proceeded to take the roll. After she was finished, she put her clipboard away in her desk and beamed at her pupils.
"Alright then, let's not waste any time. You may all proceed to deliver your secret Santa gifts," she then instructed.
And with that, everyone collected their gifts and began searching for the right person to give them to.
In the case of Charlie Brown, it was actually fairly easy to get a gift for his assigned recipient. He had overheard that this guy, whose name was Jason, was a big basketball person, and as a result, Charlie Brown bought him a nice little something in that niche.
As he was being approached by Charlie Brown, Jason gave him a nod and smiled at him.
"Hi there," Charlie Brown said to him, giving him something of a smile. "Merry Christmas!"
"Oh! Thank you," Jason said as he took his gift. "Merry Christmas to you too."
Charlie Brown gave him a nod before beginning to make his way back to his desk.
While Charlie Brown was busy giving his gift to Jason, Heather had her gaze fixated on the gift she was about to give to Charlie Brown. Although she felt pretty confident that Charlie Brown would appreciate the gift, deep inside, there was no lack of nervousness. She knew that she had a secret intention behind giving this to him as a gift. But not only that, at the last moment before wrapping the gift, she had given it a bit of a... personal touch, so to speak. Truth be told, she wasn't completely sure why she had even decided to do this, but to her, it somehow felt like the right thing to do.
Regardless of all this, she really hoped that everything would work out as she had planned.
Seconds later, Heather was pulled from her thoughts by someone gently tapping her on the shoulder. She looked up to see Frieda standing there, naturally curly hair and all.
"Merry Christmas, Heather! I hope you enjoy this," Frieda said, sounding confident. "It was priced slightly over the limit, but I was able to get it for five dollars regardless. I guess that when you have naturally curly hair, you're more likely to have good luck getting good deals on things."
At this, Heather accidentally let out a laugh, causing Frieda to frown and her eyebrows to furrow.
"What's so funny?" Frieda asked in confusion.
"Sorry, it's nothing," Heather fibbed as she took Frieda's gift. She then gave her one of her usual friendly smiles. "Thank you for the gift, and Merry Christmas."
Still wondering what the heck that was about, Frieda turned and made her way back to her seat. Heather, meanwhile, placed her gift from Frieda into her backpack as she thought for a moment about what Frieda had just said. Frieda may have had a little bit of "good luck" by getting a perhaps seven or eight-dollar gift for five dollars, but Heather remembered that her own gift for Charlie Brown originally went for thirty dollars. By Frieda's logic, if having a certain type of hair helped you to get discounts at stores, then Frieda should think about what having bright red hair could apparently do for her!
As soon as Heather had put Frieda's gift away, Charlie Brown had arrived back at his desk. Heather zipped up her bag before turning to face him.
"So, Heather, did you give away your gift yet?" Charlie Brown asked her.
"No, not yet," she answered. Suddenly, she began to sound shy as she picked up her gift. "I'm able to now though. Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!"
Charlie Brown appeared rather in shock as Heather presented him with his gift.
"Heather... you're my secret Santa?" Charlie Brown asked, just to be sure.
"Mm-hmm," Heather said softly as she nodded.
Slowly, Charlie Brown proceeded to take the gift from her. He felt his face heat up a bit.
"T-Thank you, Heather," he still managed to say. "Merry Christmas to you too."
What a way to start the morning this was for Charlie Brown! Heather, his longtime crush, was his secret Santa, and she had gotten him what clearly was a pretty decent-sized gift. He was tempted to open it up right here and now, and he knew that it was going to be a real challenge waiting until Christmas Day to find out what his gift from Heather was.
A couple of hours later, Charlie Brown was in the halls on his way to his final class before lunch. He turned into the hallway that led to his destination, and then stopped short upon seeing a certain two people. Two people whom Charlie Brown still had a bit of a cool attitude towards when it came to seeing them both together.
They were Jason, that boy who Charlie Brown gave the gift to, and his girlfriend, Peggy Jean...
...or was Peggy Jean still actually his girlfriend?
"I'm afraid I can't go with you to the movies tonight. I promised my boyfriend that I would go with him," Peggy Jean said to Jason, sounding way too casual about it.
Jason flinches in response to this, as though Peggy Jean had just slapped him. Um... WHAT?!
"B... Boyfriend? But Peggy Jean, I'm your..." he tried to say.
But before he had a chance to finish, Peggy Jean strolled past him.
"Anyway, I have to get to my next class. The two of us actually have that class together," she said, not even looking at Jason.
"Boyfriend?!" Jason said again, his voice sounding strained. "But remember when... remember when... remember..."
But it was no use. Peggy Jean simply ignored him as she disappeared around a corner.
Charlie Brown was at a loss for words at what had just unfolded in front of him. In a manner exactly like what Charlie Brown had experienced when he was with Peggy Jean, Peggy Jean had just upped and randomly dumped the boy she was dating. And in the time that they were together, they both seemed as though they were genuinely into each other.
As it went now for Jason, Charlie Brown felt his stomach turn as he could literally see all the hurt come crashing onto Jason's face. And he wasn't the only one who seemed to see this scene unfold. There were a few onlookers who also seemed to witness what had just happened.
Jason stood still for a few seconds, then after giving off a loud sniffle, he pulled his hood down over his eyes and began making his way seemingly for the nearest bathroom. He raced past Charlie Brown, seeming to not even notice that he was there.
At this point, Charlie Brown suddenly no longer had any kind of hard feelings towards this guy. Now instead, he felt nothing short of extremely sorry for him, and he had the urge to do something to help. To try to ease the pain even a little. But of course, he had no idea what he could do in a situation like this. Nor did he have time to think as he heard the voice of one of the onlookers ring through the hall.
"That little bitch!" the voice yelled, earning gasps from the others. "Sorry, I had to say it. This is now at least the fifth time she's done something like this!"
"Are you serious?" another voice asked.
Likewise, Charlie Brown was also shocked to learn this news. Five times now that Peggy Jean had randomly shattered the heart of the boy she was dating?! Obviously he knew about one of these alleged instances of Peggy Jean randomly dumping someone, since he was the one whom she had dumped. However, on the grounds of some advice from his mother, he tried to not think too much of it. She had told him that since because they were so young and naive at the time, that she may not have been aware of how doing something like this may affect someone.
But now, as of today, Charlie Brown and Peggy Jean were both young teenagers, and Peggy Jean was treating boys and relationships no differently than the way she had in the past. As though relationships were some casual frivolous thing, and that a boy's feelings were nothing to care about.
If it wasn't for the fact that Peggy Jean was a girl, Charlie Brown wasn't sure he'd be able to avoid the temptation to slug her senseless. Just what the heck was wrong with this girl?!
Peggy Jean, who do you think you are, running around leaving scars?
Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown!
Yes, it was now finally Christmas morning in Sparkyville, as well as all around the world. And much unlike when he was just eight years old, Charlie Brown was quite stoked for things. He honestly couldn't wait to see what the girl of his dreams had gotten for him as his secret Santa!
"Big Brother! Big Brother!" Sally's loud voice boomed as she ran into his room. "Come on, Big Brother! Pull it together! Presents! Gifts!"
"You don't have to tell me twice," Charlie Brown said as he followed after his sister, not even bothering to change out of his pajamas.
The two Browns darted down the stairs and ran up to the mini mountain of colorfully wrapped presents lying under and/or beside the Christmas tree. Sally started her journey by showing no hesitance as she began searching for any gift that was hers.
Charlie Brown, meanwhile, had his eyes glued to Heather's gift. He appeared as though he was working out in his mind whether to open Heather's gift first, or wait until it was the very last gift to open. People have always said that it was more appropriate to save the best for last, and in Charlie Brown's case, Heather's gift was absolutely going to be his favorite for the simple reason being that it was from Heather, his years-long crush.
Finally, Charlie Brown decided that last was in fact best and he settled to start with a small gift that was from his grandmother.
For the next twenty minutes, Sally and Charlie Brown had a lot of fun and got plenty of excitement and joy from opening all of their gifts. Finally, all that was left was Charlie Brown's gift from Heather. Charlie Brown gingerly picked the gift up and smiled fondly at it.
"Heather..." he said in a whisper, so thrilled that the (once) little red-haired girl had gotten him a Christmas gift. It didn't matter that this was all technically the result of a school assignment. This occasion still meant a lot to him.
Meanwhile, Sally pouted as Charlie Brown began to unwrap his gift.
"You are so lucky, you know that? My Sweet Babboo didn't get me anything for Christmas," she complained.
"Sally, Linus has said repeatedly, time and time and time again that he's not your sweet Babboo," Charlie Brown told her.
"He is, but he isn't, but he is, but he isn't, but he is, but he isn't, but he is," Sally responded.
Charlie Brown merely rolled his eyes as he finished unwrapping his gift from Heather. Upon seeing what it was, his eyes went wide. He was unable to suppress the gasp that escaped his lips.
This was not anything at all like what he was expecting. And judging by the look on her face, it was obvious that Sally wasn't expecting this either.
"Oooh," Sally managed to say after a few seconds.
Charlie Brown remained silent as he examined his new baseball glove. Fairly simple in design, but made with very high-quality brown leather. It was a glove ideal for a pitcher, though it also looked like it could be used for playing in some other positions.
Finally, after about two full minutes, Charlie Brown slipped the glove onto his hand. It was a great fit and fairly comfortable. Upon stretching out his fingers, thereby exposing the glove's palm area, he saw something else he was not at all expecting.
It appeared that there was something written on the palm of the glove. Charlie Brown squinted his eyes, but the text was pretty small and was in cursive, so it was a bit hard to read.
He stood up and walked over to the nearest lamp, turning it on. Finally, he was able to read what was on the glove.
Sally Brown watched her brother as he seemed to just stand still with his eyes focused on the writing on his glove. Curiosity got the better of her and she began to approach her brother.
"Gee, Big Brother, what are you looking at?" she asked him.
This seemed to bring Charlie Brown back to reality.
"Oh... i-it's nothing," Charlie Brown fibbed as he took the glove off.
Sally shot a glazed look at him. That was baloney and Charlie Brown knew it. She wanted to know what was up.
"Let me see it, Big Brother!" Sally insisted as she proceeded to reach for the glove.
"I said it's nothing!" Charlie Brown tried to argue.
But it was no use. Sally wasn't going to have any of it. She snatched the glove away from him and held it back under the light so that she could read what was on it. After she was finished, a sly smirk appeared on her face.
"Wow, Big Brother. Your girlfriend really is quite the fan of yours," she said, amused. This caused Charlie Brown's face to go red. "And if you're willing to know my thoughts, I'm thinking that just maybe the reason why she even got you this glove in the first was because she really wants to see you get back into baseball."
Upon hearing this, Charlie Brown's feeling of dismay changed back to that of surprise. Was that actually the reason why Heather decided to buy him a baseball glove of all things? And did her signing her name on it maybe also play a role into this somehow?
Wow.
It seemed to Charlie Brown at this point that everyone wanted him to get back into baseball despite his insistence that he was through with it. There was obviously Peppermint Patty. But both Schroeder and Linus had tried a couple of times to convince Charlie Brown not to give up on baseball. And now here we have Heather having given him a beautiful new baseball glove for Christmas, and even having signed her name on the palm of it for some unknown reason. It was all turning into quite the show at this point.
But then, it was at this moment that something awoke within Charlie Brown. He had now come to make a very big decision.
Sally, meanwhile, was now waving her hand in front of her brother's face. "Yoo-hoo! Big Brother, come back down to Earth, please."
"Huh?" Charlie Brown blinked, then quickly shook his head to clear out his thoughts.
"Are you okay, Big Brother? You really zoned out there for a moment," Sally asked him, slightly concerned.
Charlie Brown nodded, and a grin spread across his face. "Sally, I know that it's just a little bit early still to be making my new year's resolutions, but I have just made one."
A curious look appeared on Sally's face. Her silence indicated to Charlie Brown for him to continue.
"With the start of the new year coming soon, I hereby resolve to get back into baseball," he declared firmly. "Not only that, but I am going to try out for the school baseball team in the spring."
In response to this, Sally blinked. But then seconds later, a bright smile spread across her face.
"It's about time, Big Brother," she said.
Author's note: And there we have it. Charlie Brown has decided that he is getting back into the sport that was practically his life. And it was Heather's gift that gave him that final push needed to make it happen.
There were clues of this in earlier chapters, but if you hadn't figured it out beforehand, this was Heather's intention by gifting Charlie Brown with a baseball glove for Christmas. She had believed that Charlie Brown was close to the point where he'd decide to give baseball another chance. And because she cares so much about him, and knew that deep down Charlie Brown still cared so much about baseball, she was able to think creatively as to how she could give him that needed push to get back into it, hence resulting in her gifting him with a brand new baseball glove. Pretty clever, eh?
I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and I'll see you soon with the next chapter! Plenty of Charlie Brown and Heather interaction awaits, as well as some more Linus and Janice moments!