231 Christmas Special Final: Christmas Dinner

A couple of days have passed since we went to ice skating.

I had an extremely long conversation with my mom about the time I stayed with Hayley… it had two huge parts, and it felt like as it would never end.

The first was about me forgetting to tell them that I was not coming back home that night… I don't know how I got out unscattered, it might be because it's Christmas or because she was more worried about having "the talk" again after she finished with the first part of the conversation… don't misunderstand I had this talk a couple of times already, the last one was when I started dating Hayley almost 4 months ago. I don't need to repeat it, it's been the same for a couple of years already, but if it gives my mom some peace of mind to repeat it I'll let her do it.

I managed to avoid some questions about that night, but I think that she knows what happened between us…

Besides that conversation, I have spent my time being lazy… that are vacations for after all. I have been talking a lot with Hayley, I told her we went ice skating and sent her the pictures and videos of G falling. She told me about her first time fishing with her grandpa … she hated every second of it and didn't catch anything.

I also hanged out with G, he kept nagging me to tell him details about my first time with Hayley, he tried to convince me by talking about the girls he has seen in the gym… I didn't fell for it, and I haven't told him anything … and I don't plan to feed his perverted mind with pictures of my girlfriend.

I also taught Hope how to bake the cupcakes that she likes and saw movies a couple of movies with her. I saw "A Christmas Enterprise" again, that was the name of the movie we saw with Hayley that night, so it brought me a lot of pleasant memories that were extremely inappropriate to have with my sister there, so I had to go back to my room before the movie ended.

The last part of my time was spent playing the Christmas event in 3threal Universe, this was the third game of the Ethereal Realms Series, this was also the first one of the series that was an actual FDMMORPG (Full Dive MMORPG), the former being a VR version was fun… but moving around during boss fights was really tiring, so it was a welcomed technological leap… it was an excellent exercise though.

We played a couple of Christmas dungeons with Rose, I play gunslinger class, and she uses a magic-blade specialized on light magic, so it was like a paladin. We also spent some time in our in-game guild house to forge and make some items as a gift for some of the guild members that we usually play with.

It was an almost perfect week if Hayley was here would have been even better.

…

My week went like that until today.

It's Christmas Eve, and since I have memories, most of our Christmas holidays have been at our grandparent's house, a couple of times we had a Christmas dinner with G's family too. This year my dad gifted a cruise trip to our grandparents, so we are spending it with G's family at our house.

Their dad arrived earlier to help with the food, as usual, our mother and Mr. Hunter did a fantastic job with the food. I also helped a little, I like spending time in the kitchen from time to time, something was relaxing in cooking.

I have no idea what the others were doing, but we could hear them laughing from time to time.

As we finished preparing dinner, we found that they were playing some family games on the VR console. Dante was confused by the hologram of G falling into a lake and hid behind the couch.

"I'm done! This is the fourth time."

That was what they are laughing at. Besides fighting games, G sucks in every other game, that was the reason that I play online with Rose and not him… the last time we tried, it was a disaster that we prefer to avoid.

Right now the score table was led by Rose with a large margin… she already won this. The second to fourth places were almost tied Rose's mom was second, Hope third and my dad fourth… then in the last spot with an embarrassing score was G… how you manage to not even complete the first route and don't win any of the free for all games?

"Wow G you became even worse than last time."

"It's not that!! They are ganging up on me!!"

I just laughed at him, there was still time before dinner was ready so we started a new game with me on it… Rose still won, but I was a close second. And G ended with even fewer points than before… about someone ganging up on him… it was his mom and Hope that had fun making him lose as soon as the games began… that gave my dad the chance to get into third place.

He was a little mad because of it…such a bad loser, but besides that, it was fun to play while we wait for dinner.

…

On the floor next to my chair was a plate filled with tuna, I bought real tuna for him to it, so Dante was happily purring at my side while eating.

The food was amazing, and even if it wasn't the same food, I think that Dante would agree with me. When he finished his meal, he went to the chimney to cuddle. There were some gifts under the tree, and the virtual presents would arrive at midnight… we should get a notification on the intercom for it.

After staying on the table for a while talking, we decided to go to the living room. My mom turned on the music, and Christmas carols started to sound.

I send a message to Hayley telling her that I hoped she was having a lovely time with her family, that I missed her a lot and that I loved her. In the meantime Hope and G were shaking the presents trying to guess what they had inside, Rose just looked at them, but it was clear that she was excited too.

"This is a deodorant …"

We have this thing with G… we hate giving presents to each other, so we just limit it to buy deodorant for every important date, that way we don't need to think about the gifts.

"Some people here can't wait five minutes so just open them."

It was Mrs. Hunter the one that gave the order. The next second two gifts were flying toward Rose and me.

"Think fast!"

Hope and G just threw both presents for us to open. Rose covered her and I had to catch both of them, they were soft, so there was no problem with them throwing them, but we didn't know that.

"Don't throw the presents!! It can have something hard or fragile inside."

"Sorry, mom."

"Sorry Mrs. Davies"

They relaxed a little after that, and both ripped the presents… come on how old are you already??? At my side, Rose opened one of her eyes and saw me holding both presents. I gave her one of the gifts and opened the other.

It was a blue and white winter pajama, it was a good gift in the last year grew a bit so my favorites one no longer fit me.

At my side a could hear Rose's excited yell.

"Oh my god!! Thank you, Spence!!"

"Hey! I bought that present!!"

"Thank you too Bro… Spence, did you find it in AKB? The last time I went there, they were sold out."

"We went with G the day they arrived."

"Thanks."

"But... I bought it..."

Rose was smiling and hugging the little wolf cub.

They kept opening the presents, as predicted I got a deodorant from G. At midnight Rose received a collection of light novels that she wanted from her parents, a lipstick from Hope, and my earrings. She was so happy that she wanted to go online to put them on her character right away but was stopped by us.

Hope received a new intercom that looked like a white pendant, a green ribbon from G, a lipstick from Rose (I think they did the same last year so they must be copying what G and I do with the deodorants), I gave her the last studio album from her favorite band.

G received Gym stuff and the subscription for that place he likes to go… and my deodorant.

After my pajama I opened the deodorant, my parents gave me a new helmet for my bike. Rose's gift surprised me, it was an old astronomic laser. I went outside to try it right away. I have seen them before, but it was amazing to be using one, outside the sky was clear, and there was a full moon, there was a halo surrounding the moon. Rose wanted to see too so she followed me.

"That one is Sirius, that is Orion… it supposed to be a hunter, but I don't see it."

I used the laser to point at the stars, the green laser continued until our eyes could see it anymore. It was amazing.

"Thank you, Rose."

"You are welcome. That part can be a bow don't you think?…"

________________________________________________

It was really late…I had one more present left to look at. Inside the box there was a metal sphere and a ring. I recognized what it was right away.

I subconsciously smiled as I read the note that was inside.

'Find the extra constellations.'

Still smiling I left a metallic ring on the floor and connected the intercom to the sphere. It sparked a little, and it started floating when I left it in the middle of the ring.

Around me, a holographic star map appeared. From time to time, one of the constellations will be shown.

"… now I see the hunter."

I will have to show it to Rose next time, she was trying hard to see it too.

Another constellation was shown, but this was the one that Hayley told about in the note, the image that the stars formed was a heart with a couple of letters.

'S+H'

I lay down tracing the constellations with Rose's laser until I fell asleep.