A Christmas Comedy

A cliche Christmas story filled with laughter, cringe- worthy moments, and heart to heart conversations

“Why the hell am I here again?” I asked, walking towards a well decorated house with two people I liked to call my partners in crime.

“Because” the quiet blonde said, “this is my first Christmas with his family. It’s not like I’m ‘nervous’ or anything, but I would like some extra support.”

“His family loves you though and if you do need ‘extra support’” I said making air quotes, “drag Sarah and Ashley, people you’re actually related to.”

“Hey!” Katrina, the loudest of us three, yelled, “Jasmine wanted us to come so we have an obligation to come and support our friend. Besides,” she grabbed Jasmine’s and my shoulders and pulled us closer to her, “ a certain someone has a date with destiny we need to make sure happen. Right?” she gave me a devilish grin and my stomach dropped while Jasmine just quietly snickered.

I sighed, knowing that no matter what objection I gave them I would lose the argument and so begrudgingly I followed them into the bright house that contrasted the dark sky.

As soon as we got inside, I knew it was a horrible idea. For one it was so many people, not just Jasmine’s recent in laws, but so many people I didn’t know and I, for one, am no friend of crowds of strangers. Two, all the “fate” that loomed around tonight was making me even more anxious. So long as I didn’t see him it would be… alright.

“Where’s the booze?” I complained as soon as I finished strategizing a plan for the night.

“You’re not drinking tonight, “Katrina said, scanning the crowd, “One, you drove us here in the first place and twwooo your date is somewhere around here.”

I prayed he wouldn’t be here.

“JULIAN!” Katrina yelled, shattering my eardrums in the process.

He looked for the source of the ear-splitting voice.

“Please let him be drunk off his a*s.” I muttered.

“Ah Katrina… AVIA-chan, “he said hurrying over in our direction.

He wasn’t stumbling. Damn. He grabbed my hand and kissed it. “And how is my honey doing?”

Katrina nudged me closer to Julian in an attempt to create some theatrical display of fireworks. It was not successful.

“Hey… Julian…” I said hesitantly, “Do you know where the bar is?”
“Why yes I do. Your love, Julian, will take you.” In one swift motion, he swept me away towards where I hoped was the open bar. I turned around to Katrina, giving the most pitiful look I could muster, in hopes she would at least join us. She refused, but just gave me a thumbs up, with a look on her face saying, ‘don’t come back until y’all are together.’ Please let the bourbon drown this night out of my conscious.

When we got to the bar, I immediately took a seat and got a glass of bourbon.

“I’ll have the same thing” Julian told the bartender, taking the seat next to me. “So how is my beautiful raindrop doing lately?” he asked, taking a sip of his bourbon.

“What the hell is with all your pet names lately?” I asked.

“I thought you enjoyed these names my beautiful Avia-chan.”

“Oh god no” I muttered to myself, “let me guess, Jasmine and Katrina told you about my latest… obsession.”

Julian looked at me, his eyes started to widen and his face started to redden, “Well… Katrina mentioned that you were currently binge watching Fairy Tail.”

I sighed and took another drink of my bourbon, finishing my glass. I didn’t really know how to read him. It’s great that he’s trying to take an interest in things that I was in an attempt to become closer to me, but I still didn’t know about how to continue our “relationship.” To him, it probably felt like any other normal relationship, but to me, it felt like we were precariously standing on top of a Jenga tower.

“I… u…. need to go find Jasmine” I said quickly, “she’s still nervous about y’all.”

“I understand Avia-chan, but she shouldn’t worry about us, we love her.” Julian said eloquently. I knew he was trying to impress me, but right now, finding jasmine took priority.

“Tell her that then” I said, hopping down from the barstool and hurrying off to find my nerve wracked friend.

I spent about ten minutes of looking for jasmine and surprisingly she looked as if she was doing fine.

“Hey jasmine” I said cautiously, unsure of how drunk she was.

“AVIA! Hey this party is great isn't it?” Jasmine asked with so much glee any sane person would have thought that the spirit of Christmas had possessed her

“Is she drunk off her a*s?” I quietly asked her stoic husband.

He shook his head and said “she hasn't had a drop yet?”

I was genuinely shocked. About an hour ago jasmine was fidgeting nervously as we headed towards the party questioning whether or not she should have when with the dress she was wearing. It was a simple dark purple, knee length dress, but she was positive that her in laws would say that it was too showy, even though it was just a tank top sleeved dress. Now she was chumming it with her in laws like she had known them her whole life. I scoffed to myself and said “yea this is a great party. I'm gonna go find Katrina, I just wanted to make sure you were doing alright.” I quickly left Jasmine and her husband. I didn’t want to stay in one place for too long, I feared either Julian popping up and trying to woo me, or Katrina asking me when our wedding was planned. Somehow, I wandered onto the dance floor, which was definitely not a place I wanted to be. “Why did I come here in the first place,” I muttered to myself. It wasn’t this party, or Julian and Katrina were the problem, it felt like my anxiety was rising. For no reason at all, I felt like this tremendous amount of pressure was on my shoulder from something as simple as a miniscule relationship with someone. Maybe it was because my mind that never stops predicting the future, predicting the inevitable end of everything, which had prevented me from doing a lot of things, but of course no one ever knew about that. Somehow I ended up dancing with two other men before I found Julian.

“Avia! Shall we dance?” Julian exclaimed reaching his hand out to me.

“Sure.” I said and followed Julian back onto the floor.

Somehow one dance turned into two and then three before I realized how long we had been dancing, but more importantly we danced to three songs before either one of us had said anything.

“That’s a beautiful dress you have on Avia” Julian said, a red hue blushed his cheeks.

“Thanks” I said sheepishly, “I never had an opportunity to wear this out so why not?”

Silence followed as we still continued to dance. It was an odd feeling, part of it felt awkward because this was the longest awkward silence I have ever experienced, but it also felt somewhat like it was at home in his arms. I didn’t know how to respond but I felt my cheeks start to redden and to avoid Julian from seeing my cheeks I fell into his chest, which of course didn’t really help but shocked Julian and it made just about my whole body flushed.

“Are… are you alright, Avia-chan?” Julian asked, his face practically glowing red.

“Uh… yeah” I said, regaining enough self control to prevent my face from becoming as red as Julian’s and separated from him, “I just thought I saw someone I really didn’t want to see.”

“I thought you had said you didn’t want to come because you didn’t know anyone that was gonna be here” Julian questioned, I thought that he had caught me in the lie, but I wasn’t sure. I hoped that he wouldn’t question me anymore about it.

“I thought the same thing but I guess wrong” I said quietly. I knew I made a total a*s of myself.

Surprisingly Julian just pulled me back towards him, “Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.”

He held me like that for about two more songs then I quickly spoke “I think he’s gone now, you… you can let go of me”

“Really I haven’t seen anyone leave yet.” Julian replied, scanning the crowd. Damn our height difference.

“I’m fine, but if you don’t let go of me, there will be a makeup blob on the front of your shirt, thanks to your sweat.” I said with more fierceness than would have liked because I could see the hurt upon his face. My god why did he have to have the most pitiful disappointed face ever.

He pushed me away slightly, just far enough where it looked like we were still dancing, but rather than looking like every single other couple, we looked like two middle schoolers. He didn’t say anything for the rest of the dance and at the end of the song, he started to pull away. I grabbed his arm before he turned away, “Sorry,” I said quietly, “Thanks.”

He didn’t say anything but simply grumbled and walked off. It didn’t matter who wanted this relationship to work; whether it be Katrina, Jasmine, or hell, even myself, I’m pretty sure I just fucked it all up.

The actual dinner was quite simple, I sat with Katrina, Jasmine, her husband, and all of his siblings, which included Julian. I felt awful for the way I left things and I refused to look him in the eyes because I didn’t want to see his hurt face, which I’ve already seen and I was about ready to break down from, or his piseed off rage face. I’ve never seen it before, but from lore, you did not want to be on the receiving end of. Although I thought I was the one that should feel ashamed for everything that had happened, it seemed like Julian seemed like he felt bad for some unknown reason. He was trying to avoid any and all eye contact with me, although he could looked directly at me and still not looked at me in the eyes because how damn tall he was! I noticed that Katrina would look at Julian and then glance at me, then back at him, thinking that some miraculous moment happened to us. “If you have anything to say, just go ahead and say it Katrina!” I snarked at her, quiet enough only for the two of us to hear.

Katrina leaned in towards me and quietly spoke “I was just trying to figure out what was going on between you and Julian. I mean it is soooo awkward, right now.”

“You chose to sit there” I replied. “More importantly, did you really HAVE to make me sit across from Julian.”

“Why not?” Katrina asked, “You two are like totally meant to be together.”

“Fate is dead” I said standing up, leaving the table in the midst of dinner.

I took asylum at the bar. It seemed like everyone was having a grand ole time, well except for the debbie downer who was sitting by herself at the bar.

“I'm shocked that you actually ran off to here” a cool voice said, sitting in the barstool beside me and ordered a whiskey

M“Hey Connor” I said staring at the massive number of bottles behind the bartender.

“So what's the big deal with you and Julian. Y'all kept giving each other awkward looks throughout dinner. Did something happen between y'all?” Connor asked. Unlike Jasmine and Katrina, Connor was very low key about he felt about Julian and me.

“Before dinner, on the dance floor…” I started, not removing my chin from the counter.

“He grabbed your a*s didn't you. Don't pay any attention, he's just an a*s man. Hell, he's been drunk enough where's he went and grabbed my a*s.” Connor said.

I chuckled a bit “no it wasn't that.” I said “it just… All of a sudden it just got awkward.”

“Was it weird from the start or did you make it awkward.”

It took me a while to give any response “I've always hated your insightfulness Connor”

Connor leaned in closer to me “listen if you feel the chemistry between the two of you, then act on it”

I lifted my head and faced Connor “but… I just feel that it already feels like much more already”

“What like it's an arranged marriage or something? Then just take it slow.”

“No” I said shyly moving away from Connor. I knew he could read my face if I was close, hell he could probably read my mind. “It just like, it feels like such a bigger deal.” I lowered my voice even more that I wasn't 100% sure if Connor could still hear me “if anything happens, good or bad, it's not going to just affect just the two of us. I mean Julian is Jasmine’s brother in law now and the last thing i want is to lose her as a friend cause we've been friends for so long.”

“F**k that s**t!” He said, slamming his hand on the table. “Every relationship has the opportunity to fail and every relationship has the opportunity to succeed. Even if you break up, you really think Jasmine is going to choose between you two? The only reason she might have to choose is if one of you breaks the others heart.”

“And that's exactly what will end up happening!” I cried out “my end game is marriage, his isn't. So what's the point in even trying when I already know the answer!”

“That's the whole point of life. We know that we're going to die but we still keep living. Besides humans do have pretty malleable ideals, even Julian. You might just be the woman to change his mind.” He leaned back a little and placed his arms behind his head, knowing he already won this argument.

I reached towards Connor, “I really do hate your wisdom.” I grabbed his drink, attempted to take a sip but immediately spat it back out. He laughed and took his drink “that's why Julian and I have become such close friends and that's probably why you and I have become friends.”

The rest of the night was pleasant. I hung around Katrina and Jasmine, but neither one of them really bothered me about what happened between Julian and me. At the end of the night when we went to go give our thanks to the hosts was when I gave them two all the ammunition they needed.

“I guess I'll see you when you get home” Jasmine said quietly to her husband, giving him a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you all so much for having us.”

“Your family Jasmine, why the hell wouldn't we invite you.” Julian said “same goes for Katrina and Avia”

I gave a small smirk to Julian, thanking him for telling Jasmine that, and I knew that Katrina was giving me a mischievous look so I was avoiding looking in her direction. As Katrina and Jasmine started leaving, I lingered back a little, I turned and started walking towards Julian. His face started to turn red and mentally I was laughing my a*s off. I kicked him lightly in the back of his knee, making him drop a little bit. I gave him a peck on the cheek and whispered “I really do hate how f*****g tall you are” I swiftly turned around before anyone could question what just happened, even though I knew that for the next two hours I would be given a thorough interrogation, but who knows what the future holds.