Chapter 100. Christmas Day (4/6)

The three girls had been laughing the entire time having a blast ganging up on me with Chris. It was like they were all getting some form of petty revenge on me.

I’d made too many enemies and had no allies. I was destined to be defeated here. That was the problem with villains, they just didn’t have enough powerful allies to back them up. They typically did things on their own. If they did have plenty of allies, then no matter how powerful the heroes, villains who played dirty could easily defeat them. The heroes were bound by their absurd sense of moral justice and an inability to kill or sacrifice lives. The advantage they had to defeat the unrestrained villains with no limits on what they could do was numbers.

Thus when there were an equal number of villains and heroes all villains needed to do was take people hostage at different sites at far enough distances apart and force the heroes into a corner. The heroes would be restricted and unable to do a thing about it. The villains could tell them to simply stand there and tell them to let them beat them down. Every five minutes they would release a hostage. With such conditions imposed there would be no way for heroes to win.

Well, in the end, all that was just a long-winded excuse for my own incompetence. But, I was never really that serious about this. I was just making Chris realize if he picks a fight I’m going to give him one.

His side may have won, but he himself didn’t look that way at all. The majority of the snowballs I threw were at him. He was shivering and freezing his ass off.

Seeing his pitiful appearance our eyes locked and I shot him a cocky look.

You see what happens when you start a war with me? Try it again and I won’t go as easy on you next time.

Right after that, he ran back into the house in a rush to warm his body up.

Everyone soon followed his lead and returned inside.

As we were the coldest, Chris and I took a shower to warm up a bit. Starting with cool water then slowly increasing the temperature. There were two showers, one upstairs and one below. I used the larger one on the bottom floor while Chris used the one upstairs. I ended up finishing first. When I came out, Rosa, Alicia, and Irene all went in together.

What the hell? Was this some sort of new technique women used to save money on water or something? There was no chance in hell I’d ever shower with anyone else. That was way too embarrassing for me.

Rosa and Alicia was one thing, but Alicia and her mother? Did mothers and daughters actually shower together? Isn’t that just weird no matter how you look at it at this age?

But it seems they’d only done it on this occasion because they were all cold themselves. It was more out of consideration for not making each other wait to warm up. That was the actual logic used behind it. 

Irene being the responsible adult, putting children first, wanted her daughter and Rosa to go first concerned they would get sick. While Rosa and Alicia had wanted Irene to go first since she was the one it would hurt the most if she got sick. Irene was the financial pillar of the household after all. In the end, Rosa made a proposal that they compromise and all shower together. As usual, everything always came back to Rosa.

When in doubt over something out of the norm, blame Rosa. That was the lesson I’d gradually learned over time.

When they came out they all looked refreshed. Rosa was hugging Irene from behind, getting along ridiculously well. If I was a stranger, I’d think Rosa was even her own daughter.

There was something odd about their closeness that had me on guard, but I really didn’t know what it was. If they were plotting against me together, it would be far more effective to remain distant. They could easily blindside me that way. But if they made it so obvious how close they were, it made me feel like there was no intent to launch an attack on me from the dark. I felt uneasy.

But it was probably just my paranoia. Either way, today was already over in terms of Alicia.

After we were all warmed up we started to exchange presents.

The first one to open up and receive his presents was Chris, the youngest. His mother had bought him a bike, she hadn’t held back at all. When he saw it, he was over the moon. It was the most expensive gift he received. He started crying and thanked his mom knowing how much she worked to save up for it. It was a touching scene to see his mother hug him while he bawled his eyes out.

She said she saw how hard he worked to do well on his finals so she worked hard too to save up for it. It was a reward for his efforts. Even I wanted to cry a bit, if I could, that is. 

His sister bought him a watch that looked pretty stylish and good on him.

Even Rosa had surprisingly prepared a gift for him. He seemed pretty eager to accept it too. It was an older girl he was crushing on after all. Though it wasn’t anything much, only a pair of stylish gloves and a matching scarf, he accepted it like it was some sort of sacred treasure. Seeing his cute reaction, Rosa couldn’t help but bend over and give him a kiss on his forehead while calling him a ‘cutie.’

Alicia and Irene had awkward smiles on their faces as they easily saw through the little crush he’d developed toward Rosa. They didn’t plan to say anything about it though. Such bittersweet experiences were just part of growing up.

When everyone’s eyes turned to me, I felt a bit uncomfortable. Chris definitely didn’t expect anything, but it seems everyone had a suspicion I had prepared something. They’d seem the box I brought in yesterday with me.

I retrieved the box and explained, “I’ve had this PS2 and Xbox 360 sort of just collecting dust in my closet for a while. I don’t know the exact number, but there’s something like a hundred games here between PS1, PS2, and Xbox 360. I don’t plan to ever play them in the future and I was thinking about dumping them on someone since it was just taking up space in my closet. ”

They were all things my own mother bought me over the years when she was still alive. Since she couldn’t be with me at home often, she would do what she could to buy me a game with whatever money she could scrounge together. For big events like Christmas or my birthday, she typically bought one of the newer more expensive games. Throughout the year she would occasionally buy some used ones that I could use to preoccupy my time with while I was all alone at home.

I’d… probably never touch any of these ever again. I couldn’t anymore. I also didn’t after high school in my first life.

It seems Irene had put two and two together and realized my deceased mother would have been the one who bought all of these. The concerned look she shot me was evidence of that.

“If nobody wants them, my plan is to just throw them out.”

“No way! You can’t seriously throw away all of this.” Chris immediately chimed in and started rummaging through the games in the box. His eyes lit up when he saw some of the titles of the games.

“If you’re just going to throw them away I’ll take them off your hands.”

“Oh? You’d do that for me? That’d be quite the help.”

“I’m not going to thank you,” Chris grumbled quietly. He wasn’t honest at all. It was obvious he looked forward to trying out all the games.

Irene stepped forward beside her son, placed her hand on top of his head then made him bow his head. She said, “Don’t be ungrateful and say thank you properly.” She similarly bowed her head a bit to me in thanks.

“But mom-”

“No buts. I don’t remember raising a son who can’t even say ‘thank you’ when receiving such a gift.”

It seems her words got to him as, albeit slightly reluctant, he finally showed his gratitude and said, “Thank you.”

“Oh, just don’t let your grades slip because of it. Use moderation when playing and just use it as a means to relieve some stress. If I find out your grades have slipped because you’re playing video games too much I’ll personally come and throw everything in the garbage.” I made sure to add that in to keep him on his toes.

“Y-Yeah.” Chris stuttered back.