Happy day after Christmas!! I'm only one day behind for this holiday piece but I feel like that's alright, this holiday season has been a good one and I didn't want to ruin it by isolating myself for an hour writing this. Instead I spent time with my family and had a wonderful Christmas even though there were some rows and it got a bit too loud sometimes but that's what happens when we're all together. So I'm just going to wish all of you a Happy Christmas (though it's belated), a Merry New Year, and a Happy Reading.
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As Chandler woke up she could hear her parents in the kitchen, messing with Christmas morning's breakfast and her small nephew keeping them company. Stretching, Chandler's foot nudged something at the end of her bed causing it to moan out a small “mew.”
“Warren,” Chandler murmured as the large, ashy gray cat prowled up her legs to rest on her stomach, blue eyes half closed but staring in her direction. Warren was her brother Mike's cat, named after his favorite X-Men when he was younger. But the feline had taken more of a liking to Chandler, always sneaking out of Mike's room to sleep at the foot of her bed each night.
Reaching up to scratch behind his ears Chandler could hear the beginning tones of Warren purring. The vibrations running along her stomach too. “Merry Christmas.” Chandler said quietly to the cat while looking at the blue, digital numbers from her alarm clock. It was almost nine o’clock, almost time to get up and open presents. “Come on big boy,” she said as she picked up Warren and rolled out from under the covers. “Time for breakfast.”
Walking down the hallway Chandler could hear the voices in the kitchen grow louder and the smell of coffee becoming stronger. She also saw the Christmas tree in the living room. The lights were still on and the clear ornaments reflected back sun-lights of pink, green, and blue all over the brown wrapped presents under the tree. That had been a tradition in the family that Chandler's parents had started. To recycle old, brown paper bags for wrapping and tying off with a colored ribbon, each specific for one person. There were six different colored ribbons under the tree, Sadie's were always green, her favorite color. Some of Mike and Rose's gifts were wrapped with both colors, indicating that it was a gift for them as a couple.
Warren turned a little, his claws digging into the cloth shirt Chandler was wearing. “All right. All right.” Chandler said to the restless cat and walked into the kitchen, letting Warren jump from her arms onto the floor as she got his kitty bowl out and filled it with food.
“Auntie Candler!” Jay yelled, reaching for her instead of leaving his place from in front of his pancakes to hug her like he wanted to do. “Santa came! He ate the cookies and the carrots are gone!”
“Really?” Chandler asked him as she got a cup of coffee after putting away the kitty kibble. “Did you see him?”
Jay's face fell a little then, “No, I fell asleep.”
Chandler chuckled at her nephew, marveling at how he could pronounce his “r's” now and his still child-like love for Santa and Christmas.
“We're doing presents soon,” Emma, Chandler's mom said as she and the rest of the family started cleaning up their breakfast plates. “You better eat something Chandler.”
“Yes mom,” Chandler said, sitting next to Jay and half listening to him talk about what the big box under the tree could be as she grabbed a couple of pancakes and spread applesauce on them. He kept going back to a puppy.
“Jay-Bird,” Rose said to her son, extending her hand out to him so he would take it and follow her. “Let's get you cleaned up.”
Stopping mid sentence and standing up in his chair Jay leaned over and gave Chandler a sticky kiss on the cheek, “Merry Christmas Auntie.”
Smiling and ignoring the stickiness on her cheek, Chandler said “Merry Christmas Jay-Bird,” to the retreating form of Jay and returned to her pancakes, too lazy to wipe her face yet.
Warren hopped up into the now empty seat beside Chandler and mewed a little, his blue eyes half closed again.
Chandler smiled again, the syrup still on her face and her hair catching in it as she realized, in his own feline way, that Warren had just wished her a Merry Christmas too.
