Christmas cheer.

Disclaimer: Property of Jerry Bruckheimer and his minions, I own nothing.

Well, it's Christmas, I was bored, and realised I hadn't written a single Christmas story! So in between cleaning and cooking, I started this. It's not great and very chliché, but it's Christmas-y.

Happy Holidays!

Jellicos

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"Mo-om!" If I just closed my eyes real tight, then the noise would stop. "Mom! Common! Wake up!" But the whining didn't stop, and soon there was a little blonde tornado running through my bedroom. "Mommy, mommy, wake up! It's Christmas!" She exclaimed in the kind of joy you literally only found in seven year old kids on Christmas morning.

"Linds, it's so early." I tried, but I knew before I'd opened my mouth that it was in vain.

"Santa left presents!" She explained, and in her mind that was a perfectly logical reason for climbing on top of your mother at six in the morning, screaming.

"Five more minutes baby…" I pleaded, but my sentence ended with a loud groan as a surprisingly heavy little girl landed on my back. "Ouch!"

"Please mommy…" She pleaded with those big blue puppy-dog eyes. Damn, she's good. I sighed.

"Alright…" I didn't get further before she jumped up with a loud cheer and I had to raise my newly awakened voice to get her attention. "Go switch on the coffee maker and I'll be out in two seconds, okay?"

"Hurry mommy!" She ran out, leaving me wishing I had a quarter of her energy right now.

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Fifteen minutes later, my daughter was sitting beside the tree, drowning in ripped wrapping paper. She was smiling so brightly as she opened her last package I had a hard time looking away as I sipped my morning coffee.

There had been a huge stack of presents, my sister and mom had gone out of their way this year and I have to say I was a bit impressed at how quickly Lindsey had managed to plough her way through all those gifts in a quarter of an hour.

"The Superstar Dance off game!" She shrieked of joy as she ran up to hug me, almost knocking both me and my cup to the floor.

"I'm glad you like it baby." I laughed as I hugged her back, placing my coffee safely out of the way on the table.

"I love it! Thank you, thank you, thank you!" She jumped up and down a couple of times before flinging herself back down on the floor next to her game. I silently wondered how rich I'd be if I found a way to bottle her energy.

"Can we play?" Lindsey asked, her hopeful eyes twinkling of excitement.

"Let's start by cleaning up the worst of this." I picked up some of the wrapping paper, ignoring the little pout on my daughter's face. "After that we'll go out get some Christmas breakfast and we can play when we get back home, okay?" I looked up to see her smiling again.

"Okay." She agreed and pointedly placed her game on the middle of the coffee table, just so we wouldn't forget it.

"Common, help me out here." I asked as I grabbed a big plastic bag to stuff all the wrapping paper in. Lindsey hurriedly started crumpling paper up, apparently realising that we weren't going anywhere until it was all cleaned up.

"Hey mom?" She called from the floor after finding a way to get to all the paper by crawling under the Christmas tree. "We missed one!"

"What?" That couldn't be, I was sure we'd gotten through all the gifts I'd laid out last night.

"Here!" Lindsey scrambled up from under the tree, pine needles in her hair and a crumbled, red package in her hands. "It's for you." She stated and handed it too me.

And she was right; the present was marked with my name. There was no second name, no indication who it was from. I knew I recognised the handwriting, but I couldn't for the life of me remember whose it was.

"Who's it from?" Lindsey asked as if on cue, but I just shook my head.

"It doesn't say." I told her, still starring at the package. It was nicely wrapped, and pretty heavy.

"Open it mommy!" She was ready to tear the package from my arms, so I decided I'd better get cracking before she'd torn it open herself.

It was carefully wrapped, but it didn't take me long to get it open. Once I did however, I thought my heart would burst.

"Wow…." I could hear Lindsey whisper her awe as I held the sparkling antique music box gingerly in my hands. It was perfect, the frosted glass, the gilded décor, the two little girls' ice skating on the lake. As I opened the lid, the tears welled up. It was the same song I remembered from when I was a little girl.

"Mommy, what's wrong?" I realised I'd been crying as Lindsey's worried words reached me, so I smiled and wiped my cheeks.

"Oh honey, nothing is wrong." I pulled her too me and rested my head on her soft hair so I could keep her close but still let her get a good look at the box. "My grandma used to sing this song for me when I was little."

"You sang it to me too." She added as she carefully traced her finger over the little golden leaves on the sides of the box.

"Mom, look, there's a note inside." She reached into the box a little too fast, but by some miracle managed to avoid tipping it out of my hands.

"Lindsey!"

"Sorry." God, how I was supposed to be mad at this child was beyond me. Instead I told her to be more careful and took the little note from her hands.

"Merry Christmas Catherine, love…" I trailed off, this couldn't be right. I mean... how... no.

"Who's it from mommy?" She asked, her eyes darting from me to the note and back. It couldn't be… could it?

"Get your coat baby, we're going for breakfast." I quickly got up to run to my bedroom. She was not getting away with this.

"But mom…" She started and I turned at the foot of the stairs.

"We're making a little stop first." Oh no, there was no way she'd get away with this. I don't know how she managed to find out about the song, or the ice skating, even how she managed to get the present under my tree. But there was no way I was going to let her have the last word, that was my thing. And I was sure as hell gonna look good doing it, meaning I needed to change out of my pyjamas.

Skipping up the stairs, I suddenly realised what a magical time of year Christmas really was. And there was another someone who was soon about to find out the same.

Beware the holiday cheer, Sara Sidle.

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Merry Christmas everybody!

Jellicos