The Great Christmas Exchange!

It was the first night of the annual ski trip. All the students had just finished checking into their rooms after a long day of travel, and she was glad to haul her little bag of presents to the Starlight Lounge and set up for the informal Christmas gift exchange that the majority of the Harriman students had agreed to. Pulling on her comfy multi-colored sweater over white tank top and a cute pair of jeans, along with her favorite UGGs.

In her hands as she walked in was a massive shopping bag filled with christmas-wrapped gifts for all her friends, as well as conciliatory gifts for all of those not lucky enough to be on her shopping list. While she and Isaac had already done their gift exchange with their family three days prior, it was the consensus among their friends that they would wait until the ski trip, as was tradition, to celebrate Christmas. It was a Harriman tradition, and in a way like getting two Christmases, which was always better...

Smiling pleasantly Isabelle staked out a moderately vacated corner of the lounge, a circle of sofas and loveseats next to a massive fireplace. Snuggling up on one of the sofas and tucking her legs underneath her butt, Isabelle set her shopping bag on the floor and smiled warmly at an attractive resort worker who brought her a mug of hot cocoa with tiny marshmallows floating on the top. There was something about the holidays that brought the best out of Isabelle.

Ahh, winter. Simon flounced into the lobby, as eccentric as usual. His dark brown hair was still is a messy array of wet strands flying in each direction. Really, this had been the first time he'd been inside since the lot of kids who'd gone to Sugarloaf for break had dropped off their bags to be shuttled off to their rooms. He loved it, really. He loved every waking moment of it. He loved the fresh powder crunching under his boots. He loved dangling his feet off the edge of the chairlift, the weight of his snowboard tugging excitedly at his ankle. He loved peeling off layers of soaked clothing and redressing into something fresh, warm, and dry - even if that something was a mess of clothing unruly enough to suit his tousled hair. He loved it all, really.

But out of all of the incredible, amazing, fantastic, glorious things about the winter wonderland, what Simon loved more than anything was Christmas. Strangely enough, Christmastime had even managed to become even more significant when he'd made the decision in his third year at Harriman's to stay in Maine over break and head off with the rest of the kids to the mountains. His friends and classmates had ultimately become his family in that cozy - yet, admittedly, unnecessarily large - lobby at Sugarloaf. Plus, since he wasn't going home for Christmas, his family had begun mailing him his presents. And, more importantly, he'd sworn on his old dog Willis's grave that he wouldn't open them until after he'd had Christmas with the rest of his friends. This meant that not only did he get to spend the entirety of his first night at Sugarloaf slurping hot cocoa and opening presents with some of the most important people in his life, but he got to see what his family had picked out for him. And that was always guaranteed to be good. But that wasn't the only thing he was anticipating this Christmas.

"Hola, Izzadiddle!" chimed Simon brightly, jumping to a halt at her side and ruffling her hair just for the sake of bothering her. "I gotta tell you, sweet cheeks. It's good to see you in your natural state of...uh, hairness again. I mean, blonde was nice, but this is definitely more your style." He strode then to the large potted fern that had been there since his first year at Sugarloaf, beginning to grab decorations from his bag and hanging them on the poor leaves of the fern.

Audrey wasn't sure what to do with herself. Ever since arriving back Sugarloaf, she had tried to entertain herself. As soon she arrived there she had unpacked quickly, before setting off outside. After attempting (and failing) to make a snowman, she had went back in for hot cocoa. When she noticed that it was getting closer and closer to the time when the Christmas exchange would start, she had made her way back up to her room, and changed into more comfy clothes. After pulling her hairbrush through her hair, and grabbing her bag full of christmas presents, she made her way back down to the Lounge. She glanced around the room briefly before catching sight of two certain Harriman students.

Smiling widely, she made her way over to the two, and dropped her bag over the back of one of the love seats. "Hey Izzbelle, Simon." She made her way around the love seat, before plopping down next to her bag. She pulled her legs up under herself, kinda like Izz was sitting, and slouching a bit, getting comfy. "It's great to be back, huh?" She glanced at the potted fern Simon was standing by and nodded slightly, thinking it was a good idea to decorate the plant. Because for reals, it's christmastime! Every plant needs decorations.

Audie then turned her attention to Isabelle. "Are you going to be around the Antigravity complex this year? I don't think I even entered the place last year, so I definitely plan on hanging out there for most of one day. Rock climbing or something!" She laughed, no matter how many times she thought it, she was super glad to be back here. She didn't know what she was going to do next year when she wouldn't be apart of the school anymore. She wondered briefly what any of the other seniors would think about planning a little reunion and coming here when the rest of the Harriman group was here. If no one else thought the idea was good, it would be a weird christmas next year without this trip.

Isabelle was pleased to see Simon arrived, and beamed up at him with a kind of misty-eyed look about her. Bringing her hands up to her hair with a mildly irritated expression on her face, she smoothed her dark brown locks, re-dyed the moment the play was over and she was back at home. Ah, it felt good to be back to the way God had made her. Once it was sufficiently smooth, she set her hand back on her mug of cocoa, taking a long drink as Simon began to pull out decorations.

"Yeah, I like it better this way, too..." she observed, removing her hand from her mug once more to pull a chunk away from her body in order to examine it between her fingers. "Blonde felt so very un-me... But, alas and alack, it's back to normal."

Lazily Izz leaned over and helped throw decorations on the poor helpless fern, one hand still holding her mug of cocoa which she nursed steadily as the other clumsily took decorations from Simon and helped string lights. They were just about done decorating when Audie plopped down next to Isabelle on the sofa.

"Hey Audball," Izz said with a smile, taking a long sip of her cocoa as Audie asked if she was going to be checking out the Antigravity Complex. Isabelle had checked it out last year, but hadn't spent much time there... however, rock climbing was always a fun activity. Mulling over it with a marshmallow in her life, she chewed slowly before swallowing the hot puff and smiling warmly.

"Rock climbing sounds like fun... we should make a day of it, get everyone together..." Setting her cocoa down on the coffee table in front of her, she reached in her bag and dug for a moment before finding a carefully wrapped present marked 'For Audie'. "Enjoy. Merry Christmas."

Micah never really knew how to go about the whole Christmas thing. While he wasn't exactly Orthodox, he was still a Jew nonetheless. His family did their menorah and their chanukkah bush and all was right with the world, and they left Christmas to the goy. But the majority of his friends at school were Christmas-celebrators, and he was never one to want to miss out on a festivity. Therefore Micah took it upon himself to spread some good old Jewish generosity and spread a little chanukkah to all those not lucky enough to have been born with a nose as spectacular as his.

Donning his brown checkered shirt and comfy brown sweater, along with a pair of dark jeans, he trotted down to the Starlight Lounge for the annual tradition of Make Everyone Feel Awkward Because Your Heritage Is Different. Ah, what a country. The disappointment only sunk further on his shoulders as Micah entered the lounge to see none other than Isabelle Cauldine and her little pet Simon. The only bright little sunbeam that could possibly overshadow them was that his darling Audrey had already made her appearance and was able to rescue him from the vicious Izz.

"Hello hello, what have we here..." Micah said with a smirk, plopping onto the couch across from Audie and Isabelle and setting down his royal blue bag with an obnoxious star of david emblazoned on the front. Reaching in he pulled out a small bag of gelt and a dreidle, chucking it at Izz viciously with a lascivious grin. "happy chanukkah Izziebelles; hope your one-night goyim ceremonies went well the twenty-fifth."

Turning to smile at Audie, Micah dug in his bag for a moment before locating her present, wrapped in a tiny box, and gently lobbed it to her dangerously close to Isabelle's mug of hot chocolate on the coffee table, drawing a hiss from his sworn enemy. "I hope it's okay... I wasn't sure if it would fit your phone."

Micah turned his gaze to Simon, raising his eyebrow appraisingly and pursing his lips just a little. Well, if he had to cater to one of them, he may as well supply a little something for the other. Roughly Micah chucked a bag of gelt at him, grinning like a stupid little boy. "Happy chanukkah there, Theodore... I hope you got your hula hoop."

Oh no. It was Christmas time. Which meant, gift exchange, which was exactly what Darnell had walked into the lounge to take part in. He had a nice little paper bag with him, one of those lunch-sized ones, unfortunately. Christmas time always made him feel uncomfortable, especially since he started going to Harriman. All these rich kids, they could get each other tons of really cool things and think nothing of it. They had little plastic rectangles tucked into their wallets screaming to be taken out, yelling 'Christmas is fun!' Christmas was a lot less fun for a person who stuck their hands in their pockets and found, at best, and old fuzzy TicTac.

Nevertheless, Darnell had taken it upon himself to go Christmas shopping this year. Things would be changing, he felt, and he needed to be more optimistic. Plus, he was yearning for things to do to keep his mind off cigs; an excruciating trip to the shop hadn't exactly been the doctor's order- but what mattered what it'd worked. He hadn't smoked since the break-up/make-up with Abi; and you'd better believe he was proud of that.

In any case, his baggie was full, which meant victory had, in the end, been Darnell's. Vini vidi vici, suckahs!

"Alright kiddies, it's Darnie Claus time!" he declared with a huge grin spread across his face. Hopefully his friends liked those ugly little troll dolls, 'cause that was the cheapest thing on sale on his shopping day, and that was all he had in his baggie of goods. He had one for each person, one he'd thought would fit them the best. For instance, Izz's had bright pink hair with a little bow on the top, and Micah's had brown hair and was holding a dreidel. Perfect ah? He didn't know Simon that well, but took him into account because of Izz. His troll had a snowflake on it. Meh, best he could do. He chucked each one at each person, and then scanned the room for Abs. She'd be there soon, he was sure. For the moment, it seemed right to plop down into a chair and soak in the company.

As Katz arrived Isabelle couldn't help but narrow her eyes a little on instinct, her body tensing up as he came in all haughty and irritating. With much disdain she caught the little bag of gelt and a dreidle he chucked at her, dropping it almost immediately between her leg and the sofa and most likely not planning on picking it up for the rest of the evening. Digging in her bag of conciliatory presents, Izz found a candy cane and chucked it with equal fervor at Micah.

"There you go, Katz. Merry Christmas." The tension between the two was palpable, and Isabelle couldn't really even remember why it was she was hating Micah so much at the moment, other than she just found him incredible irritating. Oh! and how repulsive he'd been at homecoming! How could she forget?

Izz's frustration was assuaged quickly before it could build into anything too destructive by Darnell Allred's sudden and providential appearance. "Hey Darn..." she said warmly, catching his troll as he chucked it at her and admiring it for a moment. How cute! She loved Trollies!

"Thanks man, merry Christmas! Here, I got you a little something too, it's no biggie..." she dug in her bag before pulling out a basic pair of zic firth drumsticks with a ribbon tied around them, handing them over with a shrug. "it's nothing big, but I know how fast you go through them, so I figured one more pair couldn't hurt..."

Isabelle stifled a yawn, checking her watch. "There should be more people here by now..." she observed, yanking her phone out of her pocket and sending out a bevvy of texts to those not yet present, no pun intended.

Abi smiled, she wasn't sure how many presents exactly she had brought with her, for all of her friends of course. She was so excited to go out there, Abi couldn't be bothered to unpack for the moment, she always figured packing was better than unpacking, because you never had to think of the things you had put in your case before. Not to mention, you were always going somewhere new and it was a whole lot more exciting, and who wants to unpack when they get to a place like this. So far, Abi had been looking around the shops for any last minute presents, but had come back with a few sweets and that was it. Walking down to the lounge with her bags of goodies, wearing her warm jeans and a black cardigan with a white top. As she walked her necklace bounced along with her, as soon as she spotted her friends and Darnell as always! Abi quickly walked towards them.

"Hi everyone!" A sudden buzzing on her phone made her frown as she tried to work out who it was. Dropping her bags she quickly tried to get to her phone located in her jeans pocket. Pulling it out, she saw a text from Izz, "Nice one!". Popping the phone back in her pocket, Abi began digging around each bag, 'Audie' was the easiest to grab, with a large label wrapped around the wrapping. "Audie! Here's yours!" She smiled at her friend, handing her present to her. It was small and cute but she hoped she liked them, it was sort of funny considering how much Audrey loved to bake.

Searching the other bags, she took out a small package, wrapped up with ribbon she passed it to Izz. It was something small, a little keyring with a ballet shpe attached, something small she had found that Izz would probably like. For Simon, another keyring, she was beginning to see a trend. This keyring was for his love of the theatre, she had found it in the same shop as Izz's, it also made a nice watch too. Finally came the candy canes, covered in bows, which she handed out to everyone. Abi didn't really know any of the others and considering that none of her other friends were here at the moment.

Walking over to Darnell she smiled, handing him his present, it was a small keyring as usual, and looked no different to any of the others. "Happy Christmas!" Abi gave him a hug and a kiss, hopefully he would like his present. She had already put plenty of pictures of the two of them on there already!

Attention, attention, Darnie's mind rang out. Abi's here! He turned his head toward her as she entered, smile growing, waiting for her to come over and join him. He wondered for a moment how she'd act- this was pretty much the first time they'd hung out boyfriend & girlfriend with all their friends.

He waited somewhat patiently as she passed out gifts, coming to him last, with her hug and her kiss. But she was fooling herself if she thought she was just going to get up and walk away- he pulled her back when she seemed to be trying to stand up again- thrusting her back into the chair with him, into his lap.

The keychain she gave him rested in his hand, and he held it up so they both could see. He watched with his signature crooked smile as the photos faded into each other. All photos of the two of them, together. He reached into his pocket for Abi's gift and then- stopped. No- not right there right then- he wanted to wait a little.

"This is awesome. I love it," he told her softly, with a kiss. "Do you want yours now?... Or later?" He was asking, but of course, he still wanted to wait deep down inside. But since Abi'd already given him his, he didn't want to look as though he had come unprepared or didn't have anything.