[GL] Someone Once Told Me the Grass is Much er on the Other Side-Chapter 120: Christmas Arc: Five

Aurora and Adama sat around the Christmas tree opening presents. Aurora got make-up and clothes while her sister got video games. Adama got up and kissed her mother and two sires. The parents smiled watching their children enjoy their time.

Samantha got up and proceeded to walk to the kitchen. "Anyone want hot cocoa or coffee?" The Alpha asked.

"Me! Give me coffee!" Aurora yelled.

"You are not having coffee, young lady," Lacy said mean mugging her daughter.

"Mom, I gotta prepare for college," the Omega moaned. Salmona laughed on the couch while Lacy slapped the other Alpha on the thigh.

"Don’t encourage her," Lacy said to Salmona. She turned back to her senior daughter. "No, not in this house.

Aurora’s protest died in her throat as Lacy’s stern gaze hardened, a silent command that felt colder than the frost creeping up the windowpanes. The Omega slumped back onto the rug, fingers tracing the plush fabric of her new sweater, a deep burgundy that smelled faintly of cedar from the gift box.

Across the room, Adama remained statue-still, her unopened video game controller forgotten in her lap, eyes darting between her mother and the kitchen doorway where Samantha had vanished. Only the crackle of the fireplace filled the space, its embers casting shifting shadows that danced over torn wrapping paper like restless spirits.

Aurora looked around the room as Adama began to open her video games. To Aurora, this was going to be the last Christmas of her being a senior in high school. She looked down at her clothes, the years gone by so fast for her. She wondered if it would be like this when she had kids.

She looked around the room, the feeling of Christmas.

Aurora’s fingers tightened around the burgundy sweater fabric, the cedar scent suddenly sharp as regret. Outside, snow blurred the world into soft anonymity, just as her thoughts blurred past birthdays, past trees adorned with tinsel she’d helped hang since childhood.

Adama’s controller clicked softly as she slid a cartridge free, plastic casing gleaming in firelight. Aurora traced a loose thread on her sweater cuff; each pull unraveled something invisible inside her chest. The heat from the hearth kissed her cheeks while cold dread pooled in her stomach, college applications still unanswered, dorm room, social media, boards untouched, adulthood looming like the silent grandfather clock in the hall.

She sighed and fell back onto the floor just as Samantha came abd gave her a cup of hot cocoa.

Aurora stared into the steaming mug Samantha placed before her, cocoa swirling like liquid velvet under firelight. The sweet scent clashed violently with the cedar trapped in her sweater fibers, a sensory war mirroring the storm inside her.

Across the room, Adama’s thumbs moved in frantic patterns over her controller’s buttons, the electronic chirps and digital explosions a jarring counterpoint to the silent tension thickening the air.

Aurora traced the rim of her mug with a fingertip, heat searing her skin just enough to anchor her in the present moment, away from college brochures gathering dust and unanswered texts about dorm assignments.

She watched her mother’s reflection in the darkened window, Lacy’s shoulders rigid as she stacked discarded wrapping paper with sharp, precise motions, each rustle a rebuke.

The housr filled with more laughter and joy as the hours wore on as family members began to appear. Sasha and Tyler arrived with their five children, Jaden, the oldest and the first Alpha to be born. Already a college student, she was ready to give her cousin some pointers.

Thud!

"What is this?" Aurora asked in the living room, a room with scattered conversations.

"Its my booklets for training for applications," Jaden said.

Aurora shook her head. "I already sent out applications. Got accepted into two and waiting on two more," Aurora exclaimed.

"You don’t wanna go to the first two?"

"Nope, I want one of the other," Aurora said flopping on the couch next to her aunt, Sasha. She laid her head on Sasha’s lap having the Alpha laugh.

"She’s your favorite aunt, Aurora!" Sune Joon screamed from across the room. Aurora laughed along with her sires.

"She’s my only aunt just like you’re my only uncle," Aurora snapped back playfully.

Foot steps thundered down the stairs as Adama and the younger cousins of Sasha and Tyler followed after her. Sune Joon and Cameron’s children were quiet, two kids both being Betas. They watched Adama jump down from the stairs.

"Is dinner ready yet?" The little Alpha asked as she jumped into the air and landed on Sasha just as Aurora moved out the way in time.

"Ooof, are y’all trying to kill meeee!?" Sasha said barely able to get up from the couch.

"YOU’RE MY FAVORITE AUNNNT!!"

"I’M YOUR ONLY AUNNNTTT!!"

The large family of an aunt, uncle and their spouses followed by several kids and teenagers made their way to the dining room kitchen for dinner, the Omegas getting the food ready while the Betas and Alphas set the table.

The footsteps echoed through the hallway as the pack migrated toward the dining room, a blur of moving bodies and rustling clothes. Aurora lingered near the staircase, her fingers brushing the smooth wooden banister worn shiny by generations of hands.

The scent of roasting turkey and cinnamon-spiced sweet potatoes grew stronger, mingling with the fading cedar from her sweater and the damp wool smell of coats piled by the door.

She watched her younger cousins jostle each other playfully, their laughter muffled by the thick Persian rug swallowing their footsteps. Adama darted ahead, her controller forgotten on the couch, eyes bright with the promise of mashed potatoes and gravy.

They all sat down at the table as Lacy, Tyler, and Sune Joon placed the food on the large dinner table.

Aurora’s fingertips traced the cold edge of her porcelain plate, the smooth surface reflecting flickering candlelight that danced like trapped fireflies. Across the sprawling mahogany table, steam rose in ghostly tendrils from roasted turkey and honey-glazed ham, carrying scents of sage and cloves that mingled with pine needles from the centerpiece.

Adama fidgeted beside her, knee bouncing under the tablecloth, her gaze fixed on the mashed potatoes heaped high in a ceramic bowl, white peaks waiting to be conquered. Aurora’s own stomach clenched, not from hunger, but from the weight of Jaden’s pamphlets still burning a hole in her pocket, their crisp pages whispering of deadlines and dorm rooms far from this warm, cedar-scented room.

"Ugh," she said to herself, laughing and shaking her head.

Sssspppfff!!

"Will you stop farting, Jaden?" Sasha screamed at her young adult child.

"If you hadn’t served me those beans, I wouldn’t be farting my ass out-"

"JADEN, DON’T CUSS IN FRONT OF YOUR FATHER!" Sasha yelled at her.

Aurora cut into a piece of pumpkin pie and slapped two spoons of whip cream on it. She licked the fork and took another bite, and proceeded to enter back into the living room. The teenagers were in the living room while the younger kids were up stairs in the playroom playing video games or what have you.

She sat down next to her parents as they watched some old timing Christmas movie that was in black and white. Sune Joon sat on the arm of a chair and clapped his hands when they started singing.

"Uncle Sune Joon, you look like an idol," Joseph said. Sune Joon laughed and looked at his nephew.

"What?"

"An idol!" Joseph repeated.

"Like a super star or something," Aurora said, licking her fingers. 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Sasha looked at Aurora. "Why didn’t you get me a pie?" Sasha asked.

"Because you didn’t ask," Aurora said putting up her nose.

"Can I have a pie?" Cameran asked.

"Why of course!" Aurora placed her pie in her mouth and walked back into the kitchen. Sasha glared daggers at Cameran while Sune Joon smiled sheepishly at Joseph. And the night continued on like this.

The grandfather clock chimed eleven hollow beats that echoed through the emptied rooms, each chime a hammer blow against Aurora’s temples. She lingered in the kitchen doorway, her shadow stretching long and thin across the linoleum, fractured by the dying glow from the living room television.

The air hung thick with ghosts of laughter and burnt sugar, clinging to her sweater like static. Empty pie tins sat stacked by the sink, their ceramic edges catching moonlight that sliced through the window blinds.

Somewhere upstairs, a burst of electronic gunfire bled through the ceiling, Adama’s cousins still wired, still fighting pixel wars in the playroom. Aurora pressed her palm flat against the cold countertop, the marble leeching warmth from her skin as surely as the silence leeched the evening’s joy. Her own half-eaten slice of pumpkin pie congealed on a plate nearby, whipped cream weeping into the spiced filling.

"Fuck," she said. "I’m full!" She picked up the piece of pie and walked back to the living room. She handed it to Cameran.

"Umm," Sasha said.

"Yes?"

"Where’s mine?"

"YOU STILL HAVEN’T ASKED!" Aurora yelled.