Christmas Eve, the day where holiday spirit runs the highest. Young, hopeful children attempt to stay up to see Santa come down the chimney. Adults and children alike exchange gifts, and joke around. It's the day before Christmas.

     For me, it's the day when I have to talk and treat my relatives like my family. More family pours in our house and claims a room. My dad takes the adults to golf, and me and a few older people watch over kids.

     It's also the day when my average luck and life goes in squiggly lines.

     The little spare room was finally completed and decorated, and suitcases were put there. My high-spirited neighbors blasted Christmas carols on high, and partied out on their patios, even though it was snowing. My parents had a fire going in the fireplace, and I was enjoying the time off by roasting marshmallows and making s'mores.

     My mom handed me a mug of freshly made hot chocolate with blobs of marshmallows floating around on the rich, brown liquid, whipped cream on the surface, and little chunks of candy cane powder on the whipped cream. I took a sip, and pulled away with a mustache. My older cousin, Andrea, scrolled down on her phone and scoffed.

"Hey, Matt, take a look at this," she offered, handing me her phone. I stared at the screen, and burst out laughing. It was a gif about some Christmas prank, and it was hilarious.

I snuck a look at Andrea, who was staring out the window, and switched to her photos. Most were picture of celebrities who she thought were hot, but I soon got a jackpot. Her face was taped, and her eyes and nose were drawn over by markers. She looked like a pig nosed person with a very bad make-up artist. I sent it to myself, and showed the picture to Andreas.

She shrieked and snatched the phone from my grasp, slapping my arms. "Matt! I'm going to post the picture of you and your girl friend from the roller coaster on every single social media there is!" she threatened. She held out her hand. "Give me your phone."

My phone was stolen from me, and she deleted the photo that was sent to me. Then she took a selfie of herself and gave me my phone back. When I looked at her selfie, it was a picture that made her look good.

"Wow," I said, deleting the selfie. "You suck." Andrea stuck her tongue at me.

"I've been through college, so I know which blackmail photos to keep," she said. "Believe me, if you haven't had your phone taken from your college friends yet, it's going to happen soon."

Andrea was one of the better cousins. Mostly because she was all grown up and mature, and partly because she was chill with everything, except for pictures of herself being ugly. She even took tae kwon do, art, and base. How cool is a girl that takes base, and knows how to play the electric guitar?

She snapped her fingers and said, "Matt, how about we decorate each other's faces? Like, I'll draw a monster face on you." Today was another day where parents went out by themselves and ate all-you-can-eat sushi and ice cream. Brent and Alexa were currently sleeping, and the other littler cousin was twelve, and could take care of himself.

I fist bumped her and said, "I'm in."

A moment later, all the make-up tools were laid neatly on the bathroom table thing. "You go first," Andrea offered, pointing to the tools. "Try not to ruin me."

I knew little about make up, so I uncapped an eye-liner and just drew on her face. The classics; a curly mustache, a unibrow, fake bunny teeth, and a creepy eye on the eye lid. I capped the eye-liner and told her I was finished. She took a look at the mirror and laughed.

"That's it? All right, my turn."

She started working on my face, scribbling some worryingly exotic colors, and rubbing on my face. She covered the mirror and made sure I couldn't see myself yet.

I sighed and tried to ignore the uncomfortable feeling of pens digging in my face. Andrea peeked at the screen of my phone. I was playing Angry Birds.

"Lift the bird a little more," Andrea ordered, pointing to the angle in which the bird should be shot. "Let go, and voila!" The red bird blasted through the ice and destroyed the entire building, killing off all green pigs. She smirked and worked on my face again.

After I had gone through ten levels, the parents came home. They chattered loudly, and I heard them say stuff about golf. Andrea burst out in laugher at my face, and declared, "Perfect. Now go greet your parents like a good boy." She didn't let me see what I looked like, insisting that it was perfect.

I ran down the stairs and said, "Hi, mom, dad." They turned and saw me. Their eyes lit up in terror, and they screamed very loudly. My aunts and uncle whipped around to see what was wrong, and caught a glimpse of my face. Their face also went pale.

I went to the nearest mirror and finally got to see what I looked like. My mouth flew open.

I looked like a zombie with a black eye, and blood running out of my eyes. "Andrea!" I exclaimed. "You're so awesome!" My parents didn't agree with me. They started hitting me and scolded me for frightening them.

After a painfully long lecture about how old people's hearts were weak, I escaped to Andrea. She had rubbed off the drawings on her face.

"Take a selfie with me," she begged, whipping out her phone. "I can use this at Halloween." I held up two fingers and smiled. Andrea snapped about 500 kb worth of photos, and finally let me clean it off.

I laughed my guts off at some of the pictures she took, and some I begged to delete. She erased half of the photos, claiming that it was blurry, but those photos were the ones where she looked weird in.

I forwarded the photos to my friends, and typed, Merry Early Christmas.

The Nightmare B4 Christmas, Paul responded. Tim and Ray agreed on it and sent two big thumbs up.

     I sighed and went up to my room. I dared to hope that I got something cool for Christmas. I hoped that my relatives wouldn't be like Kreacher and send me maggots for the most cheerful holiday. Yeah, they once sent me orange peels. They claimed that the orange peels were wrapped in the same paper that contained the actual gift, and the two things had been confused.

     "Matt! Come downstairs!" my uncle said. At this point, the house was crowded with so many relatives that I didn't bother to keep track of which side they came from. I think the uncle came from my mom's side.

     I walked calmly down the stairs, eyes fixed on the colorful gifts under the Christmas tree. My mom had this rules where I can open half the presents on Christmas Eve, and the rest on Christmas. It was stupid, but at least you didn't have to wait for 365 days.

     My family and relatives had already opened their presents, with only a scarf to my mom revealed that was from me. I took a random gift from my pile and opened it, not sparing the pretty wrapping paper.

Worms fell out, leaving my family and relatives to laugh. It was brightly colored gummy worms, the sour ones. I smiled and opened the next present.

It went on and on, until I finished opening half of my presents. Bright side of having many relatives? You get a lot of presents on Christmas and your birthday. Bad side? I have to do the same for all of them.

Christmas Dinner Time:

"Matt, honey, could you take out every single main course options we have?" My mom and the women were starting to plan the Christmas dinner. The lazy men were slouching on the couches, watching football and whatever old men do. Me and my cousins were stuck with kitchen duty.

I nodded and pulled open all the cabinets. I blinked at the open cabinets and said, "Mom? Is there supposed to be a box of instant noodles in here?"

My mom marched over to the cabinets and refrigerator. "Don't play pranks, Matt. There's cans of beans and mon-perishables in the cabinet, and lots of other food in the refridg--" She froze when she saw the cabinet, empty except for a large box of instant cup noodles.

Then she flung open the refrigerator. Nothing. Just a few cans of soda, and a large bucket of strawberry ice cream. She smacked her head and moaned, "I'm so stupid. I gave away everything to the homeless shelter for Christmas. I forgot to restock the kitchen."

Suddenly, the news was spread like wild fire through the house, and everybody had gathered in the kitchen. "I'm so sorry, everyone!" my mom said. "We have no food except instant noodles for Christmas Dinner."

My uncle raised his hand like he was in elementary school and offered, "I'll go to the nearest grocery stores and bag every good thing I see."

My mom nodded. "Meanwhile, all of you can rest. Rick, go fast. Please don't buy beer." Uncle Ricky gave her a thumbs up, and raced out of the house. My relatives grumbled and stampeded out of the living room to watch a movie on Netflix. I followed them.

A while later, Uncle Rick's car pulled up in the driveway. The sun was falling, and my uncle wasn't carrying anything. Maybe he needed help to carry all the things he bought.

He entered the house, shaking his head. "I'm sorry, Susan. The stores were closed, and all of the closed about five minutes before I arrived. Well, noodles for dinner!"

My mom dialed the store closest to us. She asked frantically if the store was closed, and confirmed that, indeed, every store were closed. I felt my stomach clench in hunger. I barely ate any lunch because it tasted bad, and I was saving my stomach for Christmas dinner. Now I got to fill it with instant cup noodles.

* * * *

We all sat on the long dinner table, staring at the small, paper cup in front of us. It was true, and happening. Greasy, instant noodles for dinner.

Luckily, we had found some peach preserves and cookies from the very corner of our cabinet where shadows covered it. The cookies were split evenly amongst children, and adults, including me, got the peach preserves. Yum.

Boiling water was poured in my cup, and I waited patiently for three minutes. It was all very amusing how the adult adults tried their best to make it seem like an actual, full course Christmas dinner by politely and solemnly passing the boiling water around, and laughing merrily at whatever jokes were told.

I picked a thin strand of noodle with a fork, and ate it. I barely managed to get it down. My stomach gurgled, and against my brain's will, more noodles fought their way down to my stomach. I drank some water, and ate some peaches.

"Ice cream is served!" Aunt Maple announced, banging her spoon on the table.

I had no objection against ice cream, so I stood in line for it. But, just then, the door bell rang, and after a second of waiting, the person outside knocked heavily on the door: Boom. Boom. Boom.

"I'll get it," I said, walking to the door. "Probably some stray relative." My uncle chuckled at that, and took a big bite of the ice cream.

I unlocked the door, and narrowed my eyes against the cold. It was so dark outside that it seemed as if solid darkness stood in front of me.

Wait, no. The person in front of me was about six feet tall, with a bushy beard, and a long coat with hundreds of pockets. "Hello?" I asked nervously.

The person moved forward in to the light, and I finally saw his face. He had very kind, brown eyes, that did not go well with the body he had. He carried a pink polkadot umbrella, which made sense because it was snowing outside.

The man coughed, and clapped my back. I stared at his face, and he broke out in a grin. "Yer a wizard, Matt," he said.

I gap at him, and think, Oh dang, I'm not gonna get a break, am I?