During the Christmas holidays I had to write a short story for my English homework which had to be related to the quote “When you think everyone has given up on you there is always that someone”, so I ended up writing a Christmas related sad story which I’m pretty proud of, hopefully you enjoy reading it!
Christmas; The Most Wonderful Time of the Year?
My name’s Jessica, I had the most wonderful parent. They used to often spoil me on occasions when I knew they barely had the money left to do so, the way I saw the world was split into 2 groups, either you’re a rich kid or one of the poor ones. I could tell my parents were fighting to keep us at a blurred median of the two which I appreciated.
Since I wasn’t in the ‘rich kid’ group I wasn’t very popular amongst the other kids and as soon as approached them I would either be ignored, ran away from or had horrible things said to me or just behind my back. I always tried to put on a brave face and walk away like it didn’t bother me but it did, I always felt every comment and every whisper burn away at my being making me feel worse about myself.. but I had no choice but just to live with it, this was my life.
The best part of my days would be to finally go back home to see my parents, I was their only child so my parents were the only people I could really talk to at home once they finished work. Usually I would return to an empty house and they would arrive about 15 minutes later, I was fine with this, I was fine with my life. Until the accident..
Back in a December my parents decided for the three of us to go on a family holiday together to London. It was a last minute decision which made me jump for joy with excitement, I was told we’d only be staying for a couple of nights but holidays were a very rare occurrence for me and I had never actually visited London myself so I couldn’t wait for the following Friday where we had scheduled to leave.
It was a frigidly cold Friday night near Christmas as we made our way to the train station in a taxi, similarly to visiting London I had also never been on a train before! I had packed everything I could think I might need for the holiday with some help from my mum so I was ready for the travel. Once our taxi arrived at the train station we boarded the train with little time to spare and spent the next few hours watching the lights are night scenes whiz past the windows in awe!
Once we arrived at the London train station we had to figure out where we were, which my dad worked out that we were in Monument. Our hotel was on Bond-street which was literally across the other side of the city so it seemed like we still had a long night of travel to do. We managed to hail another taxi which took us most the way and finally found our hotel (which seemingly took forever!) we checked in at the front desk and was taken to our room. The room was beautiful! Amazingly clean with a huge TV and kind sized beds, nothing near to how we lived at home; it looked like this week I could live like one of the rich kids! As we had arrived late it was way past midnight so we all went to sleep for the night with the promise of my city exploring the following day.
The next day I awake to the TV as my dad was watching a news program. Soon enough we were all awake and were ready to head out to explore London in full! We found a pizza restaurant which looked very interesting with comical Italian characters on the store-front so we decided to go inside and get some lunch. We ordered a huge eighteen-inch pepperoni pizza to share between all of us. We didn’t expect it to be as big as it was though and we just couldn’t finish it! Sadly no food was allowed back in the hotel rooms so we couldn’t take the leftovers either.
Several days past and I created tons of new amazing family memories in London but as quickly as it started the trip was over and before I knew it the day was Monday and it was time for school all over again! My happiness was drained from the adventure but little did I know that the day was only going to get much worse.. School ended up being very different that day as a new girl called Eve had moved nearby and was joining our class. During our break she came up to me and I was prepared to hear the usual mean comments which others gave me on a daily basis but instead she asked if she could hang around with me! We spent the rest of the day chatting and sitting together in class. I finally had a friend, someone who cared about me and we shared a lot of interests. After the amazing holiday I was upset at how I had to come back to school so soon but now things were looking up, finally a friend at school to make it so much more bearable!
Once the school day had ended and I arrived home my parents weren’t home as usual so I went to my room. An hour passed and still they weren’t back, if they were working late I would usually hear about it first. Getting worried I picked up my phone to call my mum, no answer. I tried calling my dad, no answer. I calmed myself thinking that they were probably just stuck in a meetings or had important work which needed to be finished. I decided to turn on the TV which was showing the local news, a report about a high speed car crash involving three people in two cars near my parents workplace.
Two familiar faces popped up on the TV screen. My parents. I was locked in shock and fear, tears streaming down my face. The reporter stated that my parents had died in the accident as their car was crushed from a side impact from a heavily drunk driver.
For the next few weeks my neighbour took care of me and after a while I started to go back to school again. Nobody cared about or my parents except Eve. After explaining the events to her she gave me a massive hug. I then told her that I wouldn’t be staying at that school for long, my neighbours couldn’t care for me forever and I was going to be moved into an orphanage across the country.
Several days passed and parents were coming in and out adopting children day after day but I was invisible to them.. It was a week before Christmas and at this point I had got used to being ignored like I had my whole life. Two adults came to see me and actually wanted to adopt me, tears of joy ran down my face as they took me on a very long journey back to their house. Upon arrival I felt like the area was familiar, but I was too nervous to really think about it too much as I followed them into my new home. Inside sitting on a chair was Eve! She ran up to me and gave me the biggest hug ever, her parents adopted me! Even through the horrible Christmas memories haunt me forever I won’t forget my parents and will always love them, but at least now I know there’s other kind-hearted people in this world!
This brings me back up to do with now, me and Eve are the greatest of best friends and sisters! I feel like the world and everyone in it tried to give up on me but Eve never gave up on me. That is when you know you have a real best friend.
Did you enjoy my story? If so maybe you’ll be interested in reading about my actual visit to London from a few months ago!
Back in 2011 for my brother Connor’s birthday my family had planned on taking him to a pet shop to pick a pet rabbit. At the time we had just 1 dog but we were unsure how she would behave with a rabbit running around I couldn’t help but think “Will my dog attack my new pet rabbit?”, we had hamsters in the past and Keira didn’t seem very happy with them but in general Keira was pretty tame and was pretty well trained so we were sure we could keep her under control. My dad drove us to McDonald’s first where we decided to get some lunch as it was just after noon. I got a chicken nugget happy meal as I usually do, Connor got a double cheeseburger, my other brother Sean got a Big Mac Meal and my mum and dad just got coffees and cheeseburgers.
Once we were done with our lunch we headed over to Pets at Home to pick out a rabbit to take home. The shop was huge with long aisles of pet accessories everywhere. We spent a while looking at some of the dog toys for our dog Keira (at the time we didn’t have our second dog Molly) before we headed towards the pen of rabbits. Near the rabbit pens they had pens of ferrets as well as hamsters and mice in cages!
