Christmas dream

It has been snowing all day. The snowflakes twirled in the air, waltzing in the wind before finally landing onto the trees of a park, covering them with a blanket of snow to protect them from the cold gusts of wind that were yet to come. It was a cloudless day, the whole city shimmered in the sunlight. Bullfinches sang from the high branches. Clara was hurrying along the park’s alleys, not noticing the beautiful nature around her. She had still so much to do. Shopping, cleaning, cooking, more cleaning, decorating the house, wrapping the presents… Who could’ve thought that preparing for Christmas celebrations could be so complicated and tiresome? Especially buying presents for the seemingly endless amount of relatives. As usual, she left this chore until the very last day and now she was sprinting from shopping mall to shopping mall in order to find the reindeer sweaters, Ho Ho Ho! Postcards and many more items that will be put away the second that Christmas was over.

Once the shopping was done with, it was time to prepare the traditional meals. First up were gingerbread cookies, chocolate sweets and other delicacies. While the biscuits were in the oven, Clara was marinating the meat, cutting up vegetables for the salads and answering the phone to confirm the large amount of guests that were supposed to come that evening. In this seemingly carefree atmosphere, the only thing that was truly preoccupying her mind was whether Dan was going to make it home for Christmas. She was worried that his flight might get delayed because of a snow-storm that has been forecast.

Finally, the preparations were over, Clara still had an hour until the guests started to arrive so she used this time to make herself look amazing. She did her nails, put on a beautiful evening dress fit for a queen, lightly applied some makeup to hide the dark circles under her eyes, gathered her hair into a simple hairstyle and put a welcoming smile on her face. She had just the time to do all this until she had to welcome the guests. All of them were elegantly dressed, brought gifts, wished Clara plenty of ‘Merry Christmases!’ and ‘Happy New Years!’ and were in a very festive mood.

Inside, the numerous fairy lights glittered, soft Christmas music was playing in the background, and the guests were exchanging stories and laughing. Clara saw none of that, her attention was fully concentrated on the only message that Dan has sent her today: Hi honey, I’m really sorry but my flight has been delayed, I’ll see you tomorrow :(. She simply couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t care less for all the guests, the fancy dishes and decorations, the only thing that she wanted was to spend this Christmas with the only person that really mattered and that was being taken away from her. All of the faces and colors blurred as hot tears clouded her vision. She quietly sat in a corner, crying. No one noticed, but she wouldn’t have cared even if they did.

A bit before midnight, when the guests were already exchanging presents, there was a knock on the door. Clara went to open it, not understanding what sort of guest would come this late. ‘Merry Christ…’ she opened the door and stopped short. It was impossible not to recognize this playful grin, the twinkle in those deep blue eyes and the warmth in Dan’s voice as he whispered: ‘Merry Christmas’.