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Writing Stream Recap: Ugh, stupid Christmas magic

Well Christmas is over, so that means it’s time to write about the harsh, sobering realities of the season that we wake up to with a hangover the day after Christmas.

For our writing exercise last stream (along with my special guest Abbey), we gave the chat five “miserable Christmas happenings” to choose from, and “drunk uncle” won by a hair. After brainstorming a bunch of ways we could write about a drunk uncle, we went with the most interesting one: writing from the drunk uncle’s point of view.

Here’s what we wrote:

The only way I can deal with my insufferable sister is by drinking my way through Christmas. Every year she “invites” me to her house by screaming at me over the phone until I cave in. I do my best to try and get out of it. Last year I told her I got Swine Flu and didn’t want to infect her five demon spawn kids, but she went online, printed out articles about Swine Flu being gone, and mailed them to me every day until I relented. This year I told her I broke both my legs, but she smashed a window into my apartment at three a.m. and scared me out of bed. When I ran to the bathroom to cower in the shower, she started yelling that my legs worked just fine.

So now I’m here, in her living room the size of a garden shed, trapped with her obnoxious kids and smelly dog. If there were a Guinness Olympics or whatever for most dog farts ripped every five minutes, that dog would have like eighteen goddamn gold medals.

Between the Dutch Oven dog fartbox, the five screaming kids pulling each other’s hair and crying because their stupid spinners didn’t fidget as much as they wanted, and my sister chainsmoking her way through her annual speech about minorities, it’s a wonder my liver can even keep up.

“And the thing about homeless people is,” she puffed. “It’s that most of them want to be homeless. There’s this one guy by the corner of B-dubs and Dollar General that pulls in at least a hundred bucks a day. And all he does is stand there with a box! Meanwhile I’m busting my ass at Applebees for three dollars an hour begging for tips like a stripper ten hours a day, and I’m lucky to hit that much!”

I took another swig of value brand beer. This year looked like it was even going to top last year’s “egg incident.” Or the time she made me dress up as Santa for the brats before that and they ripped my beard off. My real beard.

“And another thing!” she bellowed. “I was at the clinic the other day, and guess who was there? You wouldn’t believe who they’re giving health insurance to nowadays! Sure, I work two full jobs and have to pay out the ass for my pills, but these two who don’t even speak English just waltz right in there and–”

“Sis,” I interrupted. The alcohol had given me the strength to finally speak up. “Why do you invite me over like this every year? Just to complain at me like I’m some sort of… complaint sponge?”

My drunkenness didn’t leave me the most eloquent, but I must’ve gotten my point across because she went silent. Her eyes that had been rolling all over the room suddenly focused on me.

“You’re all I have,” she said softly. “With mom and dad gone, my only happy memories left… they’re with you, at Christmas. The rest of the year, it’s just dealing with garbage every day, in and out. I’m up to my knees in shit, from the dog and the diapers, and you’re my only light at the end of the toilet.”

Her words had a sobering effect on me. I could feel them lift a layer of the alcohol poisoning out from my skin.

“Wait, so that’s why you were always so desperate for me to come over for Christmas?” I asked.

“Yup.” She leaned back in her stained recliner and took another drag. “So don’t you dare think you can escape so long as you’re alive. And even when you’re dead, I’ll still find a way to bring you over for some Christmas cheer.”

For my sister, that was almost sentimental. I opened my mouth to say something nice, the first nice thing I’d said to her in forever, but her dog came over and dropped his slobbery head in my lap.

“Oh hey there, buddy,” I said, rubbing his head. “Are you finally starting to warm up to me too?”

The dog moaned, and a gust of warmth came out of his nostrils, right before he threw up all over my pants.

“Well,” I said, rubbing off the putrid liquid with a nearby roll of toilet paper. “Merry Christmas!”

Now that’s my kind of Christmas story!

After that we moved on to the writing prompt, and the chat voted on this brief yet thought-provoking one by DreadPirate27: “You are a mail carrier and you are fluent in dog.”

Of course, it was the Day After Christmas, so we had to put a negative holiday spin on it: “Stupid Christmas magic, giving me the power the talk to dogs during holiday deliveries….”

I actually really like where this one ended up, even if it did involve writing no less than three Christmas carols.

You can read the story here.

If you want to join us and help write a story by trolling in chat, or share your own writing for feedback, then we’d love to have you. We stream on Twitch every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday at 7:30pm-9:30pm (U.S. Eastern Standard Time).

And you missed the stream, you can still watch it here on rerun until Twitch deletes it.

Hope to see you next time, friend!

Featured image: PAKUTASO

Published inCuteGenres/Stories