Christmas not all alone

Once again I sigh in resignation. Feels like the hundredth time. But I have every reason to do so, I think bitterly. After all, it's the first Christmas that I can't spend with my family. More precisely, I am about 1,500 km away from her.
I roll on my stomach and pout pouting out the window where the thick snowflakes are wrapping Dublin under a cold, white blanket. It's really not that I don't like Ireland, on the contrary! I love this country like crazy, that's why I chose it for my semester abroad of my studies. But, if I had known that I couldn't be home for Christmas because of that, I would have thought twice ... and I would have chosen anyway.
I'm getting mad at myself because if there's one thing I absolutely hate, it's self-pity. So I sat up and wondered what to do to distract myself. The first thing that comes to mind is television! The problem is, I don't have one here in my dorm room. "I don't need ...", I had assured my parents when I moved in, "... I definitely won't be bored here!" Think! , because my friends made it home in time and are now celebrating with delicious food and their loved ones by their side. Only I had dawdled a bit with ordering my plane ticket again - typically - and can now celebrate alone.
OK! , I think to myself, what else could I do? I turn on my laptop and try Facebook, but I also immediately knock this idea in the bin, since most people post pictures of their Christmas dinner or send holiday greetings. I groan in annoyance and let my head fall on my desk. There is a thud. Great, now I have a headache too ... I rub my forehead and look outside again. The flakes have even increased in size that you can hardly see anything in the snowstorm. A shiver chases through my body and instinctively I wrap my thick, blue wool sweater more tightly around my body.
I give a start when my cell phone rings and the picture of my mother sticking her tongue into the camera appears on my screen.
"Hello, my Schnatzi!", She says happily. 'Schnatzi' had been a slip of the tongue when she couldn't decide between Schatzi and Schnecke and accidentally made a mix of the two. Since then I only call her 'Schnatzi'. "I hope you are not all too alone."
Yes I am. "No, everything is fine."
"Have you at least put up a Christmas tree?"
I look at the fir branch that I picked and hung two balls on and quickly answer: "Something like that, yes."
"Then you have a little Christmas feeling. Your sisters want di- EMMA! WE MISS YOU!", It echoes from the background. It is also very bad for my sisters that I cannot be there, especially for the smallest of the two, who is only ten years old.
"Me too!" I shout. Then we talk about gifts, the latest gossip and God and the world for almost half an hour before my father calls everyone to dinner.Christmas is his cooking time. Only he can do the duck so wonderfully! And my mouth is already watering, great. All I get today is a frozen pizza - to celebrate the day - and a nibbled marble cake from yesterday. We say goodbye and despite the fact that this call should cheer me up, I feel more depressed than before.
But since I can't stand self-pity, as I said, I pull myself together and look at the display of my laptop again. I fix the URL bar on as if, if I only concentrate hard enough, the redeeming page pops up on its own. But it doesn't, bad luck.
Just as I reach for the corner to close my laptop, a page occurs to me that I hadn't visited in a long time. 'animemanga.de'.
I skilfully type the letters into the bar and the page is built up in front of me.
At first I'm a bit surprised that I still know the name and password, but when I think about it, it shouldn't, because animemanga. de was pretty important to me back then. Not a day had passed that I hadn't scoured the fanfiction and fanart sections for news. But when I started studying, my visits became more and more lukewarm until I had stopped them entirely six months ago. It's a pity, I thought to myself.
I enjoy clicking through the site, watching old anime, and reading sequels to stories. Before I know it, it's been two hours and I notice I'm getting hungry. So I take a little break, put my pizza in the oven and set the alarm clock so that I don't forget it - I'm bumbling!
Back at the laptop, I notice the little 'Stats' in the menu bar on the site and move my mouse over it. A dropdown shows two numbers: the members generally who are online and my friends who are online. My friends online number is a tough one: 0.
The other number is limited to a manageable 31 people on this holiday. Hm, I'm probably not the only lonely here. For fun, I read through the names and get stuck with a user: "Jackie-Chun". Oh, a Dragonball fan, because Jackie Chun is one of them! That was my favorite anime back then and not only mine strikes me as I inspect the profile, reminiscing. It belongs to a young woman, 19 years old, and her name is Sophie. Although I have no idea why, I immediately sympathize with her and I seriously consider whether I should write to her. But I shake off the idea when my cell phone alarm rings and reminds me of my pizza.
After dinner I don't know what to do with my time again, so take my heart and type in a message in which I write to her that I don't really want to disturb her at Christmas, but I like her profile a lot and I just don't do anything else have to do. To my surprise, she writes back relatively quickly and asks if I'm a Dragonball fan, that I like her site so much and that she doesn't mind that I write to her now because she's just as bored.Apparently she is home alone because her parents flew off on their second honeymoon over Christmas. They thought she was old enough to leave them alone, but the truth is that she doesn't like that at all. At least they could have left earlier or later, but not over the holidays. But she hadn't said anything, she just couldn't do that to her parents.
Sophie is really great. We talk a lot about the seasons and both Dragonball GT are the worst mistake of the makers. We discuss what we would like if we found all of the Dragonballs. She would like to have siblings - which I can really understand - and I would like to go on a trip around the world.
I made tea, feed my marble cake, and regularly choke when she writes something funny ... which she often does. At some point I have a stomach ache, and I can't really probe whether it's from coughing or laughing.
After a while we get to the subject of fanfiction. We both like to write, although I tend to do it on my own and she likes to post the stories online. So I start reading a few of her one-shots alongside the chat and I'm impressed. Her style is really captivating and I tell her that too. Two people found each other, I think, smiling.
Hours go by, and it is only when I look outside again and it is so dark that I cannot even see the snow that I notice that we have written over three hours. With a heavy heart, but still pretty happy, I thank you for your distraction from this lonely Christmas day. Lonely Christmas Day ... I'm starting to ponder because actually I wasn't really lonely. Although no one sang Christmas carols with me, shared a banquet with me, or unwrapped presents with me, I was not alone. No, I even had fun, I have to admit, and after saying goodbye I sink into my bed smiling and burying myself deep in the paint. I think there is only one more holiday left to survive. Before I doze off completely, I decide that I will now use animemanga more often. de will stop by. This will be my new year's resolutions.

The next day I wake up with a grin all over my face and stretch with relish. The first thing I do on Boxing Day is to enter "animemanga. De" in the URL bar. And what I find is a message from 'Jackie-Chun', in which she asks me if we don't want to write a fanfiction together. The second day won't be boring either, I think and answer her.

I hope you enjoyed the short story.
I wrote them for the advent calendar '13 :)

LG, Vesta