It's 7am. You awake to an empty house. You realize your whole family probably just left. In fact, it was likely the sound of the car pulling out of the driveway that triggered your gradual awakening. They're headed to catch a plane to some swanky overseas shithole city where the food sucks and your streaming accounts won't work. [[Call your parents on their cell phone]] [[Go back to sleep]]It's chilly outside, you're not in the mood to spend time in the car, and you definitely don't want to spend the next week in some crappy hotel with the whole family getting on each others' nerves in between mercenary outings to various boring "cultural attractions" and restaurants where the chicken tenders are horrible. Besides, you were having a real cool dream involving your school, red Koopa shells, and Tina Pocarine, the high-strung snotty girl who always reminds your teacher to assign homework. [[Drift off to sleep...]]You call your dad on his cellphone. It takes a few rings because he's always irritatingly slow with the in-car console Bluetooth. He eventually answers, though, and you can hear the whole family chattering excitedly, having just realized they forgot you. You don't even have time to say hi, as the first words out of his mouth are "oh jeez, sport! Don't worry, we're turning around right now, just stay calm. We'll be there in five minutes!" [[Wait five minutes]] [[Run away from home]]Within five minutes, your dad pulls in the driveway and beeps the horn. Grabbing your phone and Switch, you head out the door and load into the family car. You barely catch your flight, the vacation is a tedious slog through boring "cultural attractions" punctuated by family outings to restaurants where the chicken tenders suck and someone invariably ends up staying up all night with food poisoning, and when you get home you discover someone broke in and stole your brother's Xbox, along with a bunch of other stuff that doesn't really matter to anyone besides your parents. [[It's not all bad, though...]]You impulsively throw a t-shirt, several Funko Pops, and your Switch into one of the twenty "Keep Calm and Carry Herbalife" tote bags your insane aunt gave your mom at the tail-end of her short-lived "entrepreneurial" phase, right before she switched to being a manipulative online demagogue. Before anyone gets back, you're already heading off, destination unknown. You quickly fall in with a couple of older guys who make a living robbing houses - in fact, the same day you ran away from home they broke in and stole your older brother's Xbox. There's something strangely amusing about playing it. You make a great decoy for them, and quickly become a valuable asset for your ability to talk to other kids to find out all the ins-and-outs of local home security systems. Nobody knows why you chose this path, least of all you - but it's definitely the path you're on. ((FIN))You're suddenly awakened by the sound of your phone ringing. [[Answer it]] [[Turn it off and go back to sleep]]"This is mom, dad's on his way home now! Oh my gosh, I am so so sorry. We're about to catch our flight, but remember that mommy loves you and will be thinking of you on vacation!" [[Wait for dad to come home]] [[Run away from home]]Damn it, you could see the red Koopa shell in your status bar, why do you have to be woken up? You turn the phone off and go back to sleep. [[Sleep more]]After about thirty minutes you hear your dad pull into the driveway. You can tell he's stressed out and not exactly happy about the non-refundable plane tickets for you and him that will now no longer be needed, but it all seems to melt away as soon as he sees you and realizes you're okay. The next week is mostly uneventful, aside from the weird van that was parked outside your house one evening until your dad went out to figure out what was going on. It's kinda cool spending a week just you and your dad, and by the end you've even taught the old fart how to hold his own at Fortnite. If you're to be honest, looking back on things, this was quite possibly the best Christmas you ever had. However, even before the return flight touches down, your mom has already started laying the groundwork for an elaborate fiction. In this fantasy, had you and your father been present on the vacation, the whole family would have had a great time and bonded in ways the morning talk shows and shitty self-help books are always gushing about. It would have somehow made everyone else not get on each other's nerves in the hotel room, not bored with the "cultural attractions", and somehow not get food poisoning from the overpriced restaurants. In the grand scheme of human suffering, you and him missing out on ~The Christmas Vacation~ was basically second only to Eve and the apple. The subsequent tension never quite seems to entirely go away, and the whole matter is frequently brought up - or, perhaps worse, very explicitly //not// brought up - during every subsequent squabble between her and your dad, which is probably why they ended up divorcing a few years later. All the "Divorce for Kids" books always try to point out that it's not your fault, but you're pretty sure that in this case, you're the exception that proves the rule. On the bright side, your dad stays in town and he and your mom keep joint custody. Times with your dad always kick ass, and the two of you even end up doing a "father and son" gaming stream that becomes pretty popular. Life's an odd duck, but it's a good odd duck. ((FIN))''Damn it''. This time you had the red shell AND a line of sight and now you're suddenly jolted awake by the sound of a car door slamming shut and someone approaching the house. [[Wait for them to come in]] [[Hide]]Your dad slams the front door and comes straight to your room. You just barely have the presence of mind to pretend like you're still asleep. You can tell he's stressed out and not exactly happy about the non-refundable plane tickets for you and him that will now no longer be needed, and you being such a sound sleeper all of a sudden (or so he thinks) complicates things further. The next week is mostly uneventful, aside from the weird van that was parked outside your house one evening until your dad went out to figure out what was going on. It's usually kinda cool to be alone with your dad, but to be honest this week sort of sucks. The whole time he keeps asking why you didn't answer your phone, and talking about how there must be some odd hormonal imbalance for you to sleep so soundly until 9 in the morning, especially as up until now you were always the "early bird" of the family. It's just so sudden and out of character for you. Meanwhile, even before the return flight touches down, your mom has already started laying the groundwork for an elaborate fiction. In this fantasy, had you and your father been present on the vacation, the whole family would have had a great time and bonded in ways the morning talk shows and shitty self-help books are always gushing about. It would have somehow made everyone else not get on each other's nerves in the hotel room, not bored with the "cultural attractions", and somehow not get food poisoning from the overpriced restaurants. In the grand scheme of human suffering, you and him missing out on ~The Christmas Vacation~ was basically second only to Eve and the apple. [[It continues...]]The subsequent tension never quite seems to entirely go away, and the whole matter is frequently brought up - or, perhaps worse, very explicitly //not// brought up - during every subsequent family squabble. To make matters worse, your dad is now hyper-vigilant about your diet and exercise, worried that if you could sleep through your phone ringing, you could sleep through a smoke alarm going off, or worse. If your mom's not snarking off at him for not buying a second set of last-minute plane tickets to save ~The Christmas Vacation~, he's snarling at her about the unhealthy foods she lets "you kids" eat. Your siblings are not the least bit pleased with the resulting state of the pantry. Eventually, your mom and dad divorce. All the "Divorce for Kids" books always try to point out that it's not your fault, but you and your siblings are pretty sure that in this case, you're the exception that proves the rule. Your dad stays in town and he and your mom keep joint custody, but it's always a choice between a rock and a hard place - life with mom (who will continue bringing up ~The Christmas Vacation~ long into your own adulthood) and your siblings (who all call you "Snoozy"), or life with dad, who by now is obsessed with soy, gluten, sugar, and microplastics and is convinced that LCD screens and the color red emit dangerous infra-radiation which can disrupt circadian rhythms. Thirty years ago, you might make an interesting rock star. These days, the only path is "content creation". Hope you like Corporate Memphis... ((FIN))You're not in the mood to deal with anyone right now, so you quickly grab your phone and hide under your bed. You hear your father come in the house and call your name several times, his tone increasingly worried. Remaining as calm as possible under the circumstances, he leaves the house to go looking for you. Maybe you went to a friend's house, or maybe you're just walking around the neighborhood, or maybe... [[Well, that was an interesting decision...]]Now you have the house to yourself, though the irritating thing is that you're not really sure for how long. You spend the day messing around, mostly in your brother's room. The sun sets, and you happen to notice the strange van across the street. More centrally, you notice the two strange figures coming out of the van... [[Hide again]] [[Booby-trap the house]]You quickly hide. Within seconds you hear the sound of breaking glass. You don't dare risk investigating, so you can only sit there and listen to the sounds the men make as they go through the house. They seem to spend the most time in your parents' room, where the shiny baubles and grown-up trinkets live. After what feels like hours, but in reality is perhaps fifteen minutes at most, they leave. You extricate yourself from your hiding spot and quickly check the house. It looks like they stole your brother's Xbox and made a mess in your parents' room. For some reason the kitchen sink is running, too - maybe they washed their hands to remove DNA or something. You don't know, but you quickly turn it off. [[Things get worse]]Now would be the perfect time to reinact one of your favorite Christmas movies! Unfortunately, you barely have enough time to throw your Funko Pops on the floor before the men in the van break in. They step right on your Funko Pops - technically a success. Of course, they're wearing boots, so the end result is just some broken Funko Pops and two slightly-irritated house thieves. Practically, perhaps less of a success. They immediately notice you watching and their eyes grow wide. Like most house thieves, they weren't really looking to socialize on the job. One of them pulls out a switchblade, and you can feel yourself melt with terror as the other tells you, in no uncertain terms, to shut the fuck up and pretend like you never saw anything. They leave, and as you're watching them leave, the old kook who lives in the neighborhood notices you and quickly calls your dad to rat you out. [[Wait for your dad to arrive]] [[Run away from home]]As you're at the kitchen sink, the old kook who lives in the neighborhood happens to catch a glimpse of you through the window. Within seconds, he's calling your dad to snitch you out. [[Accept your fate]] [[Run away from home]]Within minutes, your dad storms through the front door. "What the FUCK is the MATTER with you?" He quickly explains in no uncertain terms that you not only caused him a major panic attack, but you completely ruined Christmas for the entire family. [[Sigh...]]Within minutes, your dad storms through the front door. "What the FUCK is the MATTER with you? ''AND'' you broke the window?" Your father is in no mood to let you explain that, while you're certainly guilty of causing him a major panic attack and a thoroughly ruined Christmas, you're not the one who broke the window. [[Sigh...]]There's really no explaining it. Something is clearly deeply, deeply wrong with you. It's one thing to oversleep, kids screw up. But to ignore your phone? And to HIDE when your father shows up to look for you? What was going through your head? Your actions today simply weren't rational, even by the lower bar of childhood rationality, and something must be done. You're clearly old enough to understand that you weren't in any trouble, there was no reason to hide. Either you were doing it because you thought it would be funny, or you //weren't// doing it because you thought it would be funny, and either way, there's something deeply the matter with your upstairs facilities. Your parents quickly arrange for you to see a child therapist, who really is at a loss to do anything about your odd behavior. You're started on some prescription medications, but since nothing is really wrong with your brain - well, nothing that modern pills can treat, at least - as a consequence the only real result is that your brain never really developes the ability to self-regulate, just as a house's central heat will never kick on if there's always a space heater running. And everyone's always watching you like hawks, so even if you tried to stealthily ditch the meds, even the slightest growing pain would likely result in melodrama. You reach adulthood as a neurotic mess that's completely dependent on various chemical lobotomies. Thirty years ago, you might make an interesting rock star. These days, your only options are self-starting entrepreneur or being a manipulative online demagogue. Unfortunately, nobody ends up buying your "Keep Calm and Stay Home Alone" merchandise, so your only remaining option is online demagoguery. Hope you like e-begging... ((FIN)) While the short-term is suboptimal, in the long run, your parents' absent-mindedness has laid the groundwork for the world's easiest guilt trip, which you can, and do, exploit for the rest of your life whenever times get tough. "Yeah, well, you would never go on vacation without BUZZ" (or "LINNIE", or "MEGAN") means that every eruption of inter-sibling rivalry is resolved in your favor in the Court of Mom and Dad, and of course, all it takes is a soft sigh and piteous glance to melt their hearts and get you that ice cream cone, or game card, or whatever small-fry item you're looking for. You're smart enough to not go overboard, never quite coming across as spoiled or vindictive, and your siblings quickly understand their place in the pecking order and bear little resentment towards you. As you get older, "oh, so NOW you notice me" is a surefire way to diffuse any situation where your parents catch you sneaking in late, because by now they can't help but laugh a bit. It's a comfortable life. ((FIN)