#queuetopia

The Keeper sat hunched over her table, head in her hands, the long blonde locks covering her face like a thick curtain, while her cigarette burned away in the ashtray.

Many matters picked at her brain like stinging bees, fighting for prominence as they drained her of all the energy she had. In such times she wondered why she let her father talk her into taking up his mantle. Maybe she was a good leader, but that didn’t mean she had the stamina to put up with the kind of stress she had been handling for the past few months. Sure, she could chase after game for hours but the tiredness after those sessions didn’t threaten to crush her bones.

She was lost in thought, or rather in efforts to ignore all thoughts, till there was a knock at her door. Looking up with a snap of her head, Ayanna was surprised to see who her visitor was.

“Rayyad? What brings you to my office?”

Growing up in the lap of luxury and extravagance, Christmas holidays for Stella meant lots of gifts and long feasts. When she was a child, they’d drift from one party or gala to another, till they were all too tired to even move, yet managing to make on time for another dozen of such functions, looking fabulous as ever. Christmas day itself? Well, that was one sacred say for the Wells. They didn’t step out of the house for anything. No function or work was more important than spending the whole day with family. And all of them were always present. From the eldest, her grandfather, to the youngest, her brother.

However, as years passed by, she drifted away from her family, for a number of reasons that none of them wanted to acknowledge. She still attended the important functions because she was, after all, a Wells. But, on Christmas day itself she stayed only for the breakfast, and left before they could make her stay for lunch. The warmth had eroded substantially and the gifts didn’t matter to her. Though, she was always welcome.

Thankfully, this holiday season, she had a better reason to stay away from her family. She was with someone who loved her, the man she loved more than she could put in words. And this Christmas day she was planning to spend the whole day with him after enduring the breakfast with her family. She was so looking forward to celebrating with Matthew. She’d already bought a gift for him. She was excited to spend Christmas the way he’d told her that he and his sister celebrated. Stella was raring for a quiet Christmas was the man she was head over heels for.

So excited she was that she didn’t even find the decorations a tad excessive when they clearly were. She’d just chuckle at Matt’s enthusiasm and pitch in. Even now, when he was busy draping the garlands around the mantle, she had been watching him from across the room, till she spotted the mistletoe. True to the spirit, her darling had pulled her in for a kiss and now she was hanging in his arms, a few inches off the ground, chuckling against his lips while the mistletoe lay forgotten on the ground. She had dropped it to wrap her arms around his neck when he’d lifted her up. “And I love you,” she replied into the kiss, grinning and kissing him passionately.

All For The Game Characters 1/? : Riko Moriyama

"Contact with it is unpleasant. That's why I blocked it. It felt as if my brain were being squeezed through my nose."