Set: Christmas time

Book type: Fiction

Merry Christmas!

This book is based on 'The Polar Express'

Published in 2025

"All done," I announced, I had been gathering wood from the shed for the fire. It was going to be the coldest Christmas in history! It had been snowing almost every day and temperatures dropped very low. My family and I lived in a forest where no one else was, so we only had each other. I have three siblings, two younger, one older. 

"I've got all the wood," I presented to my family.

"Thank you, Chloe," replied Mum. I looked a lot like my mum, except for my eye colour. I had my dad's eyes.

"Chloe, Chloe, was it cold?" asked my brother, Arthur,

"Of course, it's snowing, and there is snow everywhere," I replied, Arthur asked silly questions sometimes.

"Kids, it's dinner time," announced Dad,

"YUM, dinner," Arthur exclaimed.

We went to the dinner table and sat in our normal spots. My two sisters, Dahlia and Hope, on one side. Dahlia was the oldest, she had brown hair and blue eyes, just like our mum, but her hair colour is like mine, Hope had our dad's hair colour, but blue eyes, like our mum. Arthur and I were on the other side. Arthur looked exactly like our dad, they had the same eye colour and hair colour. Arthur looks up to him so much, he even got the same haircut as him. Our parents were on the ends of the table.  

Christmas was my family's favourite time of year, except for me. Christmas was just getting a bit boring. You know how when you get older you start to stop believing in Santa, well that's me now! We never get any presents from him (Well I don't think they're from him), we don't write lists to him, and we don't do lots of things that people who believe in Santa do. So, there is really no reason to believe. The thing that doesn't make sense is that I'm the only one in the family who has realised Santa isn't REAL (probably except for my parents)! 

"Come on kids, it's time to make the cookies," exclaimed Mum,

"Yay," my siblings cheered, they were always thrilled to make the cookies for Santa.

"Yay," I groaned. I didn't want to make the cookies. I didn't want to do anything except sit in my room, where there was peace and quiet. So, I tiptoed slowly until,

"Chloe, come here. You have to do it too," Mum realised that I was trying to escape. I walked slowly to the kitchen, where they were making the cookies.

"Since you're last here," started Arthur, "You can just put the cookies in the oven," 

"Arthur, she can help out with everything," said Dahlia, sometimes (on days like Christmas eve), she was so nice. 

"Since you volunteered Arthur, Chloe can do the cookie dough, and you can put them in the oven," said Mum. She was obviously joking because when Arthur is being silly, she sometimes will joke around, and it will annoy him. 

"What!" he cried in despair and disappointment; doing the cookie dough was his favourite thing to do when making cookies.

"You know she is kidding, right?" Hope whispered in his ear, Hope would always help him out, even though he never helps her, and he is older.

"Dahlia! I'm doing the cookie dough; I'M doing the cookie dough!" Arthur whined, 

"Okay then, Chloe, you do the cookie dough with Arthur," Dahlia replied

"WHAT!" Arthur and I yelled.

"Dahlia, please, I will die doing a job with him, please, let me do something else!" I pleaded, but it didn't look like she changed her mind, she looked at me, rolled her eyes, and went back to looking for cookie cutters. 

"Yes, Dahlia, Chloe's right, she will die if she does the cookie dough, so change her job," Arthur said sarcastically. 

"No, you won't, you'll be fine," answered Dahlia, "You two are doing it together and that's that!" So, Arthur and I gathered the ingredients for the cookie dough.

"Arthur, why didn't you get the chocolate chips?" I asked

"I think that we should change it this year and put bird seeds in them!" He replied, 

"No, we are not! That will destroy the cookies, and no one can eat them!" I cried; no way I was letting him destroy cookies.

"Yes! We are!" Arthur called out, and tipped the seeds in.

"NOOOO" I thought in despair! Now we had to remake the cookie dough all over again!

"AHRGGH!" I screamed, "Now we have to make the cookie dough all over AGAIN!" 

Arthur destroyed the cookies! 

"Okay! What's wrong now?!" Dahlia shouted, 

"Arthur destroyed the cookie dough by putting seeds in it," I claimed,

"No, she destroyed it by putting seeds in it!" Arthur sobbed. He was trying to get me in trouble so he wouldn't! But, I'm sure she could tell that he was fake crying, and that I would never destroy the cookies for Santa (Even though he isn't real). I would never ruin Christmas for everyone else. Dahila looked at the cookie dough and said, 

"I'll do the cookie dough, Arthur can put them in the

oven, and Chloe, you don't have to do anything." 

"But...."

"NO BUTS!" exclaimed 

Dahlia as she interrupted 

Arthur. So, I walked to my room and sat on my bed. 

No, SHE DID

I looked outside my window; I saw the snow fall gently from the sky. It was nice and peaceful. I felt bad for my family (except for Arthur), I felt bad because they have to make the cookie dough all over again, and it's all Arthur's FAULT! He destroyed Christmas for everyone.

"Why does he always have to cause trouble?" I whispered to myself. Knock knock knock! Someone was knocking on my bedroom door,

"Who is it?" I asked, but there was no reply, "I said, WHO IS IT?!" I said it even louder, I felt like it was Arthur. He usually does that to prank me every time he has a chance, and this was one of his chances.

About an hour later, Mum came into my room and quietly said,

"It's bedtime. Goodnight Chloe," 

"Goodnight," I replied. So, I laid on my bed and went to sleep.

Toot toot! The noise woke me up. 

"What's that noise?" I thought, there were no train tracks around here, so it couldn't have been a train. I got out of my bed and looked out my window to see a train outside my house.

"How is this possible" I wondered. There are no train tracks at the front of my house, and there is only grass around my house (which is all covered in snow at the moment), so how did it get here? I slipped on my sneakers, not worrying about socks, and quietly ran to my front door. 

                        "Okay," I whispered to myself, "It's now or never to find out about that train,"                              I didn't know if it would be a good idea to go find out about a random in the                                middle of the night. But my confidence took over and I opened the door.  

There it was. The train sat right in front of me as I walked next to it. The train had big golden words saying, 'The Polar Express'. 

"I wonder why it's called The Polar Express. Does it go all the way to the North Pole or Antarctica?" I wondered, I knew it was silly to think a train could go all the way to the North Pole or Antarctica. But, it got to the front of my house. 

As I got closer to the first carriage, I saw a faint speck on one of the carriages further away,

"Is that a person?" I thought, so I walked towards the speck to find out what it is. As I got closer to the speck, it started to look as if was a conductor. 

"Okay! This is starting to get really weird. A random train, and now it has a conductor!" I was surprised to think the train had a conductor. I thought it was a train that somehow fell off a set of train tracks and drove all the way to my house.  

As I got closer to the conductor, I could hear a faint voice in the air,

"The conductor must be saying something," I believed he might have been saying something to me, since there was no one else around. So, I started to jog slowly, until I had reached my destination. I felt as if this was something magical while I jogged, even though magic isn't real. When I arrived where the conductor was, he said, 

"That took you long enough. Hurry now, we're going to be late," he turned around and put his foot up, but before he took a step, he turned and looked at me as if I was supposed to do something.

"Are you coming?" he asked, I had no idea what he was talking about, so I questioned him.

"If you don't mind me asking, but where is the destination? Because I have no intention to get on a random train, that somehow ended up where there are no train tracks nearby. Unless I know where this train is going to!" At least I was smart enough to know to never trust strangers. 

"This train is headed to the North Pole of course. This is the Polar Express,"

"The North Pole?" I questioned in surprise. If that train was to travel to the North Pole, it would have to go through the Arctic Ocean (If someone falls in the water, they would be most likely to get really cold and will most likely DIE), and somehow tracks are randomly going to appear on top of the water. This is an impossible thing to do, no one would be able to dive a train to the North Pole. Anyway, the North Pole is just ice, no person could ever live there, and trains can't have tracks on ice! 

"Hmmm, I see." he said as he got out a clipboard with a piece of paper on it, "Looks like you wished for no gifts, and you didn't help make the cookies for Santa this year."

"I," I started but, he interrupted me and asked,

"So, are you coming or not?" I didn't know what to say or do, I wanted to have an adventure, but how could I trust this person. He could be trying to kidnap me! Just at that point, I realised the train was on tracks! Tracks were in front of my house!

"This must be magic, if the train is on tracks in front of my house, then it must me magic!" So, I decided to get on the train.

As I got into the carriage, I saw that I wasn't the only kid, there were lots of kids on the Polar Express, and some were around my age. I sat on a seat where no one else was sitting and looked outside the window. My house was nowhere in sight, and the train was gradually gaining speed.

"Tickets," asked the conductor,

"Tickets" I thought, "Oh no! I don't have a ticket!!!" Now I was starting to get worried. What was going to happen now?

"Your ticket, please," questioned the conductor. When he asked me for my ticket, I pretended I had a ticket and that I was looking for it. I saw a golden ticket sitting in my pocket. So, I gave it to the conductor, and he replied,

"Thank you," and he punched holes into it.

A little while later, the conductor came in and a bunch of chefs came into the carriage. They turned seats around and put tablecloths in front of us. The tablecloths floated there, making a small rectangular shaped table. After that, they put mugs of hot chocolate on the tablecloths.  

As I was drinking my hot chocolate, a girl who was in the seat in front me (since the seat she was sitting on turned around to face me) said,

"Hi,"

"Hello," I replied. The girl had blondish-coloured hair with a bright purple nightgown, while the girl next to her had dark, curly hair with a dark purple nightgown. But the strange thing was, the girl with blonde hair had a yellowish colour eyes (And I have never heard or seen someone with yellow eyes in my whole life).

"Can you believe that we are going to the North Pole?" She questioned, I didn't really know what to say. Since, for some reason, I still don't believe in Santa and that this train is magical.

"Yeah." I said sarcastically, but I don't think she noticed the way I said it.

"Ah," I gasped, there was a humongous bump. It was so big, that everyone fell out of their seats.

"What was that?" I thought as I looked out the window. It looked as if we were on ice.

"Look out your window," I told the girl with the yellow eyes.