Visiting my mum is never easy. She has a tainted history. It's dark and broken, and I can't fix it for her.

My father died on Christmas day fourteen years ago, and it d*mn near destroyed her. Every Christmas after that one had been almost unbearable.

For most of the following Christmases, she hadn't even left her bed to open presents with her children, let alone buy a tree. Then when I was sixteen, she'd tried to kill herself on Christmas Eve, and less than three weeks ago, ...