Welcome back to Blogmas 2025! If you’re just joining us, Blogmas is my annual December tradition of posting holiday-themed content every single day from now through Christmas Day. It’s ambitious, occasionally exhausting, and somehow I keep doing it year after year. This year, I’ve enlisted AI to provide daily writing prompts to keep things interesting. Today’s prompt ventures into fiction territory: Write a short story about someone who finds a mysterious gift under their tree that no one in the family bought.

So here we go—Day 2 of Blogmas brings you a short story. Grab your coffee (or hot chocolate if you’re feeling festive) and settle in.

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The Gift No One Gave

Sarah Morrison sat on her living room floor at 11:47 PM on December 23rd, surrounded by wrapping paper that seemed to multiply when she wasn’t looking. The house was finally quiet—kids asleep, husband dozing on the couch with Die Hard playing softly on the TV (his annual argument that it counted as a Christmas movie had become tradition itself), and even the dog had given up supervising her gift-wrapping marathon.

She’d been at this for three hours, and her back was informing her that forty-two was too old to be sitting on the floor like this, even with the cushion she’d stolen from the couch. But the dining room table was covered with Tom’s elaborate gingerbread village—a pandemic hobby that had somehow stuck—and she’d be damned if she was wrapping presents on the bed only to have him wake up and see what “Santa” was bringing.

The tree lights cast everything in that soft glow that made even their slightly chaotic living room look magical. She’d always loved this moment—the night before Christmas Eve, when all the preparation was almost done and the anticipation hadn’t yet turned into the beautiful chaos of Christmas morning. Even with her back aching and paper cuts on three fingers, there was something sacred about being the only one awake, orchestrating the magic.

Sarah reached for the last unwrapped box—a LEGO set that she’d hidden so well in October that it had taken her forty-five minutes to find it earlier that evening—when she noticed another package pushed far back under the tree, almost hidden behind the tree skirt.

It was wrapped in brown paper, the kind her grandmother used to save from grocery bags and iron flat for reuse. A simple red ribbon ran around it, tied in a bow that looked like it had been done by someone who actually knew how to tie bows, not like Sarah’s attempts that usually required strategic placement of stick-on bows to hide the mess underneath. There was a small tag attached, and in careful cursive that no one used anymore, it read: “For Sarah, who keeps the magic alive.”

She sat back, confused. Tom’s handwriting looked like a doctor’s prescription written during an earthquake. The kids—twelve-year-old Emma and nine-year-old Jack—hadn’t handwritten anything longer than their names since school started requiring everything be typed. Her mother was coming tomorrow, but she always labeled her gifts “From: Mom/Grandma” with military precision.

Sarah glanced at Tom, still unconscious on the couch, John McClane’s tiny TV explosions reflecting off his glasses. Maybe he’d actually managed to surprise her this year? But no—Tom was many wonderful things, but subtle wasn’t one of them. Last year he’d been so excited about the earrings he’d bought her that he’d given her three separate hints a day for two weeks.

She picked up the package. It was lighter than its size suggested, and something inside shifted gently—not quite solid, not quite soft. The brown paper felt old under her fingers, authentic in a way that the “vintage-style” kraft paper from the craft store never quite managed. The ribbon, she realized, was actual cloth, not the synthetic stuff that made up every ribbon she’d bought in the last decade.

Sarah looked around the room as if someone might suddenly appear to explain. The dog—Murphy, their golden retriever who treated every day like the best day of his life—lifted his head briefly, tail giving a halfhearted thump before he settled back into his bed.

She should wait. Open it tomorrow with the family. That would be the reasonable thing to do.

But when had she ever been reasonable at nearly midnight on December 23rd?

Sarah carefully untied the ribbon—it seemed wrong somehow to cut it—and unwrapped the paper with the same care. Inside was a wooden box, the kind that might hold tea or jewelry, made from wood so smooth it felt soft. There were no hinges, just a fitted lid that lifted off to reveal…

Letters. A stack of letters, maybe two dozen, each in a different envelope, each addressed to “Sarah” in different handwriting.

The first envelope was cream-colored, expensive-feeling. Inside, the letter read:

Dear Sarah,

You don’t know me, but I wanted you to know that five years ago, you saved my Christmas. I was the woman crying in the Target parking lot, sitting in my car because I couldn’t afford presents for my kids. You knocked on my window, handed me an envelope with $200 in it, and said, “Merry Christmas. We’ve all been there.” You walked away before I could even thank you properly. My kids had Christmas because of you. I’ve been paying it forward ever since.

Thank you for keeping the magic alive.

Sarah’s hand flew to her mouth. She remembered that day—barely. Tom had gotten his Christmas bonus, and they’d been doing better that year. The woman had looked so defeated, and Sarah had acted on instinct, grabbing the emergency cash from her glove compartment. She’d never told anyone about it, not even Tom. It had felt like something that should stay secret, like birthday wishes and first stars.

The second letter was on notebook paper, three-hole punched:

Mrs. Morrison,

You probably don’t remember me. I was in Emma’s class three years ago—the kid who threw up during the Christmas play. My dad had left that October, and Mom was working three jobs. You stayed with me while everyone else went to the cast party. You told me that sometimes the best performances happen off-stage, and that being brave enough to try was what mattered. You gave me your angel costume’s halo to keep. I still have it. When things get hard, I remember that sometimes we’re all just doing our best, even when we throw up on the wise men.

Danny Chen

P.S. I’m in middle school now and I’m in drama club. No throwing up so far.

Sarah laughed through the tears that had started without her permission. Danny Chen. She’d completely forgotten, but now it came back—the poor kid, green-faced, absolutely mortified. She’d grabbed paper towels and helped clean him up while the other parents pretended not to see. The halo had been Emma’s from the previous year’s play, collecting dust in the costume bin.

Letter after letter told similar stories. The elderly neighbor who Sarah had driven to doctor’s appointments without being asked. The grocery store clerk who she’d always asked about genuinely, remembering her kids’ names. The Amazon delivery driver who she’d chased down the street in the rain to give a thermos of hot coffee and a candy cane. Small moments that Sarah had forgotten almost as soon as they’d happened, but that had meant something to someone else.

But how? How were these letters here? Some were dated years ago, some recently. Different papers, different pens, but all real, all here in her hands.

The second-to-last envelope was different. Older. The paper was yellowed at the edges, and the writing was in fountain pen:

December 24, 1952

Dear Sarah,

One day, you will sit where I’m sitting now—tired, overwhelmed, wondering if all the effort matters. If the magic you’re trying to create is worth the backache and the paper cuts and the bills that will come in January.

It is.

Every moment of love you pour into this season, every small sacrifice, every time you choose to create joy for others even when you’re running on coffee and determination—it matters. It ripples forward in ways you can’t imagine.

This gift found its way to me when I needed it most, and now it finds its way to you. Not because you need reminding of your worth—you know that already, even when you forget. But because sometimes, in the quiet moments late at night when you’re the only one keeping the magic alive, it’s nice to know you’re not alone.

You’re part of something bigger. A chain of love that stretches backward and forward through time, mother to mother, heart to heart, those who create the magic for those who still believe in it.

The last letter will explain. Or it won’t. Sometimes mystery is its own kind of magic.

Merry Christmas, dear one. Margaret Eleanor Thompson

Sarah’s hands shook slightly as she reached for the last envelope. This one was new, crisp white, with her name written in silver ink.

Sarah,

There are those who say there are no miracles anymore. That mystery has been explained away by science and cynicism. They’re wrong, of course, but they’re also not entirely incorrect.

The miracles now are smaller, quieter. They happen in parking lots and school auditoriums and in the glow of tree lights at midnight. They happen when someone who is tired and overwhelmed chooses love anyway. When someone remembers that we’re all just trying our best, even when we throw up on the wise men.

This box has been traveling for longer than you might believe, finding its way each year to someone who needs to remember that the small magics are the real ones. The everyday kindnesses that seem insignificant but aren’t. The love poured out in gift wrap and gingerbread villages and staying up too late to make morning magical for others.

You wonder how these letters came to be here. The truth is both simple and impossible: love finds a way. Always. It bends time and space in small ways, just enough to remind us that we’re all connected, all part of the same story.

Keep the box or pass it on. Add your own letter or don’t. It will find its way where it needs to go, when it needs to go there. That’s what love does.

But tonight, in this moment, it wanted you to know: You are seen. You are appreciated. The magic you create matters.

Look up.

Sarah looked up from the letter. Tom was awake, watching her from the couch with a soft expression.

“You okay, babe? You’re crying.”

She looked down at the box, the letters, the evidence of impossible things. When she looked back up to answer Tom, to try to explain, the box was gone. The letters, the brown paper, the cloth ribbon—all of it had vanished as if it had never been.

All that remained was a single candy cane on the floor where the box had been, striped in the old-fashioned way, the kind her grandmother used to buy that tasted like actual peppermint instead of just sweet.

“I…” Sarah started, then stopped. Tom was already getting up, coming over to her with that concerned look he got when she pushed herself too hard.

“Just tired,” she said finally, accepting his hand up from the floor. “And happy. It’s almost Christmas.”

He pulled her into a hug, and she breathed in the familiar smell of his cologne mixed with the gingerbread he’d been baking earlier. Over his shoulder, she could see the tree, the presents she’d wrapped, the life they’d built together in all its imperfect, beautiful chaos.

“Yeah,” Tom said into her hair. “Almost Christmas. Come on, let’s get you to bed. Santa can’t come if you’re still awake.”

Sarah laughed, letting him lead her toward the stairs. At the doorway, she looked back one more time. Murphy had moved from his bed to under the tree, curled up exactly where the box had been. His tail thumped once, as if he knew something, or maybe just because dogs understand magic in ways we’ve forgotten.

The candy cane caught the tree lights, throwing tiny prisms of color across the wall. Tomorrow her mother would arrive too early, the kids would wake up even earlier, and the beautiful chaos would begin. There would be too much food and probably at least one argument about something silly and Emma would roll her eyes at least seventeen times and Jack would break something with his enthusiastic everything.

And Sarah would love every minute of it. Because now she knew—had always known, but now remembered—that the magic wasn’t in the perfect moments. It was in choosing love when you’re tired. In showing up when it’s inconvenient. In keeping the magic alive for others, even when your back hurts and you have three paper cuts and you can’t remember where you hid the LEGO set.

As she climbed the stairs, Sarah whispered a prayer, or maybe just a thank you, to whoever or whatever had sent the box. To Margaret Eleanor Thompson from 1952. To all the people whose small kindnesses had mattered more than they knew. To the chain of love that stretched backward and forward through time.

And maybe, just maybe, to the part of Christmas that still believed in mysteries, in miracles that came wrapped in brown paper and tied with real ribbon, in gifts that no one gave but everyone needed.

Outside, snow began to fall—the first of the season, right on time for Christmas Eve morning. Murphy watched from the window, tail wagging at something only he could see. Or maybe at nothing at all.

After all, dogs understand that sometimes the best magic is the kind you can’t quite explain, the kind that leaves you with nothing but a candy cane and the certain knowledge that love, somehow, always finds a way.

Even if you can’t prove it happened at all.