I had over a hundred pounds in a jar I kept in my nightstand, accumulated from my time working at the supermarket, and decided to splurge on Christmas presents. Armed with the last of my savings, I hit the city centre, determined to find that perfect something to show the folks that mattered to me how much they meant to me.

The capital's streets teemed with people. Crowds of faces, telling different tales. Some were harried and fraught with tension. On a final-minute, Christmas Eve dash to secure a gift that would make a loved one's day. Among the throng were smiling faces, infused with festive cheer. Impervious to the biting cold and lashing windswept rain.

After four hours of dodging umbrella spikes on the streets, and hostile interactions with jostling shoppers in packed department stores, I was relieved to leave the mayhem behind. My feet ached and the damp had leeched through my clothes, freezing my bones. But I had succeeded in my mission.

My mum called me a numbskull when I arrived at the door drenched, looking like a drowned rat. Her face bore the telltale signs of stressing over a turkey, allied with the fact my grandparents were coming for Christmas dinner. And my brother.

I would have waited until tomorrow to give her her present, but she looked in dire need of some cheer.

My mum's gift had required the most thought. My original plan had been to buy a shawl, but I worried it might make her feel old. I would have liked to get her a coat. The fact I didn't know her size proved a major hindrance. Not to mention, upon inspecting the price tags, I had nowhere near enough money to purchase the kind of coat she deserved. So I opted for something of practical benefit to her.

My mother suffers from sciatica. She rarely complains. She doesn't have to. The effects are wrought in her face.

My mum glanced up from the book she held in her hands; Beating Back Pain. The jacket stated the author was a renowned specialist in his field, had more letters after his name than a Greek surname.

"That's so thoughtful," she said, her smiling eyes making me forget all about my sodden clothes and aching limbs.

A few hours later, there was a knock on my bedroom door. My dad stood there in his uniform, clutching the Elvis compilation CD I'd bought him in his hand. "That was a lovely present you got for your mother. I'd never have thought of that. I'm proud of you."

I shrugged. I've never been comfortable accepting praise.

He raised the CD. "And thanks for this, too."

"You probably have all those songs already."

"Not on compact disc, I don't." That made me smile. For a moment. Only old crusties ever called them compact discs. I had never considered my dad as old. The wrinkles on his brow looked more pronounced than I'd noticed before. Flecks of grey interspersed with strands of black that had lost their lustre on a hairline that sat deeper than Arsenal's defenders. A high forehead, he claimed. Nothing to do with the natural process.

I handed him a cassette. "I copied it onto this. Y'know, so you could listen to it tonight when you're driving around in the van."

He hugged me. I don't know if I imagined it, but his hugs seemed tighter these days. My mum's too.

Dad passed me an envelope. Inside was a card, with a message in my mother's handwriting. And five crisp fifty-pound bills. "We thought this year we'd give you a few bob. You're too old to have your mother buying your clothes anymore." He ruffled my hair. "Happy Christmas, son."

After my dad had gone to work, I watched Trading Places on television with my mum in the sitting room, sat on opposite sides of the fireplace. Drew my chair closer, to catch the fierce heat radiating from the open hearth, where dancing flames leapt up the chimney. On the mantlepiece, a slew of cards surrounded the antique walnut clock my father had painstakingly restored to full working order. Artificial tree occupying its traditional spot by the window. A little lighter on dazzle with each passing year, as bulbs blew and glittering baubles got broken, never replaced.

Despite being uncomfortable with swearing, my mum laughed loudly when a beleaguered Don Ameche yells 'Fuck him' at a group of Wall Street executives. I wondered if it was to mask her discomfort. In an earlier scene, Dan Aykroyd's character claims 'those men wanted to have sex with me... they tried to bend me over.' I'd guffawed, even as I writhed inwardly. Sneaked a glance across at my mother to see if she had noticed. She hadn't.

I couldn't help but consider how things in my life were changing. In a year and a half, my schooling finished. I might be at University. Chances are, I would leave home. All that seemed a long way away. But not that long.

My mum kissed me on the forehead before going to bed.

I sat up watching TV on my own with the lights off, not paying much attention to the images on-screen, my head filled with a heavy sense of melancholy.

I awoke on Christmas morning and walked into a full-scale war. My brother, Johnny, had arrived home and immediately pissed my father off by filling every remaining space in the fridge with cans of beer. Then refusing to attend mass as a family and mocking my dad's religious commitment.

My brother's attitude pained my dad, who had foregone the luxury of sleep to spend the day with the family. Although, my mother's willingness to leap to Johnny's defence hurt him more. A cold war developed, Dad secluding himself in the sitting-room, headphones on, listening to his new Elvis CD. My mother worked on the dinner in silence, while my brother toddled upstairs to our room, smoked a joint out the window, and flaked out on the bed.

The car ride to the church was laden with unbearable tension, both parents staring straight ahead, stewing in their silent grievances.

Despite the antagonism, my dad walked around to open the door for my mum, as was his custom.

I sat in the pew, observing the packed church. All the families sat together in their shiny shoes and brand-new clothes. The picture-perfect representation of a hallmark family, but what lurked beneath the façade. The priest spoke enthusiastically about the joy of Jesus' birth and what it signified to Christians. Judging by the congregation, it was evident what it meant to the retail industry. As I watched the older mass-goers go through the motions and the younger ones bored to distraction, I struggled to find any meaning in it all, beyond tradition. The scene reminded me of our old Christmas tree, still clinging to that last vestige of its former glory.

My Grandparents arrived around two for dinner. My Granddad hugged us kids as though his life depended on it. He had lost a lot of weight. Thanks to quitting the drink five years ago, a decision aided in no small part by his heart attack. Once the definition of hale and hearty, he now seemed frail and fragile. Almost brittle, like if I matched his strenuous hug, he might crumble to dust.

My Grandmother assumed a regal position at the head of the table. While my Granddad was busy complimenting my mum on her cooking, Grandma asked dad if he'd received a promotion yet. Before informing him how well our uncle was doing. How he'd bought a summer house in Italy, and even though she hadn't set foot in the place, she was happily telling my dad how wonderful it was.

Throughout, my father presented a stoic front, while my mother chewed her food quickly.

"The meat's a bit dry," Grandmother said to my mum, which I could tell upset her. Mum took great pride in making Christmas dinner. My Granddad's hand went to his head, his clenched jaw muscles bunched together.

"Didn't think you'd be able to tell," Johnny said, turning to Grandmother with a mocking smile, "what with you wearing dentures."

My Granddad wore a beaming smile while my mother lowered her head in a vain attempt to hide hers.

Only my dad looked unimpressed.

My Grandmother acted like she heard nothing. She turned to my mother. "You've gone back to work part-time?" My mum nodded. "How nice," Grandma continued with a haughty expression and condescending tone, "Of course, in my day, a woman's occupation was to care for her family. Things change, I suppose."

Johnny smiled serenely. "Yeah, the suffragettes happened."

"I didn't catch that."

"Ah, selective deafness, the affliction of the ignorant and conceited."

"How rude."

"You heard that all right."

"It's this darned blasted hearing-aid. It comes and goes."

"Like a donor at a sperm bank," Johnny said, not missing a beat.

My Granddad choked back the laughter, while my father looked like he might actually be choking.

Grandma reached for her napkin and began dabbing her eyes, throwing down the sympathy card, her holding ace.

The table descended into uneasy quiet.

Johnny tucked into his dinner as though nothing had happened. The blameless eye of the hurricane, tearing shit up because it was his nature.

I caught my Granddad glancing enviously at the glass of beer my brother held to his lips.

Our nuclear family had gone into meltdown, Chernobyl style. The toxic fallout would poison whatever life was left of this festive holiday.

After dinner, my parents washed the dishes I brought in from the dining-room, in monkish silence. My brother and Granddad chatted cheerily in the corner, two untamed spirits with shared tendencies. Deprived of an audience, Grandmother put her tissues away and pouted. On the muted TV set Steve McQueen's Virgil Hilts revved his stolen motorcycle, getting ready to jump a barbed-wire fence. Like my family's attempts at the perfect Christmas, he was fated to fail.

The perfect Christmas. The perfect gift. The perfect family. Conceits of the advertising industry. Impossible ideals, adding unnecessary strain and pressure on ordinary people for what should be a joyous occasion, dooming us to failure.

After my grandparents beat a hasty retreat, on Grandmother's orders, dad disappeared upstairs to bed. My mum sat on the couch, tired and emotional. Literally. Not the euphemism for the state Johnny was currently working to achieve.

Though it may have been a by-product of the beer, he seemed taken aback when I gave him the VHS copy of Cantona, a documentary on the legendary United player. "Wow, nice one, Aaron... I feel like a bit of a wanker. I didn't get you anything."

He marched to the fridge and returned with a cold can, which he handed to me.

"What do you think you're playing at?" my mum said. "He's fifteen."

"He'll be sixteen in seven weeks."

"I'm aware of his age. I gave birth to him."

"Jaysis, one beer won't kill him."

"Well, I don't want him turning out like..." Her voice trailed off.

My brother gave her a cheeky wink. "Careful now, you're starting to sound a little like Grandma."

My mum broke into an involuntary smile. "Make sure it's just the one. And only the one."

Johnny was quiet after that. We watched the Cantona video without him saying much. Usually, nothing short of cutting out his tongue could prevent him from sermonizing on anything Manchester United related.

After mum went to bed, Johnny rediscovered his voice. "Your new school working out okay?"

"Not bad."

"Sound. Hear you quit your job."

"Owner was acting the prick. Told him where to go."

"Fair enough."

"You gonna sort me out with some work?"

"Am I fuck. I don't want—"

"I'm messing."

"Don't even joke about that. You've got smarts. Use 'em."

"But you make a few quid."

"Yeah."

"Must be nice. All that freedom."

"Is it?"

"Must be."

"I make more, I spend more. You have more money, you buy more expensive clothes. Are they better? What's the difference between Calvin Klein jeans and Levi's? I got my video collection. Now, there's a new format in the works, movies on discs. Same as tapes to CDs. Gonna have to start my collection all over. In the end, I'll wind up with the same movies."

A brief silence ensued before Johnny grinned. "You found anyone demented enough to hook up with a Murphy man?"

"Ah, you know, I've got my eye on someone, but they don't like me that way." He said not to worry and brought me another beer from the fridge.

In that fleeting moment of oblique honesty, I resurrected a connection with my brother that had long died.

We settled back in our chairs and watched Bruce Willis punching terrorists in the face in what we both agreed was the best Christmas film of all time.

It wasn't perfect. But what is?