chapter twenty-five

t w e n t y - f i v e

*

Casper is inside me when the clocks strike midnight and he whispers a breathless happy birthday in my ear. A couple of minutes later, when he collapse on top of me with a shudder and a groan, he manages to utter merry Christmas.

I think that might be the best way I've ever spent the first few minutes of my birthday, languishing in the lazy ecstasy of coming down from a high. I close my eyes and kiss him as he recovers, twitching between my thighs with my arms around him, and I take a deep breath that I let out slowly.

Later, when the vibe is a lot less sexy and a lot more sleepy, both of us are in thick pyjamas necessary to survive the cold night and when I crawl into bed, Casper hovers at the end of the bed in his flannel set.

"Are you getting in?" I ask, throwing back the duvet on the other side of the bed.

"I was going to ask what your policy is regarding bed sharing. You know, just in case you'd rather not." He drops his hand from his hair and gets in next to me, smelling of minty toothpaste and musky deodorant. It takes him no time at all to snuggle under the covers, wrapping the duvet around his shoulders, and inch closer to me.

After four years of hardly even hugging, we've ramped it up pretty quickly, zero to sixty in the blink of an eye. My mind is still reeling from three hours of talking and foreplay and sex, discussing boundaries and likes between kisses: now I'm shattered, my body reduced to a lump of jelly and a sack of useless bones.

"I like sharing the bed with people I date," I say, "but you've always got your own space if you ever want it, or need it."

"Thank you." He pulls a pillow under his head and lies on his side. "How about your policy on spooning?"

"Big fan. Especially in winter. Brrr." I rub my arms, pretending to shiver. He rolls over and backs up against me, wiggling his warm arse against my thighs.

"Congratulations, you get to snuggle me for warmth," he says, reaching back to pull my arm over him. He interlaces our fingers, holding my hand over his sternum so I can feel his heartbeat. Slow and steady, a reliable rhythm that slows my own pulse to sync with his and lull me to sleep.

*

I wake up to an empty bed and the sound of my door opening, and I blearily blink up at Casper when I see him swaddled in my dressing gown, a Santa hat at an angle on his head and a tray in his hands.

"Happy birthday!" he crows, like it isn't his birthday too, and he starts singing off key as he slowly crosses the floor, the song finishing as he reaches the bed.

"Happy birthday to you too," I say with a smile, sitting up as he sets the tray down on my bedside table, miraculously clean. He must've cleared a space without waking me up. "Nice hat."

He cocks his head, making the white pompom jiggle on the end of the hat, and grins as he wiggles his eyebrows. "I told you – I'm all about Christmas today," he says. "You could say it's your birthday slash Christmas present all in one."

"Nuh-uh," I say, shaking my head and groaning at him. "You know the rule – Christmas babies are entitled to entirely separate sets of presents."

"Oh, don't worry. I have another present for you." He makes a show of swinging his hips as he unties my dressing gown, which is several sizes too big for him, swathes of material swallowing him up. Turning around so his back is to me, he looks over his shoulder and gives me a wicked grin as he lets the dressing gown drop to just below his shoulder blades.

He's being a total dork, but I am totally into it. I pick up one of the coffees – they're identical, but one is in the mug he knows is my favourite, so I take a guess – and sip as he does a strip tease with a twinkle in his eyes.

As he shimmies the dressing gown down, he pivots round to face he and throws it open to show that all he's wearing underneath is a pair of fur-lined Santa boxers, and he's obscenely hard. I can feel my cheeks go hot as a laugh splutters out of me. He's fixed one of the bows I use for presents to his waistband.

"I told you I'd wear a Santa suit today," he says. "Unfortunately, this was the closest thing Asda had, so you'll have to enjoy it before your family get here, else things could get very awkward. Unless the whole King clan would like a strip tease? I'm a pretty good dancer."

"No, no, I think I'll keep this for myself," I manage to say, unable to tame my grin. I reach out to the bow. "Can I open it?"

He plants his hands on his hips and thrusts forward. "Be my guest."

The toast has long since gone cold and soggy by the time we're done, lying in a post-coital cuddle. The Santa boxers are in a pool on the floor somewhere, Casper lying naked against my side, one arm over me and his lips pressed to my shoulder.

"Who'd have thought my best Christmas morning would involve fucking the grinch?"

He laughs and grazes my skin with his teeth. "No, today I'm Santa," he says, his voice slow and lazy, "and I am coming to town. The little town of Bethlehem."

He cracks before I do, a boyish laugh escaping when I groan and pretend to shove him away.

"That was cheesy," I mutter.

"Would you rather cheesy Santa Cas or cynical grinch Cas? It's up to you," he says, rolling away. "I promised you Santa, but if you want me to be a grump on our birthday, I can do that too."

"No, it's good. I like cheesy. I like you."

He rolls back and plants a kiss on my cheek. "I like you too."

*

Eventually, we make it downstairs. It's a struggle to get out of bed when all I want to do is lie there with him, his warm hands tracing every inch of my body, but it's Christmas Day and at some point, my entire family will turn up on the doorstep and shit will go down if they arrive and I'm still in bed with my boyfriend.

They don't even know I have a boyfriend. Most of them don't even know who Casper is or why he's living with me, let alone that now we're together. It's been a whirlwind couple of weeks leading up to this moment, and today's going to be a baptism by fire for him. But he doesn't seem to stressed.

He seemed very relaxed in the shower we just shared. I told him there's no way he'd fit in with me, but he proved me wrong. He also proved just how well he knows how to wrangle a shower head.

"Fuck," I say when we make it down to the kitchen, my damp hair lying on a towel around my shoulders. "It's ten o'clock already."

"Birthday lie-in," Casper says. He's back in his Santa hat, but this time his accompanying outfit is a bit less obscene – jeans, and the charity shop jumper I bought him right back when he first moved in. It looks good on him. Everything looks good on him.

"We have a lot of cooking to do."

"Then you're lucky I'm an ace in the kitchen." He takes my hands and twirls me around on the icy slate floor. "What's first?"

"Heating," I say with a shiver. It wasn't so noticeable when we were sharing a bed and our bodies but downstairs is an icebox, the kitchen floor so cold that I can feel it freezing my toes through my slippers. "Can you get the oven on? Gas mark six?"

"I'm on it," he says with a salute as I shiver my way to the sitting room to work on a fire. My wood supply is running low, but there's enough to last through boxing day, I reckon, before I need to pop next door with a wad of cash and a couple of bags for life.

As the firelighters roar to life and I will the kindling I've built around them to catch light, my phone buzzes in my pocket with a text from my mum.

MUM: happy birthday baby!! can't wait to see you later! twenty-five, i can't believe it. how are all my babies so grown up? i hope you have a wonderful morning beth, and i hope you're not stressing yourself out over cooking – there's no pressure from us! it's your day darling. let me know if you want dad and paisley and me to come over early to give you a hand xxx

The message makes me feel a bit better about my lack of organisation this year. Maybe shit won't go down if everything isn't perfect. And if one of my sisters tries to complain, I can throw the birthday card at them.

As the first flames start to flicker, I type out my response and try not to blush at the thought of how I spent my morning, as though my mum will somehow be able to read my thoughts.

ME: Thank you!! It's been a fab morning, thanks. looking forward to seeing all of you – i hope you're not expecting prompt food, though. only just come downstairs! p.s. dress warm. got the fire and a heater but the actual heating's died and i keep forgetting to call the boiler fixer

A moment later, Mum sends back a face-palm GIF, followed by a few more of various animals wrapped up in winter jumpers. I titter and put my phone away to focus on teasing more life out of the fire, balling up pages from an old newspaper to encourage the flames, and ignoring my father's voice in the back of my head telling me that it's a short-lived boost that'll only clog the grate with the ashes.

Ten minutes later, I've got a decent enough fire going, so I put up the guard and join Casper in the kitchen. The table is filled with everything we have to cook today, and he's dug out the plan I made yesterday, the times that everything needs to go in if we'll be eating for two o'clock.

"I think we can handle this," he says, moving a packet of tenderstem broccoli and a head of cauliflower to the far end of the table. "I've arranged everything by the time it needs to go in. The chicken'll take the longest, then the roast potatoes and parsnips, then probably the pigs in blankets. I've got no clue about the nut roast your mum's bringing, but she can take control of that one."

"Good job," I say, scanning the table. Maybe it's not as big a job as it seems. I only wish there was more that could be done ahead of time, to save inevitably running out of space during the cooking, but aside from the sausages, everything else will either dry out or go soggy.

"Anything we can do now?" Casper asks.

I purse my lips as I think, checking that we're not missing anything, and I shake my head when a sense of calm settles, with the realisation that we seem to be under control. "I don't think so. I reckon we can relax for an hour or so."

Casper claps, the brightest grin illuminating his face. "In that case, can I give you your present?"

My face falls. I haven't got anything for him. It's been a disorientating couple of weeks and we've been together almost the entire time; aside from giving him somewhere to live, and a Christmas jumper that he's now wearing like it's his favourite thing, I have nothing for his twenty-fifth.

"Don't worry," he says when he sees my face, "this is very much a circumstantial present."

"What?"

"As in, I probably wouldn't have done anything but this kind of ... threw itself at me. You might hate it. In which case, it's reversible. It's more of a thought, I guess?"

I frown, the creases in my forehead deepening as I grow more confused by what he's saying. With a flap of his hand, he chuckles and pushes me towards the sitting room and plants his hands on my shoulders when I'm standing in front of the sofa. I sit, and when he stands in front of me, I laugh.

"Oh, no. You're not going to lap dance, are you?"

"What? No!" he cries out, then leans back, arms folded. "Wait, would you not want a lap dance? Why'd you sound so horrified at the thought?"

"I'm sure you'd be very talented considering what you can do with your hips, but I can't think of anything more awkward than sitting here while you grind on me, which would most likely be the moment my family decided to descend on us."

He pouts and sits down on the coffee table. "Well, there go your chances of ever getting a birthday lap dance from me. I hope you're happy."

I look upwards as though scanning my feelings and then back at him when I say, "Yup, I'm happy."

"Okay. Close your eyes."

I do as I'm told.

"Hands out."

I hold out my hands and feel a light, almost weightless box.

"You can open your eyes."

The box is meticulously wrapped. Crisp corners, not a single bump or tear or scuff in the paper. Every piece of tape is clean and even, and sparse. Just enough to hold the paper down. I slide a fingernail under one of the flaps and carefully peel off the tape.

Casper sits opposite me with his elbows planted on his pointed knees, his hands clasped together beneath his chin as he watches me, his eyes darting between my face and the box in my hands. I make it last, drawing out the process of unwrapping the present for as long as I can bear.

"This is excruciating," Casper murmurs. "Were you one of those kids who unwrapped as slowly as humanly possible to make your birthday last as long as it could?"

"I'm just savouring the moment," I say, but the moment is over when the last piece of tape is undone and the paper is loose, only held in place by my hands on the box. I let the paper go, and beneath it is plain cardboard. Casper shifts on the coffee table. I glance up at him and he nods at the box.

"If it's a terrible idea, just tell me. I can take it," he says. I'm growing curiouser and curiouser as I open the lid of the box, and-

Any words die in my throat, before they even reach my tongue. I know immediately what I'm looking at, but Casper seems to take my silence as confusion, as though I need this explained.

"I saw this glass bauble in your box of decorations yesterday," he says, "and when I realised the top bit comes off and you can put stuff inside, I thought ... maybe you'd like all the pieces of Robin's and Noelle's baubles to be together inside one?" He rubs his hands together as I stare at the decoration in the box.

It's one of those plain, clear glass, DIY baubles that I never got round to doing anything with. He's unclasped the metal fastening at the top and funnelled in the tiny shards of glass that I saved, and the white flecks of fake snow. I catch glimpses of the glittery white of Noelle's snowflake; the rich reds and browns and oranges of Robin's robin.

"This way, they're really together," he says. "I think it's a bit nicer than a shoebox. But if you don't like it, I can undo it."

"Don't," I say, shaking my head. "It's perfect."

His lips break into a broad smile that I mirror, my muscles acting on impulse. He reaches out and turns the bauble around, and I realise when the light catches the glass that he's decorated. I didn't even realise until now, but he's painted tiny white snowflakes on the glass, and on the other side is a robin in flight, its orange belly puffed out.

"You did this?"

He nods.

"When did you do this?"

"Last night. This morning, I guess? I found the bauble yesterday and put the pieces in it, and when I got up this morning to make breakfast, I tried my hand at painting. I'm not nearly as good as the twins."

"It's amazing," I say, most of my words stolen by my surprise and the threat of tears. "I can't believe you did this."

"I know how upset you were," he says, shrugging one shoulder, "especially when I realised why you'd smashed Noelle's bauble too. I wanted to do something. Anything, really, that I thought might help. This was all I could think to do."

"It's perfect." I touch the bauble; I turn it over and over in my hands, taking in his perfect handiwork and the glittering glass inside. He's added snippets of tinsel, I think. Something to make it sparkle, so it catches the light even more. "Thank you so much, Cas. It's perfect, oh my god. I can't believe you did this."

He smiles that endearing smile, the one that makes my heart melt, and I hold onto my emotions long enough to nestle the bauble back in the shoebox and set it on the coffee table, to pull him into my arms and bury my face in his neck. Inhaling his irresistible scent, I let out a shaky breath and hold him in the tightest hug I can give.

"Merry Christmas, Bethlehem," he whispers, his lips brushing my jaw.

"Merry Christmas, Casper."

It's a quiet, tender moment. One that simultaneously feels so fragile it could shatter, and strong enough to define us. A moment I will remember for a long, long time. Until he goes and ruins it.

When the hug comes to an end, Casper pulls away slowly and stretches out his back, pushing his elbows back, and he says, "Thanks for the birthday sex, by the way. Perfect start to the day."

"Oh my god, shut up."

"I mean it." He puts his thumb and forefinger together and kisses his fingertips. "Perfection. Just the boost I needed to get through today."

"You're very dramatic."

"No." He shakes his head. "You know who's dramatic?"

"Who?"

"Your little sister," he says.

I laugh. He's not wrong there. And then I stop when I hear the sound of a car outside, and then the slam of a door – three doors. And then a knock on my front door.

"Speak of the devil," I say, getting to my feet. "Are you ready to play the role of someone who love Christmas?"

He adjusts his Santa hat and stands. "Wait, hold on. Not yet."

I wait for a moment. There's another knock on the door. Casper takes me by the elbow and plants a kiss on my lips, taking me by surprise, and I feel his smile.

"Okay. I'm ready."

*

hello again! i took a longer break than anticipated over christmas to be with family, but i'm back now that they've gone!