Christmas Feels

I woke up still on the floor with Sara in my arms.

I smiled and kissed the back of her neck. “Baby?” I whispered.

She grunted in response, obviously still wishing she was asleep.

“Sara, our friends will be here soon. I think it’s time we got dressed, because I’m not okay with everyone seeing my fiancé naked.” Fiancé. The word sounded strange as it rolled off of my tongue, but a good type of strange. Like it was something normal. It felt right.

“We don’t need them today, we can just stay here.” She mumbled as she pressed further into me, and I was quite tempted to just leave it at that, but I couldn’t. We did need to get up, we made plans and I spent a lot of time getting all of the things we needed to make dinner.

“Baby, they’re going to be here soon whether we like it or not. Besides, don’t you want to show off that ring?” I felt my smile grow even larger, and I knew she was smiling too, I just knew. I could feel it, like how you can feel the rain coming in and how you just know when something isn’t right. It’s instinct, human nature. It’s like how birds know to fly north and south depending on the weather, they just know, it’s some primal, carnal, primitive thing inside that lets me read Sara so well. Maybe that’s just part of love, knowing.

“It is a nice ring.” She mumbled softly, finally conceding to the idea of getting up.

“I’m glad you liked it. I mean, I would have liked to give you one that had more meaning to me, like a family heirloom or something, but it was buried with my mother.”

“I don’t mind at all. It’s nice to have this one, to have our own memories about it.”

Somewhere in me my mind brought up the idea of it becoming a new family heirloom, being passed down to the family, but that was stupid because I didn’t want kids. But maybe, if Caleb had two boys, I could the younger one ours when he needed one. It seemed nice, to keep something like that going in a family, it seemed like something people did for a reason they couldn’t really explain. They did it because it felt right, and I’ll be honest, the idea of it moving on to some young kid getting ready to marry a girl seemed like the right idea.

I shook the thought from my mind and rubbed Sara’s shoulder. “Come on, we have some food to make.”

“A turkey.” She groaned.

“And potatoes, green beans, gravy, pie, cranberry sauce, dinner rolls, corn on the cob, and I got some eggnog and stuff for everyone to have. There’s quite a bit to do.”

“Worst holiday ever.” She groaned.

“And Christmas Eve?”

She rolled over so she was facing me and I could see the grin and the twinkle in those crazy green eyes. “I think it’s my new favorite.”

“That’s a lot of pressure to live up to next year.”

“Not my fault you chose to propose then.”

I smiled a little. “Yes it is. How could I wait any longer than that? Waiting that long was verging on impossible. Seeing you every day, falling more in love with you every day, wanting you more and more every day, and not fully knowing if I could have you to myself for the rest of my life? All I wanted every second of every day was to drop to one knee and ask you to grow old with me and love me until the end of time. But I waited. It was torture.” I lifted my fingers to her cheek and brushed my thumb over a freckle that resided just below her right eye.

Mine. I thought with a smile.

I then moved my hand to her lips.

Also mine.

To her collarbone.

She’s all mine. She’s as much mine as I am hers. She has me fully and completely, she will never have to worry about that. I am in love with this woman in ways that are only talked about in stories. I am living the story now, and this is my happily ever after.

“My Princess Charming, the perfect fairytale ending.” Sara whispered quietly and reached her hand up to meet mine and entwine our fingers together.

I smiled and kissed her briefly before pulling away. “God dammit. I would stay here forever if I could, but I can’t, so you need to stop distracting me. We don’t have too much time left you know.” I whispered and sat up, trying not to do what I really wanted to do which was continue kissing her and loving her and showing her all of that and doing all of that just engaged fiancé sex stuff, which sounded pretty damn great right about now.

She sat up too and I felt the coolness of her cheek on my shoulder. “I love you.” She whispered.

I couldn’t stop the smile even if I wanted to. “I love you too. So much.”

“I noticed from last night.”

“Did you like it? The ribbons and stuff.”

“I thought it was beautiful.” She said and I felt her lips move against my skin.

“I need to take it down.” I mused.

“Can we keep the cards? It sounds dumb, but…I want to keep them is all. I think they’re nice, and it’ll be nice to look back on them later I think.” She mumbled, as if she was embarrassed.

I could feel my stomach flip slightly. “So you liked them?”

“I already said yes.”

“I just want to double check.”

“You want to do a lot of that lately.”

I chuckled quietly. “I’m new to this whole thing, so I just want to make sure I’m doing it right.”

“You are. You’re doing it better than a lot of people.” She sighed. “How am I supposed to live up to the standards you set?”

“You just need to keep being you.” I said with a grin and finally I stood up and held my hand out for her. “Come on, we need to get going before people start showing up and asking questions.”

“What do you mean?” She took my hand and let me help her up before reaching down and grabbing one of the blankets to wrap around her, mumbling something about the cold as she did so.

I pulled the blanket around her tighter as I spoke, “They’re going to ask if you said yes.” I said, like it was obvious.

“How many of them knew.”

“Everyone knew. You were the only person on the planet who didn’t know.”

“That explains why Taylor was acting so weird lately.” She shuffled into the bedroom and started grappling around for clothes. It took so much energy not to go over and touch her, just to make sure she was real, that this was real.

She dressed in a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, but she still was looking around in the closet for something. I watched for a minute or so before I spoke up. “What are you looking for?” I had pulled on clothes by this time as well, a pair of jeans and an unbuttoned red shirt to show off a plain white crew neck underneath.

I could see her ears turn bright red and she said, “Just…something. A sweater.” She stumbled over her words and kept looking in the closet for a moment before moving to the drawers.

I walked over to the closet, intent on helping my new fiancé. “What about this one?” It was a simple blue sweatshirt with our school’s name on it.

“No, I was looking for a specific one.” I looked at her curiously and she turned even redder. “Never mind, it was dumb, I’ll just use that one.” She reached out to take it but I pulled it back, out of her reach.

“What one? I’ll help you find it.”

“No, it’s fine, really.” She stepped closer and I held it behind me. “Devon.” She whined and moved even closer.

I grinned and leaned down, kissing her softly, our lips moving against each other languidly. When I finally pulled away I whispered, “Which one do you want?”

She sighed and looked down. “Yours. That stupid brown one with the moose that you always wear when we stay home and cuddle and things. That one.”

I chuckled quietly. “The stupid brown one with the moose? I don’t think it’s stupid, I think it’s pretty cool. I got it up in Alaska, I thought you liked it.”

“It’s the stupidest sweater ever, and I know you got it in Alaska, it says it in big, bold letters. I do like it, I like it a lot, which is why I’m looking for it.” She mumbled, like she was embarrassed by the whole thing.

I put the sweatshirt in my hand back in the closet and walked over to my side of the bed and bent down so I could look at the shelf under the drawer of my nightstand. I had tucked it away there one night after Sara fell asleep because it was a little too warm, I just hadn’t taken it out since.

I pulled it out and turned around to see Sara watching, but she looked away again when she noticed I was looking at her too. I held it out to her, a smirk pulling at my lips. “The stupid brown sweater with the moose on it.”

“Thanks.” She said quietly and took it in her hands, unfolding it slowly and looking at it with still light pink cheeks. She looked at it for a moment before pulling it over her head and touching the small hole at the bottom from all of the use this thing had endured.

“Looks good on you.” I commented, trying hard to keep down my own blush. Sara did that to me, made me feel like I was a high schooler all over again.

She lifted the front up to her nose and I could hear her breathe in deeply. “It smells like you.” She said with a smile. “Like pine trees. I love it.”

“You said it was stupid.”

“It is. It has a moose on it.” She said and walked out into the living room.

“Hey! It’s a good sweater; I’ve had it for a long time now!” I said as I followed her into the kitchen.

“It’s a great sweater because it’s yours, on anyone else it would be a dumb one.” She said as she started pulling things out of the fridge and cabinets.

“Yeah, well, it’s my favorite.” I mumbled as I started to take down the ribbons and cards.

Sara smiled as she got out some cutting boards. “Mine too.”

There was a lot of cooking for those first few hours. A lot. Which we loved doing and had a lot of breaks to make out a little, of course, but pretty soon I heard the door burst open.

“Ho ho ho bitches!” Jan, obviously, and laughter from a few different people.

“In the kitchen!” I called out to them and I turned around just in time to see Jess, Caleb, Luce, and Jan coming through the door with colorfully wrapped presents that Sara told them to put under the tree.

Jan walked up to Sara and raised an eyebrow at her. “So what’d you say? Did you break my girl’s heart?”

I looked over my shoulder from my mashed potatoes to see Sara just blinking with her mouth open, she must not have been ready for Jan’s bluntness. I decided to help her out. “She’s wearing my sweatshirt, do you think she broke my heart?” I said jokingly.

The rest of the group had come in by then and Jess was practically bouncing up and down. “Did she say yes? Caleb told me everything, oh Sara, did you say yes?” Caleb laughed and wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

Luce walked up to Jan and slipped her hand in Jan’s. “Come on, stop trying to scare the poor girl, it doesn’t matter if she said yes or not, it matters if they’re still in love.” Luce then looked over to Sara and said, “But we still want to know if you said yes.”

By now Sara had recovered from the shock of the whole ordeal and was smiling like a schoolgirl when she held out her left hand for everyone to crowd around and look at.

“Nice going sis.” Caleb said after he had finished looking at it.

“It’s beautiful.” Luce said and leaned into Luce.

Jan was quiet for a couple seconds, and then said, “You be good to her, alright? She’s had it rough in the love department and she doesn’t need any more of that crazy shit happening to her. Don’t hurt my best friend like so many people have before. I know you love her, and I know that I probably don’t need to say this, but I’m going to anyways because she’s my best friend and I hate watching her get hurt.”

Sara looked over at me and I could see that light in her eyes, the one that told me everything that I needed to know that this would all be okay. The one that told me she loved me to bits. “I won’t hurt her, Jan, you don’t have to worry about that at all.”

Jan nodded. “Good, because I doubt she can handle that again. She loves you too much. She doesn’t like to admit it, but she’s a diehard hopeless romantic.”

“Just like mom.” Caleb said quietly, looking at me with a small smile. “She’d be proud, Nic, she would be so proud.” Nic. Only mom and Caleb had called me that, and he usually called me Dev or Devon now. Nic felt like it was just a part of my past. Nic, short for my middle name Nicole, my mom had called me that all the time, and Caleb had picked up on it when we were kids. He had said it a few times since we met again, but for some reason, it meant something this time, because it was about mom.

“Yeah?” I asked, my voice catching in my throat. I could feel tears stinging the back of my eyes and I looked down at my feet, trying not to think about her and what life would be if she were here. I tried so hard not to think about her and dad and the life we had before the crash.

“Of course she would, look at you. You’re becoming a chef, you’re getting married, you have a dog and a little place to call your own, but most of all you’re happy. Mom always used to say she was proud of us because we were doing what we loved, remember? You would be in the school musical and would suck total ass and you would feel like crap afterwards and she would tell you that she was the proudest parent in that room. Of course she’d be proud.” Caleb’s hand gripped my shoulder. “I’m proud of you too.”

Dammit, don’t cry, not on Christmas, not in front of Caleb and Jess and Luce. Not in front of Jan, who would never let me live it down. Not in front of Sara. “Thanks, Caleb.” I whispered, still choking back tears as I hugged him tightly.

“Come on, let’s go do presents, I wasn’t prepared for all of this feely stuff.” Jan mumbled as she shifted uncomfortably.

There were presents and food and talking and plenty of showing off Sara’s new ring, but it wasn’t really about that. It was about family, because that’s what we were. A family. It was about love and laughter and getting together for family, that’s all it was ever really about.

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Sort of a fluff chapter, I know, but I think it's time for some cuteness in the world, ya know? I like cuteness, besides, I'm planning on a not so cute, little bit sad, idea for a book up next. Nothing set in stone, just toying with an idea is all. I always write yeses, have you noticed? The characters are always on the same page, and it's starting to bore me a little, so I'm looking at some different ideas and I think I've got one. It will be called Romance 101, it's not on the Novel Ideas thing I posted a while back, so if I finally settle on this one (I kind of already have settled and am now three pages into the first chapter, but shhhhh) it will be a complete surprise to what it's about.

I will tell you the main characters names for any book I write next though. Lane and Spencer.

Get ready to ship...

LANCER. (I thought it was really good.)

ALSO

LET'S TALK ABOUT JAN AND LUCE

I just posted the first chapter of their story called When Cupid Hit the other night. Their story will be shorter and will skip forward in time a lot in the first few chapters and then it will slow down and we will move with them as a couple as they do their thing.

It's going to be good you guys.

I am so excited for everything that is about to start happening.

Anyways, as always, let me know what you think and all of that good stuff. I'll see you all real soon, ok?