Oceans [A.Shelby]

TWENTY-SEVEN

CHRISTMAS, what a time. 1919 brought change, it was the first time Lillian was at the Warwickshire estate for Christmas in nearly a decade.

Despite the early hours, and only the servants being awake, Lillian and her husband were stark and the room was filled with quiet noise.

Their bodies were so in sync with eachother, even down to the words they spoke and the noises made. Their bodies reacted to eachother as if they were well known books.

With other women before his wife, Arthur was careless and he wanted fast paced, but with his wife it was different. It wasn't sex, this was more personal, more sensual, atleast this occasion was. The pair had the best of both worlds, on one hand they could go wild with each, they had christened many places, but
on the other hand, there were times whe they wanted to cherish the moment, just be together.

Admittedly, the pair no longer worried about trying to prevent anything coming from their many bedroom sessions. Karl had stirred something in Lillian who before was far from maternal.

He nipped at her skin as he placed kisses along her neck, collarbone and chest. Lillian couldn't help that her nails dug into him and she begged silently that he'd stop teasing her.

To this Arthur laughed and reminded her they had already gone three times and it wasn't even 9 in the morning.

"Merry Christmas Lils'' He murmured to her as his hands ran up and down her body freely, massaging her tender skin as she closed her eyes.

"Merry Christmas, trouble," A smile came to her lips at the fond nickname.

"Four Christmas' I spent over there, it's not quite as exciting anymore, ay?" Lillian perched herself up, and she ran her thumb along his cheek gently.

"I can't promise a Christmas with my family is exciting as such," Arthur laughed in response to her words, "but there'll be more, those times are just a memory, a fragment of the past. They aren't the present Arth and you need to remember that"

Arthur murmured in response, placing a kiss on his wife's lips who leant over him.

The pairs quiet moments were interrupted by a persistent knock at the door, one Lillian knew to be her mothers.

"My darlings, it's Christmas!" Her mother called on the other side of the door, something Lillian hadn't heard in years.

"We'll be down," Lillian called to her mother, before she rolled out of bed well and truly naked, giving her husband a smirk before disappearing into her dressing room.

However, Christmas in the household didn't truly begin until the evening where they at their Christmas dinner, exchanged presents and then a 'family evening' as they called it. Uptight as he was, even William May joined in with charades after a Whiskey or two.

"How lovely it'll be when there's children sitting around this tree again," Dora had commented that morning as they gazed upon it, the May children all glancing between eachother with shakes of their heads.

But that evening, something was brewing.. was it the heavy clouds that hung over the darkened sky, or the bitter cold that nipped with promise. Perhaps it was the youngest May child, with a ring in his suit pocket and clammy hands that fiddled with eachother.

"Do you have it?" Lillian questioned her younger brother in the hallway, the family leaving them to the main sitting room.

"Have what?" Edward asked, Lillian raising a perfect brow at her brother, "of course I have it, what idiot would lose an engagement ring!"

"Good, you heard mother, she wants Grandchildren so I hope for her sake Faith says yes." Edward shook his head with a smile at his sister before following her into the room.