Catfish and the Bottlemen Imagines

The Christmas Wish Part 2

🤍 Van's POV 🤍

"We both need a pound for the Christmas raffle... and we can't wear our uniforms today, it's Christmas jumper day!"

"You burnt the toast AGAIN! Ughhh I can't eat it!"

"I want braids today Daddy, Maisie said she's going to wear braids and we said we were going to match!"

It's going to be one of those days, I can just tell. My head's spinning and it's not even 8am yet. I gulp the dregs of my tea down and turn to face my children. How can two such angelic beings be so goddamn exhausting?

"C'mon kids, go easy on me, one at a time," I smile weakly at them, digging into the pocket of my skinny jeans and coming out with a handful of fluff. "Damn it, I've not got any change on me... who carries loose change these days anyway?"

"Mummy always does... she has everything we need!" Leo pipes up, his gap-toothed grin faltering as his big sister elbows him harshly in the ribs. "Oww!"

"Hey, hey, what was that for?" I swiftly turn to Grace and she offers me nothing but a shrug. "Gracie... c'mon..." I glare at her pointedly and her little face eventually creases into a sheepish frown, her voice quiet and tentative when she finally speaks.

"I told Leo not to say that stuff about mummy... you know... about how she looks after us better."

Ouch... that stings. I must visibly wince as Grace jumps down off the breakfast bar stool and immediately flings her arms around my waist. "I didn't mean it daddy, I didn't mean it to sound like that. You're the best daddy there is! You're just as good as mummy, you're just different, you do stuff in a different way, that's all."

That's one way of phrasing it...

"It's okay angel, I know what you mean," I sigh, planting a soft kiss in her parting, stroking her hair. "I'm trying my best honey, I really am."

"I know you are daddy."

Leo jumps down too, not wanting to miss out on the opportunity for a cuddle and I envelope him as well, all of us glued together in a big family bear hug in the middle of the kitchen.

"I'll call in to the corner shop on the way to school and get you some change. We don't have Christmas jumpers but Leo... go and grab your felt tips, we can make our own. And Grace... go get your brush, I'll see what I can do."

The kids break away and I run my hands through my hair, taking a deep breath. I'd never imagined that having children would be quite so challenging and relentless, but then again I'd never signed up for this.

Having kids was always my end goal of course, it was my ultimate wish come true, a culmination of everything that I'd worked towards and hard for. I'd been saving for as long as I could remember, squirrelling away a portion of money from touring before we even got signed in preparation for this part of my life. It was supposed to be a good life, a better life. It was supposed to be more meaningful... and it was. I loved them so much it fucking scared me sometimes. It's just that whenever I envisioned this picture-postcard idealised dream I wasn't doing it alone. I was always with somebody, it was a partnership. I was doing it alongside the woman I loved... the mother of my children.

"What are we gonna do with these?"

Leo's enquiring voice breaks me out of my troubled thoughts and I see him standing there holding his pack of brightly coloured felt tip pens aloft.

"You'll see... c'mon take this off." I scoop him up to sit on my knee at the kitchen table, helping him to shrug out of his school uniform jumper. "We don't need no shop-bought naff Christmas jumpers, we'll make our own. They'll be just as good... nah... actually they'll be better... miles better. Now what d'ya want? Santa? Rudolph? A Christmas tree?"