🎄 Underneath the Tree 🎄 Zarry

Eight ❄️

The next day, uncle Ian with Judie and their kids come quite early in the morning. Harry remembers his mom mentioning that they might come in for a bit but it slipped his mind. Nina and Lily are still very young and ever since Lily was born about two and a half years ago, they stopped coming to the cabin for the entire holiday. It's been a small controversy but schlepping things for two toddlers around couldn't have been fun for anyone.

    They have all spent Thanksgiving together and truth be told, Harry prefers Nina and Lily over Matt and Jane. They haven't learned what sarcasm is yet and even if Nina might've braided his hair so tight he considered just cutting it off before, it was all in good fun. She's five, not a professional hairdresser.

    Nina runs to Harry once she sees him when they get in right after breakfast, yelling at him in glee as he picks her up.

    "Ahhh, you're so big now," Harry pretends to drop her before lifting her up again. "You grew a foot since Thanksgiving. What have they been feeding you?"

    "Mommy gave me spinach yesterday and I didn't like it," Nina pouts. "Do you have candy?"

    "Candy?" Harry squawks dramatically. "All your teeth will rot!"

    "Don't give her anything," Judie says as she comes to Harry and gives him a quick kiss on the cheek. "She had two gingerbread cookies on the way here."

    "Don't worry," Harry gives her a smile. "Tell that to the cousins that don't even know what a gym looks like and live off of instant ramen at college."

    "I heard you!" Matt yells from somewhere.

    "Good!" Harry yells back at him. "Think about your arteries!" he looks back at Nina. "You wanna play hide and seek? Or with Evie?"

    "Evie!" Nina screeches with excitement. "She's here?"

    "Yes, she's here," Harry affirms. "She's in my room with my... boyfriend. I'll tell him to bring her down, yeah?"

    "Okay," Nina nods. "Can we play hide and seek until then?"

    "Of course, we can," Harry says and sets her down on the floor. "Go hide. I'm counting to hundred."

    "No peeking!" Nina calls out to him as she runs further into the house.

    "No peeking!" Harry repeats and pulls his phone out of his jeans. He shoots Zayn a text, telling him that his baby cousins are here and they wanna see Evie. He's sure Lily will be excited to see her too. He hopes Zayn is already up, which Harry supposes he is because of the general noise and commotion that has been going on for at least twenty minutes now. But it's still not even 10AM and in the past few days Harry has learned that Zayn sleeps like a corpse.

    He ends up turning up downstairs in around fifteen minutes, Evie in his arms. Harry's already in the living room, where almost everyone is, some Lifetime Christmas film on TV but no one's really paying attention.

    "Look who's here," Harry gently nudges Nina to look up from her book. She does look up and squeals when she see Evie. Before grabbing her, she does notice Zayn too.

    "Hello, I'm Nina," she says, reaching her hand out for a handshake. "Are you Harry's boyfriend?"

    Zayn laughs, throwing Harry a quick amused look before squatting down to be at Nina's eye level. "Yeah, I am. I'm Zayn, nice to meet you, Nina. I brought Evie down for you. She was napping so I think she's gonna want to play with you now."

    "Evie always wants to play with me," Nina says confidently and reaches for Evie. Zayn looks at Harry, asking if it's okay without any words. Harry just nods at him with a small smile. Nina has been more than great with Evie. Usually, he thinks that little kids and pets can be a disaster but Nina has been thoroughly vetted. Evie hasn't been traumatized so far and Harry hopes she won't be.