12 Days 'til Christmas ✓

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.