12 days of xmas [BrightWin]

🎁Day 1: the stranger in his bed

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

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Win was fricking tired. His flight had been delayed because of a snowstorm and then, in a chain of bad events, he had missed the layover that would have finally brought him home. And then all the layover flights had been cancelled too so he had been completely stranded, having to sit in the stiff plastic chair at the airport for hours, still wearing his office suit. It was not like he could take into a hotel either since no one knew when the flights would be back on and he was not changing in the airport washrooms, that was where we he drew the line.

Honestly, this whole year had not even been his year so far (he had broken up with another girlfriend and the promotion he was hoping for had been delayed) so he was finally looking forward to leave all the headaches behind, leave the impersonal big city and go on a much deserved holiday for Christmas and New Year's with his family. His fucking job could wait for two weeks. The world would not go under.

Win was working as a Legal Officer at a tech company and had quite a few responsibilities falling on his shoulders. But at least one year (one year!) maybe the higher management could hold off on merging companies or investing in new ventures. For some reason they always pulled these stunts before the holidays, like the end of the year was some kind of a magical deadline.

Don't let old shit follow you into the new year, tie all of your loose ends before this year ends, Win could almost hear his father's voice drone in his head. Go figure, the middle-aged men probably all shared the same sentiment.

"Oh, honey, I'm so happy that you could come, I know how hard it is for you to take days off," Win's mother had ranted over the phone just before the plane took off. "Everyone's excited to see you. We're going to make this Christmas extra special. It seems like many of us has had a rough year this time around." She sighed into his ear. "I have also invited some family friends to spend the holidays with us as well."

There was a sudden noise in the background and then a wailing cry of a very, very vocal baby. Win's mother cooed softly somewhere away from the mouthpiece.

"Well," she said when back on again after some fussy couple of minutes. "This is my cue to go, baby Kao has woken up. Your brother will pick you up at the airport. Let me know when you land for your layover. Love you, honey. Bye, bye~!"

"Bye-" Win was only able to squeeze in at the end before the beeps of a call ended pierced his eardrum, used to his mother monologue-ing at him. Someone had then tapped him on the shoulder and Win looked up, only to find a flight attendant with a stern face motioning for him to turn off his cellphone.

Win's parents had decided to host a big family get-together this year seeing as both of his sisters were finally leaving the nest soon; one was going to get married and the other one was moving away to study abroad. His older brother had also gotten a kid, Kao, so their mother was set on getting that little ball of sunshine (or a poop machine, really) the best first Christmas ever (not that he would actually remember since he was just too young). Some of his older cousins were able to get time off work and a couple of his distant aunts had finally gathered enough courage to get on a long distance flight from Thailand. And of course his grandma, she was getting very old and wrinkly, her memory not what it once had used to be. Who knew, maybe it would be her last Christmas with them so they had to make it count (actually, it has already been quite a few "last" Christmases with her by this point, not to mention that she could probably outlive them all anyway).

So yeah, this Christmas was going to be hectic with all these people gathered under one roof for the next two weeks. It would be a lot of fun but probably also vexing, as always with their family, Win mused with a tiny smile filtering over his lips. He had not seen his family in almost four years, besides that one short time when his sisters came to visit him during their summer vacation. So Win had really missed this, after all these years still not used to living alone in the big city when coming from a big family in a tiny suburban community.