by Anna Martin
The whole of our living room area, which was on the top floor of the building, was covered in tinsel and lights and assorted Christmas décor. The tree (that we’d had to drag up two flights of stairs to get in place) was covered in lights, decorations hanging from the ceiling, tinsel draped on any surface that could support tinsel-drapery, baubles and candy canes and twinkly lights and fake snow on the windows. It was gaudy. It was horrific.
It was Chris. So I loved it.
While he continued to bake and sing along to the radio, I grabbed my new laptop and fired it up to answer some emails while sat at the breakfast bar, away from his floury hands. Despite the fact that Christmas break was well underway, I still had the occasional one of my students sending me an email asking for advice or help with assignments. If I didn’t have any messages to answer I liked to stay on top of the news websites.
I wasn’t paying much attention to what Chris was doing, although I couldn’t help but notice when he switched the trays around in the oven and his cookies were set out to cool. He seemed to be done, for today at least.
It didn’t take long for him to do the few dishes and put the kettle on to boil, making a pot of the Christmas coffee I’d picked up that week when doing our grocery shopping.
“Thanks,” I said as he handed me a mug, hot and strong, as I liked it.
I’d always thought there was something special about being able to spend time with someone without the need to fill each moment with conversation. Being with Chris was just easy.
I’d already finished wrapping up most of our gifts, but apparently Chris had done some last minute shopping without me. After dinner he spread himself out over the floor in the living room with paper and bows and confetti to wrap into the layers.
I left him to it, occasionally providing a finger to hold a bit of paper in place before he taped it and watched the TV, sprawled out on the sofa. The gift-exchanging celebration with our family and friends would happen on Boxing Day, a tradition I’d brought with me from Scotland which, apparently, Americans did not share. It originated from the times when people still had servants and on the day after Christmas they’d be given a box of gifts – usually food or clothes – from the master of the house. The day was a public holiday in Britain and we were going to celebrate by inviting almost everyone we knew to spend the day with us.
For me, the most important part of the holiday would be spending it with my daughter. In the past year Chloe and I had continued to grow closer, mostly due to Chris’s intervention. She had turned fifteen over the summer and was starting to mellow and mature, something I was intensely relieved at.
She was going to be coming over with her mother, Luisa, who was one of my oldest friends (she had long since graciously forgiven me for accidentally knocking her up when we were eighteen), her younger siblings (with whom Chris was hopelessly in love – an emotion that was reciprocated by the children in question) and her step-father, Mike. Also joining the fray were two of Chris’s former bandmates, John and Lexi, who’d just welcomed baby Ruby into their family and my own sister Jilly. My friends Adam and Marlene were coming too, with their children. Needless to say, with the number of people we were expecting, we had bought in extra food for the occasion.
When the last of the gifts was wrapped I pulled Chris up onto the sofa and into my arms, where he settled back against my chest. The only lights in the room came from the glow of the TV and the twinkling of the tree in the corner, and the soft warmth of the fire on the other side of the room. I hadn’t pulled the heavy curtains over the windows even though I knew I should, to stop the heat escaping. There was something about these long winter nights that I just loved, looking out into either beautifully clear nights, when all the stars were visible, or when the sky was heavy and close with snow.
Chris sighed and turned his head against my chest, tilting his head up so he could kiss my chin. Even after the year or more that we’d been together, he still had a way of making my stomach flutter with lust and excitement and love.
“Need to go to bed soon,” he said, pointing to the clock, which read eleven thirty. “Or Santa won’t come.”
I laughed and wrapped my arms around him, pressing a kiss to the crown of his head.
“Come on, then,” I said. “Help me turn all of this off.”
We made short work of the task; the decorations had been up for weeks and I had started to remember which plug sockets to go to when switching the lights off. Chris bolted the door and I checked that my grumpy cat, Flea, was inside before falling into bed.
Even though I had the heat on it was still colder in our bedroom than in the living room, which was in the attic of the building. Chris snuggled into my chest, tangling our legs together with the comforter pulled up high on our shoulders. For a few minutes all I could hear was his deep breathing, then he hummed low in his chest and turned to seek out my kisses.
I wasn’t surprised that he wanted this – to be fair, he always wanted this. Chris used sex as a way to connect, to share something beautiful and intimate that belonged to only us. Before I’d met him I wasn’t a particularly sexual person, but he’d drawn that out of me to a point where I was confident enough to be myself and enjoy my sexuality.
He was a sensual person and I’d fallen in love with the way he touched me.
For tonight, he positioned his body on top of mine, aligning our chests and ready-to-be-aroused cocks and held himself there as we exchanged soft, delicate kisses. Our lips rubbed together and his tongue gently flicked out to tease my bottom lip before he redirected his attention down the side of my neck.
I kept my arms wrapped loosely around his waist as he pressed his lips to my skin, over and over. His hair still faintly smelled of the cinnamon he’d been cooking with earlier in the day and, compared to his cold feet, his lips were deliciously hot.
“I love you,” I whispered, wanting him to know this above anything else.
Chris lifted his head from where he’d been kissing my shoulder and smiled at me in the dark.
“I love you too,” he said and returned his mouth to mine.
With my arms holding his body close I rolled Chris on to his back, taking over his previous position and taking my turn to lavish attention on his body. He pushed his hips up to meet mine, effectively telling me to pay attention to his cock. Laughing softly, I pinned his hands to the bed and pressed our foreheads together, grinding my hips into his and sliding our erections together through two layers of fabric.
“Rob, please,” he said.
“Please what, sweetheart?” I asked. “What do you want?”
It was a fair question; even though I mostly topped, I was willing to switch if that’s what he wanted. His mood was no indication of his sexual desire, either… sometimes when he appeared most demanding and aggressive he wanted me inside him and would take himself inside my body with a heat and passion I’d come to recognise as uniquely his.
“I want you,” he said, wrapping his hand around the back of my neck and drawing me down in to another achingly soft kiss.
We both kicked off our underwear and abandoned it somewhere under the sheets. I wanted everything from him, everything at once. Chris’s hands stroked reassuringly up and down my sides as we groaned into the kisses, tongues and lips and teeth clashing as my erection poked underneath his balls.
He lifted his legs and wrapped them around my waist, his feet digging into my arse as he encouraged me to push further back between his cheeks. I indulged him for a moment then pulled away to find the tub of his favourite lube that he kept in his nightstand.
I kissed over his chest, the inked lines and rich colour of his tattoos as my fingers searched for his puckered hole, running my lubed fingers over it as I switched my attention to his nipple. Chris laughed breathlessly as I teased him, his body playing into mine as he ran his fingers through my hair and pinched at his own nipple – the one that my teeth weren’t clamped around.
We’d learned so much about each other over the pas
t year, both as people and as sexual partners. I knew his body, how to make him twitch and squirm and groan with pleasure when I finally gave him what he wanted and pushed my fingers up inside him.
Chris threw his leg over my waist to give me better access to his body and I obligingly slipped a second finger in next to the first, stretching him gently and pressing against his prostate. He gasped prettily, just like I knew he would, and reached for his cock. Unlike me, Chris could hold off on stroking himself for ages, drawing pleasure from other parts of his body first.
When I was satisfied that I wasn’t going to hurt him I smeared some extra lube on my cock and moved between his legs. We kissed hard for a moment, reassuring each other, then I pushed hard into him. His back arched sharply off the bed as he hissed.
“Okay?” I asked.
Chris grunted softly as he melted back, then took a deep breath. “Good pain,” he said.
I understood. Only being half-way in, I rocked forward again, more gently this time, until my cock was buried all the way and I was more than a little lost in him. Chris clung to me, all arms and legs and his lips on my neck.
We moved together seamlessly. His cock was trapped between our stomachs and I purposefully rubbed against it as I thrust into him, figuring out as many points of pleasure on his body as I could. This was to be one of our patented slow, easy fucks, with neither of us having the energy or inclination to make it fast and wild.
There was time for fast and wild later.
I always liked having his face close to mine when we made love, when he would rest his cheek on my shoulder was even better. I liked to hear all the little noises he would make and those could be lost when we were trying something more acrobatic. Chris would gasp or grunt or whimper with nearly every one of my thrusts, he moaned my name and sighed deeply when we paused to catch our breath.
With one of my arms tucked under his neck the other was free to touch him; I ran my fingers over his cheek and he turned his face against my touch, then kissed my fingertips.
I took that as my permission to speed up a little, dragging out the pleasure for us both, encouraging his hand to his cock for him to tug at it desperately. He liked it when I came inside him, this being the main reason why we so often did it bare, and we were both safe. I sobbed, then cried out as my orgasm tore through my body and Chris kissed up and down my neck, murmuring soft, quiet words against my skin.
While I was still inside him, riding the aftershocks, he shuddered underneath me and came too. It would have been too easy for me to fall asleep like this, with my half-hard cock still inside him. As my breathing evened out I think he figured out that this was a serious possibility and pushed at my shoulder, laughing, to get me to roll off him.
We cleaned up and I found our Christmas pyjama pants out of the drawer. Mine were green with candy canes, and his were red with white snowflakes. They were cheesy, but surprisingly warm, so I reasoned with myself that I was wearing them due to their practicality.
Clean and clothed, Chris wrapped his body around mine, spooning me neatly. I was so nearly asleep anyway, it wouldn’t take much for me to be dragged into unconsciousness.
“Happy Christmas, Rob,” Chris whispered from behind me.
“Merry Christmas, baby.”
“Rob. Rob. It’s Christmas. Wake up.”
His lips kissed up my chest and I wanted to smother him with a pillow and send him back to sleep. Just for a few more hours.
“Oh, really?” I groaned.
“Yes, really. Are you awake? I want my presents.”
I laughed and pulled him on to my chest where he sprawled, knowing that I loved him more when he was here than anywhere else. With my fingers running through his hair, down over his back and up again, a soothing, circular pattern, I forced myself into wakefulness and checked the clock on my nightstand. It was a little after eight in the morning. Not so bad at all.
“Okay. You can have your presents,” I said, then yawned widely. “I’m going to go and make a cup of tea.”
“For me, too,” Chris said, immediately relocating to the warm space my body had left and snuggling there. I tried to mind, and found I couldn’t.
The apartment was cold as I quickly made my way to the kitchen, turning the heat up on the panel in the wall when I passed it. I found out the Christmas teacups Chris had bought; red with white reindeer on them, and I liked them so much I was sure it was going to be hard to pack them away until next year.
It didn’t take long for the kettle to boil and for me to make two cups of tea. I grabbed a packet of nice shortbread biscuits too, deciding that today, biscuits for breakfast was allowed.
Chris was sitting up in bed when I delivered his cup of tea and the cat was sleeping on his feet. He accepted his tea with a smile and a kiss and when I climbed back into bed he silently, and carefully, snuggled back into my side.
We sipped our tea in silence for a few minutes then, without moving, Chris whispered “Presents,” again.
I laughed and set my tea aside, then reached under my side of the bed to pull out a little pile of carefully wrapped gifts. He grinned at me impishly and try as I might, I couldn’t help but kiss him again.
Chris pulled away first, laughing, and pushed my hair back out of my eyes.
“Stop trying to distract me,” he said.
“I’m trying to distract myself,” I told him. His eyes were warm and full of laughter as he kissed me again, a quick, hard kiss before pushing me back.
We both started unwrapping things at the same time; he’d bought me a pair of new shirts, the style that rolled up at the sleeves that I’d started to favour, and new socks, and chocolate. For him, I’d chosen a cable knit sweater that I’d seen him looking at when we were at the mall, a few new jockstraps, since he liked showing his arse off in them, and his newly discovered favourite candy – Turkish Delight.
These were all the little things, as we’d agreed. His big present though, that was under the tree.
Before having a shower and getting dressed I headed to the kitchen to get dinner started. Traditionally, my mother had always cooked a big turkey at Christmas, but it seemed like a lot of effort to go to for the two of us. The ham was a compromise – every few weeks I cooked a joint for dinner one night because it was Chris’s favourite, and there was enough left over to put in sandwiches or salads the next day for lunch.
Since it was Christmas I had found a recipe that used oranges and cloves and honey and brown sugar, it smelled delicious as I prepped everything and stuck it in the oven to slowly roast. I was making honey parsnips and carrots, too, and mashed potatoes and beans and peas with mint. All my favourite things.
Chris had taken it upon himself to be in charge of dessert. While I busied myself with the main course he worked on the other side of the kitchen preparing something huge and chocolatey and gooey that had homemade honeycomb in it. Desserts were his thing, so I mostly left him alone.
Every now and then our paths would cross on the way to the fridge or the sink and he’d give me a hopelessly sappy look and lean in for a kiss. Since this was the first year Chris had spent the holiday away from his family I wanted it to be special for him, for him to not feel like he was missing out on anything.
“How close to being done are you?” I asked as I finished loading up the dishwasher with the few things that I’d used.
“Two minutes,” he said.
“Wanna share a shower?”
This was usually code for wanna go get wet and naked and jerk off?
Chris smirked at me. “Sure.”
“I’ll go get the water warmed up.”
Since moving in, I’d completely renovated the bathroom, keeping the large bath and walk in shower unit, but changing the tiles from white to shades of blue and installing a wooden floor. The result was a room that felt warmer than it had done before, less clinical.
The shower (and the bath, come to think of it) was comfortably big enough for two and when we had time, it was a luxury to share
with him. With the water running, I stripped off my Christmas pyjama pants and the t-shirt I’d worn while preparing dinner and quickly brushed my teeth before stepping in to the hot water.
It didn’t take long for Chris to join me, wrapping his arms around me from behind and kissing across my back from one shoulder to the other. I turned and found his lips with mine, sharing wet kisses as the water poured down between us.
Naked, Chris was even more beautiful to me than he was clothed. When we first met his tattoos had intimidated me, I wasn’t sure how to react to someone who was brave enough to literally wear his emotions on his arms. Over time, I’d started to appreciate the artistic beauty of the images he’d chosen to imprint on himself. Each one of the brightly coloured designs had been carefully selected; not all of them had a particular meaning, but they were all in the same style, making him look like an old sailor.