I scoffed in response and tilted my head to touch his. “You’re a sex fiend, you know that?”
***
We all enjoyed our Christmas lunch along the extended dining room table, which was covered in a white damask table cloth and topped with a white bone china dinner set and silver cutlery. I’d placed Christmas crackers at every place setting and sprinkled gold and silver glittered stars all over the table top—stars now being one of my favourite things.
Charli had made name place settings out of gold and silver cardstock, having matched my theme and cut them into star shapes.
I’d sat Rick next to me, in the hope I’d keep him away from my grudge holding family, and surprisingly, it had not felt weird sitting in between him and Bryce.
Bryce was faced the other way, chatting to Lucy, and I had not yet cracked open my Christmas cracker, so I turned to Rick—my cracker pointing directly at him—and offered the challenge.
“Don’t cheat like you always do.”
“I don’t cheat,” he said with a wicked grin.
“You do. Look you’re holding it wrong. That’s cheating.”
“How am I supposed to hold the bloody thing?”
I shook my head at him. “You’re such a liar,” I blurted out.
Noticing that the room had gone a little silent at my choice of words, I quickly continued our harmless argument to reassure the eavesdroppers that were our family. “You know exactly how to hold it, Rick. Like this.” I rearranged his hand into the correct position. “Ready?” I smiled, “Go.”
We both wrenched our ends of the cracker, creating a loud snap and tearing the giant foil lolly-shaped novelty apart. The content’s—the winner’s prize—went hurling into the air and across the table, smacking Jake right in the middle of the face. Everyone held their breath, except for Olivia who pointed at her uncle, saying ‘ouch’.
I bit down on my lip in order to supress an outburst of hysterics while Rick raised his hands in surrender.
“Accident, Mate.”
Jake was still stone faced, and for once I couldn’t tell if he was about to lose his shit or laugh at the funny side.
It wasn’t until Scarlet-Johanna snorted a laugh at him, that everyone else followed suit, including Jake. Nate picked up the bundled prize that had rolled in his direction after bouncing off Jake’s nose. He unfolded the paper hat and fitted it to Jake’s head then read out the festive joke.
“What do you call a dog in the dessert?” Nate announced slowly.
Most of us shrugged our shoulders.
Jake deadpanned “A hot dog.”
Johanna snorted.
“No,” Nate groaned.
Charli laughed.
And Olivia threw something and said ‘ouch’ again.
Nate waited until we were all quiet then happily announced, “Sandy Claws.”
We all groaned.
***
You know you’ve had a good Christmas feed when your stomach is full to the brim with seafood cocktail, roasted turkey, glazed ham, golden crisp potatoes, pumpkin, and steamed greens. If that wasn’t enough to satisfy your hunger, you would then indulge in Christmas pudding and custard, Pavlova and trifle, and every few seconds you’d pop chocolate-coated nuts and lollies into your mouth. Once you eventually stopped eating, you’d have that increasing urge to undo your pants, followed by a developed waddle, and a hand lightly placed on your bulging gut together with a screwed up look on your face that said ‘urgh! I won’t ever eat again.’
Most of us were showing those signs as we all moved back into the lounge area to exchange our gifts.
“Best Christmas meal, ever!” Jake exclaimed as he rubbed his gut and let out a belch. “Excuse me. See what I mean?”
Scarlet-Johanna was the only who found that funny.
“So my Christmas dinners have been shit, have they?” Mum asked defensively.
“Na, Mum, not at all. This one was just better,” Jake winked at her.
“Can we open presents now”? Charli asked anxiously.
“Yes,” I sighed in surrender, sending the kids haywire with the ripping and shredding of Christmas paper.
Jen and Lucy spent the next few minutes removing bits of that paper from their babies’ mouths and clenched hands, while everyone else was deep in discussion of some kind or another.
I sat back and watched the excitement and rejoicing, and as crazy as it was, the scene before me was one of the reasons I loved Christmas so much; everyone just seemed happy. All resentment, bitterness, and dislike were checked at the door, replaced by contentment, laughter, joy and cheerfulness—it was bliss.
Bryce had placed envelopes under the tree for my brother, sister, and mum and dad. He’d even put one under there for Rick. I was curious as to their contents, hoping to God it wasn’t money. Instead, he’d organised Clark Incorporated Hotel Family Cards, so that my family could stay at any of his hotels around the world on any day, at any time. I was completely stunned.