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It was Christmas Day, and Rowan Whitethorn-Galathynius was reclined on the massive sectional his wife had bought years ago, in order to fit him, and his giant friends. There was a similar couch opposite, which she bought for her and her comparatively small friends.
He was bedecked in matching Christmas pyjamas, a shirt proclaiming him ‘GRUMPY CLAUS’ with a shoddy illustration printed beneath it of him in a Santa hat. His wife had been involved in the design, hence he was frowning — in a majorly exaggerated way.
His wife’s named her ‘MRS CLAWS’, a similarly shit drawing of a cat wearing a Christmas hat, and a turquoise collar declaring it ‘A.A.W.G.’. She was a funny one, his wife, a real fuckin’ hoot and a half.
His kids’ pyjamas were a variation of animal puns, and their own most identifiable personality trait. Their oldest, Oren, who was barely five hadn’t taken his off since they presented the pyjamas to him on the twenty-third, and no matter how hard they tried to get him out of them, they couldn’t. He was irrationally attached to them.
As his wife stood, popping into the kitchen to grab herself another drink, Oren stood from where he was laying out his latest unwrapped gift — a LEGO set he’d practically begged for. He toddled his way to Rowan, and with scrambling legs got himself up onto the sofa.
He squashed the cushions that Rowan had agonisingly plumped the night before, and he couldn’t help but laugh. “Squashing down the cushions so that your uncles are uncomfortable — maybe you’re less like me than I thought. That is all your mother, Ore.”
For once, when he compared his son to the boy’s mother, he didn’t smile, or grin, or laugh and run to tell Aelin. He frowned, and his lips wobbled, and he looked absolutely distraught. “Don’t say that, daddy. Don’t. You don’t know what you’re comparing me to.” His son frowned even deeper, and Rowan's heart broke.
What on earth was going on?
“Kiddo, can you tell daddy what’s wrong?” his son shook his head, and slammed himself into the couch cushions, as if the world were ending. His heart rate picked up with concern, Rowan had no clue what it was that his son was doing, let alone what he was talking about. “Can you whisper it in my ear? So, no one can hear, yeah?”
Oren gave a shaky nod, and scrambled along the cushions to settle himself right next to Rowan, practically breaking his ribs with the force with which he slammed his body into Rowan’s. Oren got himself onto his knees, and grabbed onto Rowan’s hair, yanking his silver locks like they weren’t attached to his head. “Ow, bud, that hurt,” he chastised gently, prying the little fingers from his hair.
He and Aelin had resolved to always be gentle and kind with their children, whilst neither of them had grown up in outright abusive households, they hadn’t grown up in truly happy houses either.
“This gonna hurt e’en more, daddy. Need to get closer, so I can whisper in your ear, so mummy doesn’t hear me. She can’t know, daddy. She can’t!” he emphasised his final point with a foot stomp absorbed by the fluff in the cushion, but it rocked Rowan like an earthquake’s epicentre was directly beneath him.
“Alright, no telling mummy. But let’s tell daddy now, yeah. Because daddy really wants to know, you’re making him worried, Oren.” His tone was muted, calming to his five-year-old.
Placing a foot on Rowan’s thigh to reach his father’s ear, Oren began “Y’know how Mrs and Mr H broke up because he loved other women, daddy?”
“Yeah, I do.” That had been a fun time, the screaming matches were loud and they lived next door. Worse, their making-up was louder.
“Well, daddy, mummy loves other men.” Oren's tone was gentle, and he tried to run a soothing hand up and down Rowan’s shoulder but only served to catch a sharp bit of fingernail in the soft, loose cotton, and snag it. He whimpered as Rowan pulled it out. Rowan pressed an absent-minded kiss to the boy’s sore finger.
Rowan attempted to sit up, going to find the nail scissors he and his wife have stashed all around the house for such incidents, but failed as his son whispered once more, “She loves Santa, daddy. I snuck downstairs yesterday, and I saw her kissing him, just like she kisses you. Gah,” he spat out, horrified by the idea of affection and other ‘things’ between his parents.
Shit. Shit. Shit, Rowan thought. How could he and his wife — his very attractive wife — have been so absorbed in each other that they hadn’t noticed their five-year-old making his way down the ancient, creaky staircase?
And how his son couldn’t recognise him, when he clearly recognised Aelin, he didn’t know. Rowan hadn’t even been wearing a Santa hat, for gods’ sakes.
He wasn’t insulted, he wasn’t. But it did sting a tad.
“Oh, kiddo. Let me grab some nail scissors so you don’t snag your nail again, and then we’ll talk this through.” Rowan placated, finally moving his son off him enough to stand up and stretch. He had been sat for too long, and he certainly wasn’t twenty anymore.
“And don’t tell mum—”
“I won’t, trust me. I won’t tell her.” He felt bad for lying to his son, but this was both too horrifying and too funny not to share with his wife. Maybe he’d tell this story at Oren’s wedding.
Rowan wandered into the kitchen, cool as a cucumber, but quickly changed his attitude when he caught sight of his wife. His body reacted, but he shushed it — and he suddenly remembered why they weren’t able to hear their clumsy, loud, and not-very-sneaky child as he made his way down the stairs last night. He had picked his wife well, so very, very well.
And in turn, she had chosen her husband well.
His hand caught her shoulder, and he dragged her out of the kitchen, until they reached the downstairs bathroom, which he pushed them into. He locked the door and turned around to find his wife with her pyjama shirt off and her matching trousers around her thighs, bent over the sink, a wicked glint in her eye.
“Time for my Christmas present, babe?” she asked, crooking a finger at him, winking, and shaking her hips a tad. Her arse jiggled too, and he had to physically restrain himself from pouncing on her, and delivering on every promise he’d whispered in her ear this morning — whilst their children were heading for their bedroom door, of course.
It was no wonder that the second they were behind a locked door she was practically naked, the snicking of a lock induced a Pavlovian response in them these days. Three young kids, and they were desperately searching for time to be intimate.
“No.” His monosyllabic answer had her pouting, and she ran a hand under herself to entice him, as distracting as she was, he needed to tell her this, “No! your ‘present’ to me yesterday whilst we were setting up stockings is why we’re in here now, and why we need to have a chat.”
“Uh-huh, hence why I’m trying to have you fuck me.” She was not getting the hint.
“No, as in we were so caught up in our kiss last night that we didn’t notice Oren sneaking downstairs just in time for him to witness us together. Kissing. Or as he saw it through his eyes, his mum kissing Santa Claus. He just cornered me on the sofa, and everything.”
“No, oh my gods, no.” Aelin hurriedly pulled her trousers back up, and with a chaste kiss to the top curve of her boob, Rowan pulled her shirt over her head. He couldn’t resist, he loved his wife’s body, “We have to have the talk with him, about Santa not being real. Fuck, I wanted to hold on to that, at least till next year.”
It hurt Rowan’s heart just as much as it did Aelin’s when he thought about how his kids were growing up. If they didn’t have Santa, they still had the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and the Sleepy Monster. (A multi-limbed creature Rowan had invented to get his children to stay in bed after they were tucked in.)
“Yep. Worse than that, he thinks you’re cheating on me, like Mrs H cheated on Mr H. He almost cried when I compared him to you, he’s really torn up about this, and it’s so cute, Ae.” He stroked Aelin’s hair and pressed a kiss to her forehead, letting them rest against each other’s for a moment.
“We need to find out where he heard about Mrs and Mr H, and we need to tell him that—”
“— tell him that Santa’s not real. Perfect, honestly.” Such fun for Christmas, and additionally they’d have to coordinate with telling their other children, as well as their friends so no spoilers were shared between the kids.
A gasp sounded outside of the door, first “Santa’s not real?” at a decibel loud enough that their youngest two children heard — perfect — and then, “I hate you daddy, you told me you wouldn’t tell mummy!” in a hurt tone — perfect — before a final, “have you got the scissors daddy, it got caught on the sofa?”
The life of a parent: it was never simple. But Rowan wouldn’t give any of it up for a chance at billions, he loved his life.