Page 28 of Full Service (West Wales Romance #3)

It was then I noticed Caroline and Mick - each of them were wearing Christmas jumpers too. Caroline’s said TOP and Mick’s said Bottom .

“What the fuck am I missing here?” I asked quietly.

“Language,” Caroline admonished.

“I was told we were all buying each other funny Christmas jumpers,” said Macsen. “It was all very last minute for me but I managed to keep you involved.”

He handed me a wrapped package which I tore open quickly, hiding the front of the bright red Christmas jumper inside in case it was as rude as Caroline’s or Mick’s.

On the front of mine was a big black dog. Underneath, stitched into the jumper was I’m not a pussy kind of guy.

“You are disgusting,” I said to Macsen as I pulled off the gorgeous jumper James had given me and replaced it with the one Macsen had.

“It’s from James, actually,” said Macsen. “He’s been knitting these rude ones and selling them online since about July. Quite the money earner I hear.”

“Well I’m glad he made an exception with ours,” said Caroline. “I know it’s funny to say I’m on top of the household but it’s not exactly rude. Unless it hurts Mick’s feelings, of course.”

Ah. I had to look down at the table in order to stop myself from laughing.

I could feel Macsen’s shoulders shaking in close proximity to me as he held in his own laughter.

When I finally had the courage to look up, Caroline was filling the glasses of wine on the table.

Mick was stirring water into the stuffing on the kitchen countertop but I could see the tops of his ears had gone red.

I got the feeling he might know more than he was letting on about the jumpers.

“Sorry I couldn’t get much this year. I’ll make up for it next year, I promise.” I handed Caroline the bottle of wine I’d wrapped in snowman wallpaper.

“Next year?” Macsen muttered as I took my seat. When I looked at him, one side of his mouth had quirked upward and I felt my cheeks heat. Yes, I was being way too presumptuous. So shoot me, it was Christmas. I was allowed to have hope.

Caroline smiled and took the wine away. Macsen, Gruff and I were all sat around the table and other than the sound of pots bubbling on the stove there was silence for a minute.

How much had Gruff forgiven me? What did he know about Macsen and I?

I looked guiltily between the two brothers for a second.

“Cracker?” Gruff asked after a minute. He was looking at me with a genuine smile so I took one end of the offered cracker. On my other side Macsen held one out. I pulled hard and somehow lost both.

“Typical,” I said. Macsen pulled out the little trinkets from his cracker and stuck the paper hat on me anyway.

“It’s Christmas,” he cautioned me when I reached up to take it off.

So I left it on. It had been long enough since I’d last worn a Christmas cracker hat.

Last Christmas I’d been in a gorgeous restaurant with Brian, ten courses of deconstructed vegetables and celeriac desserts.

I hadn’t heard from him since I’d left, but after the first week I’d hardly given him a thought anyway.

If he contacted me now, he could quite frankly fuck off.

As Caroline brought over the massive gravy boat and a big tub of cauliflower cheese I knew exactly what I’d prefer.

We all dug into the dinner as soon as it was available.

Caroline and Mick had piled up vegetables, turkey and all the trimmings in the middle of the table to take as we pleased.

By the end of the meal I was massaging my rounding stomach.

A couple of rounds of Christmas crackers had us all wearing party hats.

When I looked over at Macsen, a couple of wines down, I wanted to smother him hugs and kisses.

It was ridiculous, being this interested in a man and unwilling to take that final step.

But it was a bloody scary final step. Especially with a man who kept himself so guarded.

But every time I caught him smiling back at me, or he held up his wine glass for a toast, I thought I saw the same look in his eye.

“Dessert?” Caroline asked. She pointed to the selection of Christmas pudding, pavlova and heavy chocolate fudge cake on the counter, and every single one of us groaned in unison. “Maybe later then,” she said. She sounded almost disappointed even as she rubbed at her own stomach.

“Presents,” Mick said, seemingly to himself. And then he looked up at us all. “Let’s do presents. Can’t have Christmas without good presents.”

We all trouped to the living room, glasses of wine in tow.

I grabbed the small bag, feeling inadequate when I saw that everyone had a small pile each.

They’d even set aside a small pile for me.

I felt tears prick at the back of my eyes with the generosity everyone had shown me on Christmas Day. It felt so undeserved.

Macsen sat on the opposite side of the room to me, with Gruff in between us. I didn’t know if it was deliberate, but from the way he kept sneaking glances at me I thought it might have been. I just wanted to cross the room and kiss him.

I watched as Macsen and Gruff tore into their big piles of presents like they were kids. Caroline and Mick didn’t have much to give them when they were younger, so it seemed they were making up for that now.

I opened my own presents from the two of them. They were just the generic kind of presents I knew I’d buy for someone I didn’t know so well - socks, underwear, toiletry sets. But it still felt special that they had put the time into buying for me.

“I don’t know what to say…but thank you,” I said to them after I’d finished unwrapping.

I passed Gruff the present I’d bought him - a Lego X-Wing from Star Wars that Nathan in the Nerd Emporium had assured me he’d been eyeing up, and I’d bought Macsen Cars for Dummies . It was a stupid gift, I knew. But I didn’t know what else to get him without giving my whole bloody heart away.

He grinned at me as he opened it. “Funny.”

“I’m a real jokester.” And we just kept looking at each other.

Until Caroline cleared her throat and I realised that we’d let the world fall away round us. Fucking hell, get a grip .

“Did you get Hywel a gift then, Mac?” Mick asked.

I watched as Macsen turned slightly pink in space between the edge of his beard and his eyes. “Seems stupid now,” he muttered.

I hadn’t been expecting anything from him.

Just a week earlier we’d been back at each other’s throats.

But now in this newfound truce and dalliance, where I wasn’t staying at his flat but I was being invited round by his parents for Christmas dinner, I had no way to expect what Macsen might do. Or might have done for me.

“I’m…going out for some fresh air,” Macsen said. He stood up quickly, swaying as he held his wine and made for the back door.

“…me too,” I said pretty lamely and got up to follow him. It had gotten dark outside, but the bright pink Christmas hat on Macsen’s head made him a pretty easy target to spot. That and I thought by now I could probably pick him out of a crowd of thousands.

Macsen was leaning up against Mick’s tool-shed, holding a cigarette in his hand like he was contemplating it.

“I didn’t know you smoked,” I said.

“I don’t. I nicked this out of Gruff’s pack on the way out. He uses them to de-stress. Don’t know what I’d fucking do with it anyway, I don’t even have a lighter.”

“What is there to stress about? It’s Christmas.” I asked the question despite knowing the answer. My own heart rate was through the roof and didn’t seem to be heading down to Earth any time soon.

Macsen reached into his back pocket and held out a tiny package. It was taped together so thoroughly I had no idea how I was going to get into it. He looked down at the cigarette as if trying to unravel all its secrets rather than look me in the eye.

I finally got one end of the package open and shook the contents into my hand. There was one silver key I recognised well, and another. A car key.

“What the hell?” I asked more to myself than anyone. When I looked up at Macsen he was still looking away.

“What…is this?” I asked.

“Thing is, I know you have a key. That bit is stupid. But it’s…symbolic, you know? I just want you to know even after the argument, you’re welcome to the garage any time. You might have given it to me, but I like having you there. I want you to come and go as you please.”

“And this?” I held up the car key.

“That…so don’t think of it as a huge present, please? A friend of mine was scrapping a beautiful 90s BMW, and I couldn’t let him get trade it in for scrap. It’s a banger but I can restore it. I’ll make it bloody beautiful. And once Calvin has paid for the Aston, you’ll need some way to get around.”

“You bought me a car?” I asked incredulously. “An actual car?”

“Honestly, it was scrap value. I wasn’t buying it for you as such. It was-”

Before Macsen could finish, I’d cut him off with a kiss. I surprised both of us with the force and intensity of it, and I was vaguely aware of the wine glass in my hand slipping out and falling into the grass. I kept the keys tightly gripped in my other hand.

“Thank you,” I said between kisses. “I want you.”

“Here?” Macsen muttered. “Now?”

“No, stupid. I…I want us. I’d like you to be with me and me to be with you. No mixed messages. No possessive words said during a shag. I want to be…I’d like to be your boyfriend. If that’s OK.”

Macsen pulled back and placed one hand on my chest and for one horrible second I worried that he was about to reject me. Then he smiled and leaned in for another quick, chaste kiss that did sweet fuck all to stop me wanting more.

“Of course,” he said. “That’s what I want.

I-tried to put that across in my actions, but maybe I have to use words.

Hywel, I’ve been in love with you for as long as I remember.

I’ve thought of you enough over the last decade.

Even when I fucking hated you. So yes, if you want to be with me. I’m here. For as long as you want me.”

I smiled even as I choked back a sob. Maybe glasses of wine with dinner wasn’t a great idea.

“What do we tell the family?” I asked.

“Well, for now, we keep it quiet…” Macsen tailed off and his face darkened as he looked over my shoulder at something. I turned and looked back at the doorway, where Gruff was silhouetted, mouth wide open and glass of wine slowly dripping onto the floor from where he held it by his side.

“Don’t. You. Dare.” Macsen fixed Gruff with a stare that could have terrified a lesser man.

Gruff shouted even as he kept his eyes on the both of us. “Mum! Dad! You’ve gotten the Christmas wish you’ve had since I was seventeen!”

“What’s that?” Caroline shouted from the living room.

Macsen took a step toward Gruff even as he gripped one hand tighter to my chest.

Gruff smirked. “You’ve got Hywel as a son in law!”

“You’re dead meat,” Macsen said. Gruff ran into the house like child rather than the 32 year old man that he was.

“That pissed off about them knowing?” I asked him.

Macsen took his free hand off my chest and slid it down my arm, and clutched at my hand.

He held it as we stepped toward, and then into the house.

“Not at all,” he whispered close into my ear.

I could see Caroline’s eyes across the open plan kitchen, wide as dinner plates at the intimate contact with her son.

“But I’ll take any excuse to get my own back at my brother. ”

I laughed as he tugged me through the house to sit down next to him on the sofa. Every eye looked down to our hands for a second, but Caroline seemed to snap out of the stupor first. She gave us both a bracing smile and rummaged in a coffee table drawer before pulling out a deck of cards.

“Who’s for Chase the Ace?” she asked.

And that’s how I spent my Christmas night. Playing cards, drinking and eating ridiculous amounts of dessert. With the family that had once and now again treated me like one of their own. And with my boyfriend.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed getting to know Macsen and Hywel as much as I have. That's the end of Hiraeth's saga for now, at least in novel form.