Page 82 of Make You Mine This Christmas

‘Oh God . . . Do I smell of poo?!’

Kit theatrically sniffs her. ‘Just reindeer and... a touch of frozen dickhead.’

‘Oh, ha ha.’

The front door rattles a little as Stella and Luna jump up against it from the inside, whining as they go. When Kit unlocksthe door, they rush out, circling both women and jumping up and down around them.

Once they’re all in the porch with the door closed, the dogs stop bouncing around. Instead, with deep concern, they sniff at Haf and Kit’s dirty clothes as if to say, ‘Just what the heck were you up to without us?’

Taking off the muck-covered Doc Martens is a frankly disgusting task, and Haf pogoes about to avoid having to touch them with her hands any more than she needs to. Not that her hands are particularly clean, either.

Kit pulls a large blue Ikea bag out from a tote bag of bags hanging from the coat hooks. ‘Throw all your stuff in there and we’ll either wash it all or nuke it. Your choice.’

‘Even the shoes? Feels wrong to put shoes on clothes.’

‘I think they’re about as disgusting as the rest of you,’ she says, to which Haf protests with a harrumph. ‘I mean your clothes. Plus, Esther will have a coronary if either of us goes into that house covered in duck shit, so come on. Strip.’

To her horror, Kit just starts undoing her jeans.

Haf’s face is on fire, and she turns away so quickly that she almost slides into the door. ‘I’m not looking!’ she shouts.

‘Fine, but come on, get yours off too. And the blanket mound. I’ll shut my eyes.’

There are plenty of circumstances when Haf wouldn’t think twice about stripping off her clothes, but usually that doesn’t involve stripping in front of the woman she’s trying to convince herself she doesn’t have a crush on while standing in her fake in-laws’ front porch.

She takes a deep breath and just gets on with it.

‘I’m keeping my underwear on.’

‘Obviously,’ Kit mutters.

‘Was it obvious? You told me to strip.’ Haf sulks as she peels her disgusting jumper off over her head.

Haf opens her eyes to put everything in the bag, which she keeps her eyes firmly fixed on and tries to ignore the fact that Kit is also standing in front of her in her underwear, looking intently at the bag.

‘Do you want me to carry that through?’ she offers with a gulp.

‘We’ll take it together,’ says Kit, taking a handle. ‘Your blankets are heavy.’

Together, they drag it through the house, down a corridor off the kitchen. There’s a couple of doors here, and one leads into a compact laundry room. They release the bag in front of the washing machine, and in the confines of this small room, Haf realises that everything really does reek.

Including her.

‘You go upstairs and use the shower on our floor. I’ll clean up in Esther’s en suite, and then get the fire going,’ Kit says, padding back through the house.

Without another word, Haf obeys.

They both wander up the stairs, and Haf stares intently at the steps.

Calvin Klein. They were a black matching Calvin Klein set.

Before her horrible brain can think any more about Kit being half-naked in front of her, Kit disappears into a room on the first floor. Haf continues upstairs, waddling and willing her aching, frozen legs up. She can’t give up, because just collapsing here in her pants would probably be the worst scenario, somehow.

The hot shower is a welcome relief, even if her skin is so cold that it almost burns when she gets in. She was too tired to dig out the shower stuff from Christopher’s room, and knew if she saw the bed, she’d just clamber in and go to sleep, so she picks up a fancy bottle from the side and squeezes out a big blob. Unsure if her hair was wet or pooed on, she decides to wash it too, just to be safe.

At least she smells better now, for definite.

It takes her two attempts to get out because on the first go, the house is so cold that she goes back in and turns the water on to heat herself back up.