Page 49 of Christmas Spirit
“Christmas Day,” Georgie said, a small smile tugging at his lips as he gazed into Roland’s eyes. “It’s all a bit different to last year, isn’t it?”
Roland nodded, and looked down into the sparkling pale gold in his glass. Georgie studied the man who, in the summer, would become his husband.
The slight shadow under Roland’s eyes was evidence of how relentlessly he’d worked over the year. Georgie knew his own face betrayed the same telltale signs. They had thrown themselves into their new lives together, rushing forward at a frantic, breakneck pace.
It had been breathtaking, what they’d achieved in just twelve months, but it had brought them so much.
A successful restaurant known as much for its laid-back vibe as it was for the excellence of its food, so much so that they were booked out solid for weeks and weeks ahead. It had brought them their own home, a cosy terraced cottage in a tucked away street just a stroll away, instead of Roland’s grand but sterile town house.
Most of all, it had brought them to each other, two men, different in so many ways, yet who fitted together like the two heart shaped locks that had been fastened to one another a year ago today.
Georgie placed his flute on the table and smiled as he turned his engagement ring around and around on his finger.
“Why have you got that dopey grin on your face?”
Georgie looked up at Roland, who was doing his best to look cool and superior, but the smile pulling at his own lips gave him away.
“Just thinking about the way our lives have changed. Imagine if we hadn’t got lost in the snow, and followed the signs to the hotel — the hotel we never found out the name of, or where it was,” Georgie added, his voice dropping.
He kept his eyes trained on Roland’s. They rarely talked about the time they spent in the snowbound hotel. The hotel with no other guests. The hotel with no staff, other than a white-bearded old man with twinkling blue eyes.
“Do you think we would find it again?” Georgie asked quietly.
Roland tilted his head, his eyes narrowing. “I don’t think so.” He spoke slowly, as though weighing each word. “We found it when we needed to, and I don’t just mean because of the weather. It was like we needed to find a safe place, where it was just us, away from the world with all its constraints.”
“Where we could be more than the Executive Chef and the kitchen boy. Where we could be just Roland and Georgie. I—I sometimes think it was the hotel that found us, not the other way around.”
Georgie felt the heat throb in his face. His words sounded whimsical, almost silly. He expected Roland to laugh, but instead his fiancé nodded, his face serious and thoughtful.
“I think you’re right. We were both drowning, in our own way. The hotel, and Nicholas, were our lifeline.”
Roland took Georgie’s hands in his. Georgie’s skin tingled with the touch, the way it always did, and always would. He waited, knowing Roland had more to say.
“We could spend the rest of our lives looking for the hotel, but, honestly, I don’t think we’d ever find it because I don’t think we’re meant to, or not now. I believe — hope — that others will. Others who have lost their way and need a little, or a lot, of help to find their direction. The way we did.”
Their eyes met and held, their hands linked together and warm. Georgie brushed his front teeth across his lower lip. The words he wanted to say, they were crazy, impossible, fantastical—
“Who do you think Nicholas was, or is? Really?”
He held his breath, not sure, suddenly, if he wanted Roland to answer.
“I think… I think he was the man who brought us both our best and most precious Christmas gift ever.”
Georgie closed his eyes as his fiancé brushed his lips across his in the gentlest of kisses.
We’re each other’s gift, for Christmas, and the day after, and the day after that…The thought was as rich and luscious as the champagne Georgie tasted on Roland’s lips.
“It’s snowing,” Roland murmured.
Georgie followed Roland’s gaze. Huge, fat, feathery flakes floated in the winter sky on the other side of the big, plate glass window.
“There was no snow forecast,” Georgie said, getting up and moving across to the window.
The snow was coming down fast. As it settled, it softened the hard edges of the normally busy London street, that now was quiet and empty, and where no light shone, other than a single, softly glowing street lamp.
“No,” Roland said, coming up behind Georgie and coiling his arms around his waist. “But I’m glad it is. It seems apt, somehow. Come on, let’s get home where we can really start our celebrations.”
Georgie laughed and squirmed as Roland nuzzled into his neck. They were each other’s biggest and best Christmas gift, and they were in need of unwrapping.
Coats, hats, and gloves pulled on, and scarves wound around their necks, lights were flicked off, and the door locked. Arm in arm, and holding each other tight, they made their way home through the silent, deserted, snowy street, turning the corner as the lamplight faded to black behind them.
