It was two days before Christmas and now that he was off until the morning of the twenty-sixth, Esposito finally allowed himself to get into the full Christmas spirit. He'd managed to fit in a little gift-buying here and there on nights when Meredeth had reviews to cover, and had slowly accumulated a little mountain of gifts under the tree at Meredeth's Chelsea townhouse. He knew it was a big step to be celebrating a major holiday with his girlfriend when they'd been together not quite three months but it didn't feel so scary when he saw that she'd put an almost equal amount of packages under the tree with his name on them as well. It felt, as it always did with her, right.

Now came an equally important step for him - taking her to his parents' for Christmas dinner. He'd never brought a girlfriend home for Christmas, so taking Meredeth was a major statement to his family; of course, she didn't know that part, he didn't want to make her any more nervous than she already was. Despite having spent time with his sister, and visiting his mother's bakery, it was the first time she would be going to his parents'. She was plenty occupied by that, no matter how cool she tried to play it. He saw the extra fidgeting with her hair, her scarf, her keys; the last one never failed to make him a little nuts as there were few sounds that made him lose his mind like jangled keys.

He grasped her mittened hand in his leather gloved one. 'Don't be so twitchy. You've met them before.'

'Yeah, when there was a bunch of other people around to distract them.'

'They like you.' Esposito tugged her in for a kiss, glad he could make her mind melt a little as he heard that breathy little sigh in her throat. 'Believe me, you'd have known otherwise right away,' he added as he opened the door. 'Hello? Anyone home?'

A noise-bomb errupted as Lili and Rosalita both appeared in the front hallway wearing festive looking red sweaters and dark jeans; Rosalita wore a pink and yellow striped apron over hers. The condo smelled deliciously of roasted meat and spices as welcoming as a warm hug, which Meredeth got from both Esposito women.

'So good to see you, my dear!' Rosalita crowed as she pulled Meredeth tight against her. She shoved her back to arm's length, gave her the once over. 'You need to eat, you're losing weight since I last saw you.'

Meredeth bit her tongue to staunch the reply she was watching her weight. Instead, she braced herself for the onslaught of Lili and wasn't disappointed when the tiny woman snagged her around the waist, rocked back and forth.

'Oh, hermano, guess what! Cam's here!'

At this, Esposito's eyes went round. 'No shit! He's home?'

'Well, home for a couple of days. He leaves again on the twenty-eighth.' Lili twisted her wedding rings nervously. 'He'll be there for another five months.'

Meredeth looked around, hoping someone would explain when a blonde man strolled out from the kitchen with a glass of wine which he passed to Lili. He was shorter than Esposito, a bantam five-eight, but solid as a brick wall. He bro-dapped knuckles with Esposito before wrapping his hand around Lili's waist.

'This must be the infamous Meredeth I've heard so much about. Nurse Second-Lieutenant Cameron George,' he introduced himself with a grin and outstretched hand.

'Nice to meet you.'

'You seem like you got a good head on your shoulders from what Lili says, so what are you doing hanging around with this chump?' Cam gave Esposito a friendly shove in the shoulder.

'Well-'

'Is that Meredeth? Get in here, girl, Rosie says you're too skinny!'

The bellow came from the living room and Meredeth, having had Rosalita spirit her coat away along with the bag of gifts she'd brought, strolled in to see Alejandro Esposito seated on a comfortable-looking couch as The Bells of St Mary flickered on the television screen. His large face with its deep-set brown eyes was split into a grin as he waved one of his dinner-plate sized hands in a 'come here' gesture. He gave her the once-over that last barely two seconds and snorted. 'She's right, you've lost weight. What's the matter, my boy start cooking for you and you lost your appetite?'

'Oh, no, sir, I'm just trying to watch what I eat right now.'

'Why? Christmas is for feasting and enjoying, not counting calories.'

'Papa, I told you,' Lili said in the same tone a thirteen year-old girl would use, 'Meredeth's going to be in FHM and Bombshell, and she's doing the photo shoot in February.'

'Thank you, Foghorn Lili-horn,' Esposito said in a voice he hoped would clue his sister in to shut her trap. Much as he loved his only sibling, the girl had zero filter on her mouth. It was why she'd never been invited to plan surprise parties, or been told about engagements ahead of time as she couldn't keep the time of day to herself. He walked over to Meredeth, passed her a glass of wine he'd poured. 'It's a magazine that has models in tight clothes who tend to call women with nice figures like Meredeth 'plus-sized',' he explained off of Alejandro's questioning look.

'Ha!' Rosalita's oath rang out from the kitchen as she put the finishing touches on the roast pork. 'Lili showed me that magazine at the news-stand, and if you ask me, those girls are minus-sized. Real men like a beautiful woman with some meat on her bones. Speaking of which, dinner is ready so everyone go wash up.'

Meredeth wandered into the living room, rubbing a hand over her too-full stomach. Dinner had been an insanely delicious affair like she'd never tasted; all her Christmases had been full of roasted duck with gravy and potatoes, and apple-jelly donuts her grandmother made from scratch. Rosalita had served traditional Puerto-Rican cuisine including roasted pork, fried fish, yellow rice with ham, and bite-sized pasteles - the calzone-like dish stuffed with raisins, plantains and bacon - all washed down with strong coffee, spiced coconut eggnog and sweet red 'plonk', so named for the sound the home-brewed wine made when it hit the glass.

She'd helped with the dishes despite Lili and Rosalita's protests, but Meredeth's conscience wouldn't have permitted her to sit idly by. Now that the task was finished, she'd taken her plonk into the living room and was looking at the various photos plastered on every available space. She zeroed in on one of a young boy at a beach-side picnic table taking a bite of a cheeseburger the same size as his head.

'That's me,' Esposito said behind her, as he walked up to give her a tight squeeze.

'Oh the belly.' But she tilted her head so her cheek brushed against his temple. 'And I knew it was you, hard to miss those ears.'

'I was about seven there, and I wanted the same burger my dad was eating. Took me nearly an hour to finish it, but by God, I was going to do it come hell or high tide.'

Lili stepped into the living room with a plate of post-dinner sweets, and just watched her brother and his girlfriend. They were already such a solid unit, having gone through things some didn't face in six months or a year. But more than that, it was in the little gestures - the way he'd passed her the pepper for her sweet potato and pumpkin soup when she'd only looked up and down the table, her hand on his when his face flushed fuschia as Lili told the story of little Javi and the goat, and now, the way his chin rested on her shoulder as he told her about the family history through pictures, the tilt of her head against his.

She cleared her throat and was almost sad to see them break apart at the noise. 'Dessert,' she said, setting the tray on the table, 'and present time. Javi, your hat's by the stockings.'

'Oh, sweet.' Esposito sat on the floor by the tree and Meredeth couldn't help but laugh as he donned a siren red cow-boy hat bedecked with silver garlands and a sprig of mistletoe on a bouncy spring at the front. He looked at her, flicked a finger under the brim as Lili knelt by the coffee table, shuffled a deck of cards. 'Care to help me, little lady?'

'Oh, I think you can rustle up those packages just fine, Cowboy Jose.'

Esposito grinned at her as the rest of the family assembled, and he divvied up the presents; he noted too the glint of surprise in Meredeth's eyes as she got her own little pile in front of her. A highest-hand round of poker determined who would go first, with the lucky duck being Rosalita.

'I think I want this one,' she said, picking up Meredeth's and ripping through the shiny green paper with the efficiency of the Tasmanian Devil on a caffeine high. 'Oh, Alejo, look at this picture frame. It's beautiful.'

'Javi said you take a lot of photos, so I thought a frame would be something you could use.'

Rosalita smiled, knowing exactly what picture she would put in there when the time was right. 'Well, then I think it should be your turn next.'

Meredeth picked out the gift bag with Rosalita and Alejandro's names on it, judged from the green tissue paper that it was a book of some kind. Her guess was accurate when she unwrapped a cook book of Puerto Rican dishes. She paged through it, saw the recipe for the heavenly pork roast they'd enjoyed, then froze when she saw there was a little note on the inside cover. To Meredeth, Feliz Navidad from Mami and Papa Esposito. Her fingers brushed over it as she felt her throat clog. 'It's wonderful,' she managed, afraid she'd embarrass herself. To her utter chagrin, two fat tears splattered onto the book.

'What is it?' Esposito felt his nerves go to jelly. He'd never seen her cry before, not when it was unrelated to one of her night terrors. He scooted closer, rubbed a supportive hand over her back as she pointed at the jotted inscription on the inside cover. 'Oh, Mami, that's perfect.'

'Is something wrong?' Rosalita looked worried.

'No, it's just I've never had a present from a mom and dad together.' She put her hand over Esposito's, which rested by her elbow. 'It's the sweetest thing I've ever received.'

'Say that again, once Javi figures out you can make arepas de coco you'll want to beat her over the head with it,' Lili teased, hoping to bolster Meredeth's spirits. 'Who's next?'

By the time they arrived back at Meredeth's in Chelsea, Meredeth felt more than a little exhausted. She'd never felt more welcomed by a family in her life, and had never ached for her mother more. After the main presents, they'd also done small stockings, including one for Meredeth which had included a box of tea, refills for her fountain pen, and a jar of anatto oil to go with her new cookbook. It didn't help either that Rosalita had included some apple fritters amongst the sweets they snacked on; the simple consideration for her grandmother's tradition had almost made the waterworks start up again.

Now sitting in her new living room with her tree's lights twinkling, she sipped hot tea Esposito made for them as Arturo gnawed away on one of his Nyla-Bones; the sound was akin to a shovel being scraped over blacktop soundtracked by Harry Belafonte's Christmas album.

'That went pretty well,' she commented when Esposito sat on the couch at her feet, put them in his lap while he drank coffee with too much cream.

'Are you kidding? They loved you.' He didn't bother adding he was equally shocked when he saw the note on the inside of her cookbook from his parents. 'I think there's still one more gift for you, though.'

'Really? Between the book from them, and the iTunes card from Cam and your sister, and the little trinkets in the stocking they did for me, I don't know what else there would be.'

'All I know is Lili gave me this,' Esposito plucked the wrapped box from Meredeth's bag of loot and passed it to her, 'when you were in the bathroom and my parents had gone into the kitchen to make coffee.'

' "Mere, I got one of these at my bachelorette party and thought you might like to have one for you and Javi. Add to it as you like. Love Lili." 'Meredeth shook the present a little, surprised at the rattle from inside and wasted no time in shredding the paper to reveal a white plastic box with the words 'Toy Box' inside a red heart and underlined with three little x's. Intrigued, she lifted the lid; the burst of laughter escaped her lips in part amusement, part embarrassment. Inside was an assortment of massage oils, an artificial red rose, a variety of flavoured novelty condoms, a pair of naughty dice, some silk scarves, and a home-burned copy of The Red Shoe Diaries. 'Wow.'

'No wonder she wanted you to open that back here,' Esposito managed, his brain running rampant with a kaleidoscope of Meredeth-centric fantasies. He picked up the bottle of edible coconut massage oil, pursed his lips. 'This will make for a very merry Christmas, indeed.'

R&R&Enjoy.