by Tara Sivec
“Bev tells me I need to apologize for any part I played in what happened today,” my dad mumbles under his breath, rocking back and forth on his feet as he stares down at Sam. “I’m sorry my wife invited Fat Ralph to the wedding, and I’m sorry that stupid sack-of-shit touched my firework display and ruined my chances of securing the title of neighborhood firework king.”
Mom sighs and glares at him.
“Hey, that’s the best I can do. It’s been a very traumatic day for me,” he tells her, turning back to look at Sam. “We can just call it even. I’ll refrain from cutting off your dick, seeing as how you suffered enough by almost burning the damn thing off.”
Dad tries to hide a chuckle, but is unsuccessful, which earns him a side-eye glare from me and my mother. Thankfully, Sam doesn’t say anything and instead, wraps his arm around my waist and pulls me closer to him on the bed.
“Alright, are we ready to do this thing?” Nicholas asks, moving to the foot of the bed and looking between me and Sam.
We both nod and he clasps his hands in front of him.
“You want the short version, correct?”
Sam and I look at each other and smile, my eyes staying locked on his when I answer my brother.
“As short as possible, please. You never know when the ceiling will cave in or an earthquake or other natural disaster will hit with all of us in the same room at once.”
Everyone chuckles quietly until Nicholas’s face turns serious and he clears his throat.
“Dearly beloved, we are gathered here together, blah, blah, blah. Sam Stocking, do you?” he asks.
“I do,” Sam replies, my eyes filling with tears at how quickly and confidently he answered.
“Noel Holiday, do you?”
I nod my head, my smile growing wider as I stare into Sam’s eyes.
“I do.”
“By the power vested in me through the interwebs, I now pronounce you, Mr. and Mrs. Holiday-Stocking. Quite possibly the cheesiest last name in the history of the world, and I hope to God you don’t hyphen it legally,” Nicholas announces. “Sam, you may now kiss your bride.”
I lean toward Sam, but he pulls his head back before we can kiss.
“Sorry, I know we agreed on the short version, but I just need to say a few things first.”
Moving his arm from around my waist, he presses both of his palms against my cheeks, holding my face in his hands.
“I had an entire page of vows written to say to you, but they were in my pocket and burned when my dick caught on fire,” he tells me with a small smile.
“It’s just a flesh wound,” my father mutters with a laugh from the side of the bed in his horrible British accent.
My mother smacks him upside the back of his head, and Nicholas hands her a box of Kleenex from the table behind him when she sniffles as Sam ignores everyone in the room, keeps his eyes on mine, and continues.
“So, here’s the short version of my vows. I love you because of your family, not in spite of them. I love you because for the first time in my life, I actually have a family even if they’re crazy, and you gave that to me, Noel. You love me more than I ever thought anyone would and you gave me a family,” he whispers, wiping a tear that falls down my cheek with his thumb. “I will happily deal with our family and the chaos that follows them for the rest of my life, because you are worth every messy, loud, insane, firework to the dick moment. I love you, Mrs. Holiday-Stocking, more than anything.”
I sigh, along with every woman in the room, lifting my hands and pressing them against Sam’s that continue to cradle my face.
“That was so much better than what I wrote. My vows didn’t go up in flames, but I think I left them back at the house when I got distracted by fanning my vagina and then you distracted me even more when you pushed me against the wall and unloaded all that pent up—”
“Stop!” My dad interrupts me, his hands flying up to cover his ears. “I’m not allowed to threaten his life anymore now that he finally bought the cow and can get milk whenever he damn well pleases, but that doesn’t mean I won’t lose my shit all over this hospital and make a spectacle of myself if you talk about it right in front of me!”
I roll my eyes when my father finishes with a huff and crosses his arms in front of him, choosing not to make a comment about how he referred to me as a cow. Again.
“Fine, short and clean version,” I quickly continue. “I loved you from the first moment I met you in that airport bar at Christmas. I loved you for making me want to get married when I always thought it was something I never wanted. I loved you for making me realize I only thought I didn’t want it, just because I’d never met the right person. You’re my right person, Sam. I loved you even when I went crazy and refused to move in with you because I thought we didn’t know each other well enough to take that step. I loved you for proposing to me a second time because I went crazy and thought the first one didn’t count.”
My mother blows her nose loudly and I lean toward Sam, pressing my forehead against his. I continue with the rest of what I want to say as fast as I can before I start ugly crying.
“I loved you when I thought your penis would never work again and I knew I’d love you forever even if that turned out to be true. I loved you when I thought my family was killing you with high blood pressure and I went crazy trying to keep you calm and relaxed. I loved you every time we were stupid and didn’t talk about our feelings or problems and it made us both crazy. I loved you even when I sat in your pee and threw a pee-covered toilet seat at your head.”
Scheva groans and Alex sighs.
“See, even Noel and Sam are into Golden Showers. I don’t understand what your hang-up is?” Alex grumbles.
“You peed on me in my bed while I was sleeping!” Scheva shouts.
“This is the worst Fourth of July ever,” my dad complains. “I didn’t get to properly light off my illegal fireworks, I didn’t get to eat any corn on the cob, barbeque chicken or pasta salad, and now my appetite is ruined forever because of all the urine-obsessed yahoos in this room. I don’t understand any of you people.”
Aunt Bobbie pats my dad on the back, grabbing her phone out of her purse and pulling him away from the bed.
“Here, I have some fun porn bookmarked about just this thing that I believe will clear up any confusion,” she tells him, handing him her phone. “If you enjoy the elbow fisting, this should be right up your alley. Take notes and we’ll have a quiz tomorrow over left-over corn, chicken, and pasta.”
Everyone crowds around my father to look at Aunt Bobbie’s phone and Sam and I go right back to ignoring the curses, groans of disgust, and my father shouting, “THAT’S NOT WHERE PEE GOES! DOESN’T ANYONE USE A TOILET ANYMORE!”
We keep our heads pressed together, pretending like we’re the only two people in the room.
“I loved you through seven months of crazy, and I can’t wait to keep loving you for the rest of our lives and every single crazy holiday that comes,” I whisper, finishing the short version of my own vows.
We share a soft, slow kiss in the middle of Sam’s hospital bed while our family argues and watches porn in the corner of the room. Everyone stops talking and Sam and I end our kiss when we hear a couple of faint pops outside the window. We turn our heads together to look outside, surprised to see fireworks exploding in the night sky, not too far from the hospital. Nicholas flips the light switch by the door and the room goes dark while everyone quietly moves around Sam’s bed to stand in front of the window and watch the show.
“Not as good as mine would have been, but they’re not too shabby either,” my dad states softly as bursts of colors light up the dark room every few seconds.
He turns his head to look back at Sam and nods.
“Happy Fourth of July, son,” he tells him quietly.
I sigh happily when my dad finally says something sweet to Sam, swiping a few stray tears off of my cheek that his words caused.
“Happy Fourth of July, Dad,” Sam repl
ies back with a smile.
The room is quiet as the two men stare at each other for a few seconds, before my father opens his mouth and ruins the tender moment.
“Don’t get too ahead of yourself there, shit stick. Fireworks put me in a good mood even if I’m not the one lighting them off. It won’t last, so don’t get used to it. You should still sleep with one eye open,” he informs Sam before turning back around to continue watching the fireworks with the rest of the family.
Pressing a button on the railing of my bed, Sam lowers the upper section until we’re reclining back enough to get comfortable. I pull my legs up on the bed and curl into Sam’s side, resting my cheek on his shoulder and my arm on his stomach as we enjoy the rest of the fireworks.
“Oh, I almost forgot!” I tell him, leaning over the side of the bed and grabbing the gift bag I asked my mother to bring that she snuck into the room earlier when Sam wasn’t paying attention.
Handing him the bag, he pulls out the tissue paper on top and grabs the items inside, his eyes widening when he has them in his hand.
“Happy wedding, Sam,” I tell him, reaching over to open the front cover of the top book in the stack.
“Holy shit. This is a signed copy of Seduction and Snacks,” he whispers in awe, tracing his fingers over the inscription written in pink Sharpie.
“My boss knows the author and she pulled a few strings for me,” I explain. “And I guess the author also knows Debra Anastasia, Helena Hunting, Meghan Quinn, and Katherine Stevens, so she was able to get me signed copies of their books, too.”
Sam flips through each of his favorite books, laughing when he sees the crazy things the authors have written for him in them. Setting them on the side of the bed, he wraps his arms around me and pulls me back down to his side.
“Best presents ever. Happy Fourth of July, wife,” Sam whispers, kissing the top of my head.
“Happy Fourth of July, husband. Quick, say something piggish before I start crying again.”
As the grand finale booms outside the window and everyone’s backs are to us, I lift my head to look up Sam as he whispers as many inappropriate things about my tits, ass, and vagina that he can think of until my eyes are completely dry from tears and the wetness has traveled much further south.
“You’re lucky a firework exploded against your dick and we have to wait a few days for it to heal, otherwise we’d be doing all of those dirty things right here with my family in the room, and then my dad would definitely kill you,” I inform him.
“Well, thank God that firework exploded then,” he laughs as I rest my head back on his chest and we finish watching the grand finale. “I look forward to many more years and many more holidays with you, but hopefully this will be the only holiday that results in almost burning my dick off.”
Unfortunately, there are no guarantees with this family. Now that we’re married and Sam’s vows erased any doubts I might have had about my family driving him away (or insane), I realize everything will be perfectly fine, singed ball hair or not.
The End
The Bunny is Coming
The Holidays #4
1
Nomar Viscount
Noel
“Jesus, I missed you,” Sam whispers against my lips as his body slowly rocks against mine, his cock sliding in and out of me at just the right speed and just the right pressure to make my toes curl.
“I missed you more,” I tell him, tightening my thighs around his waist and thrusting my hips up to bring him deeper as he presses his mouth to mine, our tongues tangling together.
It’s been a few weeks since Sam and I had some alone time together where we both weren’t completely exhausted from work, and it’s the longest we’ve gone without sex since we got married last year. He’s been working a ton of overtime, and my boss at Seduction and Snacks, where I design inappropriate greeting cards, told me a few weeks ago they might have something exciting to share with me, but couldn’t tell me what it was. The only hint they offered was to think bigger than greeting cards and come up with as many fun sayings and one-liners as I possibly could. I love my job, especially since I can do it from the comfort of my own couch in my pajamas, but not knowing exactly what they wanted from me caused a lot of stress and a lot of long hours, giving Sam and me no energy to do much more than shovel a quick dinner in our mouths at the end of the day and pass out in bed. On top of that, I’ve been feeling like absolute shit lately, battling off and on with a stupid spring cold and unable to keep my eyes open much past nine o’clock at night.
It’s been horrible. Going so long without sex made us grumpy and mean. As Sam starts moving faster and slamming into me harder, I dig my nails into his back as my orgasm washes over me, pulling my mouth away from his to shout his name and thank God we’re finally out of our slump.
There’s nothing like a good orgasm to make everything better.
“FUCK! Oh, fuck, I love you so much,” Sam yells through his release, his arms tightening around me as his hips jerk between my thighs until his body collapses on top of mine.
With my eyes closed, I smile contentedly as Sam buries his face in the side of my neck, allowing me to slide my hands up the skin of his back to run my fingers through his hair. Sex with Sam before we were married was out of this world, but nothing compares to married sex. I don’t know what it is, but just knowing that we pledged out lives to each other makes everything sweeter, more intense, and more satisfying, and nothing could ruin this moment of complete bliss.
“I love you so much, too! What’s for dinner?”
Sam’s head jerks up from my neck when we hear a shout from the other side of our bedroom door, and he scowls as he looks down at me.
“AUNT BOBBIE, GO AWAY!” I yell towards the door.
“I thought she wasn’t going to be home until later?” he whispers in annoyance, pulling out of me and scrambling to the side of the bed, bending over to pick up his discarded clothes.
Aunt Bobbie recently had some money problems. Or should I say, shoe problems. She went batshit crazy during a Louboutin sale, deciding to buy shoes instead of paying her bills. She was kicked out of her apartment and, since she fucked up her credit, no one will rent her a new one. She’s been bouncing back and forth between mine and Sam’s house and living with my parents, the four of us trading off when thoughts of murdering her in her sleep start to overshadow our love for her.
“You don’t have to be so mean!” Aunt Bobbie shouts through the door. “It’s not my fault these walls are paper thin. Tell Sam his pillow talk is getting much hotter.”
“Oh, my God,” Sam groans, standing up from the bed to pull up his boxer briefs and jeans. “I can’t take this anymore. She needs to go back to your parent’s house.”
I sigh, wrapping the sheet around me as I push myself up in bed to lean my back against the headboard.
“She’s only been here for a week. I promised my mom we’d keep her until just after Easter. You know how stressed she gets preparing for a holiday,” I remind him.
“Noel, I love you, but I don’t know if I can handle another four days with that woman living here. Did you see what she did to my man cave? I grew a vagina as soon as I walked in there. Poker Night was ruined,” he argues, yanking his shirt from the end of the bed and pulling it on.
“Speaking of Poker Night, tell Alex I deleted those photos of him in a dress from my phone, like he asked,” Aunt Bobbie states through the door.
Every time Aunt Bobbie has stayed with us, she’s been told that Sam’s man cave is off limits. The finished basement is his pride and joy, with a beautiful bar and sports memorabilia that he’s collected his entire life covering the walls. We made the mistake of leaving Aunt Bobbie alone when she first got here last week, to run out and grab food and drinks for Sam’s monthly Poker Night, and when we got home…well, let’s just say it’s one of the first times I’ve ever seen my husband shed a tear.
“She took all of my framed photos of the Ohio State football team off t
he wall and replaced them with still shots of Cats on Broadway, Noel. CATS. The most horrifying Broadway play known to man. She shoved my Cleveland Cavs floor lamp into a closet and put up a disco ball. SHE PUT A SPARKLY DRESS ON MY LIFE SIZED OMAR VIZQUEL CARDBOARD CUTOUT!” Sam shouts.
“Your basketball player cutout survived just fine being in drag for a few hours,” I remind him.
“Omar Vizquel is not a basketball player! He was one of the best shortstops in Cleveland Indians history, AND SHE PUT HIM IN A PINK SPARKLY DRESS!” Sam argues.
“Nomar Viscount looked hot in that dress, Sam Stocking!” Aunt Bobbie yells from the hallway.
“HIS NAME IS OMAR VIZQUEL! STOP LISTENING THROUGH THE DOOR!” Sam screams, stomping over, grabbing the handle and flinging it open.
Aunt Bobbie comes stumbling into the room, quickly righting her feet before she falls and smooths her hands down the front of her dress as she gives us a smile.
“Seriously, you should do something about how thin those doors are. I can hear everything when I have my ear pressed against it. So, what are we doing for dinner?”
2
Drag Bunnies
Sam
“Sweet mother of God, what has he done?” Noel mutters as we stand in her parent’s driveway and stare at the front yard.
“It’s…different. I mean, it’s kind of Eastery,” I tell her with a shrug.
Noel’s father is the king of all things holidays and goes to an almost unhealthy level of decorating their front yard for everything. There is no rhyme or reason to his holiday displays, he pretty much just goes with the theory that more is better, and his Easter decorations this year are right on point with that.
