Of all yearly holidays, Christmas seemed to be River’s favourite- in contrast, Ari quite simply held some kind of bitter vendetta against anything Christmassy, and banned all discussion of it until at least halfway through December. Of course, River graciously ignored this ban, singing Christmas songs to himself and making sure that whenever he went round to Ari’s house from November onwards that he was wearing the ugliest Christmas jumper he could possibly find. This was not a difficult feat- every year, without fail, River’s mother bought him about five ugly sweaters every time it rolled around winter. He had more than enough to choose from, and Ari’s face was priceless every time; the immeasurable disgust etched onto Ari’s expression when he opened the door and saw River stood on the doorstep in an embarrassing knitted jumper was always expected, and always enjoyed. It never got old, and River had no regrets, even if sometimes it meant that ari wouldn’t even go near him until he took off whatever atrocity he was wearing. Honestly, though, River could pull anything off, and had the suspicion that ari always forced him to take off the sweater was that he knew for a fact that river didn’t wear any t-shirt underneath.

Christmas had come around again- after Halloween, which had consisted mostly of River trying to get his head around ari’s goth-punk miniphase (the week that spanned across just before and a few days after Halloween where the only thing ari ever wore was black leather, head to toe, all studded and buckled and sometimes with a great deal of skin exposed. Now, River wasn’t exactly complaining, but it was strange- and stranger still when, almost abruptly, Ari’s fashion sense seemed to mellow again before River even had time to enjoy whatever Ari was doing with himself for that short week. Feeling that he had to counter this, River went online and scrolled relentlessly until he found the ugliest, cringiest Christmas sweater imaginable, and was wearing that very same jumper when he turned up on Ari’s doorstep, 8th December. In one pocket of his jeans, his phone was nestled, and he had one earphone in, humming along to ‘last Christmas’ even as Ari opened the door.

Not ten minutes later they were both nestled together on one of Ari’s ridiculous couches, River having successfully convinced his boyfriend to watch a Christmas movie with him. It was rather surprising how easily Ari succumbed- something told him that he was expecting something back in return, and the evidence was apparent in the way he was playing with the bottom of River’s thick sweater and how his other hand had moved up and was stroking through River’s fluffy, downy hair. It wasn’t currently very long, but it had been a decent while since it’s last cut; therefore, it was medium length, soft and long enough so that Ari could rather easily comb his entire hand through it. They managed to get about twenty minutes into the movie (elf, obviously) and through an entire large pack of caramel popcorn when Ari leaned in as if to steal a kiss from him. River, deciding that this could be entertaining to exploit, pretended not to notice him, even dropping the hand that he had curled around Ari’s hip and letting his grip go slack.

Ari was predictably persistent- he reached under the hem of River’s sweater and traced faux-innocent lines across his waist, only prompting raised eyebrows from River as he forced himself not to smile. He glanced back at the screen after reaching into a newly opened bag of popcorn and pushing one against Ari’s mouth to distract him for a few seconds. When Ari opened his mouth to speak, River just barely turned his head, as if not really paying attention. As if finally noticing his boyfriend’s impatience, his expression seemed to soften, and he took on an air of false sympathy. [b]”Did you want something?”[/b] A pause, and an annoyed pout from Ari. [b]”If it’s important, i’ll pause the movie for you...”[/b]