Hello, my name is Noel, and I’m sexually frustrated.
I want to curse at Sam as he stands a few feet away, browsing through a stack of sweaters on a display table at Macy’s, but it’s not his fault I feel like I should be at a Sex Addicts Anonymous meeting. After the stellar blow job—if I do say so myself—I gave him in Santa’s Workshop, we argued up in my bedroom for twenty minutes about him sleeping on the floor again. He wanted to return the orgasm favor and I didn’t want him to feel obligated to do so. I didn’t suck his dick to pay him back for saying all those nice things to me. Okay, so maybe that was why I dragged him out there to begin with, but once I unzipped his pants and saw that glorious package inside, I really, really wanted to put my mouth on it. Forget the nickname Sox, he shall now be referred to as Hung, forevermore. I felt like it would just be safer all around if he slept on the floor again instead of being a hot-and-sexy-tempting-body-of-gorgeous man spooning me in my twin bed. I’d never be able to resist having sex with him if he was in next to me in bed.
I don’t know what the hell is wrong with me. One minute I’m sad about the thought of him leaving after Christmas, the next I only want him for sex and then in the blink of an eye, I’m back to wanting to keep him forever. For the sex.
Okay fine, for him too. He’s just so…perfect. My brain is fried from getting so worked up every time I look at him without a release to cool my jets. Once again though, all my fault. He was more than willing to diddle the doodlebug last night and I turned him down. Told him I was fine and it was just for him, that I expected nothing in return, blah, blah, blah, I suck.
“What do you think about this one? Does your Aunt Bobbie like blue?” Sam asks, holding up a light blue sweater with little sparkling crystals adorning the plunging neckline.
“Sam, I told you already, you don’t have to buy my family any gifts,” I insist for the tenth time since we got to the mall.
Today is family shopping day. We always come out to Great Northern Mall two days before Christmas to do our last minute shopping, spreading out from one end of the mall to the other, and then meeting back together for lunch in the food court. Thank God I already bought most of my presents before I lost my job and brought them with me. The meager savings account I have needs to last me long enough to find another job and get my first paycheck. And it needs to go toward first and last month’s rent on a new place when I get back to Seattle.
Dammit, even the thought of going back to Seattle depresses me. I love Seattle, I love the friends I’ve made in Seattle, and there is no justified reason why the thought of going back there should make me said.
“They let me into their home and keep me fed. Of course I’m going to buy them presents,” Sam informs me, tucking the blue sweater under his arm and moving to the next table that, coincidentally, has a display of A Christmas Story-themed items.
Yep, there it is. The number one reason why going back to Seattle makes me feel like an emo teenager.
Sam picks up a stocking cap with Ralphie’s face on it and the words “You’ll shoot your eye out!” Sam laughs, tucking that under his arm with the sweater.
“Yep, Nicholas is getting this. Wow, they also have matching socks! Oh, my God, look at this! A real Red Ryder BB gun!” he exclaims excitedly.
Watching him go from item to item, shoving more and more things under his arms for my family, makes me want to sit down on the floor in the middle of the store and bawl like a baby. When Logan found out I was bringing him home to meet my family for Christmas, he asked me how much was appropriate to spend on Visa gift cards for each of them. I just smiled and told him whatever he wanted would be good enough, when what I really should have done was tell him that gift cards are total bullshit gifts. Get to know someone, learn about what they like and what their interests are, and then tailor a gift that will be special to them. Sam has never had a family, never had anyone in his life he cared about enough to celebrate Christmas, and he already knows the proper way to shop for the holidays – with thoughtful, meaningful gifts, not a small piece of plastic that says “I don’t really know you or give a shit to know you. Here’s some cash, have fun with that.”
Sam hustles over to yet another display, this one filled with gift boxes of different Christmas sausages, jams, crackers and cheeses, immediately picking up a box with a red bow on it and turning it to face me, laughing so hard he chokes.
“A box of fifteen different cheeses, ten packets of hot chocolate mix and two mugs that say Eggnog Mugs. Yep, your dad is getting this special dairy collection,” he laughs.