𝚂𝚞𝚖𝚖𝚎𝚛𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎 𝚂𝚊𝚍𝚗𝚎𝚜𝚜

Chapter-25

It was Christmas at last! I had plans for the day, breakfast at Teo's, Christmas lunch with my family and probably dinner too. The funny thing was, after becoming a "thing" I had barely gotten to see Charles.

I didn't blame him, of course he was working hard for next season and I definitely didn't want to get in the way.

I put on one of my new dresses I'd been saving for the holidays, did my hair and headed off to Matteo's place. I'd be eating his mother's cooking after such a long time, it made me so nostalgic for the time when we were little.

Every time she made brioche, I would just run to his house for breakfast. Mamma Tanzi didn't mind at all, with a big smile on her face she'd fill my plate with even more food and make sure I'd eaten everything she'd cooked for the spread.

I entered the building and could already hear the commotion coming from the house on the second floor- a good sign! All the Tanzis had gathered and the feast was in full swing.

A girl with curly hair noticed me, she waved frantically before walking towards me and giving me a big hug, the rest of the family too exclaimed and passed me around for big hugs, I finally reached Mamma and gave her the flowers I had brought for today.

"You've grown so much! You look lovely!" She smiled giving me a big hug.

"You too Mamma!" I beamed, "merry Christmas!"

"Merry Christmas!" All of them smiled.

Matteo's siblings came around introducing themselves, and I introduced myself. I couldn't believe how quick the years had flown by, the curly haired girl- the youngest of them all was sixteen now! The last time I saw her- Marta, she was a child! Probably eight or nine years old.

All of sat down for breakfast in whatever spot we could find, ate good stuff Mamma had made for today and talked about how everyone had been. Matteo came sat down next to me, he said that it was unfair how his family had whisked me- his friend away from him.

We laughed at his little tantrum and suddenly everyone was bringing up embarrassing memories of him. He was getting even more annoyed, which made pulling his leg all the more fun.

"Mamma, I'm going to my house and I'm taking Emi with me. I'll come back when you teach the rest of your hooligans how to behave."

"Teo. Sit down, no one's going anywhere." His dad said.

"Then tell them to stop making fun of me." He huffed.

"Marco, Marta, don't tease him like that. He's your older brother." Mamma rebuked them.

"Michele, Maura, you're the older kids! Don't trouble him like that." Mister Tanzi sighed.

"Both of you have kids! You're both pushing thirty and behave like-"

"That's enough." Mamma silenced him.

I did not want to be in the middle of a full fledged fight, the five siblings and their parents arguing never really ended well, there was always screaming and crying. I knew that because I had been caught up in them accidentally, when I would just be over to do homework with Matteo.

Thank God my phone rang, I literally bolted out of the vicinity to answer it. I don't if it was the panic or what but it made me talk on the phone quite mean.

"Who is it?"

"Can't you read the caller ID?" A playful voice laughed. I didn't need to read the caller ID I knew exactly who I was talking to.

"Merry Christmas to you too Charles."

"Merry Christmas Emiko, when can I see you?" He jumped straight to the point.