Prove It

Chapter XXXIV

I would say I'm not nervous, but then I would be lying. I fucking hate giving presents because no matter who it is or how long I've known them, I hate the fact of maybe being judged for what I get them. It's probably stupid and in my head but there's nothing worse than knowing there's a possibility the person you're giving a gift to may hate what they've received.

"You okay? You're kind of quiet," Marcus whispers close to my ear. I nod my head and give a little smile.

"Yeah, don't worry about me." I make my answer as discreet as possible since in a room full of people, there's limited privacy if they sense a problem.

"Amanda come over here for the Secret Santa!" Georgia calls over to me. I groan and flop my head back onto Marcus's arm. I'm so warm and comfortable in the blankets with him I don't want to get up.

"Coming," I whine, slowly getting up from the couch. I stretch from side to side, cracking my back and knucles dramatically before joining the circle of girls, all joyously holding colorful bags in their hands.

"So are we just going to switch them or are we going to close our eyes, or what?" Lauren asks.

"What do we do every year?" Sofia asks with an eye roll. Lauren always wants to try and make the gift giving more creative, always having another idea in mind.

"Come on, it would be so much better to make it a surprise and guess rather than just expose it right on the spot!" she presses, but Georgia shakes her head.

"Nope, that'll take too long, and it's not like we have all night for this." Before Lauren could say anything else, she passes her bag over to Sofia.

"I knew it!" Sofia takes the glittery bag from her hands and carefully takes the paper out of the bag before reaching the gift at the bottom.

"Oh my God this is so cute, thank you!" she gushes over the sweatshirt, socks and dry recipe jars inside. "I can't wait to force Jon into baking with me!" The girls all giggle, as I do at the thought of her boyfriend playing Betty Crocker II in the kitchen.

"Alright Hannah I had you!" Sofia's smile is so wide handing Hannah the gift bag. Hannah usually doesn't do things with us, but since we've been hanging around Aaron more, we've inevitably been hanging around her more often.

"Thank you," she says before even opening the wrapping. She looks at the box in amusement and I'm amused looking at her expression. Sofia, bless her soul and I love her, but she can't wrap worth shit. But she tries, boy does she try hard.

Hannah rips the wrapping paper off the box, not caring about keeping the paper intact. When she opens the cardboard we all wait in anticipation to see what Sofia got her.

"Oh, thank you!" she says, holding up her first present for everyone to see. I laugh out loud at the box of condoms she's holding in her hand.

"Good thinking Sofia, we just ran out!" Aaron calls from across the room. Hannah turns and throws the box at his head, just barely missing him.

"Thanks baby!" We all laugh to Hannah's misery as she puts her head in her hands and shakes it disapporvingly.

"Okay, okay, what else is in there?" I bring the focus back to the Secret Santa when the guys starting wreaking havoc.

"Passes to the drive-in," she smiles wide.

"So you two can get in the romantic mood," Sofia teases, and this time Hannah succeeds in hitting Sofia in the face with her empty cup.

"Next!" she demands. Hannah hands her bag over to Lauren who bounces in her spot.

"Someone said you wanted it, I hope you didn't already get it," she prefaces as Lauren carefully removes the red and white tissue paper from the candy cane decorated bag.