kindred

Chapter 16 : Sleeping angels

Addie awoke in her bed, not sure how she got there. All she remembered was walking in the woods and uh..... She groaned, annoyed at herself for telling Harlan what she did. He was as emotional as a wooden spoon and sharing her feelings with him felt completely unnatural to her.

It appeared that Christmas decorating was already being undertaken in the house, she was pleasantly surprised that they even decorated for Christmas, then again, judging by the table yesterday they took holiday's very seriously.

The whole of the downstairs was in the process of being decorated by people. The large double staircase had Christmas spruce green garlands all along the banisters and a ginormous tree in the centre of them that Addie thought was at least twenty feet tall. People were already beginning to add lights and baubles to it. 

Many of the other rooms also had Christmas trees and garlands. The kitchen had miniature woodennutcracker figures on the side. Wreathes were hung everywhere and hanging decorations glinted from many walls and ceilings. She had never seen so many decorations before, at the children's home they would only have a sad looking Christmas tree. 

Addie found Harry in the living room, watching racing on the television whilst reading and marking some documents, she plopped beside him and snuggled into his arm. 

"Hi sweetheart"

"How does it look?" Addie glanced around the main living room they all sat in that looked exactly the same as usual. 

"What am I looking at?" When he signalled the boxes she got up to have a look inside and saw even more decorations. 

"Mother always made sure we decorated at least one room as a family" He sighed, Addie could see a hint of sadness playing on his lips as he held a fond smile. "Where are the boys?"

"Playing football outside. Again." She groaned.

"Can you go get them, Harlan want's to talk to them, he has stuff to do." Addie groaned, she had only just come from the cold crisp air into the warm inviting house and now she had to back outside.

She walked past a few people still decorating the house, she was sure they were decorating rooms that she had never seen before due to the ridiculous amount of decorations they had in boxes.

She found the boys in the exact place she had last seen them playing football, only they weren't playing football anymore. Elijah had James in a headlock on the floor, they seemed to be wrestling. Addie knew there was no way Elijah was using his full strength, he could have easily pinned him with one hand. He was clearly taking it easy on his little brother when James managed to get out of the headlock and tousle his brother. 

Addie didn't laugh when Adam and Elijah started wrestling. Adam was just below average height and was very lanky, unlike Elijah who was ridiculously well built. She didn't know if taking it easy would extend to Adam who she was sure would be flattened with in a second.

"Lijah" Addie called as she approached, successfully drawing his attention away from the soon to be wrestling match. "Harlan wants all of you"

The boys all follow Addie to the house, not caring to disobey their brother. Addie can't help but giggle when Elijah threw her onto his back and ran towards the house like a mad man. 

The family spent almost two hours decorating the room, granted Harlan left after fifteen minutes but it was the thought that counts with him. 

Addie was in heaven, she loved Christmas but had never seen this many ornaments or been able to spend it with a family of her own. Now she had enough family to fill three families.