Chiara opened her eyes the next morning to find Drew sitting up in bed, looking at her.

"What? What are you doing?" she asked, drawing the duvet up under her chin in a protective gesture.

"Nothing," he replied, smiling, a good smile that touched his eyes. "You just look particularly pretty when you sleep, that's all, almost angelic, so I was enjoying looking at you."

"Oh, bugger off," Chiara replied, embarrassed. "I know I snore and drool in my sleep, you lying wanker."

"I think it's because you're not speaking," Drew continued, shaking your head. "The whole 'looking like an angel' thing is blown all to hell and gone once you open you mouth, for some reason. I think it's all the cursing."

Chiara sat up, reached behind herself, grabbed a pillow, and walloped Drew a good one.

"I'm going to get you back for that when you least expect it," Drew warned her. "Now come on, let's get downstairs and start opening presents, yeah?"

Chiara's eyes lit up at the word "presents", and they quickly got dressed and made their way downstairs, where they found Ellie was already busting around, getting the goose in the oven chopping vegetables and just generally being amazing.

"Oh my god, Ellie, have you slept?" Chiara asked.

"Sure, a few hours," she answered cheerfully. "And I'll have a bit of a lie down after the presents, and probably after we eat as well, that's my way, no worries, love." She tipped Chiara a wink.

"I've set out a bit of toast to tide you over, but you're not to eat too much," she admonished. "We've enough food to feed a small army, and I expect everyone to do their part."

Ned and Noah were downstairs within twenty minutes and they all trouped into the lounge with their tea to begin opening presents as the house filled up with the smell of cooking food.

Chiara had never received so many presents in her life. Her stocking was filled with all sorts of exotic chocolates, marzipan, imported candies and fruit, most of which she had to sample right away.

From Ellie she received a bewildering assortment of clothing; dresses, leggings, another overcoat, sweaters, so many that she soon lost track. From Noah she received books and gift cards, and Ned handed her a small box with the Apple logo on it.

She smiled and tore the gold paper to show a watch, a good, sturdy, utilitarian AppleWatch that she could wear when she worked. Chiara knew that Ned knew her old one had gotten cracked when she'd banged it against the door of the truck about a month ago.

"See? It shows the relative humidity and all, so you know when it's going to rain and that," Ned informed her. "It's the new version of the one you had."

"Yeah, and it's pink, too," Chiara noticed happily. "I love it, Ned, thank you." She strapped it on, and held her wrist out so Ned could buckle it for her. She threw her arms around Ned's neck and gave him a noisy kiss on his cheek as a thank you. "It's perfect."

There were two small boxes from Drew left, which she finally put in her lap. She opened the smaller one first.

It contained a pendant on a finely wrought silver chain, a very unusual pendant of a sort that Chiara had never seen before. She held it up to the sunlight so she could see it better.

It was milky and opaque, and reflected the light in many opalescent, pearly shades of the rainbow.

"Oh, how lovely!" she exclaimed. Chiara didn't own much jewelry, simply because her mother hadn't been around to pass it on to her, and she hadn't owned many pieces to begin with when she was alive. Chiara didn't have extended female family members to give her any, either.

But Drew had seen her face when they'd been shopping in London, the wistful look when they'd been in the shops looking for something special for his mum.

"It's a moonstone," he supplied. "It's not a particularly valuable gemstone or anything, but you said your name means 'clarity' or 'light' in Italian, yeah?"

Chiara nodded, still examining the pendant as it spun in the light between her tented fingers. "So this reminded me of you, and I thought you'd like it," he explained, pleased with her response.

She finally finished looking at it, and held it up to her throat, lifting her hair with her other hand and turning around so Drew could close the clasp for her.

He fumbled for a moment, and finally managed to work it. He dropped a small kiss at the small divot on the back of her neck, where her hairline ended and the clasp fell, when he was finished.

"Thank you very much, I love it," she murmured, turning to face him. "I guess I look pretty odd wearing something so fancy with my Christmas jumper and my fat girl trousers, hm?" In anticipation of the huge dinner that they were going to eat, she'd put on a baggy pink sweater and a loose pair of pants with an elastic waist that she called her "fat girl trousers."

Everyone in the room laughed as Drew scolded her. "Those trousers look marvelous on you, so please don't call them that. You look absolutely enchanting this Christmas morning, honestly." He smiled at her. "Now open your other present."

"Oh, yeah, I nearly forgot!" Chiara said, sitting down with the other box in her lap. She tore open the colorful wrapping paper and saw yet another jewelry style box, but he wouldn't have gotten her more jewelry, would he?

Everyone was seated, leaning forward, wanting to see, so she opened it.

"Wow," she murmured. "Drew, this is stunning."

What is it, son?" Ellie asked, is it a brooch?"

"No mum, it's a watch," Drew explained. "But I knew Neddy'd already gotten her a practical one, so I had to go the other way, see, and get her a really frilly one, you might say. And you can take the band off, and put this chain on, and wear it as a necklace, like, if you want."

Chiara lifted it out to look at it. It was sparkly, simply covered from one side to the other, with blue and clear rhinestones, as bling-y as as a watch could get.

"Oh my god, Drew, I'm going to need a whole new sparkly outfit to wear with this," Chiara said with a laugh. "This is the sparkliest thing I've ever owned, full stop."

She took the AppleWatch off her wrist so she could try the new watch on, and held her wrist out so Drew could buckle it for her.

After it was strapped on, she held it close so she could really look at it.

"Harry Winston, Swiss made," she read out loud.

Harry Winston?

No.

No way.

Her wrist, her whole arm, suddenly felt very heavy.

"Drew?"

"Yeah, darling?"

"Where did you get this?" She didn't mean for her voice to come out so accusing.

"London? Why? You want me to return it?" His eyes were merry. "I thought you liked it and all?"

"I do, it's gorgeous, but that's not the point. Did this really come from Harry Winston?"

Suddenly everyone was quiet, even Noah, who was rolling around on the floor with William Wallace and his new chew toy.

"Drew, is this real?"

"CC, are you daft? Of course it's real, I even set it to the correct time and everything, you can see that it's--"

"You know what I mean, Drew, stop being thick on purpose!" Chiara waved her wrist with the beautiful watch on it in his face, coming dangerously close to swiping his nose with it. "This must've cost more than the Crown Jewels!

"Are these real diamonds? Hm?" she asked, her voice getting perilously high.

"Only the clear ones," he responded. "The blue ones are aquamarines, they're hardly worth anything, not that it should matter."

"Not that it should matter?" Chiara repeated.

"Boys, let's go check and see how that goose is getting on, shall we?" Ellie said, turning to Noah and Ned. "Come along, now." The three of them quickly vacated the lounge, though Noah did steal a look over his shoulder at the door.

"Why should you care how I spend my money?" Drew pressed on. "I earned it, I wanted to buy you something nice, and like I said, I knew Ned had already gotten you the other watch, so I went in another direction, that's all."

"That's all?"

"Will you stop repeating everything I say? It's damned irritating." Drew crossed his arms. "I l--like you. Very much. And I want you to have nice things. And I could tell from your face that you like jewelry. And I could also tell, just from spending time with you, that you don't have very much of it. So I bought you some. Why can't that be the end of it?" He sounded honestly perplexed.

"Because," Chiara said helplessly.

"Because?"

"Because I don't know if I can trust you yet," she finished, her voice growing quiet.

"Oh." Drew stepped closer, tipping her chin up so he could look into her eyes. "So you trust me with your body, night after night, but you don't trust me to spend money on you? What kind of bollocksed up set of values is that?"

"That's different. You trust me with yours as well, don't you see?" Chiara willed him to understand. "That's an even trade. This," and she held up the wrist with the beautiful watch on it, "this makes everything unbalanced, because I can't reciprocate in kind. Now I feel like I owe you," she tried to explain. "And I'm more a 'pay as I go' kind of girl, you see?"

A tear started to slip from her eye, and Drew wiped it away with his thumb before kissing her beautiful, humble mouth.

"Well, believe it or not, I do understand what you're trying to say, and all I can tell you is you've got your equation all wrong," he said with a small smile. "Because nothing about our equation is equal, my darling CC." He put his arms around her. "Practically since the day we met, you've given so much more, so much better than you've gotten, and this silly jewelry is just me trying to put the equation right by a tiny bit, you see?" He kissed the tip of her nose. "So you're just going to have to accept it, and wear the gaudy thing, because I can tell you like it--"

"I love it," she interrupted.

"You love it," he corrected himself. "Wonderful. All the more reason, then. And please don't save it for special occasions, okay? I mean, don't wear it to go grubbing about in the rose garden, but wear it as often as you can, because it will make you happy to wear it, and it will make me happy to see you wear it, yeah?"

Chiara nodded. "Okay, yeah."

"Starting today. Please leave it on?"

Chiara nodded again.

"Shall we go see how much skulking about they're doing in the kitchen, then?"

"Yes. And Happy Christmas, Drew."

"Happy Christmas to you as well, Miss CC."