(Part 01)
There are four Windmill Cottages in the village of Mornington-By-Mere and they are as quaintly picturesque as is the rest of the village.
They stand detached in a neat row alongside the southern bank of the River Brooke situated between the East Bridge and Church Hall.
The Chapman family live in number 1 and Jo Williamson and her daughter Cassandra live next door at number 2.
Alan Chapman was a 50 year old widowed Farm Labourer and was very highly regarded and as such he was never out of work as a result and because of that he could easily pick and choose where he worked.
As a consequence of his outdoor life he was a lean fit man with a full head of sandy hair and a weathered complexion.
His daughter Lorraine didn’t live with him full time as she was a Nurse at the Winston Churchill Hospital in Abbottsford and rather than commute back and forth she shared a flat with two other Nurses, Jane Hall, and Rosie Parsons who also lived in Mornington and worked at the Churchill.
It wasn’t a huge flat and nor was it in the smartest part of town but it was perfect for them as it meant that they had a place to live that was close to work, which was ideal for them all as they worked shifts, and it meant that split between the three of them their expenses were less than their travelling would have been.
His 23 year old so James was also a Farm Labourer but he worked exclusively at Windmill Farm and the baby of the family Siobhan went to college and was well employed in the evenings babysitting.
So as a result of his children’s independent existences Alan spent a lot of his leisure time on his own.
He wasn’t altogether happy with that but he had been a widower for ten years so he was getting used to it.
He was not an unsociable man however and was well liked by those who knew him and he got on well with his neighbour’s.
One of those neighbour’s was Josephine Williamson who he knew very well and would have liked very much to have known her better.
But what held him back was that she was 8 years younger than him, so he admired her from a distance.
She was five foot eight with luscious thick ginger curls tumbling down onto her shoulders and mesmerizing green eyes, with a lovely figure, curvaceous and perfectly proportioned.
Jo was a divorcee but had raised her daughter single handed and had to stand on her own two feet, she had managed to get a full time job with one of the new firms up at Mornington Field, Paige Turners and things were going well for her so she was happy-ish.
But Caz was in her final year at University and when she graduated she was going to marry the love of her life, Alex Kincaid-Smith who lived at number 4 which meant Jo would truly be alone.
But she wouldn’t under any circumstances tell her daughter how scared she was of that prospect because she didn’t want to hold her back.
(Part 02)
Alan was in a much more positive frame of mind when December came around, because Christmas was just around the corner.
He liked Christmas and so did the kids so he was guaranteed they would all be around if only for a few days.
Alan had spent the whole week working up at Wood Hill Farm for the Newman’s but they had got on so well that they were finished by Friday lunchtime so Kashveena fed him a good lunch and sent him on his way with a full weeks wages.
Kash Newman was renowned in the area for her cooking and she didn’t stint on the portions either.
When he got home to an empty house he sat down in front of the TV and started watching “The Bishops Wife”, one of his all-time favourite Christmas movies, but with his stomach still full with Kash’s lunch he lasted no more than 10 minutes before the long blinks set in and as a result he spent the afternoon sleeping on the couch in a fitful dreamy sleep in which Loretta Young featured heavily.
It was just when he had woken from that long afternoons snoozing and surfaced from an erotic dreamland that he heard the sound of the doorbell.
The bell continued to ring as he made his way up the hall and when he opened the front door he found a rather tipsy Jo Williamson leaning against the doorframe.
“Alan darling” she slurred, “I am a damsel in distress”
“How can I help?” he said
“I’m locked out” Jo said “and Caz won’t be back for at least an hour”
Cassandra had gone to Abbottsford with friends to do her Christmas shopping.
“Could you be a dear and let me stay here until she gets home?”
“Yes of course” he said just being neighbourly “Come on in party girl”
“Thank you kind sir” she said as she almost fell through the door.
“Let’s get your coat off” he suggested which proved to be something of an effort, but they managed it in the end and when they had she adjusted her skirt and straightened her scarlet festive top.
He sat her on a chair in the hall while he pulled her boots off revealing her festive tights with a cute holly leaf motif.
“Come in the kitchen and I’ll put the kettle on” he said
“Wine will do” she suggested and fell against the wall giggling.
“Coffee I think” he replied
A couple of cups later and Jo had sobered considerably and she told him all about the Paige Turners Christmas lunch at the Old Mill Inn and how much she had enjoyed it.
Well he already knew how much she had enjoyed it by the way she fell in through the front door.
“Do you want another cup?” he asked
Jo checked her watch before replying
“Yes please, but I must have a pee first”
“Ok, I’ll take it through to the lounge” he said
(Part 03)
Alan was sitting on the sofa when she tottered into the lounge, make up repaired, outfit perfect, and in one hand she held a sprig of mistletoe.
“Look what I have found,” she said and as she reached him she raised it above her head.
So he stood up to face her, puckered up and gave her a Christmas kiss and as his lips touched hers her it was evident that it was a more intrusive kind of Christmas kiss she was interested in, which took him by surprise, but it was a nice surprise, so in the spirit of the season and just to be neighbourly he responded in kind.
Holding the bubbly redhead in his arms was something he had often imagined but never expected for a moment that it would actually happen.
She was gorgeous and felt so good in his arms and the smell of her hair and her perfumed skin intoxicated him.
He never for a second believed that she might view him in a similar light.
He supposed it must have been as a result of the over indulgent boozy lunch, but whatever the cause she was showing no signs of letting up and had consolidated her position by locking her arms tightly around his neck.
Jo and Alan lay silently in the afterglow in his bed and after a few minutes Jo turned her head to look at him.
“My goodness that was really powerful mistletoe” Jo said from beneath the duvet.
“It was that” he agreed
“This isn’t quiet how I envisaged the day going” she said
“Well we Chapmans take hospitality very seriously” he said
“I don’t make a habit of this” she said
“Nor do I” Alan said “And this isn’t something I envisaged happening either, but it’s something I pictured in my dreams, often”
He reached out and put his arm around her and she lay her head on his chest.
“Truly?” she asked
“Truly” he confirmed
“Mine too” Jo whispered and kissed his skin
“I’m sorry if it wasn’t as good as you dreamed” she said
“I’ve only ever been with… I had only ever been with my husband John”
“It was every bit as I dreamed it” he reassured her and she hugged him tightly
“I’m no serial philanderer” he confessed “There’s been no one since Eve, until now”
“I’m glad” she said and he felt her sighing breath on his chest
They lay entwined beneath the duvet and after about 5 minutes Jo broke the silence.
“I have to go” she said “Cassandra will be wondering where I am, and what I’m doing”
“I don’t want you to go” he said
“It won’t be forever” she reassured him
“I know” Alan said “I thought we could try another sprig of that mistletoe”
“Oh yes” she said “merry Christmas”
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