When Holly's alarm blared out at 7am the following day, there was no sign of Noel. She woke up in bed alone, and there was absolutely no hint that the events of last night had actually taken place.

"Wow. It really was all a dream," she whispered. It had been one hell of a dream, though. Especially the latter part, which admittedly would have needed some sort of parental guidance warning.

It also reminded her, once again, of how alone she was. It had been so nice to even imagine that she had someone to spend the holidays with. Somehow, she now felt even worse.

"No more mulled wine before bed for me," she told her reflection wryly as she cleansed her face. She didn't even think to check the back garden.

Today was her last day of work before she had four days off for Christmas. Normally, Holly loved being off work - annual leave was the best part of having a job, after all - but Christmas holidays were, of course, different. Usually, there would at least be some sort of token gesture acknowledging her boxing day birthday, but her family hadn't even mentioned that this year. She had the distinct impression they'd actually completely forgotten about it, in fact.

Holly had started working in a call centre soon after she graduated from university. It was meant, originally, to be a stop-gap - a temporary gig until she found her dream job. Somehow, she was still working there five years later - but not only that, she'd managed to work her way up the ranks to team manager. She often pondered how ridiculous it was that she had managed to get promoted in a job she hated and had never really wanted in the first place.

At the same time, though, she made decent money and largely liked her colleagues. Except for . . .

Ben Nicholas.

And he was, of course, the first person she encountered when she walked into the office that morning.

"Wow, you look miserable this morning," he commented immediately, and her Ben-activated guard immediately powered up, an attempt to protect herself from his usual spiky barbs. His dark blue eyes slid over her in the slightly assessing way that always had made her feel lacking. "Didn't you get the memo that it's nearly Christmas?"

Holly rolled her eyes as she slipped off her coat and scarf. "Not everyone is a fan of Christmas, believe it or not." That aforementioned guard was clearly faulty today, as she wouldn't normally admit this to anyone. Especially not Ben.

He was her office rival. They'd started on the same day, all those years ago, and Holly had found herself having to compete with him from the outset. Even when they were in training, it was somehow a race to see who would complete each learning module first. Then, it became a contest to see who could take the most calls and answer the most emails on a daily basis. Now they were both managers, and it was their teams' stats they would duel over.

While he was never outright mean to her, Ben rarely had a civil word to say to her. It was kind of sad, really. When she'd first met him, she'd actually had a bit of a crush on him. During their first week of training, they'd actually got on well - she'd go as far as to say they might have even been flirting. 

Then suddenly, he'd just went cold on her, and she had no idea why. The friendly teasing from week 1 became a constant battle of wits, and, frankly, most of the time, Holly found it exhausting.

"You're not a fan of Christmas?" He asked now, clearly sceptical. He ran a hand through his light brown hair and squinted his eyes at her, in the way he always did when he was about to make a point. He reminded her of one of those smug lawyers in a courtroom drama. She'd actually told him that on more than one occasion. "Yet on the 7th December - Christmas Jumper Day, I believe - you won the contest for gaudiest Christmas jumper, did you not?"

"You're just mad you didn't even place," Holly muttered, swivelling her chair away from him. Did he have to remember everything?

"I didn't really think I had a chance of winning," Ben shrugged, moving his own chair so he was in her line of sight again. "I'd bought the last jumper available from Tesco on the way to work. It just had a load of snowflakes on it, really. But yours was covered in glitter, had Santa and a Christmas tree on it . . . and weren't there some sort of battery controlled lights?"

"I just picked up the first jumper I spotted too," Holly protested, somewhat weakly. She may have overdid it with the jumper, admittedly. When you don't like Christmas and are trying to prove otherwise, it can be easy to go completely too far in the other direction. It had felt like an utter betrayal to herself that she had somehow managed to win that particular competition.

On the upside, though, the prize had been three bottles of mulled wine. Which she had thoroughly enjoyed, of course.

"What about that mini-pantomime Sylvia from Accounts put on last year?" He pointed out. "You ended playing one of the lead roles in that, didn't you?"

(The urge to shout "Oh no I didn't!" was strong. Despite the fact that Ben was sadly telling the truth.)

"Someone pulled out of the show last minute, and Sylvia emotionally blackmailed me into it," Holly countered. To refuse had felt way too grinchey so she'd ended up prancing around the canteen dressed as an elf. The performance had ended up on YouTube and had almost gone viral. She still hadn't quite got over that particular humiliation.

"And who can forget the time you sang '8 Days of Christmas' by Destiny's Child during karaoke at the Christmas party a few years ago?" Ben ticked yet another point off his fingers.

"That's just . . .  A really good song," Holly admitted. She had always been a massive Destiny's Child fan. And, in her defence, she'd been very drunk and loved karaoke.

Ben smirked, clearly feeling like he'd won this round of whatever game he'd decided they were playing today. "So, are you going to the Christmas party tonight?" He sounded like he really couldn't care less one way or the other. And, somehow, even after so much time, that still stung.

"As long as there's free booze, I'm there." Holly concentrated on logging on to her computer. 

"Ah, Holly Sprigg's favourite rule to live by!" Ben stood up. "Do you want a coffee?"

He must have been possessed by the Christmas spirit, Holly thought. He never offered to get her anything. "You're not going to poison it, right?" She asked warily.

"I can make no promises. You'll just have to risk it." And he actually had the audacity to wink at her as he walked away.

The coffee was perfectly palatable and, as far as she was aware, had no trace of toxicity in it. Although there was a funny, unsettled feeling in her stomach the whole time she was sipping it.

Weird.

A few hours later, she was helping one of her team out with a difficult call when Ben slid a post-it note in front of her.

Reception just called. Your brother is downstairs.

Panic infused her, racing alongside adrenaline through her body. Had something happened to someone in her family? Was Simon okay? What if his snowman had . . . Wait, what happened last night had all been a dream, so that couldn't be it.

She wrapped up the call on auto-pilot, with no real idea of what she'd promised the grumpy customer in order to get them off the phone. She would worry about that later.

"You okay?" Ben asked her as she slipped the headset off, her heart beating too fast. Was that concern in his eyes? Surely not.

"I'm fine." She hurried away, taking the stairs rather than waiting for the lift. Time was of the essence, and her blood type was now A for 'alarmed'.

But when she got down to reception, she was in for an even bigger surprise. Because it wasn't her brother waiting for her after all.

It was Noel.

What's your favourite Christmas song? '8 Days of Christmas' is actually my second favourite . . . after 'Fairytale of New York' by The Pogues & Kirsty McColl. Which I only found out a few weeks ago isn't that well-known outside of Britain! I have actually learned a lot about cultural differences through Wattpad!