Ho Ho Hopefully

Christmas is just one of those times of year that really got on Darran's nerves. In his opinion it was totally overrated. Father Christmas was a fraud, he only wore red because Coca Cola put his in that silly red and white suit back in the 60s. Christmas was one big set up.

However that was the one thing that Christmas and Darran did have in common.

It was all a set up.

"Darran if you don't get your arse to my house tomorrow I will make the rest of your life extremely difficult for you!" Came the high and loud tones of Matt down the phone.

Darran sighed with some agitation and tried to keep his angry breathing at bay.

"Don't sigh like that!" Matt said indignantly. "I'm doing you a massive favour here!"

"You're doing me a favour?" Now it was Darran's turn to be indignant. "Do I need to remind you about the last girl you set me up with?"

Naturally Darran didn't have to go that far.

He had spent the past two Christmases, 'single, bitter and getting pissed watching Oliver Twist', or at least that's how Matt and the rest of his friends saw it. Matt had always taken his role as best friend very seriously and decided that to ease Darran's Christmas loneliness he would try and set him up with some female friends.

Every year the set up had been a disaster. The two females that Darran had been forced to talk to and spend Christmas dinner with, were bad enough to put him off women for the rest of his life. The first girl two years ago was painfully shy, and only opened up about her turtles when asked if she had any pets by Ryan in an act of desperation.

The last girl a year ago was possibly even worse. She was a Funeral For A Friend fan simply out of convenience and pretended to know every song the band had ever written, and she kept calling Darran Gareth. Needless to say she was shown to the door in the most polite way possible.

So with a heavy heart Darran got ready for the much-dreaded Christmas Dinner that was going to take place at Matt's house. Everyone else would be bringing their loved ones, their girlfriends or even wives as well as their children. It was Darren's worst nightmare.

He got dressed as slowly as humanly possible, pulling on his black blazer with great care and during the process of getting ready received three phone calls from Matt, checking he hadn't bailed out and forcing him to get ready quicker.

Eventually Darren came to the realisation that he couldn't put off this dinner for much longer. Bracing himself he pulled his winter coat on and opened the door, a sharp gust of winter wind hitting him slap bang in the face and sending a few stray fat snow flakes into the hall of his house.

Darran begun the slow trudge to Matt's house and was so intent on making his feet go as slowly as possible he walked straight into someone, causing this person to loose their balance and fall into the wet and cold snow.

"Oh my gosh I am so sorry!" Darran exclaimed as he stuck out his hand to help the pretty girl whom he had just knocked to the floor up.

"Oh no it's ok I was in a rush and didn't see you," she said as she gratefully let herself be pulled up.

She brushed the snow off her black coat and sent Darran a dazzling smile, which involuntarily made his heart skip a beat.

"But it looks like we're heading the same way," she said with her strong smile still in place as she pointed up the road that Matt's was located.

"Yeah," Darran said and carried on feeling the need to make conversation. "I'm off to a friends dinner party, it's going to be a nightmare," he said with a wry laugh.

"Oh my god me too!" The pretty dark haired girl exclaimed as they both commenced their walk, not realising that they were literally heading in the same direction. "A friend of mine feels the need to set me up with some randomer every Christmas and it's been a terrible experience every single year"

"That sounds exactly like my friend," Darran said with a laugh, trying very hard not to stare at the dark haired girl for too long. "You sure we're not talking about the same person here?" He asked jokingly, but then the girl came to a sudden stop at a house that looked very familiar indeed.

"Well this is me," she said and pointed up at Matt's house, with a soft smile and at the same time the front door flew open.

"Darran! Nat!" Came the excited squeal from Matt who with a growing grin on his face ran outside to meet them. "You two have already met?" He asked with confusion as he came to s shuddering stop in front of them.

"We literally just bumped into each other," Nat said with a smile at Darran.

"Well then I don't really need to do big introductions," Matt said grinning broadly. "Darran meet Nat, Nat meet Darran your date for tonight."

Darran couldn't help but think that this year Matt had gotten the date set up, one hundred percent right, for the very first time.