Surprise! So, this past Christmas I wrote a drabble for gothamgirl28 in this universe involving Tom and Sybil. Amerigirltn asked if I could also do a drabble for Mary and Matthew, since their romance was also an integral part of this story. I told her that I would post the Tom-Sybil drabble here and add to it to include Matthew-Mary eventually. Eventually turned out to be six months later. Yeah, that's about right anyway. Here it is finally. I put the names of the couples at the top of each section, as a callback to how each chapter used to be from one character's perspective.

Previously, on The Holiday, Tom and Sybil had a son named Eamon and Sybil was pregnant. It's five years later, and Tom, Sybil, Eamon (7) and Saoirse (5) are at Downton Abbey to spend Christmas with the Crawleys. In this universe, Mary and Matthew have George (6) and Mary Margaret ("Maisy," 3), and Edith and Gregson have Marigold (4)—they don't actually appear but they are mentioned.

Tom and Sybil

"Mam, I'm cold!"

Sybil rolled her eyes at her daughter who had just walked into the room Sybil and Tom were staying in, dressed in her pajamas and holding her teddy bear and favorite fleece blanket. "I told you, darling, it's an old house. We just have to bundle up."

"Well, that's why I brought my blanket!" Saoirse said, as if exasperated that her mother did not note the obvious.

"Da and Eamon will be back from the kitchen soon with our hot cocoa, and that will help too."

"OK," Saoirse said, climbing into the large bed in the room and pulling off a pillow to bring it over to the fireplace, where Sybil had just been stoking the embers.

"Did you enjoy Christmas Eve dinner with your cousins?" Sybil asked as she pulled Saoirse next to her and wrapped the blanket around her.

Saoirse nodded. "I did, except Maisy said Eamon and I talk funny."

"Well, she's little and probably doesn't understand why you have an Irish accent."

"I told her she talks funny too, but she didn't seem to like that very much, so she started crying and her nanny didn't like that very much."

Sybil laughed at the way Saoirse rolled her eyes when she spoke. Maisy, a sweet natured child most of the time, was the baby of the family and treated as such by everyone around her, which meant that every so often she'd subject the unsuspecting to one of her temper tantrums. The rest of the Crawley cousins were well used to it by now.

"I miss granny," Saoirse said after a while, a bit out of nowhere.

"I know, darling, but we'll be home in a few days, and she promised to make us New Year's dinner since we missed her today. Usually, we have Christmas with granny and come to Downton for New Year's and grandpapa's big party, but it's nice to be different once in a while."

Saoirse nodded. "I just like granny's because she lets us sit all together."

Sybil smiled, thinking how funny it was that Saoirse protested about the fact that Christmas at Downton meant not only that she couldn't help make dinner as she did every year with her grandmother Claire Branson, but also that she and Eamon had to sit at a separate table from their parents. Her kids loved her side of the family, of course, and especially enjoyed having cousins in George, Maisy and Marigold who were closer to their age than their Branson counterparts, almost all of whom were a great deal older. Still, Eamon and Saoirse always seemed to see the Crawley rituals with a skeptical eye—and Sybil couldn't really blame them, given that she'd done the same thing as a child growing up. They were like her in so many ways, even though they were also, Sybil had to admit, very thoroughly Irish.

Sybil and Saoirse didn't have to wait long for Tom and Eamon (also already in his pajamas), who walked in gingerly so as not to spill any of the warm, sweet liquid from the mugs they were carrying. Once everyone was settled on the floor near the fire—Saoirse on her father's lap and Eamon nestled in between Tom and Sybil, Tom asked Saoirse, "All right, darling, do you remember the blessing? You're the youngest, so tradition calls for you to lead it."

Saoirse bit her lip and looked over at her mother.

Sybil gave her a smile of encouragement. "You can do it, darling."

"OK," Saoirse said, then took a deep breath.

"May you always walk in sunshine. May you never want for more."

Then the other three Bransons held up their mugs of hot cocoa and joined her, "May Irish angels rest their wings, right outside your door."

xxx

"The girl burst into a laugh; drew her shawl more closely round her; and they walked away. But Oliver felt her hand tremble; and, looking up in her face as they passed a gas-lamp, saw that it had turned a deadly white."

Mary smiled from the doorway as she watched Matthew struggle with turning the page on the worn copy of Oliver Twist he was reading from, with each of his children weighing down an arm of his as they cuddled their father while he read to them. "They're both asleep," she said, finally stepping into the room.

Matthew smiled. "I know. I was reading for me. I love this book."

Mary sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed George's foot. The blond boy—a veritable carbon copy of his father—shifted slightly but remained asleep. "And how are they supposed to follow the story if you keep reading once they go to sleep?" She asked looking at Matthew again.

"I don't think they mind. If it were up to Maisy, I'd have to start at the beginning every night. She finds it disconcerting that we can't finish the book in a single sitting."

Mary laughed. "Well, I'll take her, if you want to take him."

"What do you mean?" Matthew said, pulling both sleeping kids further into his chest.

"They have their own rooms here."

"But they're so comfortable."

Mary rolled her eyes. "Last night, when this happened, you said it would be all right, and we both ended up on the carpet in front of the fireplace."

"Which was its own kind of fun," Matthew said with a wink.

Mary couldn't help but smile. "Nevertheless, I want to get a good night's sleep tonight—for once!"

"Oh, all right."

Mary stood and moved around the bed to gently lift up Maisy without waking her. As the young girl shifted into her mother's arms, she didn't open her eyes, but she did speak. "Oh, mummy, hi. I love you. Are you going to sleep with us?"

Mary looked at her daughter's face. Maisy was also fair like her father, but her features definitely favored Mary—including, as Matthew put it, "eyebrows that will haunt boys' dreams." One of those eyebrows twitched now and Maisy's eyes flickered open. "Mummy?"

Mary sighed. "All right, darling, but not after tonight."

Once the four were settled again in the king-sized bed, with parents on the edges and kids in the middle—Matthew lifted his head to look at Mary.

"Happy Christmas, darling."

Her eyes were already closed, but she said, "It is happy, isn't it?"