Pete sends him Celine Dion.

Patrick clicks play out of curiosity. I’m your lady, Celine warbles. You are my man.

“Okay,” Patrick says, and shrugs. Pete is often inexplicable.

Then Pete sends him Trisha Yearwood’s She’s in Love with the Boy. Even if they have to run away, she’s gonna marry that boy someday.

It’s definitely one of the weirder ( Read more... )

Brem said that if there was going to be any kind of kickball tournament he ought to be the captain.

Oliver retorted that he wanted to know how much kickball they’d played on the TARDIS.

Lucky had expressed skepticism that Oliver was especially knowledgeable about kickball, either, whereas her dads had encouraged her to play soccer.

Tennyson ( Read more... )

Arthur had been typically pragmatic in his teenage parenting approach. “We cannot expect her to tell us everything, Eames. Who tells everyone everything? Everyone has secrets. We cannot condemn her for keeping secrets sometimes.”

Eames agreed, because he had despised hypocrisy in his parents and had vowed never to be that kind of father (when ( Read more... )

Ever since childhood, Patrick has always written songs endlessly. Nowadays he tends to write to Pete’s specifications. A song that sounds like the last day of school. A song that sounds like my mom’s apple pie.

Patrick writes them all, but he doesn’t think any of them are what Pete needs. He works on the song he thinks Pete really needs whenever ( Read more... )

Arthur brings home mincemeat pies.

Eames is very excited by the mincemeat pies. Kid-on-Christmas-morning. Arthur’s happy he got them. “What I really love, though, is figgy pudding,” Eames says, and sighs.

So Arthur calls Eames’s mom and asks for her figgy pudding recipe. He labors over it and presents it on Christmas Eve as a present.

Eames ( Read more... )

“No,” Sherlock says, “no, no, and no.”

“Hang on-” John begins.

“No, Oliver has rejected all of these.”

“Oliver has rejected all of the Christmas decorations?”

“They’re all tedious, aren’t they, Ollie?”

Oliver nodded.

John didn’t bother to ask why a three-year-old had such opinions on Christmas decorations. “But you love the tree,” he ( Read more... )

On the 23rd day, Elliot texts Jonah as he’s on his way home: Can’t go out tonight, it’s too soon. Jonah makes a detour to the Thai place on Mt. Auburn. He arrives home to find Elliot, exactly as he’d anticipated, curled on the couch before the makeshift coffee table shrine he erected after the news. Or, rather, it had started out as a shrine; by ( Read more... )

When Bennet was a boy, home was covered in snow, with crystal clear light and air so sharp it hurt to breathe.

He tries to see Euphonia through Archer’s eyes, tries to imagine how it compares to Archer’s definition of home: to Jadenvale’s heavy golden sunlight and tropical heat and air that Bennet experiences as a wet blanket.

He says ( Read more... )

“You’re not going skiing?” Patrick asks.

“Nope,” Matt agrees.

“But you planned this whole trip. You brought ski goggles and ski boots and skis. And you’re not going skiing?”

“You and the kids love skiing and are ski experts and that’s great, you’ll have a great time skiing. I’ll have a great time getting recognized in the lodge and signing ( Read more... )

“You guys should write a Christmas song,” Kylie suggests.

“Bah humbug,” Matt replies.

“No, I’m serious. Christmas songs make bank. Mariah Carey makes bank.”

“Yeah, she never shuts up about it,” Matt says. “What do you say, Trick? Christmas song?”

“You could do a whole Christmas album,” says Miranda.

“Then we could get invited to light the ( Read more... )