(no subject)
“Ryan Sanders said that Santa’s not real,” Olivia says conversationally one day, a week before Christmas.
Disclaimer: This never happened, this never will happen, they're not mine, etc, etc
Author's Notes: Title lovingly ripped off from a Junie B. Jones book. Written in a day and with other fics that I've promised to people on the backburner. Unbeta'd, so all mistakes are mine.
“Ryan Sanders said that Santa’s not real,” Olivia says conversationally one day, a week before Christmas.
Kris has been preparing for this day. He doesn’t slam on the breaks or break down and let his heartbeat rise because his five-year-old might suddenly not believe in Santa anymore (Adam should be proud of him for that. He’s been dreading this conversation since Olivia’s first Christmas). Instead he stays calm and says, “Oh really?”
“Yeah,” Olivia sighs, and Kris sneaks a peek into the rearview mirror to see that she’s gazing unconcerned out the back window. “I told him that he’s silly. I didn’t call him a moron because Santa’s watching.”
Kris snickers quietly to himself, then turns the radio louder and sings Christmas carols with his daughter.
He and Adam are lying in bed together that night, tangled in sheets and half asleep from a full day of Christmas preparation when Kris mentions it to him.
“Olivia’s friend told her there’s no Santa today.”
Adam’s eyes shoot open and Kris is pretty sure if his head wasn’t planted firmly on Adam’s chest, Adam would be up and pacing the room.
“And?”
“And nothing. Liv told him he was wrong in as polite a way as possible because Santa was watching her.”
Running a hand through his hair, Adam sighs.
“Well,” he starts. “You know what this means.”
Kris stares him, dumbfounded. He most certainly does not know what this means.
“We have to not adopt the kid who doesn’t believe in Santa?” he ventures. Adam shakes him off and climbs out of bed, padding quickly across the room to the closet. The double doors fling open and Adam steps in, beginning to dig.
“Adam, what are you…”
“Santa suit,” he says simply. Kris groans.
“No, Adam. I refuse. She still believes in Santa, there’s no need to…”
“Kristopher, we agreed when she was born that we would try to keep it so that she would believe in Santa until she was at least 8. If there’s any seed of doubt in that head…”
Kris remembers that conversation. The first Christmas, when they had brought Liv to the mall to sit on Santa’s lap, she hadn’t cried like the other babies. She had merely stared on in wonder and tugged on his beard, checking every now and then to make sure her daddies were close by. They had walked away with a solid agreement that that sort of wonder and amazement should be kept intact for as long as possible.
It was all very nice in theory, Kris admits, but having a kid and winning American Idol and falling in love with another man has taught him that sometimes life happens and you just have to roll with it.
“She doesn’t believe in Hanukkah Harry anymore,” Kris argues. Adam rolls his eyes.
“That’s because Hanukkah Harry was my dad in a yarmulke, mustache, and t-shirt that said ‘Hanukkah Harry’ in Sharpie. The kid is many things, but stupid is not one of them.”
“Adam, please,” Kris begs, getting on his knees as Adam pulls the red suit from the closet. He could kill his mother for buying it in his size instead of Adam’s.
“Sorry, baby. Just think of it as a present for Liv. And I’ll be sure to give you a nice thank you for it too.”
Kris slumps back against the bed, knowing that he could never break a promise he’d made for Liv’s sake. Adam climbs in next to him and whispers, “Ho, ho, ho.”
The thing is, Kris sleeps like a rock on a normal night. Factor in a Christmas Eve party with family and friends, a couple of glasses of eggnog, some wine, and a very excited daughter who “can’t fall asleep, Daddy, the reindeer need their food on the yard and what if they eat it or if it gives them a tummy ache and they don’t fly up onto the roof and what if they’re on the roof and they get tangled in Dad’s Christmas lights and really, Daddy, I’m just not tired.” So yeah, he and Adam put Olivia to bed around 9:30 and then he goes to just relax in his own bed for a while and winds up conking out.
He’s barely cognizant of the hands on his hip and shoulder shaking him and he’s pretty sure he hears someone (a voice that sounds familiar, but so far away- Adam?) whispering in his ear, “Come on, Kris, get up so I can get her up.”
Who? He thinks he asks, but it also might be in his mind, Who are we getting up and why?
When he doesn’t get a response, he rolls over and ignores the shaking and whispering until he hears a final “ugh”, and then the noises stop. He closes his eyes with a smile.
There are some things that do wake him up, though.
A scream from his daughter is one of those things.
He hops out of bed, barely noticing Adam’s absence because it’s midnight already and Olivia just screamed like someone was trying to kill her. Sprinting barefoot through the house, he makes it down the stairs in half a second flat.
Standing there he sees a figure, tall, jolly, robust, and dressed in head-to-toe red velour.
Except that the figure is a little too tall and his ankles peek out from the bottom of his pants. His wrists do the same from his jacket, and Kris can see the exact wide outline of the figure’s back, straining against the fabric. When Olivia squeals again, the figure looks up with blue eyes and a kind smile, and Kris can see the outline of a pillow under the black faux-leather belt.
“Santa!” Olivia breathes next to him, holding up the wall at the foot of the stairs, “Is it really you?”
“Ho ho ho,” Santa bellows, his voice familiar and his eyes twinkling as he looks at the little girl. “Merry Christmas, Miss Olivia.” His eyes sweep up to Kris’s laughing face and the twinkle behind them becomes a little malicious. “And Merry Christmas to your daddy. I see he wanted to wake up and come meet me too.”
Kris snorts and covers it up with a gasp. Olivia tugs on his hand.
“Daddy,” she whispers, “it’s really him!”
“Yes, Olivia, it’s really me. I’m just finishing up putting the presents under the tree.” Liv’s eyes dart to the large pile under the tree and she squeals again, pulling at Kris’s hand. “Thank you for the cookies, sweetheart. Though Santa isn’t really sure he can eat so many- my belt is going to pop!” Kris rolls his eyes. They’ll be splitting those cookies later whether Adam wants to complain about it or not.
“You’re welcome,” Olivia responds meekly. Kris bends down and kisses her head.
“Ok, baby. I think Santa needs to get back to work. Can you say goodnight?”
Olivia nods for a second, seemingly thinking hard about whether she is willing to let Santa go. She steps forward and Kris lets go of her hand, staying close in case she chooses to lurch forward and give Santa’s beard a tug. Instead, she simply puts her arms out for a hug. Santa kneels forward to oblige.
“Merry Christmas, Santa. Thank you for coming.”
Then she leans forward, whispers into his ear, and pulls back, leaving Santa giggling helplessly by the tree.
When she’s all tucked into bed, settled and smiling as her eyes droop closed, Kris shuts her bedroom door and scampers back downstairs. The cookies are gone and Santa is seated on the couch, lying back with his eyes closed. Kris straddles him.
“I’m sorry I didn’t wake up,” he says, leaning forward to press a kiss to Santa’s mouth. “But there’s no way I could have made nearly as good a Santa as you did.”
Kris tugs on the white cotton, revealing Adam, sleepy and happy, smiling up at him.
“I could have killed you,” he yawns. “I should have known not to trust you with waking up in the middle of the night, though.”
Kris leans forward and kisses him again, feeling Adam’s arms come up around his back.
“You’re the best dad she could ask for. You know that, right?”
Adam shakes his head.
“You’re a pretty good contender yourself. You’d be better if you didn’t sleep through everything, but y’know. You did agree to this silly plan in the first place, so I guess you can’t be all bad.”
“It wasn’t silly,” Kris counters. “You gave her something she’s going to remember forever. And if that kid doesn’t believe in Santa until she’s at least 10, I’ll be shocked. You made her Christmas.”
“Yeah,” Adam grins. “She made mine, too.”
He leans forward to steal another kiss and Kris obliges, humming happily into his mouth.
“Come on, Mr. Kringle. Let’s get you upstairs before she decides to come down for round two and starts singing ‘I saw Daddy kissing Santa Claus.’”
They stand together, and Adam wraps his arm around Kris’s shoulder. The fabric of the jacket tickles his neck.
“Hey,” Kris says suddenly, looking up at Adam with curious eyes. “What did she say to you when she hugged you?”
“Oh,” Adam responds in a whisper. They tiptoe past Olivia’s bedroom. “She told me that she guesses I grew a lot this year and that she’ll work on getting us to buy me new pants for Christmas next year. Then she told me that she’s going to tell Ryan Sanders that he’s a moron first thing when she gets back to school.”
They tumble into bed, laughing together.
A few minutes later, as Adam begins to snore next to him, Kris could swear he hears hoofs scratching on the roof and someone shouting, “Ho, ho, ho!” in the distance.
He cuddles close into Adam’s side and lets himself drift off to sleep too.
Disclaimer: This never happened, this never will happen, they're not mine, etc, etc
Author's Notes: Title lovingly ripped off from a Junie B. Jones book. Written in a day and with other fics that I've promised to people on the backburner. Unbeta'd, so all mistakes are mine.
“Ryan Sanders said that Santa’s not real,” Olivia says conversationally one day, a week before Christmas.
Kris has been preparing for this day. He doesn’t slam on the breaks or break down and let his heartbeat rise because his five-year-old might suddenly not believe in Santa anymore (Adam should be proud of him for that. He’s been dreading this conversation since Olivia’s first Christmas). Instead he stays calm and says, “Oh really?”
“Yeah,” Olivia sighs, and Kris sneaks a peek into the rearview mirror to see that she’s gazing unconcerned out the back window. “I told him that he’s silly. I didn’t call him a moron because Santa’s watching.”
Kris snickers quietly to himself, then turns the radio louder and sings Christmas carols with his daughter.
He and Adam are lying in bed together that night, tangled in sheets and half asleep from a full day of Christmas preparation when Kris mentions it to him.
“Olivia’s friend told her there’s no Santa today.”
Adam’s eyes shoot open and Kris is pretty sure if his head wasn’t planted firmly on Adam’s chest, Adam would be up and pacing the room.
“And?”
“And nothing. Liv told him he was wrong in as polite a way as possible because Santa was watching her.”
Running a hand through his hair, Adam sighs.
“Well,” he starts. “You know what this means.”
Kris stares him, dumbfounded. He most certainly does not know what this means.
“We have to not adopt the kid who doesn’t believe in Santa?” he ventures. Adam shakes him off and climbs out of bed, padding quickly across the room to the closet. The double doors fling open and Adam steps in, beginning to dig.
“Adam, what are you…”
“Santa suit,” he says simply. Kris groans.
“No, Adam. I refuse. She still believes in Santa, there’s no need to…”
“Kristopher, we agreed when she was born that we would try to keep it so that she would believe in Santa until she was at least 8. If there’s any seed of doubt in that head…”
Kris remembers that conversation. The first Christmas, when they had brought Liv to the mall to sit on Santa’s lap, she hadn’t cried like the other babies. She had merely stared on in wonder and tugged on his beard, checking every now and then to make sure her daddies were close by. They had walked away with a solid agreement that that sort of wonder and amazement should be kept intact for as long as possible.
It was all very nice in theory, Kris admits, but having a kid and winning American Idol and falling in love with another man has taught him that sometimes life happens and you just have to roll with it.
“She doesn’t believe in Hanukkah Harry anymore,” Kris argues. Adam rolls his eyes.
“That’s because Hanukkah Harry was my dad in a yarmulke, mustache, and t-shirt that said ‘Hanukkah Harry’ in Sharpie. The kid is many things, but stupid is not one of them.”
“Adam, please,” Kris begs, getting on his knees as Adam pulls the red suit from the closet. He could kill his mother for buying it in his size instead of Adam’s.
“Sorry, baby. Just think of it as a present for Liv. And I’ll be sure to give you a nice thank you for it too.”
Kris slumps back against the bed, knowing that he could never break a promise he’d made for Liv’s sake. Adam climbs in next to him and whispers, “Ho, ho, ho.”
The thing is, Kris sleeps like a rock on a normal night. Factor in a Christmas Eve party with family and friends, a couple of glasses of eggnog, some wine, and a very excited daughter who “can’t fall asleep, Daddy, the reindeer need their food on the yard and what if they eat it or if it gives them a tummy ache and they don’t fly up onto the roof and what if they’re on the roof and they get tangled in Dad’s Christmas lights and really, Daddy, I’m just not tired.” So yeah, he and Adam put Olivia to bed around 9:30 and then he goes to just relax in his own bed for a while and winds up conking out.
He’s barely cognizant of the hands on his hip and shoulder shaking him and he’s pretty sure he hears someone (a voice that sounds familiar, but so far away- Adam?) whispering in his ear, “Come on, Kris, get up so I can get her up.”
Who? He thinks he asks, but it also might be in his mind, Who are we getting up and why?
When he doesn’t get a response, he rolls over and ignores the shaking and whispering until he hears a final “ugh”, and then the noises stop. He closes his eyes with a smile.
There are some things that do wake him up, though.
A scream from his daughter is one of those things.
He hops out of bed, barely noticing Adam’s absence because it’s midnight already and Olivia just screamed like someone was trying to kill her. Sprinting barefoot through the house, he makes it down the stairs in half a second flat.
Standing there he sees a figure, tall, jolly, robust, and dressed in head-to-toe red velour.
Except that the figure is a little too tall and his ankles peek out from the bottom of his pants. His wrists do the same from his jacket, and Kris can see the exact wide outline of the figure’s back, straining against the fabric. When Olivia squeals again, the figure looks up with blue eyes and a kind smile, and Kris can see the outline of a pillow under the black faux-leather belt.
“Santa!” Olivia breathes next to him, holding up the wall at the foot of the stairs, “Is it really you?”
“Ho ho ho,” Santa bellows, his voice familiar and his eyes twinkling as he looks at the little girl. “Merry Christmas, Miss Olivia.” His eyes sweep up to Kris’s laughing face and the twinkle behind them becomes a little malicious. “And Merry Christmas to your daddy. I see he wanted to wake up and come meet me too.”
Kris snorts and covers it up with a gasp. Olivia tugs on his hand.
“Daddy,” she whispers, “it’s really him!”
“Yes, Olivia, it’s really me. I’m just finishing up putting the presents under the tree.” Liv’s eyes dart to the large pile under the tree and she squeals again, pulling at Kris’s hand. “Thank you for the cookies, sweetheart. Though Santa isn’t really sure he can eat so many- my belt is going to pop!” Kris rolls his eyes. They’ll be splitting those cookies later whether Adam wants to complain about it or not.
“You’re welcome,” Olivia responds meekly. Kris bends down and kisses her head.
“Ok, baby. I think Santa needs to get back to work. Can you say goodnight?”
Olivia nods for a second, seemingly thinking hard about whether she is willing to let Santa go. She steps forward and Kris lets go of her hand, staying close in case she chooses to lurch forward and give Santa’s beard a tug. Instead, she simply puts her arms out for a hug. Santa kneels forward to oblige.
“Merry Christmas, Santa. Thank you for coming.”
Then she leans forward, whispers into his ear, and pulls back, leaving Santa giggling helplessly by the tree.
When she’s all tucked into bed, settled and smiling as her eyes droop closed, Kris shuts her bedroom door and scampers back downstairs. The cookies are gone and Santa is seated on the couch, lying back with his eyes closed. Kris straddles him.
“I’m sorry I didn’t wake up,” he says, leaning forward to press a kiss to Santa’s mouth. “But there’s no way I could have made nearly as good a Santa as you did.”
Kris tugs on the white cotton, revealing Adam, sleepy and happy, smiling up at him.
“I could have killed you,” he yawns. “I should have known not to trust you with waking up in the middle of the night, though.”
Kris leans forward and kisses him again, feeling Adam’s arms come up around his back.
“You’re the best dad she could ask for. You know that, right?”
Adam shakes his head.
“You’re a pretty good contender yourself. You’d be better if you didn’t sleep through everything, but y’know. You did agree to this silly plan in the first place, so I guess you can’t be all bad.”
“It wasn’t silly,” Kris counters. “You gave her something she’s going to remember forever. And if that kid doesn’t believe in Santa until she’s at least 10, I’ll be shocked. You made her Christmas.”
“Yeah,” Adam grins. “She made mine, too.”
He leans forward to steal another kiss and Kris obliges, humming happily into his mouth.
“Come on, Mr. Kringle. Let’s get you upstairs before she decides to come down for round two and starts singing ‘I saw Daddy kissing Santa Claus.’”
They stand together, and Adam wraps his arm around Kris’s shoulder. The fabric of the jacket tickles his neck.
“Hey,” Kris says suddenly, looking up at Adam with curious eyes. “What did she say to you when she hugged you?”
“Oh,” Adam responds in a whisper. They tiptoe past Olivia’s bedroom. “She told me that she guesses I grew a lot this year and that she’ll work on getting us to buy me new pants for Christmas next year. Then she told me that she’s going to tell Ryan Sanders that he’s a moron first thing when she gets back to school.”
They tumble into bed, laughing together.
A few minutes later, as Adam begins to snore next to him, Kris could swear he hears hoofs scratching on the roof and someone shouting, “Ho, ho, ho!” in the distance.
He cuddles close into Adam’s side and lets himself drift off to sleep too.