BV12: The Season For Giving
Note: This one's not from a prompt. Just a direct follow-up to the previous chapter.
Yuri and Ivan spend Christmas together and decide to do something special.
Totally SFW.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
Ivan kept insisting that there be a tree. Like for many people in Sternbild, getting a Christmas tree was a tradition for him. As soon as Thanksgiving was over, he started begging, using as many sad stories as he could in the hope that Yuri would comply and give him his tree. He even told him about his sad memories from the previous year, when his Christmas suffered due to a lack of a tree. His eyes had teared up a little as he concluded the story.
That would have been enough to convince Yuri - if he needed any convincing to start with.
Getting a Christmas tree was always something he did. He hated to be one of those people who sat around at Christmastime and thought too much about the good years of their childhood that were gone, but that tended to happen. There were things that he missed that he didn't even want to think about anymore and seeing the tree in his living room was always a reminder of those times. At the same time, it was a way of bringing life and happiness into his home each year that he didn't have otherwise.
And now, with Ivan, it sounded even nicer. The star at the top of the tree was a symbol of something wonderful in the distance. It was right there but represented something far away. The thought was sort of depressing sometimes, but was also sometimes enough to lift his spirits when he felt like he had no hope at all.
He let Ivan keep asking because he wanted to see his face when he brought the tree home. If he let Ivan have his choice of tree, he was going to end up with sometime too big or too small for his living room, so he went out and got it himself. He made the trip to one of the nearby tree lots and picked out the nicest Douglas-fir they had and packed it up in the trunk of his car by himself, then drove home praying that Ivan wouldn't be coming over before he had it up.
Once he had the tree sitting in its spot in the living room in the tree stand with some water, he stood back to have a look at it. Nearly touching the ceiling, the tree stood taking up a good portion of the carpet in front of the window. Each branch was covered with thick, soft needles and made the whole room instantly smell like Christmas.The obvious thing that was missing were the ornaments...
He always did those by himself now, too. If Ivan knew there were a tree, Yuri wondered if he would want to help him decorate it. It was hard to decide whether it would be more of a surprise if he saw it fully decorated and wondered if it would be more of a treat if he let him decorate it with him instead...
However, he stood there thinking about it for so long that he ran out of time. The doorbell rang and he felt immediate panic, looking between the door and his bag of ornaments. There were bulbs in there from when he was really young... Did he really want Ivan to see those kinds of things? It would make him look like a crazy person who still lived in the past, right? He could actually hear Ivan sighing outside at that point though, so he let him inside and that was that.
The best part was, Ivan had entered sounding as if he were going to ask about the tree again and then he looked over Yuri's shoulder and his eyes got wider than Yuri had ever seen. He ran over to it and started touching it and making lots of loud, adoring sounds at it. At that point in December, Yuri already had his gift for Ivan, but he wasn't sure it could get any better than that. His pure excitement at seeing the tree probably would have been enough.
As it turned out, Ivan had some old ornaments of his own. Yuri was afraid of how Ivan would react when he inevitably started to dig through his bag of ornaments, but he was surprised and relieved to hear him make all of the same adoring sounds at them. He came back the next day with a few of his own, each with a special meaning to them, and hung them on the remaining free spaces on the tree.
That time, when Yuri stood back and looked at the tree, he really started to realize that this was the first Christmas he had spent with someone else's oraments on the tree, with someone there to make the holiday worth celebrating again.
Without his consent, Ivan rushed into his kitchen after that and attempted to make cookies out of whatever he could find. If Yuri weren't there to supervise, he was sure his house would have burned down.
After spending that whole day running around the house excitedly, Ivan seemed to start to sober up from his cheer once he got exhausted. By then, he started to talk about presents and seemed to get very concerned about finding something nice for Yuri to repay him for getting him a tree. (Yuri really thought that the readied bag of ornaments would have been enough to tell him that he had intended to get a tree anyway, but he enjoyed Ivan's excitement too much and didn't mind the thought of getting a gift from him. He had no idea what Ivan would think to get him, so it gave him something to look forward to.)
Little did Ivan know, Yuri had already made the preparations for his gift. He felt quite proud inside for being able to even obtain the certain gift. He knew it was something that Ivan had been dying to get and he was going to love surprising him with it.
Ivan was away with the other heroes taking care of a criminal when the preorders opened for the limited holiday Origami Cyclone action figure. Spending a great number of his hours at work in front of a computer, Yuri knew he would be able to get in to the site to stake his place in line for the figure. It was unfortunate that Ivan was distraught over not being able to make a preorder in time, but it just made Yuri feel successful, knowing that he had something that Ivan would be excited about.
Any time that presents came up in their conversations, Ivan got nervous and wiggled around, making excuses for why he hadn't gotten him anything yet. Once Yuri told him that he already got him something (and that he would love it), it seemed to just make Ivan feel that much more guilty.
There was something else Yuri had been thinking of getting him. It meant a lot more than just an action figure, although that was still special for its own unique reasons. After Ivan had collapsed at his door, Yuri realized another thing, a lot like what he had realized while looking at their ornaments next to each other.
Ivan thought of this as a second home now - maybe even the home for him.
So after a little more thought, Yuri concluded that he should get him his own set of keys. The odds that he was ever going to out himself as Lunatic were growing slimmer with the more time he spent with his little hero, so he had no fears in giving him his own keys to his house. Just as long as he kept all of his costumes, accessories, and weapons locked up like he always had, he wouldn't worry about Ivan finding them while he was out.
“I figured out what to give you,” Ivan told him on Christmas Eve.
It had certainly taken him long enough. Christmas Eve was really the last day for him to get a gift, let alone think about what to get someone. Yuri worried that it would be something he picked up last minute, but held some hope that he had thought of something really good with all of that time he had.
“S-so... What are we... Gonna do tonight?”
Yuri hadn't given much thought to Christmas Eve. He already told Ivan that they would go to a good restaurant for Christmas and then come home to... enjoy the warm fire. Then maybe eat some cookies and watch an old Christmas movie. It was the kind of thing everyone did, even Lunatic.
Christmas Eve was a bit puzzling for Yuri, though. He could hardly remember what he used to do with his parents on that day. All he could remember was the excitement he had because Christmas Eve meant that the next day was Presents Day. When there was no one to give him gifts, he just... must have stopped giving significance to Christmas Eve.
“Later,” Ivan said, looking up at him with those eyes of his that allowed him to get away with most anything, “can we go to the park together? ...M-maybe really late. Like, right before midnight.”
“What kind of thing are you intending to do at the park...” Yuri asked, suspicious and already feeling cold at the thought.
Ivan colored and hid his face in his hands, whining about how that wasn't what he meant. Good to know, because as much as he liked the thought of putting ice on Ivan and making him squirm, he didn't personally like the thought of freezing his ass off with some public indecency. Besides, that was incredibly illegal. Also kind of interesting... Wait, no.
Right, that wasn't what Ivan meant, so... What did that mean exactly?
He passed the park so many times on his way to work that he hadn't even thought about it. The trees in the park were all decorated with lights and there were various other little holiday attractions though the different paths for families to enjoy. It was also a great spot for couples because it was lit all night long. Leave it to Ivan to come up with such a suggestion.
And really, it wasn't a bad suggestion. In fact, Yuri liked it a lot. It was a lot more than what he had planned, after all. Ivan continued his proposal for their evening and suggested that they bring their gifts with them to open after midnight.
That must have been what he spent all that time coming up with...
It was worth it. That night, they drove to the park together. Ivan kept his face glued to the passenger side window the whole way there, ogling all the lights on the houses and buildings and pointing out the ones that he thought were the best. It was somewhat distracting, what with all the traffic (traffic near midnight!) but they made it to the park safely, without any mishaps.
Ivan jumped out of the car with his small giftbox in his hand. He had shown it to Yuri earlier, even let him hold it, but Yuri was unable to figure out what it was. It didn't really make a sound, but he sensed some movement when he rattled it around so... something was in there, for all that meant.
Ivan's action figure had arrived just in time and Yuri wrapped its box with paper he found that resembled origami paper patterns. He thought Ivan would get a kick out of it, and by the look on his face, he did. The key set he had made for him was put in its own little box and wrapped up with more of that paper and a gold bow on top.
“I have an idea,” Ivan said once they were both out of the car. His boots made a crunching sound in the snow when he stopped in front of Yuri and held up his gift to him. “I'll let you hold your present. We'll swap now, but we still won't open them until it's officially Christmas, okay?”
“That's very cute,” Yuri said, holding out his presents for Ivan to take.
They swapped gifts and Ivan looked down at his boots. His cheeks, nose, and ears were turning red already and Yuri wondered if it was the snow or just how Ivan's nature. “D-do you mean that...”
Yuri thought he sounded pretty serious when he said it. Yes, he meant it. “Yes. Did that come across as condescending...? Ah, I really meant that. We're exchanging gifts at the park in the snow and there are Christmas lights all around us. That's definitely cute. Even I can tell that and I've become aware that my concept of 'cute' is usually stranger than how the average person perceives 'cute'.”
Ivan stared at him but it seemed that he didn't believe him still. “Yeah. Well, uh. I still can't tell if you like it, even if you're calling it cute.”
“I like it.”
That must have been enough. Ivan started walking off on his own down the first path, holding his gifts to his chest with his mittened hands.
The lights around them kept the darkness away, making the snow sparkle along the path in the spots where they shined the brightest. The long purple scarf Ivan had wrapped around his neck flapped behind him as he walked through the snow. His steps started to grow slower very quickly, probably as he noticed the way the wind would unpleasantly slap him in the face for trying to walk too fast. Before long, he stopped and looked behind him to wait for Yuri to catch up.
Yuri was enjoying taking his time, though. He liked the way the lights above them seemed to make Ivan's hair look shinier, like he had a halo around his head made of white, green, and red lights. Up close was even better, though. His cheeks were still pink, but his soft white skin looked even more pure surrounded in snow.
He hardly realized that he had stopped to stare at him closely until Ivan poked him in the shoulder.
“We haven't gotten very far. D-don't you think it's too early to stop and... s-stare at each other?” Even though every part of him seemed to slow down in the cold, Ivan's eyes darted around nervously.
“Right. Let's keep going then.” Just to be a jerk, he added, “If you get too cold, you can hold my hand, you know.”
He really didn't want to make Ivan pass out or give him a heart attack or anything, but he really loved watching his reactions to the simplest of things. It didn't require any bravery for Yuri to suggest that. Even though he used it to get a rise out of him, he also totally meant it. If Ivan really wanted them to, he wouldn't mind holding his hand in the snow. His mittens were adorable, but his hands were probably freezing in those things.
“The lights are really pretty. I'm glad we came,” Ivan remarked as they got farther down the path. They passed over a bridge with a little frozen pond over it and he pointed to some lights they had arranged over the rocks in the pond to look like ice skating penguins. “Oh my god, those are so cute! Little penguins! Ice skating!”
Every sentence he said sounded more excited than usual when his teeth were chattering. The longer they stayed out and the more his teeth chattered, the more Yuri wondered if he should add his scarf to Ivan's to keep him warm.
The next time they passed under a bright street lamp, Yuri pushed back his coat sleeve to look at his watch.
“Ivan,” Yuri said, putting a hand on his shoulder to get him to stop. Ivan's boots slid a little in the snow and he wrapped an arm around his waist to keep him still. Ivan's hands came up to press against Yuri's chest and his presents were squished between them.
“Y-yes?” he asked, startled.
Yuri found himself mysteriously speechless for a moment. It had to be the lights.
He held up his watch for Ivan to see. “Take a look for yourself. It's... Well, now it's one minute after midnight.”
“O-oh. Sorry, if I hadn't almost tripped we would have been right on the dot. Well, uh... Um... Merry Christmas!”
He smiled softly. “Yes, Merry Christmas.” Yuri released him gently until Ivan could step away with enough space to open his gifts. “Are you going to open your presents first?”
“Can I?”
He sounded so excited, of course he would let him go first. Besides, Yuri liked feeling like he had a special present of his own to unwrap. It was a long time since he felt that type of anxiousness. “Go ahead,” he said. “Go with the bigger box first.”
Ivan's mittens seemed to make it a little difficult for him to get the wrapping off, but he managed. Once he got a good rip in the end of it, the rest seemed to follow with it. He cursed lightly as it tore right down the middle and he rubbed his mitten over it as if he could fix it.
“Darn it. The paper was so nice... I didn't want to ruin it.”
“It's fine,” Yuri laughed. “I have a whole roll.”
That made Ivan brighten just a bit, but his face completely lit up when he realized what was underneath that wrapping paper. “O-Oh my god,” he exclaimed in the quietest, most shocked voice one could make. “It's the special edition - I don't even - I didn't get to preorder it!” His eyes were glued to the box as if he couldn't even believe that the thing he was holding were the real thing. “Th-this is... Thank you so much, Yuri!”
Yuri wasn't expecting such a forceful hug from someone who was still holding a box in each hand, but he sure got one - and almost got knocked over from the sheer cheerful force Ivan put into it.
“This is going to go right next to regular Origami Cyclone! Uwaaaaah... Look at his little Santa hat!”
“I had a feeling you would like it. I remember how devastated you were when you thought you weren't going to be able to get one. I'm sure you could have worked out something with the manufacturer, being who you are and all, but I wanted you to have one when everyone else got theirs.”
“Y-you really do understand...” Ivan said, nearly sparkling with happiness. Yuri wasn't sure he knew what there was to understand, though. It was a nice action figure, after all. Why not?
“Are you going to open your second box now?” He didn't want to sound like he was trying to hurry him along or anything, but he was starting to freeze. Ivan's excitement was probably what had kept him from turning into a popsicle so far.
It seemed as if he forgot about the second gift in light of the first one until Yuri reminded him of it. “Ah.” He shook his head and tried to tone down his enthusiasm. “Right, yes. Opening the second one now. I'm really curious to see what this is after that first one...”
He fussed with the bow until the string let all came loose and he was able to pull it off. When the wrapping was off the box, he rolled it into a ball with the wrapping paper from the other box and stuffed it into his coat pocket. He looked up to Yuri for a second to try to gauge his reactions, then back down at the box as he slid the lid off of it.
For a few seconds, he just stood looking at it, then swallowed and smiled. Yuri wondered if the sniffle was from the cold or something else, but the smile he had was a kind of smile Yuri hadn't ever seen on him before. He looked happy and... if Yuri wasn't mistaken, he looked very touched.
“Are these... Like... keys to your... house?”
On that second or third pause Yuri was almost certain that he was going to say 'heart' and he groaned internally at his own corniness. When he nodded, Ivan grabbed the hand that Yuri had holding his gift and lifted it, urging him to open his own box. Yuri raised an eyebrow at him, but he was very curious now to know what Ivan had gotten him if he was looking at him so anxiously like that now.
His own box was covered in the cutest, most Japanese-looking little reindeer Yuri had ever seen. The Ivan-ness of it made him grin. He slid off one glove for a moment to carefully unwrap the little box, then slid the glove back on immediately after. The box was quite light and as he slid the top off of it, it became clear why Ivan had wanted him to open it suddenly like that.
“Let me guess,” he said, picking up the key that rested snugly in the tissue paper of his box. “This is a key to your place.”
“It looks like we had the same idea,” Ivan said shyly. “Except, like, I didn't get an action figure for you. I think there's a Lunatic one already that could go with this, though...”
“I already have it.” No shame.
Ivan smiled and hugged his gift boxes to his chest. “Should've figured. We can introduce them when we get back.” He paused and tried to do his best to hold both boxes with one arm, then held out a hand for Yuri to hold. “I don't know if you meant it back there, but... U-um...”
“Certainly,” he replied in a gentlemanly manner. Ivan's mittened hand slid into his and he could tell how chilled he was. Gently, he tried to radiate a little bit of heat to him; just enough to get him back to the car without turning into a beautiful Ivan ice statue.
“You're so warm,” Ivan said happily, seeming to take notice of it. Ivan got a little bit closer and pressed their arms together to get more of his heat while they walked. “I was so surprised just now that I didn't even really say what I thought about it, huh... Thank you. I mean, you know how I feel about the figure, but the keys - thank you.”
“Don't worry about it,” he said. “And thank you for the key as well. It means just as much to me. Although... I haven't visited your place much, have I?”
Ivan shook his head. “I thought this would give you more reason to, since I visit your place so much.”
He did quite enjoy going into Ivan's room that time - although there had been some special circumstances for it that time. But he was sure he could find more special circumstances. That was a thought for later, though.
While they had been walking, they hadn't encountered very many people, but now that they were leaving, it seemed like everyone else who came to the park were leaving as well. Each couple walked closely, just like them, trying to keep each other warm on the way to their cars. Yuri held his hand a little bit tighter to savor the warmth next to him.
INDEX
Yuri and Ivan spend Christmas together and decide to do something special.
Totally SFW.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
Ivan kept insisting that there be a tree. Like for many people in Sternbild, getting a Christmas tree was a tradition for him. As soon as Thanksgiving was over, he started begging, using as many sad stories as he could in the hope that Yuri would comply and give him his tree. He even told him about his sad memories from the previous year, when his Christmas suffered due to a lack of a tree. His eyes had teared up a little as he concluded the story.
That would have been enough to convince Yuri - if he needed any convincing to start with.
Getting a Christmas tree was always something he did. He hated to be one of those people who sat around at Christmastime and thought too much about the good years of their childhood that were gone, but that tended to happen. There were things that he missed that he didn't even want to think about anymore and seeing the tree in his living room was always a reminder of those times. At the same time, it was a way of bringing life and happiness into his home each year that he didn't have otherwise.
And now, with Ivan, it sounded even nicer. The star at the top of the tree was a symbol of something wonderful in the distance. It was right there but represented something far away. The thought was sort of depressing sometimes, but was also sometimes enough to lift his spirits when he felt like he had no hope at all.
He let Ivan keep asking because he wanted to see his face when he brought the tree home. If he let Ivan have his choice of tree, he was going to end up with sometime too big or too small for his living room, so he went out and got it himself. He made the trip to one of the nearby tree lots and picked out the nicest Douglas-fir they had and packed it up in the trunk of his car by himself, then drove home praying that Ivan wouldn't be coming over before he had it up.
Once he had the tree sitting in its spot in the living room in the tree stand with some water, he stood back to have a look at it. Nearly touching the ceiling, the tree stood taking up a good portion of the carpet in front of the window. Each branch was covered with thick, soft needles and made the whole room instantly smell like Christmas.The obvious thing that was missing were the ornaments...
He always did those by himself now, too. If Ivan knew there were a tree, Yuri wondered if he would want to help him decorate it. It was hard to decide whether it would be more of a surprise if he saw it fully decorated and wondered if it would be more of a treat if he let him decorate it with him instead...
However, he stood there thinking about it for so long that he ran out of time. The doorbell rang and he felt immediate panic, looking between the door and his bag of ornaments. There were bulbs in there from when he was really young... Did he really want Ivan to see those kinds of things? It would make him look like a crazy person who still lived in the past, right? He could actually hear Ivan sighing outside at that point though, so he let him inside and that was that.
The best part was, Ivan had entered sounding as if he were going to ask about the tree again and then he looked over Yuri's shoulder and his eyes got wider than Yuri had ever seen. He ran over to it and started touching it and making lots of loud, adoring sounds at it. At that point in December, Yuri already had his gift for Ivan, but he wasn't sure it could get any better than that. His pure excitement at seeing the tree probably would have been enough.
As it turned out, Ivan had some old ornaments of his own. Yuri was afraid of how Ivan would react when he inevitably started to dig through his bag of ornaments, but he was surprised and relieved to hear him make all of the same adoring sounds at them. He came back the next day with a few of his own, each with a special meaning to them, and hung them on the remaining free spaces on the tree.
That time, when Yuri stood back and looked at the tree, he really started to realize that this was the first Christmas he had spent with someone else's oraments on the tree, with someone there to make the holiday worth celebrating again.
Without his consent, Ivan rushed into his kitchen after that and attempted to make cookies out of whatever he could find. If Yuri weren't there to supervise, he was sure his house would have burned down.
After spending that whole day running around the house excitedly, Ivan seemed to start to sober up from his cheer once he got exhausted. By then, he started to talk about presents and seemed to get very concerned about finding something nice for Yuri to repay him for getting him a tree. (Yuri really thought that the readied bag of ornaments would have been enough to tell him that he had intended to get a tree anyway, but he enjoyed Ivan's excitement too much and didn't mind the thought of getting a gift from him. He had no idea what Ivan would think to get him, so it gave him something to look forward to.)
Little did Ivan know, Yuri had already made the preparations for his gift. He felt quite proud inside for being able to even obtain the certain gift. He knew it was something that Ivan had been dying to get and he was going to love surprising him with it.
Ivan was away with the other heroes taking care of a criminal when the preorders opened for the limited holiday Origami Cyclone action figure. Spending a great number of his hours at work in front of a computer, Yuri knew he would be able to get in to the site to stake his place in line for the figure. It was unfortunate that Ivan was distraught over not being able to make a preorder in time, but it just made Yuri feel successful, knowing that he had something that Ivan would be excited about.
Any time that presents came up in their conversations, Ivan got nervous and wiggled around, making excuses for why he hadn't gotten him anything yet. Once Yuri told him that he already got him something (and that he would love it), it seemed to just make Ivan feel that much more guilty.
There was something else Yuri had been thinking of getting him. It meant a lot more than just an action figure, although that was still special for its own unique reasons. After Ivan had collapsed at his door, Yuri realized another thing, a lot like what he had realized while looking at their ornaments next to each other.
Ivan thought of this as a second home now - maybe even the home for him.
So after a little more thought, Yuri concluded that he should get him his own set of keys. The odds that he was ever going to out himself as Lunatic were growing slimmer with the more time he spent with his little hero, so he had no fears in giving him his own keys to his house. Just as long as he kept all of his costumes, accessories, and weapons locked up like he always had, he wouldn't worry about Ivan finding them while he was out.
“I figured out what to give you,” Ivan told him on Christmas Eve.
It had certainly taken him long enough. Christmas Eve was really the last day for him to get a gift, let alone think about what to get someone. Yuri worried that it would be something he picked up last minute, but held some hope that he had thought of something really good with all of that time he had.
“S-so... What are we... Gonna do tonight?”
Yuri hadn't given much thought to Christmas Eve. He already told Ivan that they would go to a good restaurant for Christmas and then come home to... enjoy the warm fire. Then maybe eat some cookies and watch an old Christmas movie. It was the kind of thing everyone did, even Lunatic.
Christmas Eve was a bit puzzling for Yuri, though. He could hardly remember what he used to do with his parents on that day. All he could remember was the excitement he had because Christmas Eve meant that the next day was Presents Day. When there was no one to give him gifts, he just... must have stopped giving significance to Christmas Eve.
“Later,” Ivan said, looking up at him with those eyes of his that allowed him to get away with most anything, “can we go to the park together? ...M-maybe really late. Like, right before midnight.”
“What kind of thing are you intending to do at the park...” Yuri asked, suspicious and already feeling cold at the thought.
Ivan colored and hid his face in his hands, whining about how that wasn't what he meant. Good to know, because as much as he liked the thought of putting ice on Ivan and making him squirm, he didn't personally like the thought of freezing his ass off with some public indecency. Besides, that was incredibly illegal. Also kind of interesting... Wait, no.
Right, that wasn't what Ivan meant, so... What did that mean exactly?
He passed the park so many times on his way to work that he hadn't even thought about it. The trees in the park were all decorated with lights and there were various other little holiday attractions though the different paths for families to enjoy. It was also a great spot for couples because it was lit all night long. Leave it to Ivan to come up with such a suggestion.
And really, it wasn't a bad suggestion. In fact, Yuri liked it a lot. It was a lot more than what he had planned, after all. Ivan continued his proposal for their evening and suggested that they bring their gifts with them to open after midnight.
That must have been what he spent all that time coming up with...
It was worth it. That night, they drove to the park together. Ivan kept his face glued to the passenger side window the whole way there, ogling all the lights on the houses and buildings and pointing out the ones that he thought were the best. It was somewhat distracting, what with all the traffic (traffic near midnight!) but they made it to the park safely, without any mishaps.
Ivan jumped out of the car with his small giftbox in his hand. He had shown it to Yuri earlier, even let him hold it, but Yuri was unable to figure out what it was. It didn't really make a sound, but he sensed some movement when he rattled it around so... something was in there, for all that meant.
Ivan's action figure had arrived just in time and Yuri wrapped its box with paper he found that resembled origami paper patterns. He thought Ivan would get a kick out of it, and by the look on his face, he did. The key set he had made for him was put in its own little box and wrapped up with more of that paper and a gold bow on top.
“I have an idea,” Ivan said once they were both out of the car. His boots made a crunching sound in the snow when he stopped in front of Yuri and held up his gift to him. “I'll let you hold your present. We'll swap now, but we still won't open them until it's officially Christmas, okay?”
“That's very cute,” Yuri said, holding out his presents for Ivan to take.
They swapped gifts and Ivan looked down at his boots. His cheeks, nose, and ears were turning red already and Yuri wondered if it was the snow or just how Ivan's nature. “D-do you mean that...”
Yuri thought he sounded pretty serious when he said it. Yes, he meant it. “Yes. Did that come across as condescending...? Ah, I really meant that. We're exchanging gifts at the park in the snow and there are Christmas lights all around us. That's definitely cute. Even I can tell that and I've become aware that my concept of 'cute' is usually stranger than how the average person perceives 'cute'.”
Ivan stared at him but it seemed that he didn't believe him still. “Yeah. Well, uh. I still can't tell if you like it, even if you're calling it cute.”
“I like it.”
That must have been enough. Ivan started walking off on his own down the first path, holding his gifts to his chest with his mittened hands.
The lights around them kept the darkness away, making the snow sparkle along the path in the spots where they shined the brightest. The long purple scarf Ivan had wrapped around his neck flapped behind him as he walked through the snow. His steps started to grow slower very quickly, probably as he noticed the way the wind would unpleasantly slap him in the face for trying to walk too fast. Before long, he stopped and looked behind him to wait for Yuri to catch up.
Yuri was enjoying taking his time, though. He liked the way the lights above them seemed to make Ivan's hair look shinier, like he had a halo around his head made of white, green, and red lights. Up close was even better, though. His cheeks were still pink, but his soft white skin looked even more pure surrounded in snow.
He hardly realized that he had stopped to stare at him closely until Ivan poked him in the shoulder.
“We haven't gotten very far. D-don't you think it's too early to stop and... s-stare at each other?” Even though every part of him seemed to slow down in the cold, Ivan's eyes darted around nervously.
“Right. Let's keep going then.” Just to be a jerk, he added, “If you get too cold, you can hold my hand, you know.”
He really didn't want to make Ivan pass out or give him a heart attack or anything, but he really loved watching his reactions to the simplest of things. It didn't require any bravery for Yuri to suggest that. Even though he used it to get a rise out of him, he also totally meant it. If Ivan really wanted them to, he wouldn't mind holding his hand in the snow. His mittens were adorable, but his hands were probably freezing in those things.
“The lights are really pretty. I'm glad we came,” Ivan remarked as they got farther down the path. They passed over a bridge with a little frozen pond over it and he pointed to some lights they had arranged over the rocks in the pond to look like ice skating penguins. “Oh my god, those are so cute! Little penguins! Ice skating!”
Every sentence he said sounded more excited than usual when his teeth were chattering. The longer they stayed out and the more his teeth chattered, the more Yuri wondered if he should add his scarf to Ivan's to keep him warm.
The next time they passed under a bright street lamp, Yuri pushed back his coat sleeve to look at his watch.
“Ivan,” Yuri said, putting a hand on his shoulder to get him to stop. Ivan's boots slid a little in the snow and he wrapped an arm around his waist to keep him still. Ivan's hands came up to press against Yuri's chest and his presents were squished between them.
“Y-yes?” he asked, startled.
Yuri found himself mysteriously speechless for a moment. It had to be the lights.
He held up his watch for Ivan to see. “Take a look for yourself. It's... Well, now it's one minute after midnight.”
“O-oh. Sorry, if I hadn't almost tripped we would have been right on the dot. Well, uh... Um... Merry Christmas!”
He smiled softly. “Yes, Merry Christmas.” Yuri released him gently until Ivan could step away with enough space to open his gifts. “Are you going to open your presents first?”
“Can I?”
He sounded so excited, of course he would let him go first. Besides, Yuri liked feeling like he had a special present of his own to unwrap. It was a long time since he felt that type of anxiousness. “Go ahead,” he said. “Go with the bigger box first.”
Ivan's mittens seemed to make it a little difficult for him to get the wrapping off, but he managed. Once he got a good rip in the end of it, the rest seemed to follow with it. He cursed lightly as it tore right down the middle and he rubbed his mitten over it as if he could fix it.
“Darn it. The paper was so nice... I didn't want to ruin it.”
“It's fine,” Yuri laughed. “I have a whole roll.”
That made Ivan brighten just a bit, but his face completely lit up when he realized what was underneath that wrapping paper. “O-Oh my god,” he exclaimed in the quietest, most shocked voice one could make. “It's the special edition - I don't even - I didn't get to preorder it!” His eyes were glued to the box as if he couldn't even believe that the thing he was holding were the real thing. “Th-this is... Thank you so much, Yuri!”
Yuri wasn't expecting such a forceful hug from someone who was still holding a box in each hand, but he sure got one - and almost got knocked over from the sheer cheerful force Ivan put into it.
“This is going to go right next to regular Origami Cyclone! Uwaaaaah... Look at his little Santa hat!”
“I had a feeling you would like it. I remember how devastated you were when you thought you weren't going to be able to get one. I'm sure you could have worked out something with the manufacturer, being who you are and all, but I wanted you to have one when everyone else got theirs.”
“Y-you really do understand...” Ivan said, nearly sparkling with happiness. Yuri wasn't sure he knew what there was to understand, though. It was a nice action figure, after all. Why not?
“Are you going to open your second box now?” He didn't want to sound like he was trying to hurry him along or anything, but he was starting to freeze. Ivan's excitement was probably what had kept him from turning into a popsicle so far.
It seemed as if he forgot about the second gift in light of the first one until Yuri reminded him of it. “Ah.” He shook his head and tried to tone down his enthusiasm. “Right, yes. Opening the second one now. I'm really curious to see what this is after that first one...”
He fussed with the bow until the string let all came loose and he was able to pull it off. When the wrapping was off the box, he rolled it into a ball with the wrapping paper from the other box and stuffed it into his coat pocket. He looked up to Yuri for a second to try to gauge his reactions, then back down at the box as he slid the lid off of it.
For a few seconds, he just stood looking at it, then swallowed and smiled. Yuri wondered if the sniffle was from the cold or something else, but the smile he had was a kind of smile Yuri hadn't ever seen on him before. He looked happy and... if Yuri wasn't mistaken, he looked very touched.
“Are these... Like... keys to your... house?”
On that second or third pause Yuri was almost certain that he was going to say 'heart' and he groaned internally at his own corniness. When he nodded, Ivan grabbed the hand that Yuri had holding his gift and lifted it, urging him to open his own box. Yuri raised an eyebrow at him, but he was very curious now to know what Ivan had gotten him if he was looking at him so anxiously like that now.
His own box was covered in the cutest, most Japanese-looking little reindeer Yuri had ever seen. The Ivan-ness of it made him grin. He slid off one glove for a moment to carefully unwrap the little box, then slid the glove back on immediately after. The box was quite light and as he slid the top off of it, it became clear why Ivan had wanted him to open it suddenly like that.
“Let me guess,” he said, picking up the key that rested snugly in the tissue paper of his box. “This is a key to your place.”
“It looks like we had the same idea,” Ivan said shyly. “Except, like, I didn't get an action figure for you. I think there's a Lunatic one already that could go with this, though...”
“I already have it.” No shame.
Ivan smiled and hugged his gift boxes to his chest. “Should've figured. We can introduce them when we get back.” He paused and tried to do his best to hold both boxes with one arm, then held out a hand for Yuri to hold. “I don't know if you meant it back there, but... U-um...”
“Certainly,” he replied in a gentlemanly manner. Ivan's mittened hand slid into his and he could tell how chilled he was. Gently, he tried to radiate a little bit of heat to him; just enough to get him back to the car without turning into a beautiful Ivan ice statue.
“You're so warm,” Ivan said happily, seeming to take notice of it. Ivan got a little bit closer and pressed their arms together to get more of his heat while they walked. “I was so surprised just now that I didn't even really say what I thought about it, huh... Thank you. I mean, you know how I feel about the figure, but the keys - thank you.”
“Don't worry about it,” he said. “And thank you for the key as well. It means just as much to me. Although... I haven't visited your place much, have I?”
Ivan shook his head. “I thought this would give you more reason to, since I visit your place so much.”
He did quite enjoy going into Ivan's room that time - although there had been some special circumstances for it that time. But he was sure he could find more special circumstances. That was a thought for later, though.
While they had been walking, they hadn't encountered very many people, but now that they were leaving, it seemed like everyone else who came to the park were leaving as well. Each couple walked closely, just like them, trying to keep each other warm on the way to their cars. Yuri held his hand a little bit tighter to savor the warmth next to him.
INDEX