TITLE: Nora’s Christmas Wish.
AUTHOR: semisweetsoul
FANDOM: Brothers & Sisters
CHARACTERS: The Walkers, the Holdens, the Whedons, the McCallisters, the Harpers and a Wandell.
RATING: PG I guess.
SUMMARY: Christmas 2007 at the Walkers estate and the rollercoaster of emotions we all love to experience when we watch the show (hopefully).
SPOILERS: I did my best to respect canon up until last episode which was 2.09.
DISCLAIMER: None of these fantastic characters were originally created by me. I would be so lucky!
- - - - - - - - - - CHAPTER TITLE: A memorable Christmas
CHAPTER SUMMARY: The recollection of a memorable Walker Christmas.
WORD COUNT: 2 507
AUTHOR’S NOTE: This is my favorite chapter, written in a fit of inspiration when the story literally writes itself.
Chapter 1- part1,
Chapter 1-part 2,
Chapter 2 Chapter 3: A memorable Christmas
Nora Walker had started cooking one day in advance because she wanted to do things properly that year. The previous Christmas she was lying in bed with the worst flu that she had ever suffered as far as she could recall. She could barely breathe and the fever had her mistake Sarah for Kitty and Kevin for Tommy. William had decided to take care of her which she found so unexpected that even if she had had enough strength to protest she wouldn’t have bothered to try.
Her husband had convinced their children to change their plans and they had all ended up at Joe and Sarah’s with all the food Nora had already bought. According to Justin, it had been an ‘awesome’ day. This year she was secretly hoping that her son would describe the day as ‘super awesome’ or use any other compliment only her youngest kid could ever think about. That was the reason why she had made sure not to fall sick again by taking a flu shot the moment she had gotten wind of the return of the epidemic.
The Christmas tree had been in the house for three days but all the ornaments were still resting in the attic in the big used brown box labeled Christmas stuff. Nora used to bedeck the tree and the house with her children; she didn’t want to break the tradition so she was determined to wait for them to arrive.
As soon as the doorbell chimed, Nora ran to the door to welcome Kitty and Kevin: “Come on in! Kitty! It’s so good to see you, thank you for coming. Justin is gonna be overwhelmed! Excuse me kids I’m not done in the kitchen yet! Kev, would you be a doll and get the decorations box from the attic, thanks honey!”
“Good to see you too, mom!” Kevin replied. “And stop calling me a doll, please!” but Nora hadn’t heard him she was already back to her cooking books, preparing some shrimp cocktails that were generally greatly appreciated.
An hour later everyone had arrived and Nora could hear them talking, laughing and arguing which didn’t really please her but didn’t worry her either, it was the Walker family’s dynamics. She was interrupted by her oldest daughter coming in; Sarah opened the fridge obviously trying to remember what she went looking for. As she noticed her making a wry face at the bottle of milk, Nora came to the rescue. “Would you prefer some juice? I have apple and orange. Justin could have come by himself; I mean sometimes this kid really takes life as it comes!”
“What?” Sarah replied distractedly.
“I said next time Justin asks you to get him something, tell him to get it himself, you’re not at his disposal and neither am I!”
Sarah was at loss to understand what her mother was talking about; she nodded politely and tried to run away in the living-room but just as she reached the door her mother called for her. “Sarah, wait a sec, since you’re here, please come and taste the shrimp cocktails and tell me what you think. Is the seasoning okay?”
“Yes, give me a sec, I’ll just bring these bottles to Justin, you know how he is! Teenagers are so impatient these days!” Sarah left without a murmur, never to be seen again in the kitchen that night.
When Nora finally stepped out of her favorite room of the house to enter the dinning room she felt she was sent in a new dimension. Of course it was Christmas, but if it wasn’t for all the food she had been preparing, she had no other way to know it was. Her heart was filled with a warm feeling as she made her way to the sitting room; everything was where it was supposed to be. Her children not only had decorated the tree and the room, they had managed to give the whole atmosphere a merry and classy touch.
Sarah and Joe had probably been kissing under the mistletoe for a moment but anyone seemed to have noticed. Saul, William and Tommy were laughing by the fireplace while Kitty and Kevin had indulged in their two favorite hobbies: drinking wine and bickering, undoubtedly about some of their well-know divergences of opinion; Justin his headphones on was simply admiring the sparkling and magnificent tree.
As Nora contemplated the whole scene she realized something was missing, she came closer to her husband and whispered something to his ear. Together they slipped away and a few minutes later they returned arms filled with what Santa had brought them to fill the family’s stockings.
“Well, I think a Christmas tree looks better with presents underneath it, don’t you think?” Nora asked the assembled company.
“You’re right Mom!” Justin agreed overly excited. “So when do we get to open the presents?”
“Be patient, son” advised William in a slight paternalistic tone. “Nora,” he continued, “is there anything else we can help you with?”
Nora wasn’t sure but something wasn’t right. She took upon herself to forget about what it was at least for the time being. It was time to eat anyway. All the Walker family gathered around the table to enjoy a home-made traditional Christmas meal.
Nora had been in the kitchen for almost half an hour now when the kids started to wonder if something was wrong. Kevin sacrificed himself and five minutes later he came back with not so much to tell his worried relatives, everyone seemed to care what took Nora so long except Joe and Sarah who acted like teenagers in love for the first time.
“So what is she doing?” Justin asked tired of the wait.
“Well, she’s in the pantry pacing up and down. She says she’s coming in a minute. And no Justin, you may not open the presents!”
Justin moaned about his mother’s inconsiderate behavior “this whole tradition of opening the presents after desert sucks!”
Finally, Nora got back to the dining room; she seemed different, a bit shaken like she had been crying.
“Is everything alright, darling?” William asked worriedly.
“Yes, yes, yes, it’s fine, it’s fine, really!” Nora assured him. “The thing is I had this great present and couldn’t remember where I’d hidden it, but that’s okay I’ve found it back. And Justin, honey, go open your presents, sorry for keeping you waiting!”
About forty minutes later the room looked like a mess. In between the presents, the torn wrapping paper, the ribbon and the empty boxes and bags, Justin was engrossed in the comic book Kevin had offered him, he himself was overexcited by the lavish book about Broadway Kitty had managed to find but not without difficulty. Sarah wanted to immortalize the scene with her brand new camera courtesy of her father, when Nora called for everyone’s attention.
“Please, everyone. Well ... I...” Nora took a deep breath before she could continue, “Sarah, Joe this is for you two, Merry Christmas!” The young couple was taken aback by Nora’s mysterious final gift and thanked her sincerely. Sarah’s shacking hands made the opening part a bit difficult but when she finally succeeded in revealing the little box content sparkles filled her eyes.
She was lost for word, after a moment, her voice trembling with emotion could be heard saying: “Oh God! Mom! ... How did you...? How did you know?” Nora who couldn’t take her eyes off of her daughter answered in the simplest tone, “I’m a mother. I sense these things.”
Kevin and all the family were there trying to put two and two together, but the lawyer as a result of being so conditioned by his job could not bear being kept in the dark any longer. He had to have either his mother or his sister explain what this was all about. “Okay! Can you two stop being so cryptic, please? And by the way, what’s in the box?”
Sarah squeezed her husband’s hand and looked deeply into his eyes to seek some sort of approval. “Okay, sure. Here it goes...” Sarah said wiping the tear that ran on her cheek. “In about five months I’ll be the mother of a little girl!”
After both Sarah and her husband received her parents, her siblings and her uncle’s congratulations, Kitty started teasing her mother, “the fact that you were in the pantry Mom should have gotten us thinking.”
Nora rolled her eyes at her daughter and launched into a thorough explanation: “Well, okay. I suspected something was going on. It hit me when I noticed Sarah was drinking juice instead of alcohol, when she avoided the shrimp cocktails, which incidentally is so like me each time I was pregnant I couldn’t even stand looking at any thing that came from the sea! Plus the fact that these two haven’t been able to keep their hand off of each other tonight, I had enough clues to suggest the possibility that well, you were expecting Sarah! And honestly honey, now that I know it seems that there’s already a tiny little baby bump here. Oh I’m so excited, I’m gonna be a grandmother!” Nora had pronounced those last few words with such enthusiasm that Sarah couldn’t be happier, she was so nervous to tell her parents. Joe was right; they were thrilled to become grandparents nearly as much as her siblings were excited to become aunt and uncles.
Kevin came closer to her sister to hug her and surreptitiously peeped into the little box. “That’s a cute little bunny you’ve got here Sarah!” he said in a childlike voice.
Nora agreed “Isn’t it? I wasn’t really looking for it and it might sound a little crazy but it was just like it smiled at me when I went past the shop window. Ten minutes later I found myself buying Wendy the bunny and I thought that would be a lovely gift for my future grandchild!”
“Wendy the bunny?” Joe interrupted half-amused.
“Yeah, the woman at the store had named all the stuffed animals on sale; I have to say I hesitated with Ralph the giraffe but I chose the bunny it was cuter!” Nora replied light-heartedly.
“No it’s great Mom!” Sarah assured her. “Only someone here would prefer to have Wendy the baby!”
“Oh, really, you were thinking about naming the baby Wendy! What a coincidence!”
“Well, actually it’s more like Joe’s idea but to be completely honest Wendy Whedon, well, I’m not a fan! But that’s okay we have plenty of time left to decide!”
- - - - - - - - - -
“Well, in the end they chose to name the baby Paige and you know the whole story.” Kevin said pensively as he remembered the first time he had met his niece at the hospital.
“And what happened to Wendy the bunny?” Scotty enquired feigning to be worried about the little teddy’s fate.
“Well, I have no idea!” Kevin realized amused.
“What about your worst Christmas? Want to share?” Scotty asked shyly.
“This one... since we won’t be together.” Kevin replied, his blue eyes staring at Scotty like he had wanted to hypnotize him.
“Yes, I’m sorry. But we’ve already discussed this.”
“Yeah, I know. Is there any way I could convince you to come with me to my Mom’s?” Kevin pleaded.
“No, there’s not. You know you’ll go. You can’t spend even a day far from your family! And excuse me, but I find this a little weird that you would want me to come, since you don’t want to go yourself! If you’re embarrassed to be there, how you do think I would feel, spending Christmas with your ex’s brother and have to be nice and kind knowing for a fact that he hates me for stealing his brother’s boyfriend!?” Scotty asked visibly upset by the mere idea that they were having the conversation again.
“Robert doesn’t hold any grudge against you, believe me I’m the one he loathes. But I get your point. It wasn’t the best idea,” Kevin was forced to acknowledge.
“I’ll go to my folks, end of discussion.” Scotty replied curtly.
But Kevin wasn’t that easily flustered, he had another idea: “What if I came with you to your parents?”
Scotty couldn’t believe what Kevin had just said so much that the only thing he could do was repeat his words: “You wanna come with me to my family? ... Kevin!” he started in a whisper that indicated nothing good would come of what he was going to say. “Look at you, you’re rushing things again. You rushed breaking up with Jason to be with me and now you’re rushing to meet my family. You don’t even consider you and me a ‘we’. I don’t see why I would introduce you to my family. You should take some time trying to decipher what you really want, who you really want to be with.”
“You’re right; I should probably stay here, all alone, to think things straight, like why I’m such an ass sometimes.”
“Don’t start please, Kev! Are you trying to make me feel guilty? Well, it’s working!” Scotty sighed, Kevin was such a child sometimes; he couldn’t stand when things didn’t turn out the way he planned. “I think I’d rather sleep on the air mattress tonight,” Scotty added.
Kevin wanted to protest but didn’t want to inflame the situation. “So when do you leave?” he finally dared to ask.
“My plane is tomorrow morning.”
“I could drive you to the airport, if you want?” Kevin proposed as a mere formality, thinking Scotty would deny the offer.
“I don’t know...” Scotty muttered.
“Listen, Scotty, I don’t want us to fight tonight especially if it’s our last night together in a few days so why don’t we go to bed and you tell me your best Christmas memory, you know, as a bedtime story?”
A minute ago Scotty was fairly decided to sleep on the air mattress not so much to teach Kevin a lesson as to stick to his principles until he realized he would be the one who would be done, it wouldn’t be fair, he would struggle on the hardness of the air mattress while Kevin would be peacefully asleep on a soft bed. “Okay, we’ll share the bed tonight but only to sleep,” Scotty was quite glad to notice some disappointment in Kevin’s eyes, this time he would be the one to be done except that when Scotty lay down there on the bed with Kevin so close to him he was forced to admit he wouldn’t have mind if they had done more than just sleep.
The next morning Kevin drove his boyfriend to the airport. They had left an hour early supposedly to avoid traffic, they both knew the real reason was to have enough time to say goodbye properly, or rather to kiss goodbye properly, something Kevin did fairly well apparently since ultimately Scotty almost missed his flight.
- - - - - - - - - -
Up next: The Christmas party preparations.
Here. * * * * * * * * * *
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