the indescribable moments of your life
I've been reading WAY too much A7X fic and there's no one here to stop the madness.
School is done for a month and a half and that makes me as giddy as I can be while suffering from the plague. Anyway, speaking of wasting illnesses, I think I have the plot for my ficathon fic, thanks to a combined effort from various parties on the brainstorming front. Also, speaking of fic, I have a 5,000 word Pete/Patrick AU that is off to beta as we speak. We shall see if it ever sees daylight since I'm a little weird about the ending.
If You Held Yourself Up to The Light
Not mine; written in about 20 minutes under the influence of various cold medicines. Title taken from the song that I can't get out of my head: Smashing Pumpkins, 'Tonight, Tonight.'
“You still have this?” Ryan asks, kneeling next to the box of ornaments on Spencer’s floor.
“What?” Spencer leans over to see what Ryan is clutching. It’s a little clay disc with a hole punched in the top where a frayed red ribbon’s been tied into a bow. The disc has a star carved into it, and it’s been painted bright yellow. There’s a crack in one side and the glaze is chipping off, but the RR carved on the back is still legible.
Spencer runs a finger along the smooth edge of the ornament, until his fingers meet Ryan’s. “We made these when we were in fourth grade,” he says, remembering the smell of the paint and the smudges of glitter across Ryan’s cheek. “Mine’s around somewhere too. I think I tried to draw a sheep and you told me--”
“That it looked like a pig,” Ryan finishes for him, handing him the ornament. “I’d forgotten.”
Sitting with Ryan, careful to keep two inches between their knees, Spencer pokes into the box again, moving aside glass balls and little wooden sleighs and snow globes. There’s a very old candy cane that’s half intact and half mint-scented sugar, and, oh, there they are. There’s a paper plate snowman and a reindeer too, with most of his pipe cleaner antlers either gone or twisted into curls.
“The reindeer’s yours,” Spencer says, shaking glitter and fuzz off of it. “I think, um, is he wearing eyeliner?”
Ryan laughs, and Spencer feels the knot of tension in his stomach--the ulcers just waiting to erupt--lessen a little. “After art, remember? We’d go to music class? With Mrs. Tory? She made us sing Rudolph and Jingle Bells.”
“In a round,” Ryan says, straightening his reindeer’s remaining antler. “We had to sing Jingle Bells in a round.”
Right. Spencer can hear a chorus of high-pitched, uncertain fourth-graders stumbling over the complexities of Jingle Bells, which, really, was better than the spring concert when they’d had to sing “Wind Beneath My Wings.” That had probably affected Ryan in ways that would never fully come to light.
“You want to hang these on the tree?” he asks Ryan, taking a leap, wondering if Ryan will resurrect a little bit of his childhood and put it on display, if only just for the Smiths who’ve already seen most of it.
“Won’t they look silly?”
“No,” Spencer says, getting up. “A Christmas tree never feels right until it’s got ornaments made out of pipe cleaners and construction paper on it.”
Ryan patiently tries to re-stick the reindeer’s nose to the plate, and when that doesn’t work, he starts on smoothing the torn edges of the paper. “So, Christmas isn’t Christmas,” he hands the reindeer to Spencer who’s still holding the star, “until you drag out all the old, worn out, torn up, falling apart things?”
“That, Charlie Brown,” Spencer answers, arranging the ornaments around the lights on the tree, “is definitely what Christmas is all about.”
School is done for a month and a half and that makes me as giddy as I can be while suffering from the plague. Anyway, speaking of wasting illnesses, I think I have the plot for my ficathon fic, thanks to a combined effort from various parties on the brainstorming front. Also, speaking of fic, I have a 5,000 word Pete/Patrick AU that is off to beta as we speak. We shall see if it ever sees daylight since I'm a little weird about the ending.
If You Held Yourself Up to The Light
Not mine; written in about 20 minutes under the influence of various cold medicines. Title taken from the song that I can't get out of my head: Smashing Pumpkins, 'Tonight, Tonight.'
“You still have this?” Ryan asks, kneeling next to the box of ornaments on Spencer’s floor.
“What?” Spencer leans over to see what Ryan is clutching. It’s a little clay disc with a hole punched in the top where a frayed red ribbon’s been tied into a bow. The disc has a star carved into it, and it’s been painted bright yellow. There’s a crack in one side and the glaze is chipping off, but the RR carved on the back is still legible.
Spencer runs a finger along the smooth edge of the ornament, until his fingers meet Ryan’s. “We made these when we were in fourth grade,” he says, remembering the smell of the paint and the smudges of glitter across Ryan’s cheek. “Mine’s around somewhere too. I think I tried to draw a sheep and you told me--”
“That it looked like a pig,” Ryan finishes for him, handing him the ornament. “I’d forgotten.”
Sitting with Ryan, careful to keep two inches between their knees, Spencer pokes into the box again, moving aside glass balls and little wooden sleighs and snow globes. There’s a very old candy cane that’s half intact and half mint-scented sugar, and, oh, there they are. There’s a paper plate snowman and a reindeer too, with most of his pipe cleaner antlers either gone or twisted into curls.
“The reindeer’s yours,” Spencer says, shaking glitter and fuzz off of it. “I think, um, is he wearing eyeliner?”
Ryan laughs, and Spencer feels the knot of tension in his stomach--the ulcers just waiting to erupt--lessen a little. “After art, remember? We’d go to music class? With Mrs. Tory? She made us sing Rudolph and Jingle Bells.”
“In a round,” Ryan says, straightening his reindeer’s remaining antler. “We had to sing Jingle Bells in a round.”
Right. Spencer can hear a chorus of high-pitched, uncertain fourth-graders stumbling over the complexities of Jingle Bells, which, really, was better than the spring concert when they’d had to sing “Wind Beneath My Wings.” That had probably affected Ryan in ways that would never fully come to light.
“You want to hang these on the tree?” he asks Ryan, taking a leap, wondering if Ryan will resurrect a little bit of his childhood and put it on display, if only just for the Smiths who’ve already seen most of it.
“Won’t they look silly?”
“No,” Spencer says, getting up. “A Christmas tree never feels right until it’s got ornaments made out of pipe cleaners and construction paper on it.”
Ryan patiently tries to re-stick the reindeer’s nose to the plate, and when that doesn’t work, he starts on smoothing the torn edges of the paper. “So, Christmas isn’t Christmas,” he hands the reindeer to Spencer who’s still holding the star, “until you drag out all the old, worn out, torn up, falling apart things?”
“That, Charlie Brown,” Spencer answers, arranging the ornaments around the lights on the tree, “is definitely what Christmas is all about.”