torchwood: 'making with tradition' (standard, for tw_calender)
Title: Making with Tradition
Prompt: Day 3, Christmas Cracker, on tw_calender
Rating: PG/Standard; one risque/lewd/suggestive comment, but ... it's Jack.
Characters: Jack, Ianto
Summary: Christmas Eve in the Hub, and Jack and Ianto are alone together. (Disclaimer: Bad Christmas cracker joke is, in fact, a real joke found inside an actual cracker; author holds no responsibility for amounts of joke-induced groan.)
It's Christmas Eve in the Hub and things are quiet. Gwen has gone home to Rhys, after making Jack and Ianto promise - individually and together - that they will attend Christmas dinner at her flat the next day. Jack is sprawled across the ratty couch that sits against the wall with his feet propped on the coffee table, when Ianto comes to join him. Ianto settles back without even so much as a comment about Jack's inappropriately placed feet - perhaps a Christmas miracle in itself - and holds one end of a Christmas cracker out to Jack.
Jack turns and raises an eyebrow. "Where did you get that?"
"I found it up in the tourist information centre." Ianto shrugs. "Pull it?"
"Usually when someone asks me to pull on a suspiciously phallic object," Jack comments, leaning forward, "this isn't quite what I have in mind."
Ianto rolls his eyes. "Humor me."
Jack pulls on his end of the cracker while Ianto holds the other, and it separates with a loud snap! Ianto gets the bigger end of it, but he pulls out the paper crown and reaches over to put it on Jack's head, maybe just to make the other man fuss over his hair. Jack only laughs, though, and reaches over to take the cracker and dump the rest of its contents into Ianto's lap.
"'Why does Santa Claus have no children?'" Jack reads the joke from inside.
"'Because he only comes once a year and it's down a chimney,'" Ianto deadpans in response, then groans.
Jack slings an arm around Ianto's shoulders and leans back, laughing. "I remember when they'd first started putting jokes in those things. You'd think they get better with time, but they don't. They'll still be making Christmas crackers centuries from now and those jokes will still be bad."
Ianto settles in closer to Jack than he normally would with anyone else present. "It's tradition. Snow, eggnog, bad prizes from Christmas crackers ..." He pauses, worrying at one of the buttons on the front of Jack's shirt. "Hanging the stockings, opening gifts Christmas morning. Come home with me tonight?"
Jack had gone home with Ianto their last Christmas together, too, but the circumstances had been different. John Ellis was dead and Jack, along with the inside of Ianto's car, had still smelled of exhaust and death. Even this Christmas is dampened by Tosh and Owen being gone, but the captain has reminded himself to remain thankful for those he has left.
"Are we making it a tradition?" he asks, going for casual and unable to help a little something vulnerable in his tone.
"Of course." Ianto smiles. "Come on, I'll show you where I put the mistletoe."