Walking into Burke's apartment, Cristina noticed right away that the layout of the furniture had changed, and hated that she noticed. It had only been 2 weeks and 3 days since she had first seen the inside of Burke's apartment, and it was already becoming comfortable to her…well as comfortable as someplace so freakishly clean and organized could be. But there were little signs of her presence, a toothbrush, a pile of clothes in the corner (Burke's one concession to her inability to be organized) and her motorcycle helmet tossed carelessly on the table.
The furniture was different because space had been made to accommodate an eight-foot tall Christmas tree, which was currently occupying what felt like the entire room. The room smelled overwhelmingly of tree, so Cristina breathed through her mouth. Burke's legs were sticking out from under it, though she couldn't for the life of her see the rest of him. A muffled curse later and the tree was illuminated with white lights, and the rest of Burke emerged from underneath the tree.
"I got it at the place down the street. What do you think?"
"It's big. And green." Burke rolled his eyes at that.
"I have to go, I'm on call."
"We can decorate it when you get back, then."
"Don't bother waiting for me, you go ahead." She was halfway back out the door by that point, determined to escape before she was roped into hateful holiday experiences.
"So what are you getting Burke for Christmas?"
Cristina almost spat her sip of coffee back into her cup.
"I have to get him something?" Meredith rolled her eyes.
"Of course! You practically live there, you're in a relationship, it's Christmas, and those factors combine to mean gift giving."
"Emphasis on the practically please, I'm not moving in any time soon." Cristina put her coffee cup down on the bench. She and Meredith were taking their break outside in the abnormally warm Seattle morning. Of course, it was winter in Seattle, and it was raining, so they were ensconced under an awning.
"So what are you going to get him?" Meredith raised an eyebrow, and smirked her trademark smirk.
"I don't know. Maybe a mop? He likes things clean." Meredith laughed at that.
"You'll think of something, I'm sure."
"Well Christmas is in two days, so I'd better have a brainwave soon. Or else he's getting the mop." She glanced at her watch and leveraged herself off of the bench.
"Back to the grind." Meredith scowled and stood, and they entered Seattle Grace side by side.
Once inside they split up, each peeling off to her assigned task for the morning. As Cristina made her way to the elevator she let her mind wander to thoughts of the Christmas season. She'd never been a fan, as a child Christmas had been such a production, a never ending parade of hideously cute reindeer jumpers and candy cane stockings and parties and egg nog and she had hated every minute of it. Even now, away from her mother's cloyingly cheesy celebration she felt mild revulsion at the sight of holiday window displays and the stuffed reindeer that were currently perched proudly on many of the hospital computers. 'Bah, humbug' she grumbled.
"You know, talking to yourself is the first sign of insanity." Burke had snuck up on her while she was lost in her thoughts.
"What an original statement." She smirked at him and continued on her path to the elevator. He fell into step beside her.
"You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch." She scowled at that and replied, "I hate Christmas."
"I don't know how anyone could hate Christmas. Peace, love, sugar cookies…it all works for me."
"Well growing up it was itchy tights, children's choir and effusive relatives, so I'll pass, thanks." Cristina had reached her patient's door, and paused in front of it.
"Whatever you say, Dr. Yang." Burke had a mischievous smile on his face. Cristina rolled her eyes and entered the room. She could hear him whistling, "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" as he walked away.
Later that day Burke's happy holiday mood had definitely soured. He looked at the OR board and cringed. Nine procedures to go, and it was already midnight. Thankfully none were cardio-thoracic patients, but it looked like it would be a late night for everyone else. The holidays were always busy at the hospital. He hadn't seen Cristina since that morning, and the board had her in OR 3 with Dr. Montgomery Shepherd. He would just have to leave her a note saying that he would see her in the morning. He smiled ruefully as he walked along the hallway, remembering his own days as an intern. His reverie was interrupted by his pager, which was flashing 911. Cursing under his breath he hurried to the Emergency Room.
Cristina glanced at her watch as she hurried from OR 2 back to OR 3. It read 6:00 am, but that couldn't be right. It hadn't been six hours since all hell had broken loose at the hospital, had it? Shaking her head to clear it just made her feel dizzy, so she thought that maybe it had in fact been six hours since 27 people had been brought in, from a 15 car-pile up on the expressway. Every surgeon currently in the hospital was working on a case related to the car crash, and they had called most of the interns back to help. The rush for operating room space was complicated by the fact that they had been backed up even before the crash and now… they would be lucky to get out before the next day. Which was…Christmas. Well, maybe she'd get lucky and they'd all have to stay for two days. It seemed unlikely though, since lots of visiting doctors were coming in, like they had for Thanksgiving. She sighed. Working through Christmas would have been nice.
Lost in her thoughts, Cristina rounded the corner and ran straight into Burke. He grabbed her arms to steady her as she swayed from the impact.
"You look exhausted." Concern was evident on his face.
"Thanks, you look fresh as a daisy yourself, you know." Her grimace was almost a smile. He must have been tired, because that crack didn't even faze him.
"I thought you would have left by now, you've been here for over 24 hours."
"Yeah well, Bailey can't get a hold of George or Alex, so I'm stuck here until they show up."
"I'll tell her to let you leave."
"Are you kidding? There's so much going on, I don't want to miss anything. Anyway, I'm not tired at all." Swaying while she said that hadn't helped her argument, but hopefully he hadn't noticed that she was about to collapse from exhaustion. Burke frowned.
"You should really go back to the apartment, you can take a nap and put up some Christmas decorations – " Christina cut him off.
"No way am I decorating. I hate Christmas. And decorations. And egg nog. If you want to decorate, that's fine, but I'm not interested."
"Fine." He turned and walked away without a second glance.
After he'd ignored her two successive times in the hallway Cristina yanked Burke into an on-call room to talk to her.
He sat down on the bed, looking defeated. Cristina leaned against the door, her arms crossed over her chest.
"I don't get why this is so important to you." She leaned her head back until it hit the door with a thump.
"I like Christmas, that's all. I don't get why that bothers you." He laid his head back against the pillow. They stared at each other, neither knowing what to say.
Their pagers beeping broke the silence.
"911." Burke was the first to react; he was already on his feet before Cristina had read her pager code.
"Dammit." Then they were out the door.
As they stood side by side in the operating room Cristina's mind wandered back to their…argument. For lack of a better word she would call it an argument. The thing was, they were both too stubborn to argue. Neither of them would really listen to the other, a strategy that didn't really lend itself to productive discussions. Or any discussions, really.
When they finally stumbled back into the apartment it was midnight on Christmas Eve. Cristina didn't think she'd worked a longer shift since her first one – even her boundless enthusiasm for surgery had waned over the course of her 32-hour shift. Shedding clothes as she went, Cristina barely made it to the bed before collapsing. Burke followed more slowly, taking the time to turn off the Christmas tree lights for the night, and looking despairingly at the bare branches before he flicked off the living room lights. Not even bothering to take off his clothes he lay on the bed and was immediately asleep.
The insistent beeping intruded on his dream as the timer on a bomb, it was a few minutes of frantic attempts to dismantle the bomb that Burke woke up enough to realize that it was his pager. From her spot curled up at his side Cristina shifted.
"Whamesat?" Her question was muffled against the pillow. He thought she was asking what was going on, but that was just a guess. The pager was still beeping.
"Hospital, 911. I have to go in." He hit it with his hand like an alarm, anything to make that infernal beeping stop.
"Can I come?" He would have smiled if he hadn't been so tired. That was his Cristina.
"O'Malley's there, you should stay and get more sleep." He looked at the clock, it read 4:08 a.m.
"Mmhhmm." He hadn't realized how tired she was – if she didn't argue about surgical opportunities she must have been ready to pass out on her feet. It looked like she was already back asleep as he walked quietly out of the bedroom.
He glanced resignedly at the undecorated Christmas tree as he walked out the door and back into the bleak Seattle night.
Burke paused outside of the door to his apartment, with his hand on the doorknob. The surgery had been long and exhausting. For a nasty minute about halfway through he had thought the patient wouldn't make it. Everything had turned out fine, though, and he had scrubbed out on autopilot, body already planning its return to a nice warm bed. Taking only a second to return O'Malley's Christmas wishes he had pointed his feet towards home. Now that he'd arrived, however, he was hesitant to enter the apartment. The fight with Cristina had been…hard. Unpleasant. He didn't want to fight anymore. Right now he wanted to crawl back into bed with her, and wake up around three o'clock. He resolutely pushed open the door, and was surprised by the small jingling sound that it made. He looked down, only to see two sleigh bells tied around the knob with a red ribbon.
Burke was confused. He pushed the door the rest of the way open, and walked into the apartment. It was decorated – it looked like every decoration he had ever owned was up, on the walls or on the table or on the tree. A Christmas carol was playing quietly on the stereo; he thought it was Oh Holy Night. He could see the tip of a Santa hat peeking over the top of the armchair, and when he walked around to face it he saw Cristina curled up, wearing her pajamas and a red and white hat that said 'I've been nice' across the front. Burke was just placing a blanket over her sleeping form when she opened her eyes.
"I decorated the house." She sounded just as proud as she had when she'd used the key for the first time.
"Thank you. It's –" She silenced him by pulling him onto the chair to kiss her. Her mouth tasted like peppermint.
Some time later Burke reluctantly untangled himself from Cristina, and stood.
"Thank you," he said again.
"You're welcome." He kept hold of her hand while he looked around his apartment again, his gaze drawn towards the twinkling lights on the Christmas tree in the corner, which was decorated to the nines.
The small pile of presents under the tree was brightly wrapped. Among them he saw the ones his mother had sent, as well as some he assumed were from her friends. There were two with his name on them, and releasing Cristina's hand he went and got hers from the hall closet where he had hidden it earlier that week.
She smiled as he handed it to her and sat cross-legged in front of her chair. The song on the stereo switched to "Joy to the World."
Cristina ripped the paper off quickly to reveal a boxed set of stainless steel surgical instruments.
"I had them engraved for you."
"Oh! I love them!" She launched herself into his arms. Burke smiled against her hair. Surgery was clearly the way to her heart.
When she handed him his present he carefully unstuck the tape, slowly peeling back the snowman-print paper. It was a silver double picture frame, on one side a young Cristina was holding a teddy bear and smiling a big toothless smile, and the other was a picture of them together. He remembered the day – Stevens had dragged them home after rounds to meet the new dog, and had brought out the camera after he'd taught Doc how to roll over. He didn't remember her taking a picture of him and Cristina, but here it was, unposed, he was tucking a piece of hair back behind her ear, and she was smiling up at him.
She was looking at him hopefully, obviously unsure if he would like her gift.
"I love it." Her face lit up.
"There's one more." She handed it to him, a big box that felt unusually light. He gave it an experimental shake, hoping to have some idea what could be inside.
Opening it he saw only a piece of paper. He looked at Cristina quizzically.
"Read it." She was watching him intently. He picked up the paper and scanned it quickly. It was… a typical end-of-lease agreement…signed by Cristina Yang, M.D.
"You canceled your lease?"
"I have to move out by January. I don't suppose you know of someone who might be looking for a cranky, messy roommate?" He beamed at her.
"I might be able to find space. As long as the roommate wouldn't want to vacuum. That's my favorite thing to do."
She smiled and then kissed him, and the presents lay forgotten on the floor for a long time after that.