Came to me whilst baking gingerbread men with my dad. My first fanfic, probably awful. Set around Christmas time at Janet and Leo's before they split and before Harry left.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. Not one bit. (except possibly the plot.) The characters belong to the BBC. If I did own this Leo and Janet would not have split, Harry would not leave, Afghan would not have happened and Nikki and Harry would be married with kids by now (or at least together.)
Nikki still has long hair in this.
She loved Christmas. The time she spent with her rather dysfunctional family; Leo, Janet and Harry. Harry. She smiled to herself even as she thought his name. It was so perfect, it suited him so much. She realised she'd been staring at her hands for a while whilst she thought and got back to kneading the dough.
"What are you making?" a loud voice said in her ear. She jumped and knocked the bag of flour all over Janet's kitchen floor. "Do Janet and Leo know that you are wrecking their kitchen and using their ingredients up?" Harry raised his eyebrows at her and smiled innocently.
"Harry," she whined, "You made me knock the flour over!"
"Gingerbread men?" he smirked at her, "Nikki, its only Me, You, Janet and Leo for dinner, and none of us are 4,"
"Physically, at least. You behave like a four-year-old in the office most of the time," she quipped back quickly. "anyway, I like gingerbread men, they taste good and they are Christmassy. And Janet said I could." she poked her tongue out at him.
"She's going to kill you, you know. She loves this kitchen." He said, glancing at the floor and the mess he had caused her to make. "and your pretty black dress is ruined." he looked at the just-above-the-knee black dress that she was wearing and that she had miraculously kept the flour from hitting. The blonde looked down to and frowned.
"Why? I didn't get any flour on it?" A Grin split across Harry's face as he threw the handful of flour that he had be holding behind his back at her. "Harry! its everywhere!" she cried, her best friend folding into peels of laughter. She couldn't be mad at Harry, especially with such a juvenile look of innocence and humour on his face, and she felt herself laughing along with him, discreetly scooping some flour up. She looked at him and smiled, "Will you tidy this up with me please?" she asked, motioning to the floor. he looked down to and as his head was bowed she emptied her handful of flour into his dark hair that was getting on the verge of needing another cut. She would have to send him to see Simon again, he did such a good job last time. Harry looked up at her and chocked on the fine cloud of white that came down when he shook his head.
"This is war!" and before they knew it they were running around Janet's large kitchen, spreading flour to every crevice possible.
The sound of loud laughter had drifted into Leo and Janet's conversation in the living room and Leo walked through to see what was causing such a racket, "What on earth is..." He trailed off as he rounded the corner and stopped to observe the antics of his colleagues in his kitchen. He fell silent when he saw the two of his closest friends standing in the middle of the kitchen, a little more than 'a light dusting' of flour covering them both head to toe, dancing to 'When You Say Nothing at all' by Ronan Keating. They where swaying slowly, completely out of time with the music. Leo smiled at the pair of them, if it was anyone else he would have gone berserk, and Janet would have been worse, but the sight of the woman he thought of as a daughter with her head on the man who was the closet thing he could call to a son's chest made his heart melt. It was obvious that they both loved each-other to the outside world but it seemed that to them they just couldn't see it. It agitated him, when detectives asked him questions along the lines of "How long have Dr Alexander and Dr Cunningham been seeing each-other? they look perfect together, I hope it lasts." after a post-mortem and he has to reply "Well, they aren't actually together. But I know what you mean, They are perfect for each-other. They are completely in love, they just can't see it themselves." and there is an awkward silence from the detective.
"Leo?" Janet's voice broke him out of his thoughts as she came up behind him, "What's going... Oh," she said as she saw the scene in front of her. "Come let's give them some privacy." she took his arm and they want back through to the living room and sat on the sofa and continued their conversation together, the topic leaning more and more towards the couple dancing in the kitchen.
As the song ended Nikki looked up at Harry and then at the gingerbread men still sat uncooked on the side. "Harry, the gingerbread men haven't even been cooked yet." he smiled at her and let her go, both feeling colder and more lost with the loss of contact. The male pathologist waked over to the uncooked biscuits and ate ones leg. "Harry!"
"In my opinion gingerbread men always taste better before they are cooked than after." they both smiled. "And anyway, they only take fifteen minutes to cook, I'll clear up whilst you put them in the oven." She smiled at him and walked over. He wrapped her arms around her and she looked up into his face, leaning in so she could smell the aftershave that she brought him last year mixed with the smell that was entirely Harry. Before he could stop himself he leant down and kissed her. It was slow and sweet and didn't last long. He pulled back and shut his eyes, waiting for the slap that never came. Instead she leant up and kissed him again, this time for longer, and he smiled through it because it was everything he had ever wanted it to be. It was better than the time he had kissed her in the pub to shut her up the day before Penny arrived at the lab, better than the dreams she featured constantly and better than any woman who he'd ever kissed. All because this was Nikki and she was real.
"Is this what you want?" she asked when they pulled back after oxygen became a problem. They had their foreheads resting against one-another and she motioned between them, "Us?"
"Yes, more than anything." he breathed, gingerbread once again forgotten.
Ta-da, there you have it, et voilà. Yes, I made gingerbread today in a black dress, biggest mistake ever! the flour went everywhere. This came to me whilst baking gingerbread men and singing along to the music.