A/N: Happy Holidays everyone! I wrote this - literally - in three hours and as I am posting this, it is 3am in NYC on Christmas Eve. Hope you guys don't mind a little *sad* holiday cheer. For those of you who have just kind of stumble upon this story - A Promise Kept is part of my AU universe that mixes High School Musical with CSI: NY. While it is not needed, I recommend reading Finding Your Way Back Home before because you will appreciate this story more, but once again, it is not needed. For those of you who have read Finding Your Way Back Home, I hope you enjoy this mini-Christmas present for I have added a 'prequel' of sorts and a 'peek of a sequel' for you dedicated readers. The next chapter of Finding Your Way Back Home should be up a few days after Christmas, or at least I'm hoping.

FYI: All mistakes are mine, no beta, and my BFFs aren't the best proofreaders.

Disclaimer: All I own is the bubble that I live in, everything else is up for grabs

A Promise Kept

I am dreaming tonight of a place I love
Even more than I usually do
And although I know it's a long road back
I promise you

I'll be home for Christmas
You can count on me
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents on the tree

Christmas Eve will find you
Where the love light gleams
I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams

~*~*~

Snow was falling thick and heavy around the city that never sleeps. Up above, someone had taken a young girl's wish for a white Christmas and made it reality for the tall skyscrapers that called New York City home, was blanketed by fluffy white snow. Multi-colored strands of lights adorned every building, making the city glow with festive cheer. Chatter was abundant in shopping malls as many rushed in and out of stores purchasing last-minute presents, while laughter emanated from impromptu snowball fights in Central Park. It was Christmas Eve and the eight million people who called this big city home were celebrating the holiday upon them.

In a cramped but gaily decorated townhouse all the way in Middle Village, Queens, a young girl was curled on a worn couch. Carols played softly from the radio next to her while she stared longingly out of a picture window that framed a scene of boys and girls happily frolicking in the snow. The smell of freshly baked gingerbread wafted from the kitchen to the young girl's spot on the couch, but it did nothing to stir her from her thoughts. Gabriella Montez was waiting. She had stubbornly refused to partake in the holiday festivities, all day she had sat on the couch staring out the window. Gabriella was waiting for her Dad to come shake the snow out of his black hair, give her a huge hug and merrily exclaim "One more day 'till Christmas Ella!"

Another glance at the analog clock hanging on the wall told Gabriella all she needed to know: her father's shift would end in exactly thirteen minutes. It would be another hour, though, before he would walk through the front door.

~*~*~

From the bright kitchen, a distraught mother watched her daughter keep up appearances by mentally tricking herself into believing that her father would be spending the holidays with the two of them. A look at the overflowing calendar was a quick stab to Maria Montez's heart, a visual reminder of how many days had passed since her husband's untimely death: thirteen. It had been Maria's hope that by baking gingerbread men and playing carols her daughter would be in the Christmas mood, but she had been sadly mistaken, for as much as Maria missed her husband, she knew that Gabriella's innocent view of the world made her father's death hurt twice as much.

Maria was shaken from her memory at the sound of soft singing, first she passed off the musical noise as the carolers on the radio, but on closer inspection, Maria discovered the noise to be from her daughter. The eleven year-old was quietly singing, I'll Be Home For Christmas, tears silently falling down her porcelain face.

"Christmas Eve will find me, where the love light gleams. I'll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams," Gabriella sang unconsciously.

Maria walked over to her daughter and lightly sat down, before placing a comforting arm around her daughter's small shoulders. It was the first time she had looked at Gabriella properly in two weeks. Despair seemed to seep through the chocolate irises, her beautiful curls were limp, her face pale, her body seemed to sag – Maria thought that Gabriella looked more like the grieving widow, than she herself did.

"I miss him too, mija," Maria whispered into her daughter's ear while pulling her close.

"He promised," Gabriella whispered brokenly.

Maria looked down at the dejected face, "What did he promise mija?" Maria had known her husband to promise their daughter many a thing, for Gabriella had had her father wrapped around her pinky, so she could not possibly know all that he had promised Gabriella.

"He promised that he would be home for Christmas," sniffled Gabriella. Maria lovingly tucked a stray curl behind Gabriella's ear. "He promised me Mommy, he told me way back in October that he would be home all Christmas day." Gabriella pulled away from her mother and stubbornly crossed her arms. "Daddy never breaks his promises to me."

Maria felt her eyes water as she watched her daughter try to believe in the impossible. Her normally hyper-rational, logic-all-the-way daughter was in firm belief that her deceased father was going to come back alive. "I'm sorry mija," Maria said. "But your daddy cannot come back. You know that Gabi, your dad's up in heaven."

"Well God can bring him down for just one day," Gabriella maintained stubbornly. "Since Christmas is a time for miracles anyways, this miracle would be just a normal accomplishment on God's to-do list."

The preteen stared at her mother, willing the older woman to contradict before turning away and staring at the kids still playing outside. Maria also glanced out at the happy children, but suppressed a chuckle at her daughter's reasoning – the thought was so naïve, so Gabriella, that it gave Maria hope that happiness would fill up this home once again.

One of the kids outside – a boy who looked to be a few years older than Gabriella – paused in front of the Montez residence. A sad smile graced his flushed face and snow flecks dotted his jet black hair, he waved half-heartedly at the mother-daughter pair before dropping the pile of fluffy snow in his hands and trooping towards the brownstone. Maria got up from the couch to usher Don Flack Jr. into the house.

"Hey Auntie Maria," Don called out as he hung up his coat and toed off his snow-soaked sneakers. "How are you?"

"Getting better Donnie," Maria assured the teen. "How are you and your parents?" she asked, handing him a steaming mug of hot chocolate and a gingerbread-man before pushing him over towards Gabriella's still body.

"Their fine," shrugged Don as he chomped off the gingerbread man's head. "Mom says that you and Brie are invited to spend Christmas at our place tomorrow."

"That's nice of them Don," Maria said politely, perching herself on her husband's leather recliner letting Don settle down next to Gabriella. "Isn't it Gabi?"

Gabriella glanced up belatedly, realizing Don's presence. "Hey Don," she greeted listlessly. "Your dad's shift ended twenty minutes ago."

"Yeah," said Don, a bit thrown at the change in conversation topic. "What about it, Brie?"

"Nothing," the preteen said with a little shake of the head. Gabriella burrowed in on herself, wrapping her arms around her drawn up knees.

Don glanced down sadly at his closest friend. Memories of the happy-go-lucky Gabriella Montez quickly flashed through his mind, each image a stark contrast to the Gabriella Montez in front of him. Don sighed heavily as he thought of last Christmas Eve, of how Gabriella had been close to exploding with holiday cheer. He remembered, Gabriella's father walking through the door with his own father. The two were chatting about some kind of political stuff, but the moment that Mr. Montez walked through the door, Gabriella had been staring patiently at her father as if waiting for something. Don remembered Mr. Montez coming up beside Gabriella, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek, sprinkling the girl with the snow that had settled on his hair, and exclaiming, "One more day 'till Christmas Ella!" Gabriella had proceeded to giggle gleefully and give her father a big hug.

Contemplative, Don drained his hot chocolate and munched on the last of his cookie before quirking the ends of his mouth upwards. Scooting up close to Gabriella, he proceeded to shake his head like a dog, sprinkling Gabriella with melting snowflakes. Gabriella rolled her eyes and glared up at Don, but he was too far invested in making his best friend smile again. Shaking his head again he leapt up and dramatically bowed in front of Gabriella before taking her small hand and pressing a quick kiss to the top of her hand.

"Brie?" Don prompted.

"Yes Donnie?" asked Gabriella, with a whisper of a smile.

"There's one more day 'till Christmas," he told her with a big grin.

Gabriella did not say anything but she did grace him with a watery smile before she threw her arms around him in a big hug. "Thanks Don," she whispered almost inaudibly.

"Anytime," Don whispered back.

~*~*~

Gabriella Bolton awoke with a start from the dream of Christmas past. Carefully – so as not to ruin her eye makeup – Gabriella dried her eyes and blew her nose. She glanced down at her desk, the calendar there told her all she needed to know, about why her subconscious insisted on playing that particular memory as her dream: It was Christmas Eve. The scene outside of her office windows was the same as that Christmas Eve twenty-three years ago; New York City was blanketed in white powder and lights were strung from every inch of the buildings that lined Broadway. Inside the New York Police Department's Crime Lab, there was no indication that it was Christmas Eve beside perhaps a few less lab personnel.

Yawning slightly, Gabriella rolled her neck and braved drinking her now-cold coffee, as she booted up her computer. Her eyes traveled to the three pictures perched on her desk: one of Gabriella and Don from their childhood, one of her and her parents, and one of her and her own husband and daughter. Those were the people Gabriella was supposed to spending her Christmas Eve with, but for now she was fine with privately mourning the loss of her father and mentally checking everything off of her to-do list for her family's Christmas festivities. Sure, Gabriella thought, that one year had been hard but every other year that had followed was almost like old-times, for it took the following years for her to realize that her father was celebrating Christmas with her - just in spirit, instead of physically.

The sound of soft footfalls made her look up in the thought that it would be her boss, Mac Taylor, telling her to go home. Sadly, it was not Mac, but rather Don Flack. The lanky homicide detective was wearing the same unassuming grin as he had worn in her dreams and was toting an infant wrapped snugly in a purple snowsuit and her bemused husband. Don handed her the sleeping baby before leaning against Gabriella's glass desk. He pressed a soft kiss to Gabriella's cheek and as Don drew back, his ice blue eyes twinkling merrily, he exclaimed: "One more day 'till Christmas Brie!"

~*~*~

Christmas Eve will find me
Where the love light gleams
I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams

If only in my dreams