The crisp winter air hit your face with a rush, bits and pieces of snow tingling against your cheeks. The thick forest close to your holiday house were rather impressive. Especially since you got to go outside every day and observe all the animals as they made their way through the woods. Looking over to your younger brother, you notice his bright eyes and large grin as he stares at his 'snowman'. At least that's what he calls the mutated lumps with a carrot shoved into the top one. Frowning a little, you stumble through the knee high snow, bits and pieces sneaking into boots and making you shiver. As you begin to reach him there is a sudden pressure around the toe of your boots. Without realising it, the tree root clenches the toe of your boot and you fall face first into the snow. Letting out a muffled "mmph!" you push yourself up slowly to see your diligent brother standing directly infront of you. He must've heard the ruckus you made and stopped whatever he was doing. On account of your accident, the interest in what he was doing quickly disappears
Taking a deep breath you sink into your study desk chair. The cushion isn't the most comfortable but you guess the house is old, so it's understandable if the items aren't of a fine quality either. Another downside of temporarily living in an old house is that there is little electricity, which becomes frequently irritating at night due to the fact that you are quite bored with playing scrabble with the family.
Letting out a deep sigh, you stare at the old radio. Your hand ran over the dusty surface before you picked it up in your gentle hands. Sweeping the dust off was the easy part, the turning on and finding a station would be the hard part. The on switch was rather obvious, the large button at the centre under the station scale. As you pushed it in, the horrendous crackling noise emerged making you grit your teeth. Quickly finding your way through the scale It seemed only three stations were available, two of which being news. Obviously you didn't choose either of those as you quickly turned to the music channel.
The radio station seemed to be playing old Christmas tunes. Which made sense since it was late December. Slowly sitting back in the chair, you feel a cool draft enter the room. Looking towards the open window, you frown a little.
"Did I leave that open?" you whisper under your breath, standing up as you gently close the window. The old frames are easily breakable, which you had learned when you first entered the old house. The crack in the split wood was hardly noticeable, but you didn't want to risk it into becoming a bigger problem.
As you walk back to the seat, internally tutting yourself for leaving the window open at night, you snap out of the trance by one of your favourite songs. It sounded much better over the ipod, but you settled for listening to it over the traditional radio.
Normally, you would simply hum the tune, but due to your happy mood you decide that singing over the female voice would be better. You glance back at the window as you slowly walk up to it. Sitting one of your elbows on the windowsill, you watch the gentle snow drift to the ground as to twinkles brightly in the moonlight.
"I really can't stay," you sing gently as you pick a snowflake off of the window sill and watch it melt in you palm.
"I've got to go way," you look into the room, the only light being a lantern hanging off of the roof. The room smelled rather musky but you didn't mind.
"This evening has been so very nice" You begin to raise your voice a little more confident as you step side to side.
"My mother will start to worry," You picked up your hairbrush gingerly and hold it to your lips as if it were a microphone "and father will be pacing the floor".
"So really I'd better scurry" You begin to over exaggerate all your movements and make actions to the song lyrics. You feel like an idiot but you ignore it. It's everyday you have a spur of the moment singing performance. Not like anyone is watching. "Well maybe just a half a drink more"
"You can put some records on while I pour~"
You jump, looking around the room. You don't recognise the voice. It's smooth voice is beautiful like hot chocolate on a freezing night. You continue singing, but a lot tenser and
"And the neighbours might think" you sing gently as you walk around the room while swaying your hips a little to the tune.
"Baby it's bad out there" the voice is opposite to you, but no one is there. You frown creases further as you walk towards it.
"Say, what's in this drink?" You survey the room preparing to jump the voice.
"No cabs to be had out there" You instantly jump towards it, but trip on something freezing and fall to the ground. You hear a giggle escape the voice and you pout as you sweep your knee's off.
"I wish I knew how to break the spell" You push yourself to stand up but you stumble a little, hitting the wall with a slight wince.
"Your eye's are like starlight now please I'll take your hat, your hair looks swell" The voice is obviously holding back laughter, making you grit your teeth.
"I ought to say no, no, no, sir" You stood sturdily, but refused to move in case you embarrass yourself again
"Mind if I move closer" You feel an arm push against yours making you shiver. It's abnormally cold like ice. Your mind starts to race. 'Could it be?...'
"At least I'm gonna say that I tried" 'No that's ridiculous' you confirm yourself as you nod to yourself, instantly pushing out the ridiculous idea.
"What's the sense in hurting my pride?" The arm disappears, a sudden joy in his voice as it becomes louder like your own.
"I really can't stay!" You use all your voice listening for the opposing voice. 'maybe, just maybe' you think to yourself, your eyes searching for the voice.
"Baby don't hold out" The voice is raised as well. You both know the next line. Wandering to the centre of the room, the voice is joined in unison with yours. A grin spreads across your face as you raise your voice for the climax of the song
"Ahh, but it's cold outside!" Your voices join to make a symphony of pitches. You close your eyes as you envelop yourself in the lyrics.
As you open your eyes slowly, the corners of your lips curl at the sight. The short scuffled white hair. The smug grin. The crystal blue eyes. The blue hoodie. The guy in front of you was, no doubt about it, the spirit of winter.
That when you notice you are toe to toe with the what-looks-like-a-teen and you jump back, smiling a little. His pearly white teeth are revealed even more as he notices your reaction.
"I guess we're abandoning the song?" He laughs lightly as he tilted his head towards the radio.
"You could say that" Your smile matches his as you scan his figure silently.
"You know it's impolite to stare, right?" he lets out a gentle laugh as he extends his hand out.
"o-oh, uhh I'm (y/n). Sorry about that, it's just your rather strange on the eyes" You take his hand and delicately shake his hand, his palms a lot colder than his forearm. He smiles gently before sitting down in your chair, resting his bare feet on the table. You roll your eyes as you sit on the single bed sitting next to it, covered in multiple blankets and doonas.
The two of you sit in silence for a couple of minutes, letting the Christmas carols dance through the small room. You glanced at him to only see him staring at you curiously.
"What?" You sigh slightly, his staring putting you off a little.
"I'm Jack by the way. That's if you wanted to know" He smirked at you before letting his eyes drift back to the radio. You feel kinda bad for not asking his name now, and you sigh as your eyes scan him in detail. You notice frost forming on the seat cushion where he sat. 'I'll deal with that late…' you mentally note to yourself, knowing how easily mildew forms on the rickety old furniture. His thin hands were hidden in the pockets of his light blue jumper. The beautiful frost patterns that had formed around the hem of a neck were amazing, as if an artist had delicately painted them on and then covered in gloss. His leather breaches were rather old. You were surprised he hadn't changed them as well but you shrugged, guessing that he might just prefer them. The light hit his icy white skin just right, pale blue eyes shimmering softly in the faint light. That's when you realised that he was looking into your eyes with a smug grin.
"Can't get enough of it, huh?" he chuckled, floating out of the chair to stand directly in front of you. He leaned forward, leaving hardly any personal space for you. His heat deserted lips were inches from your own. This was incredibly uncomfortable. In an attempt to cover up your burning cheeks, you scooted back until you hit the wall and rolled your eyes heavily.
"Do you understand the phrase 'personal space'? because you seem to be intruding mine" You grumbled, folding your arms and looking at him as if he were a child. He laughed gently and moved back to lean against the opposing wall, imitating your folded arms. You looked at the ground to see a large wooden pole, ice frosted all across it. You jumped off of your bed and crept towards it, Jacks watchful eyes beaming at your childish curiosity.
The pole was freezing, to the point where it sent shivers up your spine as you grasped it. You noticed the centre of the pole had a thick layer of ice across it, as if it had snapped and was held together by the ice like cement. You looked up to look at Jack to only find him crouching next to you, spooking you a little.
"You probably won't believe me if I told you the boogie man broke that" He half laughed half sighed as pointed at the break.
"You'd be surprised what I believe in" You smile as you prodded to unbreakable ice, burning your index finger from the cold.
"Actually, about that," Jacks voice was now infront of you, but you didn't bother to look up at him as you maintained eye contact with the rod. "Do you have any idea as to why you can see me?"
You sigh a little as you look up at him, a gentle smile across your face as you fidget yourself around to sit cross legged. "I saw Santa Claus when I was 10 years old. I remember I was so excited about Christmas that I slept by the tree. I heard a lot of clunking and a clumsy 'oof' that I forced myself to open my eyes, despite my mom telling me Santa doesn't give presents to people he see's. When I opened my eyes and saw him I began sobbing, because I wanted my presents so badly. He patted my head and told me it was fine, and that my mom was telling me a fib. I helped him unpack the presents under our tree and thanked him. Just before he left, he told me to never stop believing. So every Christmas since then I've camped by the Christmas tree and talked to him as he unpacked our presents and ate the coconut roughs and milk we put out for him. He always talked of the guardians and how the newest one was always causing trouble. So when I remembered the window was open and it was snowing outside, I quickly realised it might be the newest guardian, known for his antics and breaking and entering" You stopped after you felt a goofy smile stretching across your face.
"That's quite the story you've got there" he grinned as he stood up and wandered towards the window. He looked towards you, retreating from the window before placing his cold lips on your forehead. You tensed up instantly, his cold lips burning slightly against your forehead.
"Blessed be your soul" He whispered as he parted you, returning to the window and carefully opening it. "This was fun," he smiled, using hit feet to pick up his rod "we should do this again sometime!" he grinned as he fell out of the window gracefully, the wind quickly picking him up as he floated outside the window. He saluted with you one hand and wrote in the frost on your window with the other, before a rush of wind entered your room, him flying into the blurry white distance. As you regained your posture and mindset you shuffled towards the window, reading the clear sentence out loud.
"Never stop believing, Jack."
Well that's chapter 1! I hope you enjoyed it~
It's my first xreader fic so criticism is welcomed!