Finn hasn't ever really been one of those guys who watches the news every night or reads the paper every morning, and he can't see himself ever turning into that guy. It's just...the news kind of sucks. It always starts off with the most depressing thing that happened that day, whether it's a war somewhere or a missing child or some natural disaster. After that, they move on the politics, which Finn is positive is just the same groups of people having the exact same argument over and over again. He started paying attention to politics a lot more when Burt ran for Congress, but he's hated all of the fighting and crap ever since. On the local news, weather is the next thing, and then sports, and then the two minutes that they allow for the happy news, like that cat who got shipped to France when it snuck into some factory, but made it there totally fine and was reuinted with its family later.

It's just not worth it.

And look, Finn isn't uninformed. He reads, okay? He keeps up with what's going on in the world, he just doesn't have to watch the evening news or read the New York Times every morning.

There's one exception though. See, Finn loves snow. As soon as the weather gets cold, he makes a point of checking the extended forecast online every couple of days. And as soon as he sees those little snowflakes on the screen, he starts watching the local weather. He wants to know when exactly it's coming so he can be sure to see it as soon as it starts to fall. It's something he's always done, even when he was little and watching the news meant not watching Sponge Bob. Kurt has been teasing him about it since their parents got married, and Finn deliberately never told Puck about the whole thing because he knew better, but whatever.

Snow is...it's magical. Starting with the fact that every single snowflake that has ever fallen on earth has been at least a tiny bit different - and that every single snowflake that will ever fall will be different - and ending with the way that it makes everything look all soft and kind of sparkly, it's really like magic. And yeah, he likes looking at it, but he likes being out in the snow, too. He likes building snowmen and having snowball fights, even after that year that Puck accidentally nailed him in the back of the head with one that was more ice than snow and he had to get stitches. He even kind of likes shoveling the driveway and the sidewalk in front of the house.

(And next door for Mrs. Green. The first year that they lived in this house, he was just about finished with their driveway when this frail-looking old woman came out of her house and started shoveling her sidewalk. He crossed their front yards and took over for her, and he's been taking care of it ever since. She repays him by making these crazy-good chocolate chocolate chip cookies.)

Brittany loves snow just as much as Finn does. It's just one of the many things that lets him know that they're like, meant to be together.

They got together the spring after they graduated from high school. She was really the only other person who was still in Lima who wasn't legitimately a Lima loser (because yeah, there is such a thing, even if neither he nor Puck ever was one), so they sort of started hanging out with each other out of necessity. Sure, Artie and whoever else was around, but they were still in high school, and even though there's just a year between them, it was weird, hanging out the way they used to. It made Finn feel like a loser, even though he was actually really happy with his decision to take business classes at OSU's Lima campus and work at the garage with Burt. He and Britt started hanging out after everyone who had come home for Christmas break went back to school and they realized that hanging out with each other was better than being alone. Hanging out turned into having sex and going on dates, and before he'd even realized what happened, he was in love with her, and they were looking for a house together with a diamond ring burning a hole in his pocket. That was almost five years ago.

They haven't had a white Christmas in this house yet, which Finn hates.

They haven't had a white Christmas in Lima in years, actually. He wants it, so bad, because Christmas and snow are like, his two favorite things, and having both of them at the same time makes then both even better. He can't explain it, really, but Brittany agrees. This year though, he thinks it might happen. He read it in the Farmer's Almanac that Brittany bought when she decided she wanted to grow a vegetable garden (that didn't really pan out), and there's a meteorologist who seems to think that this might be the year.

It's already dark when Finn gets home from work on the twenty-third. Britt's office is closed for two weeks for the holidays (she's a receptionist at an orthodontist's office in town), so she's already there. The house looks like Christmas when he pulls into the driveway. There are the lights that he hung outside, outlining the roof and the porch and all of the windows and winding around the branches of the tree in the front yard, and he can see the Christmas tree glowing in the living room through the window. There's a wreath on the front door, and warm light coming from all of the windows, and honestly, the only thing that's missing?

Snow.

"Hey, baby," Finn greets Brittany when he walks into the living room after he's taken off his shoes.

She shushes him, staring intently at the television. "It's the weather," she tells him urgently.

Most days he'd kiss her anyway, because screw the weather, but they've been calling for snow on Christmas Eve all week, and he has to make sure that they haven't changed their minds.

He just catches the end of the guy's spiel, but it's really the most important part: That's the part when he says that the snow should start by noon on Christmas Eve and last into the next morning.

Brittany flicks off the TV when it goes to commercial, dropping the remote on the coffee table before clapping her hands together. "White Christmas!" she exclaims.

Finn smiles, reaching over to push his hand into her hair so he can kiss her gently, taking things a little deeper just because she's his wife and he can. "Hey," he murmurs after he pulls away.

"Hi," she replies, laughing a little before she pulls away. "So, I ordered a pizza right before you got home, so dinner's on it's way, and today I bought eggnog and made some of those chocolate peppermint cookies you liked last year."

Finn just leans forward to kiss her again because she really is perfect as far as he's concerned, even if eggnog is disgusting. Now that he's paying attention, he realizes that the house does smell like chocolate under the scent of the pepperminty candles Britt's been burning every day since Thanksgiving. "Rudolph is on tonight," he says, leaning back into the couch cushions a little.

"Really?"

Finn shrugs. "We have the DVDs, so Rudolph is on whenever we want to watch him."

"Tonight," Brittany agrees, nodding and smiling brightly. "What is it about cartoon deer who are boys sounding like girls?" she asks thoughtfully a moment later. "Like, Bambi sounds like a girl too, and then he grows antlers."

Finn just shrugs. It's a good question, and he'd like an answer too, but he doesn't have one for her. "'m'gonna go change, okay?"

"Okay." She stands up and starts walking towards the kitchen. "Do you want eggnog with your pizza, or do you want on of the Christmas beers?"

"Beer," he calls down the stairs at her. Eggnog is gross enough on its own without ruining the pizza by drinking it.

"Finn. Wake up."

It's definitely still dark, which means that it's either still late or just way too early to be awake, and Finn doesn't know why Brittany is shaking his shoulder so hard, but he doesn't like it. "Wha's goin' on?" he mumbles, blinking his eyes open slowly.

"It's snowing." Brittany's eyes are bright in the almost-darkness of their room (there's a miniature fake tree decorated in the corner that she leaves glowing all night because she likes it).

Finn glances at the closed curtains on the window. "Did you look?"

She shakes her head impatiently. "I don't have to look. It's snowing."

"It isn't supposed to start until tomorrow," he protests.

"It is tomorrow." Brittany flips the covers back, hopping out of bed and leaving Finn's whole left side exposed to the much less warm air in the room. "Get up. We're going outside."

Finn sighs. "Show me snow, and I'll get up."

Brittany huffs out a breath and finishes pulling a pair of jeans up her legs before stalking across to the window and shoving the curtains open. "See?" she demands, not even looking out the glass.

Finn does look, and sure enough, it's snowing.

He doesn't know how she knew, but then, he doens't know how she knows half the stuff she does, so maybe that's just part of being Brittany. Even though it's 4:30 in the morning, he told his girl he'd get up if she showed him snow, and she did, so up he gets, winking when she tosses a pair of jeans across the bed at him. And yeah, he's keeping his word, but he really does want to go out in the snow.

The flakes are tiny and falling fast when they step off of the patio and into the back yard, where the light from the street out front makes it just bright enough to see that there's already about half an inch of white stuff covering the frost-burned grass and lining the branches of the trees the way it only does when it's falling without any wind to blow it down.

Brittany is spinning in a slow circle, her arms flung out at her sides and her head tipped back, her mouth open to catch some of the falling flakes on her tongue. Finn just watches her for a moment, her hair fanning out and the ends of her scarf flying, and it hits him, not for the first time, just how much he really loves her.

She's laughing breathlessly when he catches her around the waist, hauling her back against his body. "Did you catch any?" he asks, his lips hovering near her ear.

She turns in his arms and wraps hers around his waist, pressing their hips together. "You never catch snowflakes on your tongue when you try. They just have to like, fall into your mouth when you're talking or whatever."

Finn chuckles, lacing his hands together at the small of her back to keep her as close as he can. "You're cute," he tells her, watching the way that the snowflakes fall to sit on top of her messy hair.

She stands up on her toes to kiss his cheek. "Thanks," she murmurs before pressing her lips to his.

Maybe it's weird, standing in his back yard kissing his wife in the snow at 4:30 in the morning, but it feels amazing and sort of romantic. She brings her hand up so that her fingers are brushing over his cheekbone when she opens her mouth against his, making a quiet noise in the back of her throat when he strokes his tongue against hers. Her hand slides up into the back of his hair, her fingernails scratching lightly against his scalp and sending little jolts down the back of his neck.

She lets out a breath when he lowers his head to kiss the spot on the side of her neck that gives her goosebumps every time he does it. "Sex in the snow is a bad idea, right?"

He laughs against her skin, his arms tightening around her waist. "Yeah."

She pulls away from him, grabbing his hand and tugging him with her back across the patio and in the back door, laughing when he practically trips through the doorway. (Which isn't a clumsy thing, but a thing where she dropped her scarf right when he stepped through the doorway so his feet got all tangled up in it.)

"I really love you."

She says it later, when he's hovering over her in their bed and she's already come apart against his tongue. Her hand is curved around the back of his neck, her fingers toying with the hair at his nape. Her eyes are soft but still a little desperate because of the way he's been teasing her, her hair messy against the pillows. He kisses her hard when he pushes into her, swallowing the moan she lets out and stilling his hips when they're pressed flush against hers.

"I really love you, too, baby," he murmurs, sipping at her lips and running his hand up the back of her thigh.

She whines his name after a minute, rolling her hips up into his. "Please move," she breathes out.

He does what she asks because it's what he wants to do, and he really loves the breathless little whimpers that she lets out when she gets close to the edge.

"Merry Christmas Eve, baby," she murmurs later, right when Finn is drifting off to sleep.

He means to answer her, really, but all he manages to do is slide his fingers over her side a little before he falls asleep.