Much later that night, long after the revelers had dispersed from both General Dynamics and Café Diem, Jo was curled up on the couch by the fireplace in her new living room, in her red silk pajamas and a contemplative mood. Her eyes were fixed on the dancing flames in front of her, her fingers delicately tracing the contours of the glass of warm cider with spiced rum in her hands.

A soft knock on her front door pulled her from her contemplation with a start. She ran a hand through her loose hair to neaten it as she slid off the couch and made her way to the door, not knowing what to expect. She pushed the door open, shivering as the cold air and scattered snowflakes fluttered into her home. The storm which had begun shortly after everyone had returned to their original sizes had only strengthened over the intervening hours. Jo looked out into the cold and the dark, freezing in place when she was the familiar blue-eyed figure waiting behind the door.

Zane leaned forward against her door frame, his customary smirk replaced by an almost alarmingly intense gaze. The sound of Jo's swift intake of breath was almost imperceptibly strangled in response. His blue eyes were dark and unreadable as they bore into hers.

"The strangest thing happened to me today," he said, with no preamble. "I got a Christmas present." Jo's eyes shifted away from him and she furrowed her brows, wondering how he'd come to be here, and how she might dodge the conversation that was sure to follow.

"What's so strange about that?" she asked, hoping to delay his questions. He was clearly unconvinced by her tone of nonchalance, but he shifted on his feet in response. This time he was the one looking uncomfortable, and from the corner of her eyes Jo found herself studying him.

"It's been years since I've had a Christmas present from anyone other than my mother," he admitted slowly, holding her eyes with his. She flinched away from him, unable to disguise her shock. Already, a litany of gifts she'd given the Zane from her timeline over the years in which she'd known him was flooding her mind. This time she'd only given him the first gift which had come to mind – hadn't even stopped to imagine that he no longer had any of the early, precious gifts she'd once savored watching him open. She'd had to leave the party when she'd left the present for him, afraid to know either way if she could succeed in putting that look on his face again.

He was shuffling his feet a little with nerves and the cold, and there was so much cautious hope in his expression that her heart tightened in her chest. She wanted to wrap her arms around him, but instead wrapped them around herself and shivered, responding in part to the gust of wind and snow coming through the open door, but also to the suddenly sobering thought of Zane, any Zane, alone and without even presents on Christmas. Acting on impulse, she stepped back and inclined her head toward the warm living room beyond.

"Come in," she said. Zane moved forward, unusually hesitant, and she closed the door behind him, gesturing to the coat rack wordlessly. He peeled off his heavy jacket obligingly, revealing the black "Santa" shirt beneath, and her lips twitched into a little smile. In front of her she could see Zane looking around, noticing the understated and subtle touches of Christmas decoration scattered through the room. Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite was playing in muted tones from the stereo in the corner. He tilted his head thoughtfully as he turned to her, his hands in the pockets of his jeans, and hmmed; half to himself, half to her.

"Not as lacking in the Christmas cheer as you make yourself out to be, are you Jo-Jo?" he asked rhetorically. His tone was light but his eyes were filled with questions. She rolled her eyes dismissively and spread her hands in front of her, as if to say okay, you got me.

"I never said I didn't like Christmas." She pointed out, crossing the room to reclaim her seat on the couch. His eyes followed her, and he furrowed his brow.

"You've never really had to; your attitude tends to speak for itself. This past week, and… you know, before." Jo filed away this information about the Jo of the other timeline, and sipped her cider.

"Well, I do." She said, simply. He shook his head once, sharply, as if to clear his thoughts.

"So – Bruce Springsteen tickets?" He asked, remembering what had brought him there in the first place. Jo feigned indifference, but she could feel her heartbeat pick up speed. "I would ask how you knew that, but I have the strangest feeling of déjà vu when I think about it," he continued pointedly. Then his tone softened unexpectedly. "Jo, I have no idea what you want from me," he confessed, "and I can't just let this go." He scrutinized her, but her back was to him and she gave nothing away. A tense moment passed, until she tilted her head and looked at him from over the back of the couch.

"Well if I were you, I would start by sitting down." She suggested. Her words seemed so incongruous at that moment that it took a minute for them to sink in. When they did, he made a hasty move for the nearby armchair, but Jo's next words stopped him in his tracks.

"I was thinking over here," she said, gesturing to the couch cushion beside her. The calm in her voice was deceptive in its seeming certainty – Jo was not at all sure she was making the right choice, but something about the expression on his face as he admitted to never once receiving a Christmas present in Eureka had felt like a solid punch to the solar plexus, and she was still reeling from the blow.

Casting her an uncertain glance, he settled down on the couch beside her. Everything about him screamed caution as he settled into the plush cushion, sneaking disbelieving glances at her from the corner of his eye. Zane held himself still, as if a sudden movement might b e the end of them both. Maybe it would be; Jo didn't even know anymore. She pulled her feet up onto the couch and wrapped an arm loosely around her knees, looking suddenly vulnerable.

"You told me last year," she said suddenly, surprising them both. "Your dad was going to take you to a Springsteen concert with him – it would've been your first concert – but," she paused, lost in the memory, and Zane finished the thought for her.

"His accident happened the day before the concert." He said quietly. "We were in the hospital during the concert itself. He died later that night, from a lung embolism. I was ten." Zane took a deep breath then let out a slightly choked laugh. "I used to think it'd be nice to go in his honor, someday. After I was sent to prison – I assumed I'd never get a chance." She glanced at him, having never heard this spin to the story. "Then I ended up here." He added absently, and looked at her. She bit her lip slightly.

"As soon as I saw that he was on tour, I knew what I was going to do." She admitted, glancing down at her hands. "Even though…" she began, but trailed off as Zane reached out a tentative arm, wrapping it over her shoulders and pulling her to his side. To his surprise, she leaned into his embrace and buried her face between his collarbone and his shoulder. He looked down at her and marveled how large his hand was, lying splayed over her shoulder. It was easy to forget how tiny Josefina Lupo really was when you'd been repeatedly restrained and rebuffed by that 5'5" frame of sinew and steel. He could barely hear what she muttered next, muffled by his shoulder, but the moment the words registered he felt his heart catch in his throat.

"I missed this." She admitted almost silently – to whom, she wasn't entirely sure. To both of them, perhaps. Zane pulled his hand from her shoulder and ran it carefully through her long silky hair, catching the time on the clock from the corner of his eye and smiling in sudden surprise.

"Merry Christmas, Jo-Jo," he said quietly, and she glanced up at him. He jerked his chin towards the clock, redirecting her gaze. Her eyes widened in surprise, and she looked back at him, obviously making quick calculations in her head. For a moment he regretted bringing the hour of night to her attention and accidentally snapping her back into the real world. He steeled himself for the moment she'd order him out of her house – braced himself for the inevitable disappointment – but it never came. Instead, she startled him by burrowing in closer against his side, warming him both inside and out. Jo looked up at him, the dim light making her eyes appear a deep hazel, and her long eyelashes casting shadows on her cheeks. She smiled.

"Merry Christmas, Zane." She said, and on an impulse turned her head and pressed a quick kiss to the curve of his collarbone. Before he could react, her head was lying on his shoulder comfortably.

"So, how did you know I was the secret Santa?" she asked sleepily.

"Lately, you've been the obvious choice for unusual events in my life," he pointed out, not unkindly. "Also, Zoe's smart but not a terribly subtle detective." He admitted. Jo stiffened and tried to pull away, but Zane used his arm to keep her pinned in place. He rolled his eyes.

"Stop that," he said, vaguely irritated. "We both know Zoe's seeing some guy from Harvard now." There was a pause, then Jo sighed and stilled her efforts to move, though a defiant tension continued to imbue her body for a moment before she let it go. She had asked, after all.

As soon as he ascertained she wasn't about to flee yet again, Zane loosened his grip and resumed the attention he'd been bestowing upon her hair before. Jo was beginning to think his admittedly soothing ministrations might actually send her to sleep when he asked a question she hadn't thought to expect.

"What was our first Christmas like?" Her first instinct was still, after all this time, to deny knowing what he was talking about. But for once, even as the words formed on her tongue, she thought better of it. What seemed like an interminable moment passed. Then Jo began, with a hint of uncertainty in her voice, to tell only the first of a number of stories that would come out on that early Christmas morning.

Zane would swear, for many years to come and with only a hint of teasing in his voice, that Josefina Lupo was by far the best Christmas present he'd ever received.

Disclaimer: Pretty sure I don't own Eureka.

A/N: I honestly can't believe I just wrote this for so many reasons, most of which are academic. There's no logical reason I should be writing anything right now, much less anything so distinctly not a chapter of Everything Is Illuminated. I'm sure some of you would rather have seen that, but that's even more of an undertaking than this was. This has been nesting in my head since last night, making it difficult to do stuff like statistical analysis and studying. Argh. Um, anyways, about this story: It's a one-shot, it's entirely unrelated to Everything Is Illuminated, it's really just the conglomeration of my thoughts about the Christmas episode. Including things like trying to make Zane crying in public over a Christmas present make sense, which I know has troubled some of us. Incidentally if this strikes you as out of character or over the top in some way it's probably because I myself am feeling out of character and over the top. I hear sleep deprivation does that to a person.

Cheerio

ADM