The Two Scrooges
Summary: Secret Santa fic for Javajive. Sorry it's a little late but I've had a lot of computer issues recently. The request was for an ill matched couple getting together and finding revulsion in all Christmas related things so I picked Kate and Miles. Hope you like this! Bit AU because it's set during the Dharma years and features Kate, Jack and Hurley. This was hard to write and I'm not sure I'm happy with and the characters are OOC but oh well! This was the best I could do.
Stuck in the corner of the room, Miles glared at the festivity going on around him. It was the annual Dharma Initiative celebrations and everywhere literally screamed corniness. The Christmas tree actually had a theme to it, represented by black and white striped baubles along the tree branches which went with the colours of the Dharma Initiative logo. Red and gold streamers hung across the ceiling and were accompanied by the most repulsive ceiling decorations which only Horace could've dreamed up, most likely in one of his drunken stupors.
He scoffed at it all and took comfort in the fact that he wasn't the only one who looked bored of the festivity. Kate, a very attractive, feisty woman also seemed to be glued to the wall as she stared aimlessly around the room. She met his curious gaze and fixated her own on his for a moment and then looked away. Some kind of connection passed between them, physical or chemical, and he smirked to himself. He'd told James that he was a babe magnet and he just so happened to attract his ex-girlfriend. It was strangely amusing.
"For God's sake, Miles!" Speak of the devil and he shall appear. James stormed over to Miles looking extremely annoyed. "You're spoiling the mood! Juliet asked you one thing earlier and you just about bit her head off. If you wanted the role of Scrooge, after that performance you got the part." A scowl forged itself on his face as he glared at Miles.
Miles, who was thoroughly amused at the fact he'd successfully wound up a man whose sudden enthusiasm for Christmas had surprised them all, sighed and wondered whether to divulge his antipathy towards this festive season, or whether to wait for a more opportune moment to reveal it, say… during the annual Christmas speech. Now that would make this holiday more exciting.
"I'm just admiring the babes," he explained, smirking at the older man. "There's no crime against that as far as I'm concerned. And FYI, Juliet should've asked her boyfriend to decorate the house and not me. I'm nobody's repairman." His smirk grew wider. "I'm a delivery man, if the item in question is a kiss and the rendezvous is underneath the mistletoe with a beautiful maiden."
James shook his head with disgust. "She asked you to help change a light bulb, not decorate the whole damn house!" he hissed. "Things are going good between us and we have a pretty good life here and I don't want you, or anyone else, to screw it up." Here his eyes hovered over in the direction of an awkward Jack, who stood by the punch bowl and occasionally flashing a tight lipped smile at someone. His eyes then averted in Kate's direction and then a sigh escaped his lips.
"Go talk to Kate," he instructed, eager to distract Miles' attention from more mischievous plans. He knew the guy fairly well by now and knew that boredom often led to mischief and he didn't want his first Christmas reunited with his friends ruined by anyone. Unfortunately, that suggestion went down like a lead balloon.
"What? Are you serious?" Miles demanded. "Look, just because you've found someone doesn't mean you can manoeuvre the last single man standing into dating someone." He folded his arms and stared James right in the eyes. They mirrored each other in stance and facial expression but neither of them budged in terms of shifting their positions.
"Don't be so stupid," James growled, rolling his eyes. "I'm not askin' ya to marry the woman. She looks about as bored as you so you should go share your revulsion for this holiday together."
Miles looked visibly cheered by the idea.
"Alright, Jim," he enunciated carefully. "I'll talk to her. Don't blame me if she finds me so irresistible that she can't keep her hands off of me. Remember – you love Juliet now." He sniggered as James began to shake with fury.
"You're a pain in my ass," was the last thing the Southerner shot at him before he stormed off.
Miles smirked again. He stuck his hands in his pockets boyishly and sauntered over to Kate, whose eyes widened with surprise and, unless he was seriously delusional, interest. She looked radiant, it had to be said. Wild curls of hair framed a small, freckly face with lips as pink and prim as a flower. Her eyes seemed to say one thing, whilst her body said something else. Her stance seemed to warn off anybody from advancing anywhere close to her and yet her eyes contained traces of loneliness and boredom.
As he came closer to her, she shot out a hand and grabbed his. Something changed in her expression and all of a sudden they were running outside and into the jungle, not so far out that they wandered into hostile territory but not too close to the barracks that they could be overheard. What does she want? he had to wonder.
"I'm glad we're away from that party," she sighed as she sat down on the ground. She gazed at his stunned expression and gestured for him to sit down, which he was only too happy to do. "Christmas isn't my cup of tea, as I'm sure you've gathered."
"You're unusually friendly towards me," he noted suspiciously. "What gives?"
"It's Christmas," she responded sarcastically. "The season of goodwill is upon of us, Miles, or have you not noticed?" She reached into her pockets and pulled out a couple of bottles of liquor. His eyes widened.
"It's a lousy season," he concluded. "It's a time for family and I haven't got one. James has surpassed all my expectations and betrayed me by chipping in with the celebration. Traitor," he added vehemently.
"I remember the one good Christmas I had," Kate reminisced, looking momentarily blissful. "It was with Aaron – Claire's son – and we sat down and ate our dinner and then went outside and looked at the stars. It was a perfect day. Every Christmas before that either sucked or I chose not to celebrate it."
She passed him a bottle of liquor. "We'll have our own anti-Christmas party," she decided and something close to sadness passed across her eyes. "We'll play I Never."
"I Never?" he repeated blankly.
"I Never," she repeated dramatically. "The rule behind it is that you say something – for instance, I never bought a real Christmas tree – and if you've done it, you drink and if you haven't, you don't drink."
He looked confused and then clicked on. Drinking games were his forte and he seemed to find a wild kind of excitement at the fact that he was alone with easily the hottest woman in the vicinity. Juliet was beautiful too but he couldn't stare at her without James' permission, let alone anything else.
"Alright, you go first," he challenged. A sudden thought popped into his head. "Let's make it Christmassy, you know," his voice dripped with sarcasm, "because we wouldn't want to seem like scrooges, would we?"
She laughed aloud. "If we had one more person, we could become the three scrooges," she chuckled. Her fingers popped open the first bottle of liquor and she tossed a separate bottle over to Miles.
"Nice pun," he observed sarcastically. "Never would've thought about that." He rolled his eyes but found he liked it when she laughed. It was music to his ears and he was glad she'd dragged him away from the dull, Dharma Christmas party.
"What do you hate most about Christmas?" Kate asked, swinging the bottle back and forth. "I guess I've never liked the fact that Christmas gets everyone hyped up about being together and then they never make an effort for the rest of the year." She though about her own mother and shuddered with anger. She betrayed me, she thought to herself, and yet at Christmas she was only too happy to visit Aaron, under the delusion he was her grandson but I guess that was my fault.
"I hate how cliché the holiday is," Miles replied. "Everyone goes out, buys a tree, decorates it, put presents underneath it and then open the presents. Nothing ever changes. Plus I've never celebrated it, not even with my mother." He shrugged. "It's just a pointless holiday. An excuse to get drunk and do stupid things which will end up on the internet."
"I used to love it," Kate reminisced. "Back when it was me, my mum and my dad." She never thought of Wayne as a father figure at all. He was a drunk, evil man and she hated him. She never regretted murdering him, only that she'd paid the price for it with the disintegration of the relationship between her and her mother. It was just another reason to hate that scumbag.
Miles listened to her and then beckoned for her to start the I Never game. He was impatient for the anti-Christmas festivity to begin and, secretly, he was enjoying the time being spent with Kate. She was unlike any woman he'd ever met and he found her almost as hot as Naomi. Of course there were complications, such as the fact that James had loved her at one point and so had Jack. God, who hadn't loved this woman at one point or another?
"I never spent more than fifty bucks on my Christmas shopping." Kate got the ball rolling.
"Seriously?" Miles chuckled. "Not even on your mother?"
"Nope," she replied, shrugging her shoulders. "Never saw the point in over indulging people in gifts they were only going to throw away later."
Miles drank, knowing he'd once splashed out on a mega expensive set of fragrances for his mother and she'd hated them. That was the last time he'd bought her anything at Christmas. He'd just taken her out for meals and on days out instead – that way she couldn't exchange it for something else.
"I never bought a Christmas tree," he replied.
"What? Never?" Kate asked incredulously, taking a quick drink from her bottle.
"Not even one of those fake trees you get which lights up a different colour every second."
Kate leaned forward and examined him with interest. "I can't believe you didn't buy a tree. What a deprived childhood you must've had." She shook her head with disbelief.
"Hey, we're surrounded by trees!" Miles gestured around him. "I spent most of my life around trees; it was just that none of them were childishly decorated."
Kate let out an uncharacteristic giggle. Secretly, she'd had a lot of punch at the party purely because there was nothing else to do. Sawyer had talked to her a few times but always, always, accompanied by Juliet. She felt heartbroken by how he'd moved on and yet she saw how happy they both were. So why couldn't she find it in her heart to be happy for them?
"I never believed in Santa," she blurted out, struggling to think of something to else say.
"Ok, wait a damn minute," Miles instructed, looking shocked. He almost dropped his bottle out of shock. "You're telling me you never believed in the big, fat guy with the red suit? My childhood might've been screwed up but yours must've been pulverized!" He scowled at her and she stared back, unsmiling.
"My childhood was pulverized," she snapped. "But not because I didn't believe in a guy who supposedly could fly around the world and deliver presents to every child in the space of one night. What child really believes in that?" She folded her arms and glared at him, annoyed by his know-all attitude.
"Chill," Miles muttered, taking an extra long gulp of the liquid. It burned his throat because he wasn't accustomed to the taste of alcohol, not being one of those men who frequently drank it.
"I can't believe it's Christmas," Kate sighed, rubbing her head. "I keep thinking about all the terrible things that happened around this time last year. Charlie dying, Claire going missing, watching that freighter explode and watching Sawyer dive out of that helicopter." Tears started to fill her eyes and she wiped them away fiercely, angry at herself for showing her vulnerable side to a man who was insensitive, bitter, sarcastic…and strangely cute. "Sorry about this," she mumbled.
"Don't worry," Miles said cheerfully. He raised his bottle and gazed remorsefully at the small amount of liquid left. "Here's to a lousy Christmas."
Kate smiled at him gratefully. "And a crappy new year," she announced, knocking her bottle lightly against his.