Home for Christmas
Santana smiled as she watched her family. Rachel was helping Ares put together his drum set, and Quinn was taking pictures of the twins. They were fast asleep under the Christmas tree, snuggling giant snow leopards. She sighed and looked out the window. Brittany hugged her.
"He'll be home for New Year's at least," she whispered.
Santana nodded. "It's our first Christmas without him."
"Aww, baby," Quinn said. "We all miss him."
Ares rolled his eyes.
"I saw that, Ares Calvin Lopez-Fabray," Rachel said quietly. "Behave."
"I don't get why everyone's so upset," Ares said. "He'll be here in a few days."
Brittany put a hand over Santana's mouth as her oldest wife turned to snap at their youngest son.
"Ares, we're upset because Christmas is a time for family," Quinn said calmly. "We want our whole family together."
The family went silent as they heard the door open.
"Abraxas?" Santana called.
The nineteen year old bounded into the room, arms full of presents and a grin on his face. "Sorry I'm late!"
"What the hell?" Santana yelled, jumping up to hug him. "I thought your car broke down."
"It did. I hitchhiked," he said, shrugging.
"ABRAXAS!" all four women yelled.
"It's cool. I got picked up by a couple families. Didn't ride with any skeevy creepers."
"We're glad you're home," Rachel said.
"I'm glad too. It was a long three rides." He knelt down to wake up Ava and Allie. "I've got presents."
The second round of presents went faster. Santana tossed a small box to Abraxas finally. "That's from the four of us."
Ares, who'd been trying to wait to give his present to Abraxas, pushed his box behind him and watched.
Abraxas opened the box, and his eyes widened. He looked up at his moms and then back down. And then back up again. "Really?"
"Garage," Santana said, trying not to grin.
Abraxas took off.
Ares scowled. "You got him a car?" he asked, with a little more bite than he intended.
"Got a problem today, Ares?" Santana asked. "Your attitude is getting old."
He pushed the box he had behind his drum set and stood. "Let's go look, girls."
"We saw it already," Ava said, opening the box to her chemistry set.
"Oh, right. I'll go then."
He walked to the garage door and stood there, watching his brother circle the small SUV like a vulture. "Do you like it?" he asked.
"Uh, duh dude."
"Right color?"
"Blue's awesome."
"I got you something too. It's not as cool."
"I'm sure it's awesome," Abraxas said. "Did you like your shirts?"
"Yeah. The blue one will come in handy during homecoming week. There's a superhero day."
Abraxas laughed and followed Ares back into the house. After a few minutes of thanking his mothers profusely, Abraxas sat down to help Ares with the last part of his drum set.
"I'm going to go get lunch started," Quinn said. "Come help me, Santana."
Santana followed her into the kitchen and whispered, "The hell is up with our son?"
"If I tell you, you can't start to argue right away," Quinn said.
"Fair enough."
"You favor Abraxas. Ah ah!" she said when Santana opened her mouth to speak. "You do. He's your little boy—I know I carried him, and he's ours, but he's yours. And he knows that, and he tries so hard to make you proud of him."
"I am proud of him."
"I know. And Ares? He knows that too. See, he's mine. And I look at him and he knows that I cannot possibly love him more or be more proud of him. He knows he doesn't have to work for it, so he doesn't. But now, after months of being the man of the house, he does have to. Because Abraxas is back. And he feels left out because he didn't even know about the car thing."
"Course not. He would've bitched about it."
"You don't know that, S," Quinn said, wrapping her arms around Santana. "On top of all that, there's the whole middle child thing."
Santana deflated a little bit. "I kind of suck."
Quinn shook her head and smiled. "No. You're an awesome mom. You just can't hold the other three up to Abaxas all the time. They're all sort of still kids, but they're becoming their own people."
Santana nodded.
"I want my Christmas present."
Ares shot up on his bed. It was dark out now, and they were waiting for Uncle Kurt and Uncle David to get there for dessert and the last gift exchange. He'd been reading on his Kindle and hadn't heard his brother come in. "Oh," he said, and picked up the box he'd brought up earlier. "Here."
Abaxas sat on the end of Ares's bed and opened the heavy box. He looked inside, then up at his brother, and back down to the box again. It was a limited edition book of Brom's art—he was Abraxas's favorite artist. "How did…I didn't tell anyone I wanted this! How did you know?"
Ares shrugged and went back to his Kindle.
"Best. Gift. Ever."
A smirk came to the younger boy's face. "Better than the car?"
Abraxas grinned at his brother's nonchalant attitude. "Maybe. You remember that year when we tried to build an igloo?"
"I try not to."
"Let's do it again."
Ares looked at him for a long moment before smiling. "The last time, my head got stuck in the opening and I got snow up my nose when you tried to pull me out."
"But now we both have a fundamental understanding of geometry, and I have a sort of understanding of physics. Come on!"
Shaking his head, Ares stood and grabbed his gloves. "Let's do it."
"Where are the boys?" David asked.
"Look out the kitchen window," Rachel said, trying not to laugh.
"What the hell?" Kurt asked as the two men looked into the yard. "Is that an igloo?"
"It's a long story," Quinn said.
Santana stood at the window and watched her sons having some sort of epic snowball fight. She smiled.
"Are you going to call them in?" Brittany asked, kissing her cheek.
"Nah. Let them play."