Disclaimer: I make absolutely no claim to Desperate Housewives.
A/n: I decided to start taking requests for fic (see my blog for more details), and this first one I got from my friend and faithful reader, Jen. So this is for her with great thanks. I was going to wait until December to post it, but I'm impatient. So consider this a little teaser of my (hopefully) successful fic-a-day run in December. Thanks for reading. Please take a minute and review!
Story Summary: Tom and Lynette's first Christmas together.
Untangling the Knot
a story by Ryeloza
"A little to the left." The tree, seemingly of its own accord as Tom was nearly invisible behind its thick branches, shuffled to the left a little, and Lynette frowned at it with a critical eye. "A little more," she directed, and then, "Yeah, nearly there, just a little more."
Tom peered around the tree with a scowl on his face. She paused, a spoon of chocolate ice cream inches from her mouth, and smiled cheekily. "Aren't you supposed to be untangling those lights?"
"I am." She nodded at the mess of wire on the coffee table and finished the bite of ice cream. Truthfully, her enthusiasm for the project had waned considerably when she realized just how many hours of work lay ahead of her. Ice cream had seemed like a much better alternative.
"Uh-huh." Tom shifted the tree another three inches, and she compromised by not pointing out that it was about an inch too far. He stepped back, hands on his hips as he inspected his work, and gave a satisfactory nod. "It looks fantastic."
"Good job, babe." The spoon scraped the bottom of the bowl, and she frowned at that one soupy bite that remained. Another serving seemed excessive, but she was eating for three and at least one of them wanted more. "Can you give me a hand?"
Tom took her outstretched arm and hoisted her off of the couch; grateful, she patted his arm as she passed. The day her center of gravity returned to normal would be the best day of her life (to hell with that whole bringing new life into the world stuff; she'd realized the true joy of giving birth the day she found herself unable to maneuver without extreme difficulty).
"You didn't even touch these, did you?" Tom called from the living room. He'd taken up her abandoned job and was glaring at the giant knot in frustration.
"You're the one who wanted a big Christmasy Christmas."
"All I said was that Christmas isn't Christmas without a tree. But it's just a tree if we don't put lights on it."
Lynette dug out a generous third scoop and rolled her eyes as she put the ice cream back in the freezer. "And all I said was that this is the only year we're going to be able to get away without all this excessive festivity. Once the kids come, we won't have a choice."
"Your childlike joy is astonishing."
"Ha." She waddled back to the living room, sidestepping where he now knelt on the ground fiddling with the lights, and sank onto the couch again. It wasn't as though she was predisposed to be a Grinch, but rather that the pregnancy was taking a toll. With feet so swollen that she could barely get them into the shoes that she couldn't see over her enormous stomach, she was less than enthused to clean up after a tree.
"Come on," he prodded, abandoning the lights as quickly as she had. She was about to point this out when he reached out for her foot and began to massage it; in light of this, she could let the I told you so go. "Where's your Christmas spirit?"
"Probably off with my childhood innocence and my virginity having a party."
Tom laughed. "Good thing I only married you for your quick wit." She smiled as his thumb ran over the arch of her foot, and he shook his head at her. "Come on: best Christmas memory."
Immediately, a host of bad memories sprung to mind (she wondered what that said about her—probably nothing good), and she pushed them aside in search of something pleasant. "Christmas Eve when I was seven," she said slowly. "There was a freak snowstorm and in the middle of the night, my mom woke us up and took us out sled riding. It was the first time I'd ever done that."
"That's a good one."
"Yeah." She smiled gently, not souring the story with the inevitably bitter ending that any good memory from her childhood had. In this case, a crushing Christmas morning when she hadn't gotten the only thing she had asked Santa for (a pair of roller skates) that climaxed with her mother snapping at her that Santa wasn't even real. "I'm sure that your parents always went all-out."
"When I was little, yeah. But, you know, they were a little burnt out on Christmas by the time I came along. We got an artificial tree when I was about six. I hated that thing. It's not the same."
"No, it's not," she agreed, surprised by another fond remembrance springing to mind—her stepfather, taking them to pick out their first live tree. Inexplicably, it had been a completely different experience. She gave Tom a fond look. "Maybe having the tree isn't such a bad thing."
"See?" He dropped her foot and crawled up onto the couch, leaning in to kiss her. She indulged the moment, and when he pulled back, she gave him a small bite of the ice cream. "And just think how beautiful it's going to be all lit up with presents underneath it."
"You're such a romantic," she said, the sincerity in her voice startling both of them. It was a strangely thoughtful realization, considering how long she'd known him, but now that she'd said it, it seemed a fairly obvious observation. And quite possibly a large part of why she loved him. "Don't ever lose that."
His finger brushed her clavicle, and even though he didn't answer her, she could see the promise in his eyes. "What do you say we beg off seeing any family this year and just spend Christmas together?"
"Can we do that?"
"Absolutely. And if you tell our mothers, then I promise to untangle the lights."
She grinned, ready and willing to take confrontation over mindless labor any day. Judging by Tom's cocky expression, he felt entirely opposite. "Deal."
"Good." He gave her another quick peck, and then pulled back, eyeing her ice cream like a vulture. "Can I have the rest of that?"
Lynette shook her head and rubbed her stomach. "No way. This is ours. Get your own."
"Hmph. With that attitude Santa's not going to bring you any presents this year."
She didn't respond, but trailed Tom with her eyes as he got off the couch and wandered into the kitchen. Watching him scrape out what remained of the ice cream, already knowing that he'd readily go to the store when she asked him later, she couldn't help but smile. It didn't really matter what they did on Christmas or if they had a tree or even if he got her a present. She'd already gotten everything she ever wanted anyway.