First of all and most importantly, Nick never meant for this to happen.
He thinks that about a lot of aspects of his life, that he never meant for things to happen the way they did. He guesses it makes him feel less responsible when things inevitably go bad - it wasn't his fault, he never wanted this to happen. But still, it did. It always does.
But we'll get to all of that later.
The story begins a few weeks before Christmas, with a lot of yelling. The short version of the story is that his friend Demi is throwing a Christmas party and he's expected to be in attendance. And so is his girlfriend. And his ex-girlfriend. Who he has to buy a Christmas present for, because he's her Secret Santa.
The long version of the story is pretty much exactly the same as the short version, except with a lot more panicking.
Shouting at Demi over the phone for about half an hour doesn't get him anywhere, and it doesn't really make him feel better either, which sucks. He's about 300 percent sure that her Secret Santa selection for him had not been as random as she keeps promising it was, but every time he makes the accusation she denies it, and he swears he can hear the smirk in her voice. After about his tenth attempt to get her to own up to it she says maybe fate had just matched him up with Miley, and he hangs up on her. The concept of fate is bullshit, that's something he's learned very well in his twenty-one years. Everyone has to create their own destiny, and Miley had long since made it clear that she didn't want him in any part of hers.
He swallows and flops down hard onto his bed, tossing his phone down beside him. Here he'd spent so long training himself not to think about Miley no matter what, and now he would have no choice but to think about her up until Christmas. Thinking about her is heartbreaking and it tends to be disastrous, and he has a feeling it will be especially bad now that she's single and he's not, now that he has someone else he has to think about too. He could kill Demi with his bare hands.
Bringing his hands up over his face, he allows himself to think about Miley for the first time in a while. He wonders who she's set to get a present for, who she's probably thinking about right about now with that cute deep-in-thought look on her face. He's fairly sure it won't be him, since she's his and he doesn't think Secret Santa exchanges are supposed to work that way (though with Demi running things, it wouldn't surprise him). The only person he's particularly hoping it's not is Olivia, because even though they've never actually met and it's probably an unfair judgement to make, he thinks that probably the only things to get exchanged there would be some rude words and maybe a fat lip. Or at least he knows that's what he would have liked to give her old ex-fiancé if he'd ever been presented with the opportunity, and he guesses it's about the same thing.
Or maybe it's just that he kind of hopes it is.
He meets Olivia at her place later that day and he's so nervous to tell her he has to get his ex a Christmas present that he contemplates hiding under a table to do it, but decides that might just make him look guilty for something. Instead he says it casually, feigning annoyance, like he's irritated with the mere thought of Miley's existence. Olivia laughs and tells him she feels sorry for him, and he doesn't like that comment in more ways than one but he has that annoyed image to uphold, so he forces a light laugh and agrees with her.
Her own subject of Christmas concern is pretty non-threatening, a friend of a friend of Demi's that he thinks he's met maybe once but can't quite remember. Probably someone else's reluctantly invited plus-one, much like Olivia herself. He guesses she'll get a gift card and be done with it, which is kind of a relief because he has enough things to worry about without having to help her pick out a gift for somebody he barely knows.
He's starting to think he might get out of this unscathed after all when she asks him what he's thinking of getting Miley, and he tells her, quite truthfully, that he has no idea.
"How about one of those little rings from a bubblegum machine?" she suggests, looking down at her nails as she says it with a smirk that he doesn't like one bit. "You know she'd be thrilled to have one of those on her finger again."
"Olivia," he says evenly. A warning.
She ignores it. "What? Don't tell me you can't tell how desperate she is ever since she got dumped. She's going to end up in a mental hospital."
"Olivia," he growls, almost a snarl. Her eyes widen for a moment and then narrow in annoyance.
"You're way too protective of her," she mutters, crossing her arms. The look on her face reminds him in a way of the mean girl clique from his old public elementary school, the ones that used to not let anyone else use the monkey bars and tell him he was a wuss for being on Broadway. He hadn't stayed in school long enough to find out what those kind of girls were like in high school, but something in him feels like they might have been something like this. He doesn't like this new side of her and he thinks about telling her that, but again he thinks that he already has too many things to worry about so he just sighs.
"Look, she hasn't done anything to you, okay? So just leave her alone."
There's something in her eyes he can't place, and maybe because she hears how tired he is or maybe because she's run out of things to say or maybe because she doesn't want to test him and see just how protective of his ex he can get, she nods her head.
"Fine," she says with a sigh, like he's asked some great and difficult favor of her. He nods, all too eager to let everything go for now. It seems like he does that a lot, just lets everything go. He's heard that you're not supposed to do that, that if you don't deal with things as they happen they'll get all bottled up until you explode, but it still seems like a better option than starting a fight. Fighting too much is something that he can't afford. Olivia the first girl in a long time he's been able to deal with for longer than two dates and if he loses her he'll be back to being all alone. Plus his parents really like her and she gets him a lot of publicity. He knows he's supposed to hang on to her.
"I have to go," he says stiffly, after a long moment of silence that was more awkward than it should have been. "Joe and I are supposed to hang out today." And that's true, they are. Nick just doesn't really find it necessary to tell her that they aren't supposed to meet up for about three more hours.
She's all smiles after that, hanging off of him as she walks him out and kissing him goodbye about three more times than he thinks is necessary, as if their little conversation had never happened. And Nick thinks he should be glad she bounces back so quickly, just forgives and forgets, but once he's finally in his car and driving away all he can think about is how being away from her, with personal space and silence and fresh air away from her sometimes suffocating perfume, should not be nearly as much of a relief as it always is.
Joe throws his head back and laughs out loud when he finds out about his brother's predicament, which puts him right up at the top of Nick's shit list with Demi. But after he gets over his amusement he does try to help a bit, which Nick guesses is nice.
"Just get her a stereotypical girl gift," Joe says, rummaging through a rack of sweaters in an attempt to find something for his own Secret Santa gift. "Some perfume or something. You should know what kind she likes."
Nick has his hands buried deep in his pockets, glancing around the store trying to find something that catches his eye, but nothing does. "That just seems so impersonal," he mumbles.
"Get her something personal, then," Joe suggests, moving on to a stack of shirts.
"It can't be too personal, though, or Olivia will get mad."
Joe rolls his eyes. "All the more reason."
Nick holds in a sigh. While his parents just love Olivia (or, at the very least, the idea of her), pretty much everyone else close to him has no problem making their dislike of her perfectly clear. He doesn't understand it, as far as he knows she hasn't really done anything to them, but it's how it is. All of them manage to be polite enough to her face, but when she's not around Joe tells him she's just after his fame; Frankie says she's mean and that Kevin, who's far too non-confrontational to say anything to Nick's face, had told him he thought she was a snob. Nick doesn't see it and ignores them all, figures they'll all warm up to her. But it does kind of bother him. And sometimes, when Joe says some new insult and Nick gets the feeling that if he even thought about saying the same about Joe's girlfriend he'd be on the ground with a broken nose and yet he can't get himself to say anything more than shut up, he kind of thinks it doesn't bother him quite as much as it should. Which bothers him even more.
"Maybe I'll just get a gift card," he sighs after a moment, sounding defeated.
"Now you're back to impersonal," Joe points out, holding a shirt up to examine it for a moment and then refolding it and putting it back.
Nick groans, tossing his head back. "I don't know what to do."
"It's Miley," Joe says matter-of-factly, with a soft and almost sympathetic grin. "I don't think you're ever going to know what to do."
Nick doesn't think he's ever heard anyone say anything more true.
That night he lies face down with his head in his pillow, part of him hoping that if he stays perfectly still and quiet maybe he can fall straight through the bed and into Hell. He spreads all his limbs out and takes up as much space as he can, enjoying his own bed while he has it. The hints Olivia has been dropping about wanting to move in together keep getting less and less subtle and he knows if he wants to keep her happy he'll have to take the plunge soon. He wishes they could take things slower, quit rushing through things and just enjoy each other, but he guesses it's better than being alone so he just has to go with it, has to make her happy so he doesn't lose her. Besides, part of him knows that he needs to be moving so fast - needs something to focus on all the time, something to think about that will keep him from thinking about the girl he's in love with and how she's single and how she hates him and how he's so pathetic he still can't get over her.
He hates the way that sounds, that he thinks about his girlfriend just to keep from thinking about his ex, but sometimes that just feels like it's how it is. And he likes Olivia, he cares for her and enjoys her company, but when he tells her he loves her he says it like a reflex, like something he says because he's supposed to say it. Not like his heart is pouring out of his lips or like he's whispering in her ear with his last dying breath or like the whole world will crumble to pieces if he can't tell her right then how much she means to him.
Not like the way he'd said it to Miley.
He rolls over and pulls his knees up to his chest, hugging his pillow to him tight as if it has some kind of comfort to offer. He hopes that, if he makes it through Christmas, the new year will be so much better to him than this one has been.
Nick spends roughly two and a half weeks getting a whole lot of nothing done, unless you include panicking and thinking of various ways he could fake sick to get out of Demi's party, all of which he eventually rules out because he knows Joe would still drag him along even if he could believably act like he was on his death bed. By the time it's two days before Christmas Eve his anxiety has reached a level he didn't think possible and he finds himself sitting on his bedroom floor, surrounded by things that he thinks would have a reasonable chance of getting him killed if either his girlfriend or his ex-girlfriend had any idea he was looking at them.
The thing is he hadn't meant to keep these things, honestly he hadn't, but every time he'd ever tried to part with them his heart had ached so badly he couldn't bring himself to, and instead he'd shoved them into the back of his closet where he can at least pretend he's forgotten about them. Photo albums and stuffed animals and notebooks upon notebooks of songs, even some nobody but him had ever heard. Old things of hers he'd kept and notes they'd written back and forth. Pieces of his first and strongest love that he can hold and feel solid in his hands whenever he starts to doubt that love even exists.
He doesn't really know what he's doing, but if there's anything songwriting has taught him it's that inspiration often strikes when it's most unexpected and he thinks maybe if he looks at all these old things that remind him of Miley, he'll come across something that will help him finally figure out her gift. It might not be the best plan but he's desperate and running out of time and it will have to do.
He kind of wishes he could just write her a song and be done with it, or just give her a copy of one of the old songs he'd written her that she'd never heard, but he feels like that would be uncomfortably personal for both of them. For a fleeting moment he thinks about writing her a letter, but then decides that would be even worse.
He thinks the worst part of it is trying to find that line between too personal and not personal enough. He doesn't want to give her some generic store-bought thing a million other people would think to give her, but he doesn't want to give her something so unique to the two of them and their story that it just freaks her out. Every idea he comes up with he deems inappropriate - an old picture of the two of them in a frame, something old of hers he'd kept for years and years, a little book of their old letters to each other. He can't think of a single thing that wouldn't make things unbearably awkward, wouldn't make her hate him even more. It feels like he's defusing a bomb. Joe had run out of suggestions, Kevin had tried but hadn't been any help and Nick's far too proud to go to Demi after she'd gotten him into this mess in the first place. In a moment of desperation he'd even asked Olivia for any ideas, and she'd rolled her eyes and told him he was spending way too much time thinking about his train wreck of an ex, that he should just get a nice card and put some money in it and be done.
It's all too much, trying to keep her happy on top of worrying about Miley's present and the other last minute shopping he still had to do and all the other things there are to worry about at Christmastime, and by this point just keeping himself taken care of is starting to feel overwhelming. He wonders if maybe he can actually make himself sick and get to stay home from the party, but he's pretty sure he doesn't actually want that after all because even though he probably shouldn't care so much about her, he'd feel really awful if Miley was the only one there who didn't get a gift.
He sits on the floor for what must be nearly two hours and then finally he huffs and starts flinging stuff back into the box he keeps it all hidden in, preparing to throw it all back into the closet and admit defeat. He's thinking that he'll just run out and get Miley a necklace or something in the morning and leave the gift receipt in the box, when something finally catches his eye.
Very slowly, he leans down and picks it up. It would be wildly inappropriate, way too personal to them. It should go right on the list with all the other far too awkward ideas and that should be the end of it. But once it's in his head, he can't get it out.
He feels the corners of his mouth twitch up into a dangerous grin as he stands up and rummages through his desk for a pen. It's probably the worst idea he's had this entire time, and quite possibly in the running for one of the worst ideas he's had ever. But something in him feels like maybe it's just imperfect enough to be perfect, just like the two of them had always been together.
All he can do is hope she'll feel the same way.
The more he thinks about his present the more he regrets it, and he figures it's a good thing the party is the next day because if he'd been left to worry about it any longer he'd probably have chickened out. He's way too aware of the package on his lap the whole drive to Demi's house, like it's burning a hole through his jeans, but not quite so unpleasant. He'd told Olivia that he bought Miley a sweater, that he had it wrapped at the store so she couldn't see it, and so far he doesn't think she suspects anything. He does feel bad for lying, especially about something like an ex-girlfriend, but he figures that by this point he's already in too deep and one little lie is not going to do too much damage. He hopes not, at least.
Demi must notice the downright death glare he gives her when she greets them at the door because she spends a good long time saying hello to Joe and his girlfriend and by the time she gets to Nick she just gives him a scared one-armed hug (that he pointedly doesn't return) and this little smartass smirk he wishes he could smack right off her face. She compliments Olivia's dress in this sugary-sweet fake voice that doesn't sound at all like Demi and Olivia returns it in the same way, and neither one seems interested in acknowledging the other past that. Nick doesn't like the tight grip Olivia has on his arm the whole time, like she's claiming her territory, but when he tries to pull away she just pulls him to her tighter so he relents, holding in a sigh, because it's just not worth it. He has enough to be concerned about tonight.
Demi's house is decorated to hell and back and he has to admit it looks pretty nice, but other than that the beginning of the party doesn't leave much of an impression on him. He stands by the garland-covered refreshment table, pretending to listen to whatever it is Olivia's saying and drinking something that tastes vaguely like chocolate and peppermint out of a red solo cup, acting like he's totally interested in everything going on around him when honestly he's so focused on the one person in the room he knows he should absolutely not be focused on that there's no room left to focus on anything else.
The Secret Santa exchanges are supposed to be done in private and on everyone's own timing, totally casual. Nick doesn't know if that makes it more intimidating or less, but either way he's dreading it. But no matter how hard he tries he can't fight that feeling in his stomach that he's not actually dreading it nearly as much as he should be. That no matter the circumstances, he can't wait to have a good excuse to talk to Miley and he knows it.
And he hates it.
While he'd never admit it out loud, he's not exactly a stranger to watching Miley at various events they're both attending. It's kind of an embarrassingly regular occurrence, actually. It's different this time, though, in that he keeps noticing her looking at him too. The first time he thinks it's just a fluke, but no, she's definitely looking right back at him - timid little smile and head tilted forward so her short hair falls in front of her eyes, her cheeks the cutest shade of pink he's ever seen. She looks adorable and way unlike herself and it's freaking him out. It's not normal for her to be looking at him, for her to acknowledge his existence at all. And if he wasn't nervous and scared before, he is now.
He's just about to reach up and run his hand across his face to see if maybe he has something on it when he feels fingernails digging into his arm and snaps back to reality with a grimace.
"...gonna head over there, okay?" Olivia's saying, and he kind of wasn't listening at all but he glances over to where she's gesturing and manages to gather that she's spotted her own Secret Santa recipient across the dance floor and is ready to go hand off the gift bag that's hanging off her arm. Nick envies the easy position she's in, how she doesn't have to have even a small panic attack about this whole thing, as he nods and lets her peck his lips. He tells her good luck and she says you too in a pointed voice and he swallows hard, figuring that's his cue.
He has to do it eventually, he tells himself. Joe offers an encouraging smile from a few feet away and he feels Demi watching him from across the room, still with that fucking smirk, but he won't give her the satisfaction of looking back at her. Instead he just swallows and puts one foot in front of the other until he's crossing the room, stepping in between dancing bodies and decorations until he finds himself standing right in front of Miley for the first time in far too long.
She just stares at him for what's probably an uncomfortably long moment of silence, but Nick doesn't really notice because her eyes are a really pretty pale blue tonight and he gets so caught up in trying not to get lost in them that he can't really focus on anything else for a few seconds.
"Hi," he manages to breathe out eventually, and it feels like it's been a million years since they'd last spoken but at the same time it feels like it was only yesterday.
"Hi," she says back, with this tiny smile that makes her nose crinkle up a little bit, and he almost forgets how to breathe.
He realizes all at once that he hasn't really spent any time thinking about what he was going to say to her. "I, uh..." he stammers for a second and then trails off, and he feels himself almost start to panic again but then she just kind of gives him this look, this subtle little eyebrow raise like what are you freaking out for, it's only me, and he doesn't know why it calms him so much but it does.
"Um..." He licks his lips and thrusts the flat box he's been holding under his arm out at her, figuring it's best to get right to the point. "Merry Christmas."
She just looks at the box and then at him and he watches as a few different emotions chase each other across her eyes, but the only one he can really place is mild amusement.
"So you're my Secret Santa, huh?" she says, definitely amused. He nods clumsily, a bit worried she's about to start laughing at him or something, but the little chuckle that escapes her feels like it's more with him than at him.
"Guess it's a small world," she says lightly, and as she says it she produces a box from behind her, a box all wrapped up in red paper and with a tag with his name on it.
It takes him a few seconds to comprehend and then he looks up, glancing over the entire room quickly. He doubts it's a coincidence that Demi's nowhere to be found.
He brings his eyes back to hers and for a long moment they just stare at each other, and then, at almost the exact same second, they both start to laugh.
"God, I knew she planned this," Miley says, still chuckling a bit. "That little sneak. I could kill her."
He laughs again and agrees with the sentiment, thinking that her tone doesn't sound at all angry, but more like relieved. Even happy.
When their laughter dies down they just stand there for a moment, and then he clears his throat and, much more comfortable now, asks which one of them should go first. Miley bites her bottom lip gently, which puts all kind of thoughts in his head that absolutely do not belong there, and says quietly, maybe nervously, "Do you think...we could go somewhere more private?"
He swallows and then looks up to glance around the room again. Olivia seems to still be happily engrossed in conversation with the girl she'd just given some kind of bedazzled phone case to and doesn't seem like she'd notice his absence for a little while. He looks around for Joe and catches him looking right back at him, but he turns his head back to the conversation in front of him right away, glancing back a second later to give his brother a grin.
Nick turns back to Miley and she's looking at him with timid eyes and he nods, and the two of them wander the halls of Demi's house until they eventually wind up in a guest room (which he guesses kind of suggests things that shouldn't be suggested between the two of them, but that's probably just him being paranoid). There's plenty of places to sit but for whatever reason they just stand in the middle of the room by the bed, each holding their present from the other out away from them the way one carries a lit candle around.
"So...do you wanna go first?" he asks after a moment, running a hand nervously through his hair, and he hears her swallow roughly.
"Uh, sure," she says, looking down at the box in her hands as if it's some kind of weapon that could potentially kill her. Somehow her nervousness makes him both more confident and more scared all at once, and he gives her a smile he hopes is comforting as she slowly unties the ribbon from around the box and digs into the wrapping paper.
By the time she gets the box open his heartbeat is so loud in his ears he can barely hear the small gasp that escapes her lips.
"Five Hundred Things I Love About You," she reads, after a long moment of silence. She looks up at him as if to get an explanation but he just gulps, so she presses, "Nick...what is this?"
He keeps his eyes focused on the wall behind her, thinking about what a horrible idea this probably was.
"When we were sixteen," he starts, mumbling a bit, "We were hanging out one day and you...you were looking in a mirror and you just said out of nowhere that you didn't know what it was about you that I liked. And I said I liked everything about you, and you said I was just saying that to be nice and I said I wasn't, and that I could stand there and name five hundred things I loved about you right off the top of my head. And I started to, I got up to, like, twenty before you made me stop, and you were laughing and saying I was so sweet and we just fooled around after that, and I guess you forgot about it."
She's staring at him with an expression he can't name, and her eyes are dull but they're shining.
"I do remember that," she says very softly. "I think about it a lot, actually."
He swallows and goes on, "I couldn't stop thinking about it that night, about you feeling bad about yourself...not realizing how much you deserved to be loved...and it drove me crazy." He's fidgeting around as he talks and honestly he's pretty proud of himself for how well he's managing to get the words out, even if he's probably embarrassing himself beyond belief. "So I started this little notebook. I was going to write out five hundred things I loved about you and then give it to you so you could look at it whenever you were feeling bad about yourself or just bad about anything. But we...we broke up again before I finished it, and I never got to give it to you. I was somewhere in the three hundreds then. And over the next few years I kind of kept adding to it occasionally, when I was thinking about you or...or when I needed something to remind me that love isn't a lost cause, that it exists."
Her eyes are burning a hole through him but he keeps his gaze on his shoes, fiddling with the ribbon on the box in his hands.
"And when I was trying to find a gift for you I just got this idea that I should finally finish the book and give it to you. And some of it is probably kind of inappropriate because I started it when we were dating, but I just...I know you're, uh, alone now and I know how easy it can be to get sad when you're all alone and I just wanted to make sure you always had something there to remind you how perfect you are."
He gulps and then finally forces his eyes up, and she's clutching the book to her chest and staring at him...and crying.
"Don't cry," he panics immediately, "I didn't mean to upset you."
She laughs a little, wiping at her eyes. "You didn't," she says. "You're just...so sweet. I don't know what to say to this."
He gives a little shrug, dipping his head down and looking up at her through his lashes. Slowly she pulls the notebook away from her body and opens it to a random page, flipping through a few.
"I love the way your eyes can be a million different shades of blue depending on your mood," she reads, smiling slightly. "I love how you always think of everyone else before yourself."
She swallows, licks her lips. "I love the way your voice sounds when you tell me you love me."
He winces a bit. "I, uh, I told you some of them were inappropriate. I just felt like it wouldn't have been right to change any of the old ones -"
"I think it's perfect," she says firmly, and before he can even begin to comprehend what's happening she's stepping up to him and pulling him into a hug.
God, the feeling of having her so close again makes him lightheaded. He hugs her back probably tighter than he should, almost clinging to her, but oddly enough she doesn't seem to mind. She smells so good and she feels so tiny in his arms and when they finally pull away he has to bite his lip to hold back a sound of disappointment.
"It's, uh..." she tries to say after a moment, still wiping at her eyes, "It's your turn."
He nods, swallowing, and looks down at the box in his hands and just stares at it for a short moment before starting to open it. He rips off the wrapping paper and struggles with the tape at the top of the cardboard box for a moment before getting it open. He rummages through some bubble wrap and then finally pulls out a snow globe.
"Oh, cool," he says, and holds it up to look into it. There's a big old-fashioned house with a snow-covered pick-up truck parked in the driveway and two little people having a snowball fight in the front yard. It reminds him of the Christmases they'd spent with her family in Tennessee, running around in the snow and snuggling by the fire and writing their names in the snow that gathered on the old truck that they used to go out and get lost in in the Summer, and saying they would live in an old house just like this someday.
He smiles as he shakes it, watching the snow swirl around the tiny boy and girl and their house.
"It, um," she starts quietly, and he looks up at her to see her staring down at her feet. "It kind of sucks compared to yours, but...I saw it in a store and it...it reminded me of us. How we used to spend Christmas in Tennessee in the snow and we always said we would come back and live there someday when..."
Her breath catches a bit and she pauses, and he waits.
"When we were grown-up and married," she finishes after a moment, in a tone he can't place.
"It reminds me of that, too," he says gently, smiling at her. "I love it."
He figures this gives him a perfectly good reason to get another hug from her, so he moves in and wraps his arms around her and he's surprised at how easily she melts into his chest. They just stand there holding each other for what feels like a long time, and he gets so lost in the smell of her hair and the feel of her soft skin brushing against his and the idea of having her in his arms again that when she tries to finally pull away, he finds himself gently tugging her back to him, without even realizing he's doing it.
"I'm, uh, I'm sorry," he stammers when he realizes why she's looking at him funny, and he drops his hold on her and instantly feels empty. She takes a step back from him but they're still pretty close to each other, and they just stand there for a little while and look into each other's eyes and he feels like the silence should be awkward, but it's perfectly comfortable.
He feels his face heat up when her eyes flicker for a few seconds between his eyes and his lips, and he knows its an awful idea but still he steps a bit closer to her, leaving her plenty of room to move away in case it makes her uncomfortable, but she stays right where she is. Already he can tell this is headed in a bad direction, but he can't quite bring himself to care enough to stop it.
Before he knows it she's close enough that he can feel her breath against his chin, warm and a bit ragged, like she's nervous. Just a few inches away from her, he looks down between them and at the snow globe in his hands, giving it a small shake. He looks into it and and he sees himself years younger, head thrown back in laughter and playing chase with the girl he's sure he's going to marry. He sees himself years older, shaking an old dusty snow globe with a sad nostalgic smile and telling a little girl and boy about the girl he'd loved long ago, about how she was married with her own children now.
He swallows hard at the ache that fills his chest, threatening to consume him. And then he reaches behind him and very carefully sets the snow globe down on the bedside table before taking yet another step close to her.
Their noses brush and her breath hitches, her blue eyes bright and overwhelming.
"You have a girlfriend," she breathes, almost more to herself than him.
"I know," he says. And then he kisses her.
When their lips touch they're standing a good few inches apart, arms down by their sides, but as soon as they connect it's like they melt into each other and he suddenly has his arms around her, hers thrown around his neck. She must have had the same drink he did because he tastes chocolate and peppermint on her lips, and he kisses her like he's trying to make up for years of not being able to, for every kiss they'd missed, every kiss one of them had given someone else. Only when oxygen becomes absolutely necessary do they break apart, and he realizes suddenly that they're clutching each other tight enough to leave bruises.
"Sorry," he says breathlessly, almost a whisper, and she shivers as she feels his breath across her face.
"Me too."
They kiss again.
Every time their lips part he feels empty, like something is missing, and he starts to think maybe he's felt that way all the time for years and just never noticed without having the wholeness of feeling her against him to compare it to. Their hands are everywhere on each other, desperate, like they're trying to remember, to memorize. It seems like everything is moving fast but they're kissing so slowly, softly, and he wonders if it's a kiss goodbye.
Finally, though, they pull apart again and she leans in to rest her head on his shoulder, her arms wrapped tight around his back. He just holds her, feeling how small she is, how different she is from when they were younger.
"Don't cry," he whispers when he feels something wet against his neck. "Please don't."
Miley makes a noise kind of like a sob that she'd tried desperately to hold back.
"We can't do this, Nick," she tells him, and she sounds so sad and he just wants to fix it, to make it better. "We can't do this again."
"Why not?" he says automatically, even though he knows it's a stupid question.
"Because!" She pulls away from him and sits down on the bed, wrapping her arms around herself like she needs something to hold, and he wonders if she feels the emptiness too.
"You and me," she breathes out, looking down at her feet, "we can't work. We've tried a million times and we just can't. We've both moved on, you have a girlfriend now. We can't do this again."
He wants to sit down beside her and pull her against him and comfort her, but he stays where he is to give her space and as he shifts nervously on his feet he realizes he's wrapped his arms around himself, too.
"I don't think we've both moved on," he says very quietly. "I can at least tell you that I haven't."
"Don't say that," she says, looking straight ahead at the wall now.
"Why? It's true." He decides to take a chance and sits down beside her on the bed, and when she doesn't move he gently wraps an arm around her shoulders. She flinches before leaning into his touch and he pulls her to him, rubbing her arm gently.
"I've tried so hard to get over you," he mumbles into her hair. "It never works. The best I can do is distract myself and pretend that I'm over it, but it's always just pretend."
"Nick," she says, high-pitched and nervous, and doesn't say anything else after that.
"I know I shouldn't be saying this," he says, struggling to swallow, struggling to breathe, "And I know I shouldn't still be so caught up in you. But I am."
She finally turns her gaze to him, and her eyes are such a piercing blue it knocks the breath out of him. She gives him a strong look for a long moment and he tries to read the expression on her face but can't, and then very suddenly she leans back and picks her feet up off the floor so she's lying flat on the bed.
"Lie down with me," she says, an order.
He complies, reminding himself to breathe in and out. When he's flat on his back beside her her arms reach out for him and tug him closer, and before he knows what's happening they're all wrapped up in each other, snuggled so much closer than they should be. He wonders if Olivia is looking for him.
"Let's just have tonight," Miley breathes into his ear, sending a rush of warmth through his entire body. "If we can't have forever. Let's just have this moment."
He pulls her to him as tightly as he can and holds her there, as if she might disappear. For a long time they lie like that, just holding each other, both breathing heavy and leaving occasional kisses on the other's skin, both so gentle and soft and broken.
He isn't quite sure what just having tonight entails, but he knows he'd be beyond content to just stay right here and hold her for hours. When Miley's hips brush against his it shocks him, and he lets out a shaky breath that she must like because she does it again, harder this time.
"Miley," he hears himself breathe out, sounding like a curse, sounding like a promise. Beside his ear her breathing hitches, the little sound making the skin on his neck prick up. She's nearly completely on top of him now and she seems so small and relaxed in his arms and he feels like if he closes his eyes he'll be in a million places at once - fifteen and pressed against her in a tour bus bunk, seventeen and nervous and breaking all the rules in a hotel room, thirty-five and snuggled up in bed and pretending the sun isn't rising outside the window so he won't have to move from her warm embrace. He keeps his eyes open and focused on the ceiling, breathing roughly and intensely in and out.
He doesn't notice that she's crying again until he feels teardrops landing on his cheek. He shifts away from her slightly and one hand reaches up of its own accord to press lovingly against her cheek, and she leans into him, sniffling, smiling. Her eyes are dull but bright and he thinks very suddenly that he can't ever remember a time when he didn't love her. He just watches her and feels her chest rise and fall with every breath she takes against him and he thinks about how he remembers life before his younger brother was born and before he was ever part of a band and before he got famous, and he spent thirteen years of his life not knowing Miley but he doesn't remember what it felt like to not love her. He remembers life and happiness long before Olivia, long before girlfriends that had come before her, but he feels like he's loved Miley as long as he's lived and he knows that means something. He thinks maybe it means everything.
"I love you," he tells her gently, even though he knows he shouldn't, because he's sure he would have just died if he held it in a second more. She lets out a sob into his neck.
"I love you, too," she whispers, and it feels like his heart is breaking and being put back together all at once and he just has to kiss her so he presses his lips against any part of her he can get to - her forehead, her nose, her eyelids, her cheeks, and ends with a sweet kiss on the lips that makes her smile so slightly he almost misses it.
"I love you," she repeats, like she's trying to get herself used to saying it. He nuzzles his nose against hers gently, lovingly, and says it back.
She snuggles against his chest and starts leaving little kisses all over his neck and he can feel every breath she takes and he feels young, feels alive.
"I wish we had more than tonight," he tells her, and hears the emotion in his own voice. She presses her face into his chest like she's afraid to look up at him.
"Me too," she says after a moment, her voice muffled by his shirt. His heart is light and heavy at the same time and something in the back of his mind is trying to tell him how wrong this is, but it's not registering.
"You have a girlfriend," she says again, turning her face to the side but still not looking at him. And he kind of just realizes very suddenly that, oh yeah, he does have a girlfriend, and he's kind of in the middle of cheating on her. And he's an ass and an idiot and he really hadn't meant for this to happen, but it had and the panic that he guesses he's waiting for doesn't come.
He wishes he knew how to put it in words, how to tell her that he cares about Olivia a lot but when he's with her he feels like he's Nick Jonas, who was in a famous band and used to work for Disney and has to be perfect and put-together all the time and smile for the cameras and show off his perfect girlfriend and they're supposed to be perfect together. Wishes he knew how to tell her that here in this moment with her, just having her near him, he just feels like he's Nick...Nick from New Jersey who likes to play guitar and has a whole bunch of brothers and doesn't have to impress anyone, just gets to be himself.
He presses his lips to hers again and tries to tell her through his kisses everything he can't get out in words, and by the time they pull away they're both breathing heavy, sweaty foreheads pressed together and hands touching at each other gently, carefully, as if one wrong move would make the other move away from them again.
"I want to try again," he breathes out against her neck, nuzzling into her as she clutches at his hair. "Please, Miley. One more time. Let's try again."
He can tell by her breathing that she's crying yet again, but it feels like they're a different type of tears. He moves up so they're face to face, him hovering over her, and her eyes pierce right through him in the most wonderful way.
"This is a terrible idea," she says.
"I know."
She swallows roughly and then takes a deep, slow breath in and then out and the whole time he watches her, tries to memorize her every little movement so that he never, ever forgets.
"One more time," she finally says, scared and determined, and then kisses him again.
While Nick would have been more than thrilled to spend the rest of his life tangled up in her that way, unfortunately they both knew they had to leave Demi's guest room eventually - and that it really should be sooner rather than later, before people started figuring out that they'd snuck off to a bedroom together. They stand side-by-side at the mirror smoothing down hair and touching up makeup, trying to make it look like they hadn't just spend at least a half hour making out in the guest room. When they finally deem themselves and each other presentable they link hands, almost like a reflex, and Miley grabs both of their presents from the bed and then they carefully step out into the hallway, somehow managing to make it back into the center of the party without being noticed.
Well, mostly. Almost immediately when they reach the dance floor Nick catches a glimpse of a rather familiar head of hair from across the room. Demi's looking right at him, at him and Miley together, and she just grins and he smirks back at her and rolls his eyes as she laughs. He'll have to remember to thank her.
As Demi turns away to talk to another guest he feels someone else's eyes on him and looks up to see his brother staring at him with raised eyebrows, his eyes dancing with something like confused amusement, and Nick doesn't catch on until he follows Joe's line of vision down to his right hand and remembers that it's still joined with Miley's.
He feels his face flush a little and because he doesn't know what else to do, he raises the hand that's still clinging tightly to hers and holds their joint hands up by his shoulder for his brother and anyone else who happens to be looking to clearly see, giving kind of an awkward shrug and what he's sure is an even more awkward grin. He tries to make it clear in his face that he's not totally positive what's going on, that he hadn't meant for this to happen, but Joe doesn't roll his eyes or march over to yell at him or ask him some silent question with his eyes like where's Olivia or what the fuck, or whatever else Nick guesses he's expecting him to do. He just looks at Nick and then at Miley - who's noticed what's going on by now and is giving Joe this nervous little smile and biting her lip and just being so cute Nick wants to kiss her right here in front of everyone - and then at their tangled fingers, and then back at Nick. And then he smiles.
Nick starts to smile back until he feels Miley suddenly tugging her hand free from his, and when he turns to look at her she's giving him this wide-eyed look of panic and then whipping around and all but running off across the room, making like she'd suddenly spotted a friend. He stares after her in confusion for a moment and then he looks back up to find Olivia directly in front of him, arms crossed.
Fuck.
She doesn't look mad really, just perplexed, which he guesses is a good sign. "Hey, Babe," he blurts out in this weird high-pitched voice, wincing as he hears himself. He's never been the best at acting natural.
"Why were you holding her hand?" his girlfriend asks, still not mad but definitely not happy either. Fuck, fuck. He scrambles to think up some scenario where he could be holding hands with his ex without getting in too much trouble, but he's fairly sure there isn't one.
"Uh..." he mumbles, a bit desperately. He knows he can't try to say they weren't holding hands, she'd definitely seen them and he's pretty sure if she caught him in a lie like that he'd be in a lot more trouble than he already is.
"We, um..."
She must realize she's not going to get an answer out of him because she moves on to the next question: "Where did you two go?"
"Oh, uh, it was kind of loud so we just went somewhere more quiet to open our presents," he stammers, hoping that doesn't sound as weird out loud as it does in his head.
"Where?"
He winces again. "Uh, a guest room."
She takes a step back from him, crossing her arms even tighter across her chest and he shoves his hands into his pockets, a little more scared of her than he'd like to admit.
"So you disappeared into a bedroom with your ex at a party and you didn't think it was necessary to tell me?" she asks, in a stern voice that rises a bit with every word.
"I was, uh, I was going to, but you looked like you were having a lot of fun and I didn't want to bother you. I didn't...I didn't think we'd be in there as long as we were."
"Oh?" she says with a slight chuckle, like she can't believe the hole he's digging himself into and he can't, either, "So what were you doing in there that took so long?"
"Opening presents?" It comes out like a question.
"Is that it?"
"Yes."
"Liar."
"Olivia!"
"It's written all over your fucking face!" she says, so loudly that a few nearby people turn to look at them. He feels his cheeks start to heat up even more.
"What is?" he asks with a bit of a gulp after everyone's turned back around.
"I don't know," she says, putting her hands on her hips which he finds makes her look surprisingly intimidating for such a small girl. "You tell me."
For a long and unbearably uncomfortable moment, they just stare at each other in silence. And he doesn't know if something in him feels too bad to keep lying to her or if he subconsciously just wants to put an end to the charade or if she used some kind of reverse psychology mind-trick shit on him or what but suddenly he hears himself blurting out:
"We kissed, okay? We kissed."
Fuck fuck fuck!
She seems a bit surprised, but more like she's surprised that he just came right out and told her than surprised that it had actually happened. Her eyes are kind of angry but also kind of hurt and he's really scared she's about to start crying and shit, damn, he never meant for this to happen.
"I'm really sorry," he says, and he is, "I didn't mean to...it just happened. I was caught up in the moment or whatever. I'm sorry."
She just stares at him, not saying a word, and for some reason it feels almost worse than screaming would have been.
"Please say something," he mumbles eventually, sounding so pathetic that if she doesn't kick his sorry ass he figures he'll do it himself.
For another long moment she doesn't say anything, and then she just swallows and takes another step back away from him.
"I just...want to be alone, okay?" she says, not really sounding angry or sad or much of anything, really, "I'm going home."
And she just walks away from him, and he stands there staring after her as she picks up her coat from the pile by the door and then just opens the door and steps outside, and he figures anything he does at this point will only make things worse so he's ready to just let her leave. But then he turns around to find his brother right beside him, eyebrows raised as he stares after her too.
"How does she think she's gonna get home?" Joe says. "We drove her here."
"Fuck," Nick sighs. "I got it."
He surveys the room while he stands by the door and drags on his own coat and is relieved to see that only a few people are staring at him. But he's even more relieved to see Miley, standing by the refreshment table and giving him this comforting, sad little smile, like she knows this is something he has to do but wishes it wasn't, and just the solidarity is comforting enough that he finds himself smiling back at her.
He heads outside into the cold, feeling snowflakes land on his face and rushes until he catches up with Olivia at the end of the driveway, reaching out and gently grabbing her arm. She flinches a little but doesn't jerk away as she turns to look at him, and he's unbelievably relieved to see that she's not crying.
"It's cold," he mumbles, looking away from her rough gaze. "Let me drive you home."
He half expects her to be too proud and just turn around and keep walking, but it is cold out and she must have figured out by now that it would be an awfully long trip home on foot in the snow, so she just nods, not looking at him, and follows him over to Joe's car. For the first few minutes of the ride she just stares out the window in silence and Nick tries to just focus on the road and fights the urge to turn off the radio and its unfittingly cheery Christmas music on every station, knowing total silence would be much worse.
"I really am sorry," he says softly after about ten minutes of quiet between them. "I never meant for you to get hurt."
She scoffs, keeping her gaze on the Christmas lights outside.
"Really. It was just -"
"Don't," she says finally, quiet but firm. "Don't tell me it was just some moment of weakness or a mistake."
He doesn't know what to say to that so he just waits for her to go on, listening as she takes a deep breath in and lets it out in a sigh.
"I saw the way you were looking at her tonight," she says slowly, quietly, and her voice wobbles but it's also kind of stern, like she's just stating facts. "And it was nothing like the way you look at me."
More silence. After a second she reaches a hand up and wipes at her eyes and he almost tells her again that he'd never meant for things to happen this way, but then he decides not to, decides that maybe it's time he started taking responsibility for all the shitty things that happen in his life.
"I'm sorry," he says again finally, not sure what else there is to say. Neither of them say anything else for the rest of the drive.
Only after he's pulled into her driveway and she's got one hand resting on the door handle do they finally turn to look at each other.
"Nick," she says quietly after a long pause, and he can't put a name to the expression on her face.
"Yeah?"
"You didn't get her a sweater, did you?"
He just looks at her, and the long silence between them must tell her everything she needs to hear because she pulls the door open, letting the cold air from outside in to wash over him and remind him he's still alive.
"Merry Christmas, Nick," she says as she steps out of the car into the snow, light and sad and maybe sarcastic or maybe not, he can't tell, and then she closes the door behind her and he stays in the driveway and watches her until she's all the way inside. She doesn't look back once.
He starts the car and heads back out, and suddenly he's so exhausted he almost wishes he hadn't taken Joe's only ride so he could skip going back to the party and just go straight home and sleep for about ten days. But the thought of Miley waiting for him there, of stepping from the cold December air into her warm embrace has him nearly speeding on his way back.
The heat that hits him when he opens Demi's front door is like walking into Heaven, and he looks around for Miley as he shrugs off his wet coat. He finds her sitting on the stairs, his present to her open on her lap and a bright smile on her face as she flips slowly through the pages, and just the thought that he'd been the one to make her smile that way lights his own face up as well. He walks over and sits down beside her and she looks up, grinning at him. He stiffens for a second when she leans over and kisses his lips but then he relaxes into it, hoping with everything in him that he'll never have to go so long without kissing her ever again in his lifetime.
"How did it go?" she asks gently when they pull away. He shrugs a little.
"Better than expected, I guess. Still unpleasant."
She leans her head on his shoulder and he closes his eyes, lets her scent consume him.
"I feel really bad," she says after a second. "Somebody got cheated on and dumped right at Christmas and it was my fault."
"It wasn't," he insists, "It was mine. I'm the one who screwed up. Not that this was a screw up but...whatever. Besides, a lot of people wouldn't really consider this cheating. I mean, we only kissed a little, it's not like we've been having an affair."
Miley snorts. "We only kissed a little like that's not a big ass deal when you're somebody else's boyfriend. Damn, Nick."
He laughs quietly, nudging her shoulder with his. "I was trying to make you feel better."
She laughs and nudges him right back, and then she leans against him again and takes a deep breath in like she's trying to breathe in the moment, breathe in him.
"Just be here with me," she says softly, nearly a whisper.
"Always," he says back the same way, his lips ghosting across her forehead. And the two of them just sit there on the stairs, and he feels so whole with her beside him and he looks around at all the garland and lights for a moment and then leans over and picks up the snow globe from beside her. He shakes it up and the two of them peer into it together, and he looks at the tiny girl and boy and the house and the truck and thinks about Christmases Future - about an old house covered in snow and children with her eyes squealing with excitement and the two of them together, always, for Christmas.
"Merry Christmas, Miley," he whispers after a moment, and he hears promises in his voice, hears the future and the past and the two of them together, where they belong, and when she looks up at him he sees all those same promises in her eyes and this time, things are going to work out. He just knows it.
"Merry Christmas, Nick."
Happy Holidays, my wonderful readers!
As a side note, I'm soooo sorry I haven't updated Perspective. Ridiculously long story short, I was keeping everything I had written for that story on a flash drive that ended up getting broken and I lost all of it, and I've been working on rewriting it and actually have chapter two finished but I just...don't like it. Not enough to post it. I'm working on writing a completely different version of the chapter that I like a lot better, but around Christmastime my family gets really busy and I seriously just haven't had the time. (I also haven't had the time to really edit this oneshot so I'm sorry for any really stupid mistakes you found in it.) I hope this little story is enough to kind of make up for the wait and hold you guys over until the holiday season dies down and I have more time to get some writing done.
I hope you all had an amazing Christmas or other holiday you celebrate, and I hope you enjoyed this little present :)