MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYONE! I hope that everyone is having a great holiday season! I know I am. :D
Thank you so much for stopping by and giving my little story a chance. I really appreciate your time here! Now, this story has been about three years in the making. My dear friend, DonnysGirl87, drew a simply adorable little Christmas themed picture for me back in 2014. I loved it so much that it inspired me to write a story! Well, I held off on writing it because of how much time my main story, Donatello's Strength, takes up. Plus, I only had a vague idea of what I wanted to write. Well, last year, a friend on DA ran a Christmas contest with the central theme of gift-giving and suddenly I had a little more focus. Unfortunately, that was also about the time my life started going sideways so my writing time and energy went straight down the tubes. ANYWAYS! Before I make this any longer than it already is, it took me until literally today (12/25/2016) to finally finish it!
I'll tell you straight up - it's A LOT longer than I expected it to be. So I have broken it up into three chapters. That way it's not one MASSIVE chapter to read and lose your place on if you have to take a break. ;)
As the description of the story says, this is another story from my little series, Life's a Dance. HORRAY! I FINALLY HAVE ANOTHER ONE WRITTEN! So, this story has no warnings and is just full of family fluff with a touch of B-team feels. I really hope you enjoy it! If you do, please let me know with a favorite, a follow, and/or a review! I truly love hearing from you guys and it helps keep me going through the darkest of times.
Life's a Dance – What is Santa Claus?
"How about now?" Donatello asked as he peeked out from behind the TV.
Michelangelo let out a heavy sigh before kicking back in the beanbag chair, stretching his legs out in front of him, and placing his hands behind his head. "Nope. Still nothing but snow, dude."
Donnie hummed as he sat back on his heels again so that he could examine the back of the TV. "And you swear that you didn't touch anything back here?"
"On my life. Trust me, bro. After the chewing out you gave me the last time I mess with it, I know better!" Mikey answered with a laugh.
The purple clad turtle made an amused snort. "Never stopped you before," he muttered to himself.
"You think it's the coaxial cable, Momma?" piped up a little voice to his right.
Donnie grinned down at the boy kneeling beside him. "I'd say it's the most likely culprit." He reached down to run his fingers through his son's sea foam green mane. "Nice thinking, Lewis," he praised, making the boy's ears perk forward and a wide gap-toothed grin spread over his face.
"Shall I go ahead and get a replacement from your workshop?" Kaiya offered from where she stood beside Donnie's left shoulder.
"That would be great. Thank you, sweetie." His eldest nodded sharply before trotting off to fetch the item, her forest-green mane and tail trailing behind her.
"Isn't there any way I can help too?"
Donnie looked over the TV at the middle member of his triplet set. Hikaru sat on the couch with her legs drawn up to her plastron and her forearms resting on her knees. "What are you talking about, sweet pea?" he questioned before dipping back behind the TV. "You're already helping."
Her shoulders sagged and she lowered her head so that only her hazel eyes were visible above her forearms. "Yeah, by staying out of the way," she mumbled.
"No," he reproved while raising a single forefinger above the TV so that she could tell that he was addressing her. "By being our eyes. Lewis and I can't work on the connections back here and see how the TV is reacting to what we're doing at the same time. We need someone to be paying close attention to the screen for us." Donnie peered back over the TV. His eyes aimed just to the left of where his daughter sat. "And we can't very well trust your Uncle Mikey to do that, now can we?"
Michelangelo twitched out of the little snooze he'd started drifting into at the mention of his name. "Huh! Wha?"
What could be seen of Donatello's face over the TV became deadpan. "Thank you for making my point, Mikey."
Hikaru blinked in surprise before the corners of her mouth twitched up at the sheepish grin her uncle offered her mother. When Donnie lifted his eyes to the ceiling with a weary sigh, she couldn't stop a soft giggle from slipping out. A flash out of the corner of her eyes pulled her attention to the TV screen. Her face split into an excited grin. "Momma! Momma, it flickered!" She shifted her posture so that she could kneel on the edge of the couch. "The static flickered just now!"
"Really?"
"Yeah! I could see the station we're on, but it was only for a few seconds."
"Now we're getting somewhere," Donnie said before ducking behind the TV once more. "Do what you just did again, OK buddy?"
"Hai!"
"There!" Hikaru shouted as the static on the TV screen finally cleared to reveal the channel it had been obscuring. "The static's gone!"
"Bingo. It is, indeed, the coaxial cable. I'm willing to bet that the BNC connector's gone bad." The screen returned to static, but this time it was on purpose. Donatello sat back and examined the end of the cable carefully. "It won't be a problem to fix, but it's faster to replace the whole cable. I can always use the repaired cable somewhere else."
He smiled when he heard the light clip-clop of his eldest daughter's hooves as she hurried back into the living room. "Your timing is impeccable, Kaiya-chan." The little turtle/horse hybrid grinned as she handed him the new cable. Within a minute, the static was banished from the TV and everything was working order once more. "See, Hikaru-chan?" Donnie said while he exchanged a fist bump with Lewis. "Never underestimate the importance of careful observation in troubleshooting!"
Hikaru blushed and ran her hand over her smooth head so that she could rub the back of her neck. "Hai, Momma."
Mikey eagerly scooped up the TV's remote and grinned from ear to ear at Donnie, Kaiya, and Lewis as they approached. "So what are we gonna watch?"
"Through the Black Hole!" Kaiya crowed while plunking herself into Mikey's lap and snuggling into his plastron.
"I'm good with whatever's on public broadcast," Lewis softly suggested as he clambered up the couch to settle on Hikaru's left.
"Nuh-uh! You guys already had your nerdy fix from fixing the TV. I'm talking about something FUN!"
The three kids looked at each other unsurely for a moment before Hikaru raised her hand. "The NYCB is supposed to be televising a production called The Nutcracker tonight," she offered hopefully.
Mikey goggled at his little niece. "Why would you want to watch something like that?!" He yelped when Donnie smacked him upside his head.
"The Nutcracker is a ballet, shell brain," the taller turtle scolded.
"OH! Whew! Had me worried there for a bit!" Mikey laughed. He watched Donnie roll his eyes at him before sitting down on Hikaru's right. When the child shifted so that she could cuddle against her mother's side, a tender smile melted the irritation from Donnie's face. Mikey had to grin at how easily those little munchkins could turn his brother into putty. "I think that will do the trick, Hikaru-chan. What time does the show start?"
"Eight o'clock."
"Awesome! That means we have just enough time to catch something else too." Mikey closed his eyes as he beamed with glee. "And considering what day it is, I know just the show!" When he opened his eyes again, he was blown away by the triplet's blank looks. "You guys do know what day it is, right?"
"Of course, Uncle Michelangelo!" Kaiya answered him, sounding a little put out, before sagely declaring, "It's December 24th."
Mikey waited for her to continue. When she didn't, he prompted, "And it's important because…"
Her eyes widened at this before she became thoughtful. "Because…it's the 358th day of the year?" she finally said, though her tone was more questioning than answering.
"The 359th if it's a leap year!" Lewis added sunnily.
"And that means there are only seven days left until the end of the year," Hikaru chimed in as well, even going so far as to raise a forefinger to mimic her mother's lecture pose.
"It's special because it's Christmas Eve!" Mikey blurted out.
The children looked at their uncle in complete confusion. "What's so special about the day before Christmas?" Kaiya asked while arching a skeptical eyebrow.
"Hello! Santa Claus?!"
"What's a 'Santa Claws'?" Hikaru asked as she looked at her siblings, who looked equally baffled.
"Santa Claus, spelled C-l-a-u-s, is a secular mythological figure that is known for delivering gifts to well-behaved children," Donatello began, drawing the kids' immediate and rapt attention. "His modern form came into existence largely because of a poem written by Clement Clarke Moore in 1822, called A Visit from Saint Nicholas and later renamed The Night Before Christmas. In the poem, Moore describes an individual that is a fusion of the 4th-century bishop Saint Nicholas and Sinterklaas who is the Dutch version of Saint Nicholas only with a bit of Odin, the pagan god of Yule who flew through the sky on an eight-legged horse named Sleipnir, thrown in."
Mikey could only sit there with his jaw hanging open as Donnie spoke. It was one of the few times in his life where he was utterly speechless. "DUDE!" he yelped once he'd found his voice again before glaring at the taller turtle, "You, seriously, fail at being a parent!"
"W-what?" Donnie stammered while giving his brother a series of startled blinks. "What did I do?"
"What did you do!? You just told them that Santa Claus isn't real!"
Donnie's eyes narrowed and his tone picked up a definite chill. "Because he isn't real, Mikey. He's a fantasy."
"That's not the point, bro!"
"And what is the point!? That I'm supposed to hide the truth from my children?"
"WHY NOT!? YOU ALREADY DO!" Three little voices gasped and Mikey immediately regretted his words. He watched the shock on his older brother's face become wounded before it twisted into smoldering anger. "Oh jeez…Donnie…I-I didn't mean t-"
"You know what, Mikey," Donnie interrupted as he stood up, straightening to his full six-foot-three height so he could tower over the shorter turtle. His brown eyes were daggers pinning his little brother to the spot. "You go ahead tell them all the lies you want," he hissed before he walked up the couch and left the living room.
Without another word, he stormed towards the bedrooms. He heard Mikey trying to call him back, but he blatantly ignored his little brother. Donnie knew he was too angry to talk rationally right now and he always tried to avoid fighting with his brothers in front of the triplets. He needed to cool off and nothing would do that better than a run across New York City in December.
He marched into his bedroom, pulled open one of the drawers to his dresser, and began to suit up. Typically, Donnie and his brothers' kept their clothing to a minimum. Their shells made anything more than their standard gear feel silly. However, the harsh cold of wintertime demanded that they wear more or risk losing fingers and toes to frostbite. Or worse – death by hypothermia.
Donnie had just finished putting on a pair of the boots that he'd specially designed to suit oversized turtle feet when Master Splinter approached his doorway. "Donatello? Where are you going?"
"Out," Donnie snapped without thinking and instantly winced. He didn't need to see the stern disapproval on his father's face to know it was there. "I'm sorry, Sensei," he murmured after he'd taken a slow, centering breath and turned to meet Splinter's gaze. "I'm just...irritable right now. I didn't mean to take it out on you." He waited for Splinter to nod his forgiveness before continuing. "I'm going on patrol so that I don't lose my temper any more than I already have."
"Leonardo and Raphael are already on patrol, my son."
Donnie resisted an exasperated sigh as he plucked a purple hoodie out of the drawer. "Then I'll hit the city's hot spots. They can never be checked too often."
The ninja master contemplated his second youngest while Donnie wormed his way into the last piece of his winter attire. "Perhaps you would be willing to run an errand for me instead?"
The purple clad turtle stopped adjusting his clothes to stare at his sensei. It wasn't every day that Splinter asked them to do something for him, after all. "Of course, Master Splinter. What do you need?"
"Earlier this month, I asked Murakami-san to order me a special blend of tea from Japan. It should have arrived by now."
"And you would like me to pick it up for you?" Donnie finished for the ninja master. When Splinter nodded, Donnie allowed a bit of a smile to reach his face. "No problem, Sensei. Consider it done."
"Thank you, my son."
Dragon Gate glistened silver in the city's lights thanks to a fresh deposit of snow. Light, fluffy flakes continued to meander down from the sky. A couple of particularly fat ones came to rest on Donatello's nose. He crossed his eyes so he could watch the delicate fractals dissolve upon contact with his body heat. Ever since he'd first seen snow, Donnie had been fascinated by the geometric uniqueness of the little ice crystals. They were just so beautiful. He could watch them for hours.
Too bad it had to get so dang cold for it to snow! The turtle shivered against a flurry of wind that bit at him through his hoodie, making him wish he'd had the good sense to wear another layer. But then again, that would have defeated the purpose of going out into the city to cool off. Another gust whipped around him, convincing him that he was 'cooled off' enough. He grabbed the edge of his raised hood to wipe the wet vestiges of snow from his face before resuming his journey across New York City's rooftops.
It didn't take him long to arrive at his destination. Even less time to get to the door. When he stepped inside, the shop's bell announced him with its delicate chime. "Hello, Donatello-kun!" Mr. Murakami greeted from behind the counter. "It has been a while."
Donnie blinked in surprise before smiling and shaking his head. "One of these days, I have got to ask how you know it's me before I say a word."
The blind man laughed while adjusting his sunglasses, "And one of these days, I may tell you." The turtle made a light chuckle as he approached the bar that ringed Murakami's kitchen area while pushing down his hood. "What can I do for you, my friend? A batch of pizza gyoza, perhaps?"
Donnie's cheeks acquired a bashful blush at how well the human knew him and his brothers. "As appealing as that sounds, I'm here to pick up some tea for Master Splinter?"
"Ah yes! It came in just this morning," the chef said before walking over to the far right of his kitchen. He lifted up the counter door so that he could leave the kitchen and head to the back of the shop. "Please, sit. I will get it for you."
Donnie did as the elderly man asked of him, folding his arms over the countertop as he did so. "Is your family well?" he called after the old man.
"Very well!" Murakami answered. Pride radiated from his voice. "My daughter-in-law gave birth to a baby girl just two weeks ago."
"Congratulations!" Donnie beamed and propped his head up in his hands. "How many grandchildren does that bring you to now?"
"Six."
"Six!" Donnie yelped. "That's amazing! I can't even imagine how busy you must be with so many!"
Murakami laughed as he returned to the front of the shop with a box. "Oh, I am busy, but not quite that busy. After all, they are my grandchildren. I only have the responsibility of spoiling them. Their parents are the ones tasked with raising them." He held the box out to Donatello. "Speaking of such things, how have your children been faring? They are three. No, four now?"
Donnie chuckled as he took the tea. "Try five, Murakami-san."
"Five years old," the elderly man murmured softly before shaking his head. "Time truly does fly like an arrow."
"Indeed it does," Donnie agreed with a fond smile.
"I hope that one day I get to meet them."
Donnie's smile faded into guilt, "You will, Murakami-san. I promise! It's just that…" he looked away for a moment, "…they're not ready to come to the surface yet."
His human companion chuckled and rested a hand on top of one of Donnie's comfortingly. "I assure you, my young friend, I do not feel slighted. When my wife had our first, her cautiousness was so great that I feared the boy would live his whole life indoors. And she did not have the concerns that you do." He patted the turtle's hand. "Do not fret. I know that one day Mother Bear will feel comfortable enough with the world to allow her…to allow his cubs to explore it."
The purple clad turtle sighed in relief even as he felt his cheeks warm at the comparison. "Thank you for understanding, Murakami-san."
Mr. Murakami's smile then became more lighthearted. "Tell me," he started as he moved to return to the back of the shop, "Do you children enjoy coloring books?"
Donnie cocked his head to the side. "Honestly, I don't know. The ones I tend to find are already filled in. And even when I manage to find an unused one, it's typically so damaged that it is beyond repair. Paper bound books do not fare well in dumpsters. Why do you ask?"
The old man returned carrying a small stack of soft backed books with brightly colored covers. He held the books out to the mutant turtle, "Merry Christmas, my friend."
"Murakami-san," Donnie breathed before shaking his head. "No, I can't accept this. You've done so much for my family and me already."
"And you four have done far more for me. I would not be here if it were not for you," Murakami gently countered while pressing the books into Donnie's hands. "I insist."
Donnie stared at the coloring books and brushed his thumbs over the topmost one's cover while trying to swallow around the emotional knot building in his throat. "Thank you," he whispered, bringing a satisfied smile to his dear friend's face. After taking a moment to collect himself, Donnie cleared his throat and said with a soft laugh, "I had no idea you were Christian."
"I am not."
Donnie's head snapped up, his eye ridges drawing together. "Then…why…"
Murakami only smiled more at Donnie's confusion. "Because I have learned that there is an ideal at the center of every holiday that is worth celebrating. No matter what faith you believe in." Donnie fell into a pensive silence that was only broken when the shop's clock chimed. "Ah!" the old chef exclaimed. "It is time to close up for the night. I had no idea it was already so late. "
The purple clad turtle blinked as watched the human turn off the shop's sign. "You're actually closing the 24/7?"
Mr. Murakami let out an amused chuckle. "It is a tradition of mine to close early on Christmas Eve so that I can help out at the shelter on Lafayette."
"Ah," Donnie drawled in understanding before a small, slightly sad smile touched his lips. "That is truly awesome of you, Murakami-san. I'm sure that the people there appreciate all your help."
Murakami nodded. "And at this time of year, it is especially difficult for them to find help. They can use all that they can get."
"I imagine so."
The chef stopped closing up to turn his sightless eyes to Donnie. He didn't need his improved hearing to catch the melancholy tainting the mutant's voice. After listening to the light rustle of pages as the turtle idly flipped through the coloring books, Murakami gently asked, "Would you like to join me, Donatello-kun?"
The offer startled Donnie. "Very much so," he began eagerly. However, his mind didn't allow his enthusiasm to last. "But," he paused to look at one of his three-fingered hands sullenly, "I would only cause a panic."
Murakami hummed thoughtfully while scratching at his chin. He tended to forget that others would fear his friends because of how they looked. It was a prejudice that he was glad he never had to get over. He couldn't even begin to imagine how different his life would be without those four turtles…those four men…in it. If only there were a way to blind others to Donatello's appearance as he was. An idea popped into his head. "I think I might have a way around that."