Notes at the end of the story
This entry has two parts. The one is edited although I was really stubborn with my poor beta. The first part covers the challenge and my beta believes it should end there but the second part is how I, more or less, wanted this entry to be played out. Both parts are posted as one oneshot. What do you think?
Lucifer in the Sky with Lions
His fingers drummed the rusted edges of the car's window. The pleasant warm air had been replaced for the past half an hour by a soft chilling temperature. What had also changed in the past half an hour was also the scenery. Long past were the fancy houses, the well-maintained road and the well-trimmed bushes.
With some reluctance, he took the warmer jacket he had been offered before leaving the house and securely fixed around his neck the hideous scratchy scarf Trixie had entrusted him to lose at some point. When he let out a sigh of contentment, now feeling somewhat warmer, he saw the Detective smirking slightly due to his persistence prior to leaving that the extra clothing was unnecessary.
"I never knew you were into getting frisky al fresco, Detective." Without caring for just this once for her bothered reaction, he just relaxed back to the car seat.
Short bushes gave way to small trees and some odd fir trees started making an appearance. What also changed was a thin layer of snow which covered the landscape ahead. Lucifer would have commented on the serene tranquillity but how could he compliment the San Gabriel Mountains?
"How long will the bathroom renovations take?" she interrupted his reverie and saw him turning his body towards her.
"Not long now, they are just waiting for the new bathtub," ordering a new bathtub had been easy but the actual shipping had taken over a fortnight. In the meantime, he had taken refuge to Maze's and the Detective's house.
"It's been about two weeks now Lucifer and the couch will not be getting any more comfortable." How had he forced himself on her house she had no clue. Probably it was the third time she had caught him getting out of her shower. She just presumed that whatever had made him wanting to cohabitate with a child must have been a grave reason. A bathtub had certainly not been at the top of her list.
"If you were gracious enough to share a bed I wouldn't have to worry about that now, would I?" he told her in good humour. It had taken her a while but after living with the man, he was an oxymoron borderline between the most adorable and obnoxious living person on the planet.
"In your dreams, buddy." she teased him lightly in return.
"That can be arranged." His semi-serious flirtatious mood was immediately back. When he saw her smile widening and then taking her tongue out at him he huffed and turned back to the window. Annoyance and being worked up never worked well with her in confining spaces. Especially with his current virginal and Mars-attacks-over-tea nights with Beatrice.
"If you stop sulking I might give you an early present." she sang and that got his attention right back at her. Reaching back for her purse she fumbled for a bit and took out a long package. She never had the time to wrap it but if this wasn't going to shift his mood, nothing ever would.
A little card fell on his lap and a perplexed frown set on his features as he opened the box to reveal six small purple bells inside.
"A custom made order, Detective?" he asked intrigued. What more was into bells than shape and ringing?
"I never took you for a campanology lover." he teased her and examined closer the white sprinkled edges of the purple bells.
She shifted uncomfortably in her car seat and glanced his way.
"They have been coloured as devil's bells. The flower that is." she murmured while taking one more closed turn.
"And it appears to be more than that," taking one of them out he could now see that each bell had a print of a different small photograph on their side.
The six small bells held pictures of every important person in his life and a couple that were certainly not on his favourites list. Amenadiel, Maze, Linda, the Detective along with Beatrice were the most treasured ones. One of them was not holding a photograph but instead the words Mom and Dad written in an elegant script.
Still holding the bell with the Detective's picture alongside Beatrice he jiggled it and sure enough, a soft ringing sounded in the car making Chloe pat his knee with what he would dare to describe as affection.
Part 2
"We're here," she said as she stopped the car near a narrow hiking path. Reaching behind her seat she retrieved the two large backpacks and handed Lucifer one of them.
"Where are you taking me, Detective?" The backpack was heavy and the proximity to Chloe had him shivering at the chilling mountain air.
"To your natural habitat of course!" Chloe told him tapping lightly a nearby yellow sign on which it was written 'Devil's Canyon'. Adjusting the backpack on her shoulders, she took the small, dusted with snow path.
"How you tease me woman!" he yelled and run towards the source of her chuckling.
After passing a small creek there was a modest sized arrangement of trees, most of which had lost their leaves for the winter.
Chloe placed her backpack on the snowed ground and took out a few strands of rope and some pieces of brown burlap. Then by setting aside some tree branches behind her Lucifer finally saw why they had to come this far. Hidden behind the thickly entangled branches were three magnificent blue-grey firs.
"My father brought the bigger one from up north a few months before I was born." She told him choked with emotion.
"They are certainly unique." he felt the smoothness of the needles between his fingers, marvelling how its colour was slightly changing at every different angle.
"Yes, well I come every year to make sure they are doing well. But it was not until a few weeks before Trixie was born when this little one made an appearance." she laughed softly and pointed the fir which was standing nearly at the same height as him.
"Then a few years ago this little cutie came along but it's still too fragile." Frowning she checked the one which barely reached up her waist, between its needles and indeed the fir was growing but not as well as she would have hoped.
"So why on earth do you want me to cut it, Detective?" He was averse to cut down something so alive. Christmas came with many kinds of absurd traditions but cutting a perfectly good tree for decoration was not what he would define as a festive activity.
"Not cut it! Dig it out! You told me you had experience on digging!" she cried out.
"Detective, I fear my kind of digging down to business, was not in the same context your fragile sensitivities are!" he shouted in return and threw carelessly his backpack with a soundless plop on the snow.
Chloe took several calming breaths, opened Lucifer's backpack and retrieved the shovel and a saw. Throwing to Lucifer the small bag of freshly brewed tea and the gingerbread disasters Trixie and Maze had baked just the day before, she started digging the soft soil of the medium-sized fir.
"Detective, just give it here!" He commented and grabbed the shovel from her hands which now appeared rather small for him to use. With several awkward plunges on the ground, a circular pit was made around the tree.
"What did you think, that the pits of hell dug themselves?" He asked her when he saw her questioning look of how fast he was working on the task at hand.
"Well, at the beginning at least?" Having left the pits of hell for the pits of San Gabriel Mountains, this was not exactly what he had in mind when he had left for his everlasting vacation.
"I want Trixie to have this tree in our house even if just for a year " He heard Chloe talking quietly behind him.
"I was planning on planting it afterwards in the garden but now we will just have to do a return trip after Christmas." The loss of their first house bothered her more than she was willing to admit. It had also affected her daughter but that could also be the fast approaching Christmas Day.
"There is always a solution, Detective." Came his muffled reply underneath the branches while he was using the saw on the unnecessary roots.
Chloe smiled at the sight of an undignified Lucifer slumped down the ground just so to free a tree from its roots. At every jerking of the saw, she could hear the bells faintly ringing from his jacket's left pocket. It had been a good choice for a pre-Christmas present. Innocent yet intimate. To be clear, intimate according to her context, not his.
Breathing heavily he lifted the tree and Chloe placed the coarse burlap covering the exposed roots. To his surprise, the tree was not as heavy as he had expected it to be at first.
"I'll just take the backpacks to the car and I'll be back to move the tree together, okay?" She handed him the rope to tie the branches and left him looking down dumbly, wondering on how to proceed.
The warmness from digging was not replaced by the expected chilliness. With Chloe getting further away, he could feel his body relaxing to the optimum temperature and his scuffed hands slowly healing as he rolled the tree around the rope. Finally satisfied with his work, he lifted the fir experimentally and decided to take advantage of his invulnerability while Chloe was away to get back to the car in the best condition possible.
When he reached the creek he felt the tree getting heavier and the cold seeping down his previously sweated neck.
"Lucifer don't move," Chloe begged him from the other side of the creek. Confused he complied and saw her reaching for her gun only to realise it wasn't there. A low growling from behind him was the last thing he heard before being pushed into the creek's shallow waters.
"Run Detective!" He stuttered due to the freezing water and tried to avoid the large feline's claws under the thankfully, well-wrapped tree.
"Lucifer run!"
"Not bloody likely! You run away from me woman!" he yelled and ducked another clawed paw. When the prickling from the cold water diminished he felt brave enough to get a hold of the animal's neck and pin it down.
"Brother's pet aren't you?" he hissed at the mountain lion only for the animal to growl back in defiance. That sneer was so similar to Gabriel's one. Although held no power over animals be it on their will or soul, his gift of getting out their deepest desires proved to be useful once more.
"I believe we have a deal then" The lion stopped struggling beneath him and Lucifer released it. At the sound of two gunshots, he knew that a panicking Detective was coming his way so he picked up quickly the tree and sprinted to the car.
When they finally managed to put the now wet tree in the car, they were both shaking violently. Him from the cold and Chloe by the fright. Lucifer closed loudly the car's door and took off the drenched scarf while waiting for Chloe to get in the car. At the sight of the mountain lion slowly approaching she hurrdely got inside and her breathing hitched. The engine sparked to life and suddenly the car moved almost violently backwards. Before she could take a hold of herself and steady the car on the frozen road, Lucifer had opened the window and threw out Trixie's scarf and one of the small bells she had given him.
"I thought I told you to run back there." she snapped at him, hurt from throwing away a piece of his customised gift.
"When you wrestle a mountain lion, Detective, in the middle of a creek, you are in no position to run!" he replied and focused back on the bells box. All bells were there apart from Dan's which had been sacrificed for his deal with the oversized cat. The car abruptly stopped and Chloe snatched the box from his hands.
Her features softened when she realised which bell was missing and he would have sworn that a small smile played on her lips. Although, he would have preferred to be dry and properly fed, If there was a moment for a first snog this was the one. Scooting closer to her, he was ready to initiate the first kiss when his pocket vibrated. Chloe who was unaware of the passing moment, she gave him back the box and restarted the car once again.
'Tune now in 102.7 FM'. That was the laconic message the good doctor had sent him.
Searching for the right button on the car's panel he managed to get a somewhat decent reception of the station at this altitude. Stealing a peek of Chloe he found that she didn't mind him much and kept her eyes on the road.
"You are listening to KIIS FM 102.7 an odd song request has just arrived with the following message: "Lucy thanks for the cruise tickets, now take the hint you two!'", Cold December Night for Lucy then!"
Under her questioning gaze, he hurriedly lowered the volume and a blushing Lucifer found great interest at looking the passing scenery. Drenched from head to toe, hands blistered by digging and with several grazing scratches from his previously unfortunate encounter he made a truly lovable sight in her opinion and so she adjusted the air-condition a few degrees higher
"Take us home Detective." He murmured affectionately feeling his ears once again flushing in embarrassment. For the rest of the ride home, the radio was quietly playing whilst Lucifer was openly looking at her with a wistful expression. Of what he wasn't even sure himself.
They call it the season of giving,
I'm here I'm yours for the taking.
So kiss me in this cold December night.
Just... fall in love with me this Christmas...
The End
(For Now)
Notes: For A03 Lucifer Christmas Challenge 17 - Bells, with Lucifer and Chloe, Outside and in the snow. Written by Sanoiro. Challenged by Wandererzaehler.
1) Songs used for this entry:
Cold December Night - Michael Bublé - /watch?v=d7GepflO6PQ
Sunday - Pasadena Roof Orchestra - /watch?v=IgFSQm19hi4
2) Originally, I wanted the mountain lion to chase him because of the ringing bells. Make no mistake that the bells indeed played their part on Lucifer being spotted by the large feline but then my writing became a bit awkward. Perhaps I might come back at some point and change it a bit.
3) I remind you that all my entries are connected. They are a continuation of each other and the ending will be the 25th's entry. Have you found the clues yet?
4) I just love blue spruce (although its needles are that of fir). ;)
5) Did you notice Gary's reference or even Grant's?