Authoress' Notes: Here's the promised Christmas Special which brings a little more light onto Kathy Jones' past and begins to shape her future. It's basically her and Donnie's first Christmas together; but I set the beginning of it during the night before Christmas Eve, since I think I might expand a bit on it. I made little hints in the "shot" and ideas are niggling at me to type up; I'll probably make this into a series of Christmas one-shots, starting here (the night before Christmas Eve) to Christmas Eve Morning, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day Morning, up until Christmas Day Eve. Let me know what you think when you read it. Without further ado, Read, Review, and Enjoy!
Dedication: This is a Gift-Fic for randomlass, my most loyal reviewer of all the reviewers I've had. Kat, thanks for all of the support and I hope you enjoy! Happy Holidays!
Summary: Just a Holiday one-shot in which Kathy Jones and Donnie help one another realize that all they want for Christmas is each other… and that nothing else matters.
Disclaimer(1): Nope, I do not own "The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" or any related characters, I believe Mirage Studios do but Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird are the Original Owners; I'm just borrowing their awesome characters to play with and messing with Canon. Nor do I own Timothy "Speed" Speedle or any other "CSI: Miami" characters mentioned within; they belong to the owners of that wonderful world. I do own, however, Kathy Jones; so, I'd appreciate it if no one used her without permission. Thanks.
Disclaimer(2): I do not own the song "All I Want Is You This Christmas"; N'Sync does.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: All I Want Is You This Christmas
Snowy night
Where it's warm here by the fire
Here with you (here with you)
I have all that I desire
It's been a long year
But somehow we got by
Now it's Christmas Eve
And love is on our side
A familiar purple bandanad Turtle was sitting at the windowsill of the small living room of the cottage his girlfriend's older cousin and Guardian had inherited, watching as the snow slowly fell to join its brethren on the ground. He looked up as his keen hearing heard the telltale footsteps of his girlfriend, Katherine Jones, and watched with adoring eyes as she entered the living room with two mugs of steaming hot chocolate, which was her beverage of choice.
"Donnie, come warm up by the fire; the last thing you need is to catch a cold the night before Christmas Eve!" Kathy, as Katherine preferred to be called, smiled bemusedly at her boyfriend of two months, Donatello, as she set the two mugs on the small table she had set up near the fire.
"I have yet to get sick, Kathy," Donnie, as he was called by family and friends, chuckled at her.
"Fine, then; I'm cold, so come warm me up, Handsome," she tried, and succeeded, this time as she sat down on one of the large pillows she'd set up by the fireplace earlier that night.
Donnie had yet to find a way to resist her pleading hazel gaze, and she knew it. "Come here, Beautiful," on his way over, he picked up a thick blanket that April O'Neil had thoughtfully slung over the back of the couch; sitting down on a pillow near her, he wrapped the blanket around himself before opening his arms to her, inviting her into the warmth of his embrace and the blanket.
Without another word, Kathy literally dived into the warmth of his arms, causing him to laugh. She playfully hit his arm before she snuggled down so much into his embrace that most of what you could see of her was her long chestnut brown hair which she'd chosen to wear in a French Braid that night. "Hush it, Handsome," she demanded playfully, "It's freezing here, compared to Miami in Christmas!"
His laughing stopped slowly and his dark chocolate orbs softened, "I'm so glad you decided to stay and spend Christmas here in New York, Kath."
"Me, too, Don," she smiled warmly, poking her head up enough to give his lips a quick, chaste kiss. "While spending Christmas with Tim is always fun, I've spent most of my Christmases with him; and there was no way I was going to give up my First Christmas with you, or with the others," she said honestly, laying her head back down on his plastron even as his arms tightened a fraction around her.
"It's going to be a smaller Christmas than what you're used to, though…" Donnie didn't know why he was protesting, but he just felt that she should be getting large, elaborate, and otherwise expensive gifts from a boyfriend that could afford it.
As though sensing what was on his mind, Kathy's smooth hand found his own calloused hand and held it, "Donnie, we've been through this; I don't care about any presents, all I care about right here, right now, right this moment… is being with you."
I don't need a hundred gifts
Beneath the tree (the tree)
Don't you know the best thing
You could give to me?
Nothing else will do
All I want is you this Christmas
(This Christmas, this Christmas)
At the end of her passionate declaration, she lightly kissed the knuckles of the hand she held in her own. "I know I'm not the smartest, the prettiest, or even the bravest girl around, but… what ever I am… I'm Yours, Handsome." She looked up at him with sincere hazel eyes and he accepts her words for what they were: a promise of her devotion to him, despite their differing personalities and species.
They sat quietly, just staring into the mesmerizing flames of the fireplace, for who knows how long. "Kathy?"
"Mmm?" She hummed to let him know she was listening.
"What were your Christmases like as a kid?"
"Busy," Kathy gave a sad laugh. "My mom and dad always had parties to celebrate, and during the ones I wasn't allowed to attend I always went to visit the kids at the Orphanage, who had nowhere to stay over Christmas… We usually sang a lot of the time. I know I'm not the best judge of singing talent, but those kids always sang from their Hearts. When we weren't singing, we were in the Kitchen baking sugar cookies."
Children sing (children sing)
Christmas carols
At our door (yeah, yeah, yeah)
Spreading joy (spreading joy)
That's what Christmas time is for
Though we don't have much
You've got me and I've got you
(Yeah, yeah, yeah)
And with a little faith
Miracles come true
He smiled in understanding, "Mikey's the same way; ever since we were sixteen, he's been dragging us to the Orphanage every Christmas Eve."
Her hazel eyes lit up, "Are we going tomorrow?"
"If you want to; Mikey's been asking to go, but none of us were sure, except Casey who said you'd love it, whether you'd want to or not."
"I do; can we go, Donnie? Please?" She pouted, knowing none of the Hamatos, with the exception of Splinter, had any form of defence against it.
"Since you really want to… sure," Donnie made a choking sound when she "squee"d quietly, still keeping in mind that people were asleep, and "glomp"ed him around the neck.
"Thank you, Handsome; you have no idea how much this means to me," Kathy whispered into his neck; he could feel the wetness on his skin that signalled her tears.
"A little bit of normalcy in your upside-down world, huh, Kitten?" The two teens turned around, spotting Kathy's cousin and Guardian; Casey Jones was the only one who she allowed to call her that particular nickname.
"Basically; you remember what it was like at Christmas, Casey," she replied, surreptiously wiping her tears away.
"Speaking of Christmas, Speed called and asked that you come spend New Years with him, since you're spending Christmas with me," her cousin mentioned her other cousin casually. "Do you think you'd be up to that?"
She looked thoughtful for a moment, before nodding bravely; Donnie couldn't help but admire that even though he saw the fear in her eyes, fear of returning back to where she'd experienced her parents death and the Trial of their murderer and her attempted murderer, she was swallowing her fear just to make someone else happy. She's one of a kind, as Mikey would say, Donnie thought to himself.
And I don't need a hundred gifts
Beneath the tree (the tree)
Don't you know the best thing
You could give to me?
Nothing else will do
All I want is you this Christmas
(This Christmas, this Christmas)
"Do you think he'd agree to a few friends coming up with us?"
Casey understood who she meant immediately, "You want to bring the Guys?"
"Yeah; I think Calleigh, Eric, and the others would love to meet them," Kathy beamed.
"I'm not sure having Calleigh and April in the same room, or even the same State, is a very good idea, Kitten," her cousin became a little nervous.
"Who's Calleigh?" Donnie queried, feeling left out, but amused at how his girlfriend suddenly "owned" the conversation.
"She's the Ballistics Expert at the Miami-Dade Precinct," Kathy explained eagerly. "She's affectionately called "Bullet Girl"."
"She's scarier than April when she's mad and almost as smart as you, Don," Casey admitted.
"Sounds interesting; I'd like to meet her," he smiled down at Kathy who practically lit up at his words.
"It's decided," she proclaimed, much to their amusement; at the same time, they were both concerned, because they heard the underlying sadness and fear in her voice at going back to where her world had turned upside down. "So, what exactly were you waiting for, Casey? Me and Donnie to get hot and steamy?" She grinned, feeling she was back in safe territory, when he grew red in embarrassment before he took a light-hearted swipe at her head which she avoided by toppling Donnie over onto his shell with a playful kiss.
"Get a room, Kitten," Casey grunted, giving the two a disgusted face before he turned around and went to get a beer from the kitchen; when they heard him walk up the stairs, the two teens laughed quietly.
"Are you sure you want us to come up to Miami with you for New Years, Kathy?" Donnie sounded uncertain even to his own ears.
"Yeah; there's no one else I'd rather ring in the New Year with than my boyfriend, his brothers, and my family," Kathy responded firmly.
He heard the unsaid "but" and prodded, "But?"
"But there'll be a lot of… distractions," she half-admitted, turning her eyes away from his.
It all clicked in his analytical mind, "Oh, Beautiful, the only girl I could ever look at and have steal my Heart with a single smile… is you." He lightly brushed aside some of her hair, which had come out of the braid and fell on her face. When she looked at him, surprised at his words, he dropped a bombshell, "Katherine Caprice Jones, I love you."
I don't want the love of any other girl
I want only one thing in this whole wide world
Nothing else will do
All I want is you this Christmas
(This Christmas, this Christmas)
She fell silent, searching his dark chocolate orbs with her own hazel and smiled at what she saw, "I love you, too, Donatello Hamato. None of my boyfriends shine even a smidgen close to you… and I think I know why."
"Why?" He smiled, holding her gaze as the ignored fire began to slowly smoulder, dimming the lights.
"Because, you're different than all of them," she answered, resting her cheek against his tenderly.
"We've been through this, Kathy; I'm a giant Mutant Turtle," he sighed as he turned his face away from hers with a slight frown, a little hurt by what he saw as her pointing out his greatest flaw.
"That's not what I meant and you know it, Donatello," she retorted, bringing his gaze back to her. "This?" She kissed his cheeks, beak, and hands, her own hands lightly caressing his shell and plastron underneath the blanket they were still wrapped in, even laying on the floor as they were. "It doesn't matter to me. It just makes you even more special in my eyes." She smiled adoringly, "It's what's in your Heart that I'm talking about." She laid a hand on his plastron, where his heart beat rhythymitically, closing her eyes as she listened to it, "I've never met anyone who's been through so much struggle, hurt, or horror, and yet still manages to come out of it all caring so much… someone who allowed a hurt orphan into his Heart and protected her so much, he even tried to protect her from himself." They both recalled the week before their first kiss under the stars, when he went out of his way to avoid her and, when he couldn't, answered her in monosyllables.
Cheek to cheek, the lights are low
A kiss beneath the mistletoe
Your face lit by the fire's glow
That's all I want tonight
During her impassioned speech, Donnie silently admired the way the fire lit her face and played with the natural light in her eyes, which glowed ever brighter as she continued, "Don, it's just," she paused, seeming to struggle for words; he noticed with a hint of amusement that, as she was searching for the right words, she was playing with his stubby fingers. "You feel… right, is the only word that comes to mind. You're strong, you're smart, you always put others before yourself, and you always give everything your all, trying over and over until you get it right. You're more human than most guys I've known. Definitely more human than Casey," they shared a smile at their inside joke and she kissed the tip of his beak again. "Even if I don't get anything else this Christmas, right now, this moment is all I could ever want for Christmas… a boyfriend who's handsome inside and out, who loves me for me, and who isn't afraid to tell me when I'm being stupid, or cranky. Someone who accepts me for me."
And I don't need a hundred gifts beneath the tree
Don't you know the best thing you can give to me?
Nothing else will do
All I want is you this Christmas
"Kath, you may be cranky at times, or stupid, or silly, or Mikey-ish… but you're everything I thought I would never get," Donnie's eyes seemed to gaze not at her anymore, but she felt that he was looking into the past. "It's true that we have a number of friends, including female mutants or human girls, but none of us thought that we'd ever be able to find someone who could love any of us for us… you love all of us, not just one; but you love each of us in a different way."
A small grin appeared on her lips, "Even Leo? Because I guarantee that everyone will argue with you on that one."
He gave her a patient, knowing look, "Even Leo. You love my brothers like they were your brothers, Splinter like a father, and you love me-"
"-in no explainable way?" She teased as he sat up a bit, scooting back into the couch with her still seated in his lap.
Donnie nodded, agreeing, "Exactly."
The young couple shared a few quiet moments, before Kathy leaned her head back on his plastron and looked up; with no warning, her cheeks darkened into a light red. When he looked down at her, having been staring ahead of himself, into the dying fire, he became concerned. "Are you getting sick, Kathy?"
She shook her head negatively before she whispered mischievously. "Look up, Handsome."
When he did so, he, too, blushed; suspended on a string from a stick that was poking over the railing above them was a sprig of mistletoe. He was certain that it was one of his brothers, as was she. She smiled when he cleared his throat awkwardly, "Am I correct in assuming that we have to kiss if mistletoe is suspended over us?"
"That would be tradition, yes," she whispered, already leaning up; their lips met tenderly as the clock struck midnight.
The clock chimes rung through the house, cheerfully announcing the arrival of Christmas Eve Morning, and a lone figure quietly pulled the mistletoe back over the railing, a fond sparkle in his unusually soft blue eyes, "Merry Christmas Eve, Kitten…"
Nothing else will do
All I want is you this Christmas
Yeah, yeah
… End?
Authoress' Notes: It's your choice; should I continue from here, focusing on a different person each "Time" or should I just let it lay where it is?
Please Read and Review; the more reviews an Author/ess receives on a story, the more and quicker s/he is spurred to write. I accept all reviews: Comment, Compliment, and Criticism (preferably Constructive Criticism); I accept Flames, but nothing with swearing in it, since the Default Profanity Filter is on my reviews.
Happy Holidays!
Cowabunga,
Laura a.k.a. uncutetomboy
PS - Anyone who correctly guesses who the person at the end is who had the mistletoe gets to choose a storyline that they would like to see in "The Kathy Chronicles" and that fic will be dedicated to them, as well. So, everyone, R&R!