I don't write enough Lyra/Kris. Most of it is fills for the kink meme, and I don't post all of those, and I love this pairing and have so many, many imaginings of it I love and want to write for... This oneshot is the beginning of me remedying that!

Written 12/24 and 12/25, Christmas Eve and Day, 2011~

The star atop the tree blinked benignly down on a room that was finally in order. "That's the last of them," Lyra sighed, sitting heavily on the couch beside Kris.

They sat and admired their handiwork for a minute. Two piles of neatly wrapped boxes sat beneath the evergreen, whose lights twinkled from among its branches and cast multicolored dots of illumination onto the shiny bows and ribbons that topped the gifts. The fireplace was low and flickering, so they held each other for warmth instead. "It looks beautiful," said Kris, her hand absently stroking Lyra's hair.

The younger woman pouted slightly. "You can tell which ones I wrapped..."

"Oh, ssh," hushed Kris with a smile. "They won't notice when they're tearing them apart."

"I never should have offered to help," Lyra groaned in disregard of Kris's all-too-true statement. She poked Kris. "You could have prevented this!"

"I think they're lovely," Kris reiterated. "And the tree looks amazing, as always."

Lyra sighed again. "Thanks." She offered the yet-unfinished plate of cookies. "Chocolate chip?"

"Santa's had enough," Kris replied, shaking her head. "I'd really better not..."

"Come on." Lyra resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "If you can eat three courses of pasta and dessert at your mom's this evening, you can eat a cookie."

"Don' t remind me..." She shifted uncomfortably. "I'm going to gain ten pounds."

"Kris," said Lyra, looking her straight in the eyes, "forget the tree: You look amazing. You always looks amazing, because you are the prettiest, most beautiful, most perfect woman in the world." Chocolate brown and watercolor blue. "Understand?"

Kris mumbled something indistinct, and the brunette went on. "What do I always say?"

"'You're the best,'" said Kris quietly, "'and I'm the luckiest.'"

"I am the luckiest," said Lyra. "The luckiest girl alive. I don't need anything for Christmas...because I've already got you."

She held up the plate again. "Now eat the damn cookie."

"I don't know," said Kris, a little sheepish but still teasing. "I think I get more compliments when you're mad... Maybe I'll leave it for a while."

Lyra's eyebrows shot up. "Well, then I'll eat it." She held half the cookie in her mouth and leaned forward. "Ffure you don't want a bite?" she said around the treat.

Kris slowly withdrew the cookie and put it back on the plate. Before Lyra could complain, she closed the gap between them and gave her a kiss sweeter than the sugar she tasted on Lyra's lips. Lyra responded eagerly, melting into her favorite space—her body flush against Kris's—and bringing her hands to the back of the blue-haired woman's head.

The firelight danced over them over them, fit so perfectly into one another, as they let their lips separate. "I'd rather eat you," Kris whispered into Lyra's ear, and her wife had to stifle a laugh.

"Mmm," murmured contentedly, setting against Kris. "You know I'd do anything for you, Kris."

Kris pecked the top of her head. "Yes."

"Anything," repeated Lyra, a little sleepily. Her eyelids fluttered shut for a moment, but she opened them and looked at the clock a second later. "Can we open out presents now? Before the rush?"

"All right." Kris got up to search among the piles while Lyra reached beneath the couch and pulled out a small box. On her way back over, Kris paused at the window and pulled back the curtains, and they both looked out.

A landscape of colorless beauty greeted their eyes. Snow lay over everything in a blanket of white—the only blanket that doesn't give warmth. More flakes, real, fat Christmas flakes floated slowly through the frosty air down without wind to settle on streets, sidewalks, lawns, roofs, cars, and the whole world. It was unbelievably perfect, Hollywood-effect snow, exactly the right accent to the holiday morning. Hints of sun had already lightened the deep black night to navy to blue to a fringe of near white on the horizon. Dawn was arriving bright on a wonderful white Christmas Day.

"Merry Christmas!" said Kris, sitting on her legs on the couch.

"Merry Christmas," said Lyra, and she gave Kris's hand a squeeze. "Me first?"

"You first," agreed Kris, handling her the package. Lyra opened the card first, a simple snowflake design on its front with the words, "Season's best to the wife who..." Inside, it read:

has the smile that makes my days bright
and the arms that make it all alright

who each morning gets me up to jump
else I'd lie there forever like a lump

who does everything I'm too lazy or inept to
who records all the things I've slept through

who is truly special and I love so much every day
I mean it deeply when here I say

Merry Christmas!

Around the last two words Kris had written, "To Lyra, who I love enough to give these terrible rhymes, who I would marry again ten hundred times,

Happy Anniversary!

Love always,
Kris."

The card was tastefully illustrated with a pair of fuzzy baby seals who were cuddling, pushing each our of bed, and so on.

Lyra smiled warmly and hugged Kris—who looked a little embarrassed—before tearing the paper off her present and tossing it aside. Inside was a plain white box, and Lyra considered the making the trusty you-got-me-a-box-how-thoughtful-of-you-you-shouldn't-have joke briefly before opening it.

The box contained a large volume of packaging paper, and, nestled within it, several figures of smooth stone. They were all different, each a Pokémon—Marill, Totodile, Feraligatr, Mareep, and a beautiful Lugia with crystal eyes.

"Wow!" exclaimed Lyra. "These are—wow! From the trip? You bought them?"

Kris smiled. "You said you really liked them."

"I do!" Lyra looked happily at her. "Thank you so much!"

"You're welcome, but I think there's one left," said Kris, peering into the box.

Lyra dug around in the paper and found the last statuette:a Wobbuffet, its etched face screwed up in a perpetual look of consternation. She started laughing the moment she saw it, and she couldn't stop for half a minute.

"Y-yours," she managed, still grinning hugely. "Go on; open it."

Kris carefully unwrapped the gift, folding the paper back and leaving it practically intact. The small box inside was next to be opened, but Lyra halted her. "Wait," she said. "I forgot the card." She reached under the couch again, pulled out an envelope, and handed it to Kris.

Opening it, Kris read the handwritten message. To Kris, my love,

You are everything to me. I try to tell you how much you mean to me, but I can never tell you enough. I owe you so much, and I will love you forever with all m y heart and soul. You deserve this, because you are worth anything and everything. Please take this as just a small piece of the life and love I owe you.

I will never forget what you did for me.

Merry Christmas and Happy Anniversary

Lyra

Kris looked at Lyra to thank her, but Lyra only nodded to indicate the box. The older woman opened it, and she gasped upon seeing what was inside.

It was a necklace in a velvet case, linked gold bands which made it elegantly, pretty despite its basic simplicity. The moderately high-end jewelry was stunning, but Kris only had eyes for the centerpiece: an irregularly shaped, very small piece of silvery-whitish, almost iridescent rock.

"It's a little silly looking," said Lyra, blushing despite her best efforts not to. "You don't have to wear it." Her eyes roamed around the room to settle decidedly elsewhere.

Kris didn't know what to say, but the furthest thought from her mind was definitely that it looked silly.

Fifteen years ago, they sat together beneath a starry sky, on the glider swing outside Kris's house. They were still girls then, heads filled with dreams of the Pokémon League, fame, fortune, adventures.

When Lyra cried, "Look, look!" and pointed and for a split second they saw a brilliant streak of light hurtle down from the starfield above and land, incredibly, somewhere nearby, they were both instantly thinking about making a wish. They found it resting in a slight crater not far from where they'd sat. The stone was cherry-red but cooling fast, and they could see its shiny, bright silver hue even in the moonlight.

"Can we touch it?" asked Lyra, her voice hushed.

"I don't know," Kris whispered back. "I'm kind of scared to."

Lyra giggled. "We still get to make a wish, right?"

"Of course!" said Kris. "It only makes sense."

They both closed their eyes and wished with all their wills. And neither thought of the Championship, or adventures, or anything of the sort. They wished:

I want to marry Kris, and be together with her forever and ever!

I wish that one day Lyra and I will get married, and I want her to be safe and happy always.

"You kept a piece of it?" Kris was looking at her in wonder. "All these years?"

"I just found it," Lyra said quietly. "I was going to give it to you earlier, I think, but..." She was still flushed. "The necklace, I don't know... It just seemed—"

Kris touched her index finger to Lyra's lips. "It's perfect. I'll always treasure this." She smiled. "I have a lot to thank this star for.

"So do I," murmured Lyra. "But I have you to thank for more."

They shared one more kiss before the sound of pounding feet rang out as a warning that Christmas Day was about to really get started. Two voices accompanied the cacophony, excited and loud.

"Santa came, Santa came!"

"I wan' open my presents first!"

"You open your presents, I open mine at the same time!"

"Can I open mine first though? I wan'—"

Into the room burst the two girls, already shoving and pulling to be the first into the piles of presents whose wrappings were not long for this world. The noise level only increased.

"—open mine first!"

"Ally, your presents can get opened at the same time!"

"I want first!"

"Grace, just tell your sister she can open hers first..."

"Girls, no pushing! Hey!"

"I got more presents than you!"

"You did not, look—"

And the packages were indeed torn into; it was clear which parent the siblings got their gift-opening method from. It was Kris's turn to sigh as she returned to the couch after her partially successful attempt to stop the girls' roughhousing, and she took Lyra's hand as they watched the spectacle unfold. "I love you."

Lyra blinked in surprise, but the children were bust enough not to groan at the mushy stuff, so she gave Kris another kiss. "And I love you."

Kris began munching on the cookie, despite her wife's vaguely horrified but-that's-got-my-spit-on-it expression, then snuggled up against Lyra. They had about twenty seconds of peacefully lying against one another before: "Allison, that is not for hitting your sister..."

Lyra referencing what she owes Kris is related to a headcanon I've yet to write, but I will someday.

Merry Christmas!