Someone always had to work on Christmas. Almost no one really wanted to be on the duty rota for that day, nor the day before or after, but crime never took a holiday, no matter what that film said. It was different for Robbie, though. He not only didn't mind being on duty, he usually volunteered to work that day. With Val gone and the kids flown, it just wasn't the same. Oh, Lyn'd be happy to see him, of course, but she'd made a tradition of spending the holidays with her partner's family while Robbie'd been on assignment. He'd gone up one year right after he got back, but it'd been awkward and uncomfortable adding him in, so he hadn't gone again. They all exchanged presents a few days early and then he stayed in Oxford and took at least one Christmas shift.
This one was Christmas Eve, and he settled into another hour of cold cases and radio carols, determined not to wallow in the grief and loneliness he always had to fight at this time of year. For one thing, if he sighed too much, Hathaway started to look far more concerned than was strictly required from a sergeant to his inspector.
Speaking of Hathaway, he glanced up from a years-old missing persons file to see the sergeant in question standing in front of him, seemingly waiting patiently for Robbie's attention. He hadn't even noticed Hathaway getting up from his desk. No, he definitely wasn't doing well at not wallowing this year.
"Can I help you, sergeant?" He tried for repressive but landed at weary, judging by Hathaway's brief, concerned glance.
"There's a carol service tonight, sir," Hathaway said. He didn't say anything else to explain that rather obvious statement, so Robbie gave his enigmatic sergeant an exasperated look.
"Yes, Hathaway, it's Christmas Eve. There are usually carol services tonight. Did you have a point?" The question was a bit sharper than he'd intended and he would have apologized with a look at the very least, but Hathaway glanced away too quickly.
"I'd like to go, sir. There's one just down the street. Starts in about fifteen minutes," Hathaway replied, looking straight ahead over Robbie's head while Robbie considered the odd request. It wasn't strictly within the rules for one of the on-call team to leave the station during a shift, but they hadn't had any calls today and if Hathaway really wanted to go, he might as well. Better than having him here being so ... polite. He was about to open his mouth to give permission when Hathaway added something.
"And I think you ought to go with me," he said, still staring straight at the wall, which meant he couldn't possibly see the astonished look Robbie gave him.
"Me? Attend a carol service?" he asked incredulously. "Have you been sampling the punch, Hathaway? I don't believe in that stuff and I can't sing. Why would I attend a carol service?"
"You don't have to be able to sing, sir," Hathaway pointed out. "Or haven't you heard some of the pop renditions this year?"
Trust him to make that kind of point so dryly, and Robbie almost smiled in spite of himself, not that Hathaway saw it since he was still finding the wall fascinating.
"We can't both leave the station," he pointed out next. Other than a few PCs, he and Hathaway were the CID at the moment and he didn't fancy explaining to Innocent that he'd failed to answer a call-out because he was off singing "Away in the Manger".
"We'll be less than two hundred meters away, sir, and we'll have our mobiles. We can forward our desk phones to them and sit at the back in case someone has an altercation over the pudding," Hathaway argued, and this time he did glance at Robbie almost hopefully before immediately looking at the wall again.
"I haven't got a clue how to forward my desk phone to my mobile," he argued, but it was a weak argument and he knew it. A carol service suddenly seemed a not bad idea, though he didn't know why, exactly.
Hathaway leaned down, pushed a few buttons on Robbie's phone, and then stood back up with a small smile on his face. "Sir."
"Alright, Sergeant, alright," he gave in, and stood up from his desk to get his coat. Hathaway turned to his own desk and pressed buttons on his phone, got his own coat, and followed a half-step behind Lewis. They nodded cordially to the desk sergeant, walked out into the cold mist that was Oxford at Christmas, then glanced at each other in simultaneous guilty glee. It felt like they were skiving off, which of course they were.
"D'ye think it's less awful to skive off to attend a carol service?" he asked Hathaway as they walked into the church, and his sergeant actually chuckled.
"I'm certain there's a dispensation for it, sir," he agreed, holding the door for an elderly woman and then catching up with Robbie as he stepped into the very last pew. The organist was already ending the prelude, and Robbie quickly looked down for a hymnal. Did they even use hymnals these days? This church did, apparently, but there weren't enough without some sharing. He glanced at Hathaway, who was holding a hymnal out with absolutely no expression.
The choir began to process in and they all stood to sing "Once in David's Royal City." He and Hathaway had a bit of a tussle over the height of the hymnal since Hathaway was so tall, but they settled it with each holding half while Hathaway loomed over and into Robbie's shoulder. Robbie didn't know any of the words anymore and he still felt a bit of a fraud, but Hathaway was singing with a skill and enthusiasm that somehow caught Robbie up in it despite himself.
Hathaway helped cue him to stand up and sit down as required by the service, which ended with a candlelit, acapella rendition of "Silent Night" that was so beautiful it made Robbie's throat a little tight. He cleared it and then glanced up at his sergeant as they made their way out of the church. He wasn't wallowing anymore, and he knew exactly who to credit for that.
"Not a bad Christmas shift, sergeant, would you say?" It was a thank you, though he wasn't any good at saying that in words. Fortunately, Hathaway knew that.
"No, sir. Not a bad shift at all," Hathaway agreed, smiling slightly, and they walked back into the station.