I don't own anything in here. (Not a surprise) Merry Christmas all.

Ghost of Christmas Past

By

Just Like Gill

Cal snores, pretending to be asleep. But his act stops when she starts planting kissing along his shoulder. "Good morning there, Love."

"Yes, it is. Merry Christmas." She scoots even closer and wraps her arms around him. "What are we doing today?"

He spins around to face her. "What do you want to do, darling?" Emily was in the next room, somehow not awake yet. He already dread knowing another Christmas dinner with Zoë and Roger was ahead. They didn't like Gillian. And everyone knew it. Gillian, being her sweet self, didn't make a big deal of it.

"I mean, what time are we waking Emily? I'm excited." She makes one of the most adorable faces he's ever seen her make. Her eyes are wide and almost baby blue. She's biting down on her bottom lip, trying to hide how excited she is. Her eyebrows are curved perfectly above her eyes.

He can't help the smile that crosses his face as he leans down and kisses her forehead. "Whenever you're ready to. You know I don't like keeping either of my girls waiting."

Her eyes light up and she hops up out of bed. She pulls on her Christmas pajamas with penguins on them-penguins with scarves (That's what she had insisted when she had him buy them for her.). "Come on." She smiles at him before pulling the door open and practically skipping down the hallway to Emily's room.

He laughs as he hears Gillian's confused noise slide out of her mouth. Why was she always so damn adorable? He pulls on the Christmas pajamas Gillian got him. Little snowmen, listening to Christmas music on their iPods. He already told her he wasn't wearing these more than once a year. Then he pulls on a white t-shirt and pads down the hallway.

"Emily?" Gillian pushes open her door. "Are you sick? It's Christmas morning! Why are you still asleep, silly?"

Emily rolls over as her dad caught up to them. "What time is it?"

"Like 6?" Gillian says, looking over her shoulder to Cal for approval.

"About then, yeah." He says, nodding and yawning in unison.

"And I'm still asleep?" Shock crosses Emily's face as she sits up.

"I know!" Gillian agrees and helps her out of bed quickly. Emily also adorned in her Christmas pajamas. Christmas colored plaid.

"Let's go!" Emily grabs Gillian's hand and starts to pull her down the stairs.

"Oi!" He grabs Gillian by the waist, causing both her and Emily to fly backwards. He grabs them both around the waist and pulls them up onto his shoulders, one on each side.

"Hunny!" Gillian squeals at the top of her lungs. "Put me down!" Her laughter drowns out her words as Emily also squeals and laughs. They both kick their legs, making it very hard for Cal to carry them properly.

"Calm down you two. Before I drop you. That wouldn't be good, now would it?" He laughs and Gillian grabs fistfuls of his shirt, clearly afraid of falling from his shoulder.

"I'm calm, dad. She's the one flipping out." Emily makes a face at her step mother behind her dad, then laughs when Gillian lets out a sigh and slightly releases the death grip she has on Cal's clothing.

Once downstairs he tosses Emily onto one of the couches and Gillian onto the other then walks over the tree and sits near the pile of presents.

"Come on you two! What's taking so long?" He starts putting the presents into piles as he ignores their protests. They get up and find the pile of presents with their name on it.

Before sitting next to her pile, Gillian walks over to the CD player and pushes play, hearing the Christmas CD that was in there start spinning. Gillian walks back to her presents and sits next to them. "Which one should I open first?"

Emily, being the sneaky daughter she is, tells Gillian to open a very specific gift. Gillian tears open a corner of the wrapping paper from the gift and reveals a picture frame. She makes face full of pure admiration when she sees the picture of their first Christmas together.

*flashback*

Cal Lightman liked Christmas, but only because he enjoyed how happy it made Gillian Foster. He watched her decorate the Christmas tree in the lobby. He watched as her office filled with a tiny Christmas tree and snowmen villages. He watched as her outfits turned into reds and snowflakes. She insisted on decorating his office, saying that their clients that come into his office would enjoy it.

"Really Cal, Christmas. It makes me happy. Especially giving a gift, and seeing the persons face light up. Best part." She tucked her legs under her, sitting on his couch.

"Yeah, I guess. Like when I give Emily those heartfelt gifts. The look on her face makes me happy I'm her dad." He shrugged it off like what he said meant nothing.

"Exactly. Which is why I start shopping for you in July. It takes a very long time to make sure I've got it right." She smiled up at him, her eyes squinting, creating wrinkles at the corners of her eyes.

"Yeah yeah. Good for me I'm a quick shopper. Still don't have yours." He stood up and walked from the chair behind his desk to sit next to her on the couch.

"Cal! There's only two weeks until Christmas! What are you thinking?" She meant to be reprimanding, but she was still smirking slightly.

"I always get you something perfect. Don't I?" He teased her. "No need to worry love. Besides, I think I've got something special this year planned for you." She just sat and smiled incredulously.

"I can't wait to see this one." She pat his leg and leaned in to kiss his cheek. "Night Cal. I'll see you tomorrow." She swung her legs onto the floor and wriggled her feet into her shoes. She stood up and waved once as she walked out the door. Cal waited a few moments before dialing Emily as he walked out, turning the lights to his office off.

"Hey, Em. Need your help with something. It's Foster-related. I need you at home for this one. Beans on toast." He hung up and slid his phone into the pocket of his pants.

He pulled up to the house, finding the downstairs lights on. He approached the house and heard Christmas music blaring from the stereo. Emily had been hanging around Gillian too much. He walked in and saw Emily decorating and simultaneously making dinner.

"Well, I didn't want beans on toast again." She countered, shifting around the pan on the stove.

"Why are you decorating?" He pointed to the green trees hanging from his living room ceiling.

"Because Gillian said I should. Said it's therapy." She shrugged her shoulder and fluffed some cotton snow as she walked past it on a shelf. "You said you needed to talk to me. About Gillian?" He nodded, not expecting her to approach the subject so soon. "I've got plans after dinner. So, let's talk now. Don't put it off." She avoided his glare and moved the pan around again.

"Alright." He slung his coat toward the front hallway and sat on the stool near Emily. "I've been thinking about what I'm waiting for."

"You mean to do something about how you feel about Gillian?" Emily turned from the stove and leaned against the counter in a very Zoë-like manor. He nodded and shuffled in his seat, never able to keep still.

"I was thinking that for Christmas I should do something to you know, get a date, or something." He motioned his hands around.

"Wow, dad. You really suck at this. Good thing you asked for my help." She pulled the pan off of the burner. Cal got up, moving around the kitchen for plates and utensils.

"What can you do to help?" He asked, sitting down at the table.

"Well, it depends on how you want to do it. Do you just want to ask her out for now, tell her you have feelings for her, or both?" She listed off as she sat down at the table with the pan of food.

"And what do you recommend?" He waved his hands around before scooping some of Emily's cooking onto a plate.

"As weird as it is to come from me," She started, scooping some onto her own plate, "I think you should just be honest. I mean, it's kind of obvious how much you two already love each other, but you should take it slow, so you don't screw it up."

"So just be honest?" He scrunched up his face, pretending to be revolted at the idea of showing emotions.

"Dad, honestly. If you keep doing stupid stuff like this, you'll only ever have Gillian as a friend." Emily shook her head sadly and began to pick up forkfuls of food.

"Don't say that Em. I'm trying, it's just hard." He pouted in a very un-Cal like manner and shoved at his food without interest.

"What makes it so hard?" Emily kept eating, without her eyes leaving her father for a moment.

"If Gill and I go forward with this, and it goes south…I might leave without my best friend. I can't lose her Em." He looked up at the end of the comment so she could see how serious he was about what he had just said.

"I can't see that happening. She's always come back anytime you've done something stupid. Waiting any longer for her would be something extremely stupid." She reached for the salt shaker to distract herself from the look on Cal's face. She'd never seen him so worked up about anything, but that's how it was when it came to Gillian. Emily knew her father's importance scale by heart-anything about Gillian or herself was at the top, followed by work, anything else could 'bugger off'.

"Em, you promised you'd help. I'm really open to anything at this point. I don't want to wait another day and have her gaga over someone else cause I didn't take the chance when I had it." Emily thought for a moment before sketching out a precise plan of attack for Cal's Christmas gift to Gillian.

Gillian had decided to hire a professional photographer for the Christmas party this year. The photographer, Lars, was a very artsy type with a specific interest in taking pictures of Gillian. He kept telling her she had such a natural beauty that it made every picture perfect. She smiled politely and glued herself to either Cal or Emily's side all night long, just to avoid being alone with Lars. Gillian posed beside Cal in front of the towering tree, they were leaning in toward each other with bright smiles on their faces. After the photographer took his time with multiple pictures of them, Cal leaned in toward Gillian.

"My office? Seven thirty?" He squeezed her hand.

"Wouldn't miss it." She smiled over at him. "You excited about your gift?"

"Aren't I always?" He leaned toward her for a friendly hug, wincing lightly at the sound of Lars approval as he snapped more pictures.

Cal kept checking Emily and his watch for the time. He was both anxious and excited to give Gillian her gift. Slowly but eventually seven thirty rolled around.

When Cal walked into his office Gillian was already seated on the couch, fiddling with the blue bow on his gift. "Hey Cal." She said excitedly. Her excitement slowly turned into confusion when she saw he didn't have present in his hands. "Where's my gift?" She pouted adorably.

"On it's way." He sat next to her and leaned in to kiss her cheek. "Let's start with mine then?" He grabbed the blue wrapped box from her lap and ripped at the paper, ignoring her complaints at how insensitively he's opening it. She smiled excitedly as he pulled back the paper and revealed a sentimental yet mildly hilarious gift. Something that would only be understood or shared between the two of them. A bottle of the first drink they shared at the beginning of their professional relationship. They toasted to the opening of The Lightman Group with this a drink identical to this one. Behind the bottle were a set of two glasses, identical to the ones they drank from that day.

"How'd you find these?" He held up the glass set in one hand and the bottle in the other, facing them toward her as if to remind her what they looked like.

"It took a lot of time to hunt them down. They don't make glasses like that anymore." She smiled to her hands, too embarrassed by his gratitude to look up.

"Thank you Gill. I mean that." He set them on the couch next to him and put his arms around her shoulders in a hug.

"So, mine?" She smiled, finally able to look up at him.

"Patience, darlin." He glanced out the doorway, hoping Emily would approach with photo album in hand. He looked up at the clock, she was late, by a whole three minutes. Looks like he was going to have to wing it. "Alright, well I was gonna have Emily bring in a photo album of all the special times that the two of us," he gestured a hand between himself and Gillian, "have shared. And then I was gonna pull you over in a hug like this." She giggled as he pulled her against him in a hug. "And then, when you sat back up, I was going to look in your eyes and make the biggest mistake of my life by continuing to lie to both of us." The giggles and smiles disappeared from her face when she realized where this was going. Her breaths became deeper as she tried to control them and her palms began lightly sweating. "You're my best mate Gill. No one else, will ever come close." She smiled lightly and played with the hem of her skirt as he continued. "And I never wanna lose you." He took a breath and a horribly timed swig of beer, leaving her in suspense as he gathered his thoughts. "But there's something more there, I think you feel it too. That emotional level I've got with you that I don't have with anyone else."

"Like we can read each other's minds?" She said, swallowing her nervousness for a second.

"Yeah, something like that." He took a breath to talk again but saw the look on her face. The light blush and her pursed lips, silently begging him to stop. He stopped dead in his tracks, better to stop where he was than have his heart ripped out when she flat out denied him.

"Cal, you know…actions speak louder than words." Before he took too much time to think about it, he leaned over and captured her lips with his own. Surprisingly when her hands grabbed onto his shirt she pulled toward her instead of pushing away. He'd read her wrong, she was the one he always found it impossible to read.

Once their first kiss was over they sat, unable to move. Foreheads pressed against each other, hands and arms still interlocked. Finally they looked up at the same time, their eyes meeting, without anything else moving. Emily walked in, camera in hand and quickly snapped a couple frames. Gillian jumped at the shutter sound but didn't move away from Cal.

Emily had quickly told Eli and Ria, and decided to camp out with the two of them, waiting for what seemed like hours until Cal and Gillian finally walked back out to the party.

Gillian and Cal knew that news traveled fast, especially in a government city, but they didn't expect that only minutes after their first kiss the entire party would have switched themes to congratulations. They only looked at each other and let out a slight smile, as they grew closer to each other they heard the shutter of cameras going off from every direction. As they kissed, they only cared about one thing and that was them. Although they faintly heard Emily in the background exclaiming that she had the best picture of the night.

*present*

Gillian tries not to cry as she remembers that night. She looks up at Emily and Cal who are lovingly bickering, unaware of Gillian's trip down memory lane. The picture gets placed directly next to her for the time being, but she has the feeling that she'll want one in every room. With one more glance at the picture she stands up and slides it onto a special shelf, the same shelf with the bottle and glasses she had given him that same Christmas. Whoever said Cal was a humbug, didn't know him very well at all.