Pairing: #2 - Jaime/Cassie
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 900+
Prompt: hot soup, roaring fire, and lots of cuddling on a cold Christmas Eve
For: Opaul

... ...

When Cassie puts her face in her hands and mumbles, "I'm really sorry about this," all miserably, as if the zeta tubes shutting down had been her fault rather than the blizzard going on outside, he just smiles at her. Honestly, she looks kind of adorable when she's like this.

"I'm pretty sure you didn't have anything to do with this."

"But today's Christmas Eve," she reminds. "You should be with your family, not stuck here in the Cave with me."

He frowns. "Hey, don't talk like that," he says, and he knows she can tell he's being serious because she peeks at him over her fingers. "I wanted to be here, remember? So you wouldn't have to spend Christmas Eve alone. And now you won't. I'll just try to get a call out to my mom and let her know that I won't be home until later."

She presses her lips together. "Are you sure?"

"I'm starting to think that you just don't want to hang out with me."

He's teasing, of course, but her eyes widen a little as she quickly says, "Of course I like hanging out with you! I just feel bad because you only stayed because of me and now—"

"Now we get to spend more time together," he interrupts with a laugh. She's actually pouting a bit right now because he's obviously finding this amusing while she feels terrible, but it's not his fault that she's being a little ridiculous. "You're not the worst company in the world, you know."

She actually laughs, and he grins at the familiar sound. As adorable as she is when she's pouting or worried, he always likes her best when she's happy.

"Thanks, Jaime," she tells him.

He shrugs his shoulders. "It's not a big deal."

"It is to me," she insists.

He kind of expects her to say more, but she doesn't, and he has no idea why he feels himself blushing as he looks back at her. She's smiling at him from underneath her long lashes, but it's not a smile he's really seen on her before. It seems softer, maybe even vulnerable, and somehow he just knows it's a part of her that she doesn't just hand out to anybody.

"I'm going to, uh, try and call my house," he says lamely, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Okay," she says, back to her usual cheerful tone, and gets up from the couch. "I'm going to see if there's something in the kitchen to keep us warm."

She smiles at him again before heading for the kitchen, and finds himself staring a bit longer than necessary as she walks away, making him blush even more and disappear into the hallway before she can turn around and notice.

His signal is surprisingly fine considering the horrible weather outside, and he doesn't even have to make up a story to tell his mom. Apparently it's snowing hard in his neighborhood, too, and so she tells him to stay put (she thinks he's at a friend's house) until she calls him when the news gives the all-clear. Hopefully the zeta tubes will be back on by then.

His mother sounds kind of sad when she tells him to stay safe and to have a Happy Christmas Eve, and he says, "I will. Love you," because it does kind of suck that he's not with his family tonight, even though he can't do much about it.

When he walks back into the kitchen, he sees Cassie standing at the stove, stirring something in a pot with a wooden spoon. She looks over her shoulder at him and smiles when she hears him come in, and there's a fleeting second where he thinks that she'll definitely be an amazing wife to come home to someday.

(He blushes at that and hopes she doesn't notice, or at least won't point it out.)

"I'm reheating some of the chicken noodle soup that M'gann made before she and Gar left with J'onn," she tells him. "Should we use mugs or bowls?"

He thinks about it for a moment before replying, "Mugs. That way it'll be easier to eat them on the couch." He grins and adds, "Because I was thinking that we could have a Transformers movie marathon since Bart has them all queued up on Netflix."

She flashes a smile. "I like the way you think."

He laughs.

And a few minutes later, he's moved the coffee table aside and pulled the couch closer so that they're in the warmth of the fire he started in the fireplace. He walks down the hallway and pulls out one of the blankets from the dryer in the laundry room, and when he plops himself onto the couch, Cassie walks into the living room with two mugs in hand.

He's about to make room for her, because he sort of sat in the middle of the couch, but she doesn't seem to think twice about it before sitting herself right next to him. She hands him one of the mugs and then uses her free hand to pull the blanket over the both of them, and when he starts the movie, she blinks as if just realizing something.

"Sorry," she says, beginning to pull the blanket off. "I could get mine—"

"I don't mind," he tells her, and she brings the blanket back over herself and gives him that same smile from before. He's decided that it's his favorite smile.

And sometime during the second movie, after they've both finished their refills of chicken noodle soup and set their mugs aside on the coffee table, Cassie curls up against his side and leans her head on his shoulder, making herself comfortable and pulling the blanket over their shoulders.

He doesn't mind this, either.