The Christmas Letter
Summary: Pre Hale fire: Sixteen-year-olds weren't supposed to believe in Santa Claus, Sydney knew that, but it didn't stop her from asking Father Christmas for just one important thing: to take the pain away, the pain caused by the loss of her parents. After being away from Beacon Hills the last few year, and living with her grandparents in Colorado, she was looking forward to spending the holidays with her best friend Derek Hale and his family. She should've known it never would've been that easy…
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters of Teen Wolf, Sydney however is all mine.
Chapter 7:
While the wrapping of the frame hadn't turned out quite as nicely as he would've liked, it was decent enough to be put under the tree, as well as the small letter that he had written out for Sydney herself. His plan for the letter was to tuck it into the branches of the tree with the hopes that no one would notice it and then when he had a few minutes alone with Sydney, he'd give it to her, then, sometime between Christmas morning and Christmas dinner, he'd give her back the letter that he had stolen from her the day that she had arrived at their house.
It wasn't an ideal plan but he figured if he didn't put it in the tree that night, Christmas Eve, while everyone was sleeping, that he'd just chicken out and never give her the letter that he had taken so much time and thought to write. It was the perfect response to her 'Dear Santa' letter and while he did sort of pretend that he was Santa Claus himself, he knew that Sydney would know right away that it was simply Peter masquerading as the jolly old man.
It didn't matter to him, what he had written was good enough for her no matter who the letter said it was from and suddenly Peter was excited by the thought of making her Christmas just that little bit more enjoyable.
She had lost her parents years ago, she was clearly still haunted by this fact and while there wasn't anything he could do to make things okay, he knew that he could at least try to give her a Christmas that she could look back on and smile. While he was at the mall, he had picked out a gift for her, but he hadn't managed to gain enough courage to purchase it.
He left the small, wooden chess set back in the store for someone else to buy and enjoy but he had made a vow that if Sydney ever spent another Christmas with the Hales again, he'd definitely get her something and something good. She deserved it, she deserved to be happy, and he just hoped that his little letter and the replacement frame for Derek's picture would put a smile on her face.
Presently everyone in the house was tucked away in their beds, perfect, that was exactly what Peter wanted while he stealthily snuck down the stairs with Sydney's gifts to his family in tow. He wanted to place them all under the tree so that she didn't know until the morning, he wanted it to be a surprise, he wanted her to know that the magic of Christmas was still very much present.
Tiptoeing down the stairs with a gift bag full of the little gifts she had brought, all of them wrapped as best as Peter could manage, he sucked in a nervous breath and pressed forward. One by one he descended the stairs, hoping that he wasn't caught; explaining that he was making Christmas right for their guest wasn't something he wanted everyone else to know about. He'd much rather just have his family continue to think he was a bit of a Grinch, but Sydney needed to know that he was trying.
When he made it to the bottom of the stairs, he noticed that the lights to the tree were still on, well, that wasn't unusual, after all it was Christmas Eve and in the spirit of the holiday, the tree would remain lit up for the night in the hopes that 'Santa Claus' would fill little Cora's stocking with all sorts of goodies. Peter brushed the lights on the tree to the back of his mind and surged forward, rounding the corner to the living room and stopping dead in his tracks at the sight.
Just beyond the Christmas tree, in their bay window, sat Sydney, all by herself with a blanket covering her bottom half and nothing but a t-shirt adorning her upper body. Her knees were bent upwards and her forehead was pressed against the cold pane of glass belonging to the window. He could just make out a blurred patch from her hot breath against the cool pane, but what had really caught his attention was how completely still she was.
Remaining exactly where he stood, without moving a muscle, Peter studied her as she sat in the window as still as a statue. He tried to figure out what she was doing and why she was out of her bed at this ungodly hour, but nothing came to mind. For a few minutes, he simply watched her as she sat in the window, her own eyes locked on the scene outside.
Peter didn't want to disturb her, he didn't want to interrupt whatever it was that she was doing, but he still needed to get the gifts under the tree and retreating at this point would seem like a waste of time. He had made it all the way to the living room without being caught, the chances of him doing that again were slim and he didn't want to try, plus she seemed to be off in her own little world, maybe he could just sneak the rest of the way in without bothering her at all.
When he made an attempt to step into the living room though, his grip on the bag of gifts faltered slightly and when he squeezed his hands together to keep them from falling, he scrunched up the end of the envelope that he had planned on putting in the branches of the tree. While it wasn't loud enough to catch anyone's attention from upstairs, it was just enough to draw Sydney out of her reverie.
Her head turned towards him, her eyes widened at his presence and before he could make a move to turn and run, she spoke, "Peter?"
Peter sucked in a breath and stepped into the room further, closing in on her so that she knew that it was, indeed, him. He hadn't meant to bother her, he didn't want to break her focus but it was too late to turn back now.
"Sorry." He whispered and Sydney gave him a quick once over.
"What are you doing?" She asked and lifted her hand up, running her fingers through her loose brown tresses.
"I could ask you the same thing." Peter countered, watching her again as she let out a sigh and turned her attention to the world outside the bay window.
"Thinking." She answered softly. "I couldn't sleep."
"Too excited for Christmas?" He questioned with a slightly teasing tone but when she shook her head no, he furrowed his eyebrows together in confusion.
"I rarely sleep around Christmas." She admitted. "Or my birthday, or any other special occasions where people are supposed to be with their family."
Peter didn't say a word in response, instead, he closed in on the tree and carefully emptied his bag full of gifts, setting them neatly underneath the bottom branches and making sure to mix them in with the gifts already residing there. She had been keeping her eye on him while he was bent over and once he was finished, he clutched the envelope in his hands and debated what he wanted to do with it.
Here was a perfect opportunity for him to just hand it over to her, she was all alone, he didn't have anyone to explain anything too, but at the thought of handing over the letter, he became nervous. The words that he had scrawled were the truest words he had ever written and if he did gain enough courage to give it to her, he didn't know what would happen between them after she had read it.
On one hand, he could hand it to her and leave, retreating back to his bedroom and hoping that she didn't mention it in front of his family, on the other hand, the idea of leaving her alone in the window on Christmas Eve saddened him the tiniest little bit. But would she even want him to stay with her anyways?
It wasn't like he had been nice to her, it was the opposite in fact, he had been anything but. Aside from their shared moment in the park when they were throwing snowballs at each other, he assumed that she hated his guts and if given the choice between being alone and sitting with him that she'd no doubt pick being alone.
"What you got there?" Sydney asked, breaking Peter out of his thoughts. He looked at her with confusion and she rolled her eyes at him in response before motioning towards his hand. The letter was still clutched in his hand and now she had seen it.
"It's…well it's for you actually." He spoke to her, his tone sounding way more confident than he felt. "Here."
Peter walked closer to her and when he was within reach, he extended his hand to her, the letter in his fingers, before debating his next move. In his head, it was probably better if he just handed it over and left her alone.
"This isn't my letter is it?" She pressed and hesitantly took hold of the edge of the envelope.
"No, I still have that. I was going to give it back to you though."
She looked up at him and met his eyes, studying the expression on his face. Whatever his game was, she didn't know, in fact, she had no idea what this all meant to him, but she realized one thing that she did know for sure, she believed him. She believed his words, she believed that he had intended to give her letter back to her and she believed that this was the ending to their little feud.
"I believe you." She gave him a nod of her head and tugged the letter out of his hand. Peter immediately turned away from her, preparing to head right back upstairs, but at the gentle pressure of her palm against his wrist, he found himself frozen to the spot for the second time that night.
He didn't move as her fingers gently gripped his arm and it wasn't until she spoke again that he gained control back over his body.
"Don't go."
There was a pleading tone to her voice, a sadness too that Peter couldn't deny. Maybe he was wrong, maybe she would rather him stick with her than be alone in the bay window of his house. Sucking in a breath, Peter turned back around to face her and he noticed that her eyes were shinier than they had been when he first stepped into the room, was she crying?
"Are you sure?" He asked in a low tone and when she shifted in the bay window to make more room for him, he hesitantly climbed up and sat down behind her. Sydney leaned into him, her back against his chest, and for a few seconds he simply held his hands in the air, unsure of where to put them. When she twisted against him though, and curled up against his chest, he lowered his arms down and let them rest against her shoulders before he turned his awkward hold on her into a warm embrace.
Once she seemed situated in a comfortable position, she made quick work of readjusting the blanket so that it covered his legs, which were on either side of her, so that he didn't get too cold sitting in the window.
She tipped her head back and glanced at him, the letter in her hold, but making no move to open it and read it. Did she already sense how truly sorry he was for what had happened the night before, or was this simply a case of her not wanting to be completely alone, even if that meant sharing the window seat with her best friend's mean uncle Scrooge?
"Did you…want to talk or anything?" Peter forced the words out but kept his voice soft and soothing. She sucked in a breath and lifted the letter up a little bit, looking at the outside of the envelope.
"Did you read my letter?" She countered, her voice barely louder than a whisper but Peter had heard her loud and clear.
"I did." He answered back simply and she nodded her head in understanding.
"And then you decided what? To write me a letter of your own? Is this just going to make fun of me?" She needed to know what she was getting herself into before she read what he had written, he couldn't blame her, he hadn't done anything to prove to her that he was trustworthy, not since she had arrived anyways.
"I wanted to try and make things right." Peter stated vaguely and felt himself relaxing a little bit against the window. She tore her eyes away from him and glanced down at the letter in her hold.
It was easy to get in, he had only sealed the very tip of the flap and once Sydney had ripped it apart, the letter was pulled out and opened in front of her very eyes. She looked at the top of the page and spotted the part where it read 'Dear Sydney' and then she stopped just as quickly as she had started.
"You didn't have to do this." She murmured and looked up at him through her lashes. "I mean, I'm still pretty mad at you for everything but it's hard to hold a grudge when it's Christmas, especially under my circumstances."
"You mean because you don't have your parents?" Peter asked, more for confirmation than anything. He didn't want to be confused, he wanted to understand her, he wanted to know why she was sitting in the bay window all by herself when the rest of the people in the house were sleeping, well, everyone else except for him.
"Yeah." She bowed her head. "Even if you're the biggest asshole ever, I still have Derek, Talia, Laura and Cora, so that's way more people than I usually have and already I've had more fun than last year."
"Really?"
"Yes. Don't get me wrong, I love the fact that we get snow in Colorado and it's definitely nice to be in my own house for Christmas, but my grandparents aren't the best people to spend the holidays with, not that I don't love them but it's just…"
"They're not your parents." Peter supplied with a knowing smile. "I can't imagine the pain that you're still dealing with because you lost them-"
"When people say lost it makes me feel like they're just missing." She cut in and he nodded his understanding.
"When they passed away." He changed his wording slightly and she let out a soft sigh. "The pain that you're still dealing with, it must be the worst pain imaginable and if there's something that I could do to lessen that pain then I would do it."
"I don't mind the way you've treated me." She pointed out and he raised an eyebrow in confusion. He had been nothing but mean to her, what the hell wasn't she seeing? "Because you treat me the same way you would even if I had my parents still. To you I'm not some china doll that needs to be handled with care, you know?"
Oh so that was what she meant. She didn't mean because he was mean to her, apparently that didn't really change things, it was the simple fact that he treated her the same way he would've if she wasn't parentless. Well Peter wasn't usually the kind of person to act different just because a person was going through some things, the only reason he was trying to fix Christmas for her was because he had been the only reason why it was so awful for her to start with.
If he hadn't interfered, if he hadn't taken her letter, then things would've been different. She would've had a decent time with his family and they wouldn't have gotten into such a heated argument the night before that had resulted in the destruction of her frame. Peter could fix that stuff but he couldn't fix her broken heart.
"Well this changes things drastically." Peter remarked and she let out a scoff in response. "I guess you don't need to read that letter then, if you don't mind the way I've been treating you."
He made a move to nab the letter from her hand but she moved it out of his reach and grinned up at him. When he realized she wasn't going to give it up that easily, he relaxed against the window and accepted that she was going to be reading what he wrote to her, even if he wasn't entirely sure he wanted her too.
"I'm going to read this now." She announced defiantly and settled into his hold.
The letter came up and she held it in front of her face, reading over the words quickly. Before she made it to the end of the first sentence though, she peered back up at him and took her bottom lip in between her teeth.
"What?" Peter asked, meeting her eyes.
"Can you read it?"
"You want me to read it?"
"Yes."
"To you?"
"Yes." She chuckled at his reluctance but when he lifted his hand up, she offered the letter over to him. Peter took it out of her hand and cleared his throat dramatically, putting off reading it for as long as he could. When she narrowed her eyes in on him, he rolled his in response and started to read the letter out loud, though his voice remained soft and quiet so as not to disturb anyone else in the house.
Dear Sydney,
I wish that I could grant you the very thing that you've asked for but the thing is, I'm only really involved in the fabrication of toys and not mending broken hearts. I do hope that wherever you are this Christmas, and wherever you end up, that you're surrounded by people that you love and who, in turn, love you as well.
You declared that I, Santa Claus, am not real but that's not true at all. I am very real, I'm alive in the many hearts of the children all around the world, I'm around wherever there is Christmas cheer and whenever you have doubt that I'm not real, like you believe, just close your eyes and let the magic of Christmas surround you and I will always be there.
No matter what, you'll never be truly alone on Christmas, you'll always have some sort of family, whether it be in the form of your grandparents, who love you more than you'll ever know, or the form of a friend who has stood by you for years. No matter where you are, or who you're with, there will always be someone who loves you, someone who wants to spend the holidays with you and even if that someone is a young man nicknamed uncle Scrooge, then so be it.
You deserve to be happy, even if it's just for a short little while, and I hope that this year you get a chance to smile while you're in California because you are with family there. The pain of losing your parents will never completely go away but each and every year that passes, just remember that you made it, you survived and you'll continue to survive so long as you believe in yourself.
I do hope that you get whatever it is that you want this year but even if you don't, never lose faith. Merry Christmas Sydney.
Sincerely
Santa Claus.
By the time that Peter had finished reading the letter, she had tears in her eyes that were threatening to erupt onto her cheeks. When his words stopped, he looked down at her and forced a smile onto his face, hoping that maybe this moment would pass without her winding up even angrier with him than she was before. He had violated her trust, he had stolen the letter to start with and here he was reading her a response to a letter that had been meant for the jolly old fat guy that lived up north.
Had she appreciated his well thought out words? Had she understood the time and effort that he had put in to the response that he had just read out loud to her? Would she forgive him for everything that he had done to her since she had set foot in his home?
"Thanks." She choked on the word and when she lifted her hand up to brush away at the stray tears that had managed to escape her eyes, he lowered his arm and hugged her tighter. "You're not a total Grinch."
"If you want me to go get your letter right now, I will." Peter said softly. "You can have it back."
"I just want…" she paused and sucked in a shaky breath, "I just want to sit here with you for a little longer, is that okay?"
He looked down at her, the poor broken girl in his hold, and smiled back at her. Of course it was okay, if sitting in the window with her meant that maybe she'd feel a little better about Christmas, then he'd sit there until his butt was numb and his body ached if he had to.
Without answering her with words, he gingerly shifted his position in order to get a little more comfortable. When she curled up against him and readjusted the blanket to cover more of them, he let out a soft sigh and held on to her, the letter falling to the seat cushion right next to his hip.
"Merry Christmas." Peter whispered and she tipped her head back, her forehead brushing against the side of his face. Before he knew what was happening, she pressed a gentle kiss against his jaw and then settled right back into his hold.
"Thank you."
Not another word was shared between them and Peter merely sat there with her. Seconds passed, then minutes, and when he managed to tear his eyes away from the calm scene outside to look down at her, he couldn't help but smile at the peaceful expression on her face. She had her eyes shut, her breathing was even and he knew that she had fallen asleep.
Whether it was attributed to the fact that it was well into the wee hours of the morning, or because Peter had sat down beside her and offered her what he was hoping was a warm, comforting embrace, it didn't matter. All that mattered was that Sydney was sleeping peacefully in his hold.
As carefully and as gingerly as he could, he slipped out from behind her and gathered her in his arms, ignoring the blanket as it slipped off of her and landed on the cushion, covering up the letter. Peter held her in his arms and made his way up the stairs with the idea that she'd be much more comfortable in her bed.
When he reached the top of the stairs, he stole a look back at his room and knew that when morning came, he'd easily hand over her letter to Santa and he'd do it without anyone knowing what had really happened between them. Locking his eyes on her bedroom door, he headed right for it, slipping inside and gently setting her down on top of the bed. Without thinking about what he was doing, he grabbed the blanket at the end of the bed and covered her with it so that she didn't fall victim to the cold, night air.
Peter turned his back to her and took a step towards the door but stopped at the small whimper that he heard from behind him. When he turned to face her, her eyes were open and she was looking up at him with a sleepy expression on his face.
"Stay, please?" She sounded so lost, so sad and Peter gave her one firm nod of her head before he wandered around to the other side of the bed and climbed on top of the covers before settling in next to her.
She turned so that they were face to face and without any sort of hint at what she was going to do, she buried her face into his chest and curled up in his hold, Peter hanging on to her as she got comfortable. He didn't know if he had managed to fix everything but he didn't care, at that very moment, that exact second, she seemed to be at peace.
Wasn't that all he could really ask for?
