Author's note: Because I thought it was just SO cute… three left, counting this one! (guess what. I'm writing this while watching DC amvs on You Tube… Rapidly I Shall Become Incurable…)
Theme #5: Almost there
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One Day In advance
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Everything in the winter morning was cold, peacefulness and silence. The white dawn was completely frozen in deep quietness and stillness – not a sound, not a voice, not even a bird chirping lightly and fluttering its wings in a tree's branches. The sky was a pale silver while a white sun rose slowly up, barely veiled by a smoke-like mist. It was yet much too early for anyone to be out – not on vacation time – and, sure enough, downtown Tokyo was absolutely deserted, and all Beika streets completely still…
Then this perfect silence was most abruptly crackled by the thundering noise of a child bumping out of bed and racing all the way down the corridor to his parents' bedroom.
"Da-ad! Mo-om! It's Christmas!" he yelled, flinging open the door. An audible groan responded him as his parents grumpily shifted beneath the bedsheets and went back to sleep. By no means discouraged, the eight-years-old boy dashed forward, climbed up on the bed with such easiness and speed that only demonstrated years of habit, and dropped himself on his father's legs.
"Da-a-ad! It's Christmas! You must wake up!"
The young father rolled on his side and, opening one blue eyes, focused his blurred gaze onto the alarm clock. Said alarm clock stood proudly on the bedside table, claiming the earliness of such a forced awakening. "Conan, it's way too early for that," he mumbled, and let his head fall back on his pillow exhaustedly.
"But it's Christmas! was the kid's cry, directly from the heart.
"No, darling," muttered his mother, sliding a lazy arm around her husband's chest and snuggling closer to him, "Today the 24th, it's only Christmas Eve…"
"But that's the same!" Conan began hopping up and down on his father's knees, obviously believing that would undoubtedly get fuller attention. Instead he received only louder groans. "Come on, wake up! We've got loads of things to do!"
"Not on Christmas Eve," his father said in his pillow. He drew his son close for a rapid kiss on the forehead. "And certainly not so early in the morning. Now go back to sleep, kiddo."
"But I won't be able to sleep…" Conan voice was already heavy with sobs, and they could well imagine his pouting face and pursued lips. Both parents opened their eyes rather hurriedly and stretched to take him in their arms. They soothed him up with comforting little nothings until he was completely calmed, and he curled up in the gap between them, his head resting on his father's shoulder his arms knotted around his mother's neck.
"Now," she said softly, "if you really can't sleep anymore, go watch cartoons downstairs and we'll come down in a few minutes for breakfast. Right?" she added, tenderly stroking her son's hair. A huge grin was spreading over his childish mouth.
"Hai!" He jumped out of bed and ran for the door, then shot back. "Ne, ne, you'll come, won't you?" he asked feelingly, clutching at the bed's bars. Upon receiving an affirmative answer he grinned again – the kind of grin that made him look just like his father at that age minus the glasses – and dashed away. They heard him storm down the stairs into the living-room.
Shinichi flopped back in his pillows, rubbing his drawn-out features. "God, what did I do…" he mumbled in his hands, rolling on his side to face his wife. Who was grinning, very much amused by the dialogue between father and son.
"Love," she said, chuckling. "To me." Shinichi smiled back. After ten years of marriage, and eight of motherhood, Ran still proved to be exceptionally patient with the masculine representatives of the household.
"I'd do that again," he murmured, drawing her closer. Their lips met, and that kiss was just as blissful as the first one had been, back to a rainy evening when they were eighteen. Just as blissful as every one they had shared in the interim had been. "I'd do that anytime…" He pulled her on his shoulder, where she leant, one arm around his waist, the other resting on his chest, fingers lightly tracing figures and patterns on his skin. Closing their eyes, delighting in their close embrace, both parents tasted peacefulness for the first time in the whole Christmas season…
… until another childish voice, but several years younger than the first one had been and obviously belonging to a little girl, cried out gaily in the momentarily restored silence, "Mo-om! Da-ad! It's Christmas!"
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I know, Christmas Eve is only tomorrow… but I'm posting this on the evening of the 23th, so most of you will read this on the morning and it's good timing actually. So then, see you tomorrow!