New Memories: A Bartowski Christmas
A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing! Here's chapter 2.
Disclaimer: I don't own the show and I'm not making money.
He slammed the door to his wife's Lotus with as much force as he dared. It was Sarah's Lotus, after all. And any damage done to it would…
Chuck shivered as he thought of what his super spy bad ass wife would do to him if any harm came to her sports car, but at least that thought distracted him from the truly rotten, horrible, awful day he had just suffered through.
It hadn't been that terrible waking up to rain. Especially because he'd had nothing at all scheduled today. Sarah had woken up earlier than him, written him a note about running errands that might take her all day, and buzzed out of their home in a flurry. He'd been awake the whole time, and she probably knew it even though he didn't move a muscle. But sometimes if she woke up before he did, he liked to peek through slitted eyes and watch as she went about her morning routine in their bedroom. Sit-ups on the floor, her controlled breathing reaching his ears for a few minutes. Shrugging her clothes on. Strapping her knives to her ankle before pulling on her jeans, a leftover habit he didn't mind at all even though they weren't exactly CIA agents anymore.
And he enjoyed it most when she knelt down on his side of the bed to kiss his cheek or forehead. This morning she had looked at him for a good fifteen or twenty seconds first, gently swept her fingers through his hair, and then kissed him right beside his lips with a whispered, "Bye baby."
That had been a fantastic start to his day, frankly.
But it was after that when everything went downhill.
Sarah was long gone and he was huddled in the warmth of their bed, meaning to sleep an extra twenty minutes before eating a massive bowl of cereal and enjoying a good graphic novel by the window, the rain pelting against the glass beside him…maybe something hot in a mug…mmm.
But his phone buzzed and pulled him out of his semi-sleep.
Morgan was in a panic. The Buy More had been robbed, just in time for Christmas. He didn't want to bother Chuck on his day off, but man, they, like, took all our electronics, and that's where the money's at, Chuck. Along with many other rambled, desperate pleas to help him with the police who were being lazy and uncooperative. He whispered that last part into the phone, probably because said lazy and uncooperative cops were right beside him. Then he'd heard a louder, "Don't worry! The owner will be here soon. He can tell you more."
Chuck had a feeling the officers Morgan was speaking to weren't all that worried.
With a loud curse, Chuck got ready and called Sarah. When she asked if she should meet him there, he ensured her he could handle it alone. So off he went in his car to the Buy More, where he spent three hours cataloguing everything that was missing with the cops. Trying to figure out how the thieves had gotten in. When security tapes in the warehouse revealed that an employee left the warehouse gate at the back open to let some of his buddies in, Chuck himself was tasked with firing Westley, the employee. Of course he didn't answer his phone.
Because Westley was also a party to theft if Chuck pressed charges, and could therefore face jail time, Chuck decided he wanted to talk to him first and get his side of the story. Not that he wouldn't press charges, but the whole benefit of the doubt thing was niggling at his conscience. He knew Westley had joint custody of two kids who lived with their mother most of the time.
So he'd gone to Westley's apartment and stood at the door for a good five minutes, hearing Westley moving around inside. Chuck had been a little rattled, considering the police hadn't offered to send an officer with him. Wasn't that procedure or whatever? What if they'd needed to arrest him on the spot or something?
When the door was finally opened, Westley barreled into him shoulder first, knocking Chuck against the wall behind him and bursting down the hallway with a backpack in hand. Startled but reacting with leftover spy reflexes, Chuck ran after him and tackled him to the ground. When he finally got Westley pinned, he went for his phone in his jacket pocket and discovered it was on the ground a few feet away—both snapped in half and sopping wet.
His distraction was enough to earn him an elbow to the mouth and Westley shoved him off and dashed to his car, driving away before Chuck could catch up to him.
Chuck found a pay phone to call Sarah first to tell her what happened and she told him she'd find Westley. He knew she would, especially considering the angry growl in her voice when she spoke to him. And then he called Morgan to tell him what happened, since the cops were hopefully still at the Buy More.
It turned out that they weren't still at the Buy More, in fact. Which wasn't all that surprising.
When he finally got back to his car, the tires had been slashed.
He'd stood there in the rain, just staring at them, for a good five minutes, before he slumped back to the pay phone to call Sarah again. She told him to stay put. She'd be there in an hour. An hour and a half at the most if the police station gave her crap, was the way she phrased it. He had no idea what that meant, but waiting in his car for that long, wet and disgruntled, was not as enjoyable as one would assume.
By the time Sarah's Lotus slid into a parking spot thirty feet away (it took her a little less than an hour because she was that awesome), he was thoroughly depressed and in the throes of self-hatred. He'd had plenty of time to come to terms with the fact that he was terrible at life in general.
When she opened the passenger side door and dropped into the seat, he murmured, "I'm so out of spy shape." And received a soft giggle and an "awww". Sarah then leaned over to kiss his cold cheek, run a warm hand through his damp hair and ask if he was all right.
She looked downright pissed then when she told him about how she threatened Westley with her knives until he gave her the names of his friends on the videotape. When she took "the little jerk" and the list of names to the police department, they were dubious and ready to take her into custody too until she showed them her old CIA badge. The smug look on her face was enough to lift his spirits that much further.
She patched up his cut lip, gave him a kiss, and then gave him her Lotus keys. "The insurance company is at the Buy More waiting for you. I would go, but I don't think you want to wait here for AAA for another hour. I'm not sure your patience can take it and it'll be a good distraction for you to be with Morgan and the insurance guy, talking about numbers and things."
He was off again, wondering at his wife's trusting him with her car, and her not fretting about the fact that his clothes were still damp and he was sitting on her pristine seats. But that was the joy of having a wife like Sarah Bartowski. She would always be such a mystery—a glorious, smoking hot mystery. But his mystery.
Chuck spent another three and a half hours at the Buy More with the idiot the insurance company sent. Some stuff shirt, by-the-book egghead who reminded him a lot of Emmett Milbarge. He was Emmett with glasses and a comb-over.
By the time Chuck finished at the Buy More, he was livid, on the verge of snapping. Even Morgan knew not to push his buttons and instead promised he would take care of closing up, patting him on the back, and pushing him good-naturedly out of the store. His bearded buddy's parting words were, "At least you've got your very own Vicki Vale to go home to, eh Chuck? Huh?" That was somewhat of a balm as he swung himself into his very own Vicki Vale's stellar sports car…that he would most likely have to pay to get detailed now that there was a wet stain on her seat where he'd been. Before going home to her, where he would most likely try to hide that fact until he could pay for that detailing job, he decided to go to the Apple store and get a new phone. Chuck Bartowski could not survive without his tech for more than twelve hours. He wasn't proud of it, but there it was.
That had taken another two hours, though, because he didn't have an appointment…at the Apple store. He could have built his own damn smartphone in the time it took for him to finally meet with a blueshirt. Things progressed quickly from there at least, but then he realized it was well past dinner, so he drove through In-N-Out, inhaled the burger and fries on the way home, the first bit of food he had eaten all day he realized…
And here he was now, slipping his key into the lock of their home and walking inside. The lights were dim and the living room and kitchen were empty. Did she already go to sleep? That would be just his luck. Sarah deciding to go to sleep at nine o'clock on the one day he could really use a long cuddle. He could always cuddle her while she slept, granted, but it was always better when she cuddled back.
Then he felt selfish and dumb. She was allowed to sleep whenever she wanted to.
He stopped mentally berating himself when something caught his eye.
An index card was taped to the wall beside the kitchen. "Nope" was written with an arrow leading to the hallway. He raised an eyebrow and followed the arrow, seeing another index card taped there that said, "Not yet" with another arrow leading further down the hallway. A card was taped to the bathroom door on his left that said "Not this one" and another arrow, until he stopped at his bedroom door that was ajar an inch or two. A larger, red index card was taped to the wooden door that said "Here" with a winky face.
To say Chuck was intrigued would be an understatement. And to say he was anything less than incredibly excited would be a downright lie.
He pushed open the door. "Sarah?"
Candles were lit all over the bedroom, providing the only light, and considering the number of candles, it was pretty bright. They were most likely on the verge of starting a fire, but who was he to complain?
He looked to the bed and saw Sarah sprawled on his side, her face pressed into his pillow. She was wearing a sexy black robe that was more lace than actual material, and it had opened to reveal lingerie he had never seen her wear before—they were a cerulean color that he knew would bring out her eyes…if her eyes had been open.
But she awakened at the sound of her name on his lips and lifted her head a little, blinking up at him groggily, before a smile came unbidden to her lips. "Hi, Chuck."
Her blue eyes snapped open and she sat up quickly, retying the robe and shifting on the mattress so that she was lying on her side, her head propped on her hand. "Hi, Chuck," she said again in a sultry voice, twirling a perfectly curled tendril of her blond hair around her finger.
Chuck burst into laughter, absolutely taken with her frenzied, panicked, half-asleep attempts to right the situation to what it would have been if she hadn't fallen asleep on their bed. The stress and anger and cold and hurt of the day was washed away as though it had never been there in the first place. And he continued to laugh until his vision was blurred by the beginnings of tears and he was almost certain his giant grin had split his cut on his lip again. His wife frowned at him, her gaze incredibly flat as she peered up at him through her eyelashes. "All right, you jerk. You've had your fun."
His laughter began to peter out as he crossed to her side while she pushed herself up to sit cross-legged on their bed. "I'm sorry, baby. That was seriously the most adorable thing I think I've ever seen in my life."
She rolled her eyes. "Oh, that's great. I'm trying to do something nice for you and you laugh at me. You're just lucky you had such a crap day, otherwise I'd be giving you a cold shoulder right about now." But she couldn't finish the sentence without laughing at herself a little.
Chuck plopped down and rounded her body with his arms, tugging her side to his front and pressing his forehead against her temple. "I cannot even begin to tell you how wonderful that made me feel."
She giggled. "Oh, good. Well…I meant to make you feel wonderful, though the method I had in mind was something very different altogether." Chuck hummed at that, but then she pulled away a little. "Are you still wet?"
"Well, I walked from the car."
"Did you not use the umbrella?"
"I was kind of…busy…being…I forgot it was there. To be honest. I was distracted. By anger."
"You still angry?" she asked, playing with the zipper on his jacket.
"No. Thanks to you, I am not angry. I mean, I'm generally angry about today, but I'm not angry right now. At the moment I just feel incredibly…" He stopped, searching for the word.
The way she tilted her head and raised her eyebrows was so cute that the word immediately popped into his head. "What?" she prompted, tugging the zipper all the way down and pushing his jacket off his shoulders.
"Lucky," he said confidently. "Incredibly lucky."
She smiled and kissed him softly.
He hummed again and tugged her close with a jerk of his arms, earning a throaty giggle as the kiss intensified. But just when he meant to lower her back onto their duvet, she gasped and put her hands to his chest to stop him.
"Mm mm, wait, wait."
Chuck blinked in a daze. "What?"
"Shower first."
"Uh, babe? I've had like thirty showers today. Fresh water. Straight from the sky. I'm good." He tried to go back in for a passionate kiss and she seemed to relent, but then she pulled back again.
"It'll make you feel better."
"I feel great!"
"You're gonna feel even better than great if you take a shower."
"Are you coming with me?"
She seemed to consider it for a moment, and Chuck waited with bated breath, but then she shook her head, much to his disappointment. He groaned and pressed his face into her shoulder. "Come on, take a nice hot shower and you'll feel amazing. I'll warm the oil…" she whispered seductively.
"The oil?"
"You didn't think I was going to let you go to bed tonight without a massage, did you?"
Chuck grinned so hard he winced and bought a finger to the tiny bandage Sarah had put there earlier on in the day while they sat in his sad little car with the slashed tires.
She winced a bit with him and reached up to move his hand away, carefully peeling the bandage. "It's not bleeding," she informed him, "but we should clean it up properly when you're done with your shower." She pushed him to his feet as he whined. "Come on, Chuck. Just a quick, hot shower. You'll thank me later."
He turned and grabbed her wrists, hoisting her up from the mattress and straight into him, clinging tightly as he nudged her nose with his. "Can I thank you now, instead?"
"As tempting as that is," she breathed, pausing for effect, "No."
His grumble made her laugh as she turned him around and walked him out of their candlelit bedroom to the shower. "Go. I'll put some clean boxers on the counter for you."
"Ooo, only boxers? Mrs. Bartowski, are you looking to get lucky tonight?"
"I damn well better."
She punctuated her growl in his ear with a slap on his backside and he gave her an affronted look over her shoulder before moving into the bathroom.
The shower actually did feel amazing, as did the full body massage. He let out all of his frustration throughout the day, telling her how he'd woken up thinking his day would consist of reading and drinking hot cider and how woefully wrong he'd been. And about Westley at his apartment and how his back hurt (she'd paid extra attention to the bruise where he'd connected with the wall after his employee body slammed him). The flat tires and the waiting and how glad he was that he had a bad ass wife who was an expert crime fighting ninja who did a better job than an entire police force had.
When the massage was finished, he peeled her out of her robe and lingerie slowly, the couple eventually sliding under the covers of their bed, making love between the silk sheets Sarah'd just bought them a few days before.
Afterwards, Chuck curled around her, his front pressed against her back and his arms wrapped about her body. He kissed her cheek from behind and hummed happily. "You know, in retrospect, this day wasn't half bad."
"I don't know, Chuck. You really did have an awful time of it. I felt terrible about it all day."
"Hey, it would have been worse if you didn't come to the rescue. Thank you, Sarah." He kissed her again and she smiled at him over her shoulder.
"What are ex-spy wives for?"
"A lot of things, apparently," he drawled through his teeth, pressing his face into her neck.
"Oh, really?" she laughed, looking affronted.
"Too cheeky? Sorrryyy," he murmured, squeezing her in apology.
"Hey, you don't have to apologize after what you just did a few minutes ago. I thought I was the one who was making your day better." She turned over in his arms and kissed his chin.
"You did. I was just returning the favor."
"I did? What, by being a huge loser and falling asleep before you got home, totally embarrassing myself?"
"Quite possibly my favorite Sarah moment ever," he grinned, earning a wrinkled nose in response. "I should have warned you I'd be home later but…"
"Chuck. You didn't have a phone! I knew you'd be late so I made myself soup and hoped you had enough self-preservation to eat. Did you eat? I know how you forget to eat when you're upset."
He chuckled and nuzzled her nose. "I ate."
"Good boy."
Chuck wrapped her up even tighter in his arms and sighed, knowing that tomorrow was going to be a hectic day at the Buy More, what with the things they were missing being replaced and more insurance crap and all of that on top of the holiday rush now that Christmas was only a few weeks away…
But none of that mattered. Because he had Sarah by his side. And she had already promised to go in with him tomorrow and do some paperwork in Carmichael Industries headquarters beneath the department store they'd bought together after they were married. Having her support meant the world to him, and knowing that she had come home and prepared all of this for him—lighting the candles, the index cards, the sexy outfit, the oils—made him feel special.
Because Sarah Bartowski was special.
A/N: More tomorrow! Please review, and thank you!
-SC