The ringing of the doorbell was almost unheard over the noise of Mariah Carey belting out All I Want for Christmas Is You combined with the whirring of whatever Jareth had pureeing in the blender.
"Merry Christmas!" cried Moira when Toby answered the door. She hugged him warmly and handed him an assortment of wrapped presents and gift bags.
"Where's your sister?" she asked.
"Upstairs in the shower," Toby told her.
"Is that the delightful Moira I hear?" asked Jareth, peeking into the lounge from the kitchen.
"Merry Christmas, Jareth!" she said. "I've come bearing gifts."
"Sarah will be down in a bit," Jareth told her. "In the meantime, come and see what you think of my cranberry sauce."
Moira went to the kitchen where Jareth was busily preparing enough food to feed several small villages. A turkey was roasting in the oven, and the scent of rosemary hinted at a savory dressing. Potatoes were cut up and tossed into a pan with goose fat and fresh herbs, ready for roasting. Moira smiled to see a colander full of freshly washed Brussels sprouts. A Christmas pudding sat cooling on the counter.
"Setting the hook, are we?" Moira said slyly.
"Beg pardon?" said Jareth, peeking under a lid at something bubbling in a pot.
"There's an old saying that says 'The way to a man's heart is through his stomach,'" said Moira. "I suppose it works on either gender."
Jareth smiled. "I just want to do Christmas right," he said. "After all, it's our first one together."
"So you're not going to pop the question?"
Jareth chuckled and kissed her on the cheek. "Oh Moira," he sighed. "Sweet, meddlesome Moira."
She started to say something, but Sarah breezed into the kitchen at that moment wearing a red and green striped t-shirt and lounge pants with Christmas penguins on them, her hair still wet.
"Merry Christmas, Moira dear!" she said warmly.
Moira returned the greeting, hugging her friend.
"I ought to be angry with you," she said, stepping back and frowning. "Your gift was too much. You know I was just joking with the remark about Tiffany and Company."
Sarah laughed. "Relax," she told her. "Only the box was from Tiffany's. We… em, made the crystal."
"What?" asked Moira. "It's so perfect and beautiful. How did you make it?"
"Magic," answered Jareth with a wink.
"It's a dream crystal," Sarah told her friend. "You put it near your bed and it's supposed to give you pleasant dreams."
"Oh…" Moira said, the connection forming in her mind. Tears sprang to her eyes as she thought about the dream she'd had the night before.
"What is it?" asked Sarah, seeing her tears.
"Nothing," answered Moira with a laugh. "It's just that… well, the crystal works. I had an amazing dream last night."
"Yes?" asked Sarah, stealing a glance at Jareth.
"Yes," her friend continued. "In the dream Kevin was finally able to tell me what happened to Kieran. It was quite a story and some day when we're all drunk enough I'll tell you, but strangely enough, I believe it. I believe what he told me in the dream. And I feel at peace. At last."
She didn't tell them about Kevin speaking. She still wasn't sure she'd actually heard it. He'd remained silent when he joined his family to have breakfast and open presents, but he seemed changed. His face was calm, his eyes focused but gentle. He looked as if a huge weight had been lifted from his young shoulders and Moira was grateful.
"Oh Moira," Sarah whispered, her eyes shimmering with tears, "I'm so happy for you. I know it's been a long time coming."
"Thank you," said Moira. "Thank you both for the gift. I don't know how it worked, but I'm grateful.
Jareth and Sarah gathered their friend into a warm group hug. "You're welcome," said Sarah.
"Merry Christmas, Moira dear," said Jareth.
The blinking lights of the tree cast a red and green glow across Toby's face as he slept, sprawled out and snoring on the sofa. From the television, voices mumbled and music swelled as the movie went into its final act.
"Merry Christmas Bedford Falls!"
"Merry Christmas, George!"
The last half of the film had gone mostly ignored. Toby had fallen asleep, exhausted from a day of presents and silly games and more food than even a fifteen-year-old boy could handle.
Sarah and Jareth sat together on the faded rug, arms and legs entangled, mouths pressed together, no words, just the smacking of lips and a few soft, satisfied moans.
"Sarah," Jareth said, pausing the make-out session. "Do you want to get married?"
"Is that your way of proposing?" asked Sarah, raising an eyebrow.
"No," he said. "But I wonder. It's what's expected in a place like this, isn't it?"
"Since when do either of us do what's expected?" Sarah asked with a little giggle.
"Quite right," Jareth began, his brow furrowing. "But… Sarah, do you want to? Would you want to spend the rest of your life chained to the likes of me?"
Sarah sat back and pondered his words. Something about them, his expression… There was an undercurrent of melancholy to his question.
Could she imagine herself marrying him? Of course. She loved him. She wanted him. She hated when he had to go back to London and leave her. She wanted to always be with him. She could see them having a home together and making a simple, but satisfying life. They would eat meals together and sleep side-by-side. They would do all the ridiculous mundane things: go to the grocery store and the bank, get the oil changed in the Jaguar, get their taxes filed jointly. Occasionally they would argue over something silly and maybe they would raise their voices, but the arguments would be short-lived and quickly followed by profuse apologies and delicious make-up sex. They could have a good life. Simple. Unburdened. Just a Mr and Mrs living and growing old together…
The thought pierced Sarah's heart like an iron-tipped spear and she gasped at the realization. Growing old. She would grow old. She would wither and die. Jareth would not.
She looked at him and saw the anguished expression on his face. It read as if he'd followed the trail of her thoughts, ending in the same moment of painful clarity.
"Sarah," he said, bringing a hand to her cheek to catch the tears that fell. She felt herself crumble. She couldn't ask him to stay with her. Not when it meant matching her fade a little every day. He would remain eternally beautiful and she would become gray and wrinkled, her youth and beauty lost to Time.
"Jareth," she whispered. "I can't…"
She didn't want to think about the passage of time and how it would change her and not him. How would he feel to find himself bound to an old crone while he remained youthful and handsome? Would he come to be repulsed by her? Would she awaken one day and reach a wrinkled hand out for him only to find that he'd gone, unable to remain with a graying old woman? Sarah knew it would kill her if he did.
Jareth drew her closer to him and kissed the corners of her eyes, her tears spilling over his lips.
"My love," he whispered. "Perhaps I shouldn't have asked. I only wanted to know because…" He lifted her chin up and brought her gaze to his. "I have a special Christmas gift for you."
Sarah shook her head. "If it's what I think it is, Jareth, please don't," she told him. "A finite life is good enough for me. I'd love to be remembered, but I have no desire to be immortal."
Jareth cocked his head to one side. "Even if it means spending forever with me?" he asked.
"Spending forever with you sounds lovely, Jareth," she answered, taking his hand in hers. "But I know there is always a price to pay for such things. Maybe I've read too many books and watched too many movies, but immortality hardly ever pays off for those who have it bestowed upon them. For you, it's probably different. For me though, it would likely be a curse rather than a blessing."
Jareth sat back against the sofa and Sarah watched him in the flickering light.
"You're probably right," he said after a few moments. "Immortality is certainly not without its… challenges." He turned to her, his eyes alight. "But Sarah, that's not the gift I had in mind."
"It's not?"
He shook his head. "My magic can do many things, but I have no power over Life and Death."
"Then what are we even talking about, Jareth?" Sarah groaned. "I'm not going to marry you and expect you to stay with me when I'm an old hag and you're still young and hot. Unless maybe you want an open marriage. But I hardly see myself just sitting back quietly while you parade a bunch of young co-eds through our bedroom-"
Jareth laid a finger over her lips. "Sarah, do shut up," he said flatly. "Honestly, you give me very little credit. Do you really think me so shallow?"
He kissed her nose and smiled.
"I am aware of the limits of your humanity. You will change. You will age. But Sarah, let me do it with you."
"What?" she asked.
"Let me grow old with you."
Sarah stared at him, confused. "How?" she asked.
Jareth traced a finger along her jawline. "While I can't bestow immortality on you, I can renounce my own. I can choose a finite life. I would get older and my age would show. Eventually I would fade…"
"But why would you do that?" Sarah asked, shaking her head. "Why would choose a life of bills and leaky faucets and arthritis and thinning hair over one of eternal youth and beauty?
"Because I've come to enjoy this funny little existence," Jareth told her. "I've lived centuries above the pain and trouble of humanity. But I've lived above its joys too. Those miraculous moments of pure bliss wedged here and there between carpools and budget meetings and microwave dinners. I've found so many of those moments with you and I cherish them."
He kissed her mouth.
"Besides that, Sarah dear," he continued. "I'm desperately in love with you and would rather have fifty or sixty years growing wrinkled and gray at your side than an eternity of unblemished skin and golden hair without you."
"You might not go gray, you know," Sarah teased. "You might go bald."
Jareth didn't flinch. "I don't care if I end up looking like a babushka, so long as you still consider me fuckable."
Sarah laughed. "You would really do that? You would really give up immortality to grow old with me?"
"Of course," Jareth answered. "I would do it without hesitation."
"But what about when... " Sarah paused, unsure of how to broach the subject. "Some day, one of us will die," she continued. "We'll still be separated."
Jareth smiled. "If we marry, we become bound in this realm and the next," he told her. "Even if I relinquish my immortality, I am still a descendant of the Tuatha De Danann. Upon passing from this life, I will go to live among my kinsmen in Tir na Nog. As my wife, you would be granted passage as well. We may be separated for a little while in this life, but we'll have an eternity together in the next."
Sarah sat back on her heels and considered Jareth's words. It all sounded ridiculous. Completely daft. But her life had been more than a little crazy since running the Goblin King's enchanted maze fifteen years earlier, and she preferred it that way. As much as Jareth appreciated the mundane things of the human world, Sarah loved the bits of magic and madness that seemed to follow those who were Fae-touched.
"What about your magic?" she asked him.
"I'll retain a small portion of it," he told her. "Enough to maintain the glamour and do a few party tricks," he added with a wink.
There was silence between them for a long moment as Sarah pondered his offer and he waited for her answer.
"Jareth," Sarah said at last. "I won't ask you to surrender your immortality for me. I can't. That decision is yours and yours alone. Just know that I want to be with you, for fifty years or a thousand or just two or three if that's all I get."
"Love, I don't need you to ask for it," said Jareth. "I've already offered it to you as my gift. I've laid my immortality aside and I offer you myself, small, finite, largely powerless. Do you still want me?"
"Of course."
"Then so be it."
Sarah waited for thunder and lightning and flickering electricity, but nothing happened.
"Is that it?" she asked. "Did you do it?"
"Yes," replied Jareth, adding with a chuckle. "I don't make everything into a theatrical production, Sarah dear."
"And yet, I could have sworn I heard a song and dance number when I was fumbling through the Labyrinth," Sarah retorted, smiling.
Jareth gathered her up in his arms and kissed her soundly.
"So what happens now?" she asked when he released her.
He smiled. "I suppose we live happily ever after."
"Well, in that case," Sarah said, taking his hand and gazing into his eyes "Jareth G. Brenin, will you marry me?"
"Oh Judy darling," laughed Jareth. "I thought you'd never ask!"
A/N: What are your thoughts about Jareth's gift to Sarah? I've been getting some great feedback, so I'd love to know what you think. Likes/dislikes? Please let me know! Thanks!
~Fanny~