The Birds Who Smile: Christmas 2018 - Presents (theme 20) [rough draft]
A Batman fanfic by Raberba girl
"Okay, baby birds are youngest, so they get to be our little Christmas elves!"
"Thank God," Damian exhaled in relief.
The whole family was sitting around the living room on Christmas morning, gearing up to open gifts.
"Boys, look," Bruce said, taking up a wrapped package to show them. "You look at the label, and it will have the word 'To' and then a name. You give it to that person. Jack, can you read this name?"
"Dat Jay."
"That's right, it says 'Jason.' Sometimes it might say 'Jay' or 'Jaybird,' but those are Jason, too. Who does this present belong to?"
"Jay good boy pesent."
"Yes, very good. Please take this over to Jason."
Jack obeyed, and beamed when Jason said, "Thanks, buddy," and ruffled his hair.
"Peter," Bruce went on, picking up another present, "can you look where I'm pointing and tell me who this gift belongs to?"
"...Seffy."
"That's right. Stephanie is the only person here whose name starts with 'S.' This is her gift, so please take it to her."
Peter grabbed the present, galloped over to Stephanie, and pitched it at her. She laughed as she caught it.
"Gentle, Peter!" Bruce called. He sighed and turned to the oldest bird. "John, can you read this here? T-I-M. Who is that? Whose name is spelled T-I-M?"
"...Ttmmy."
"Very good. Please take this to Tim."
The kids soon got into the rhythm of gift-distributing, but accuracy soon became an issue. "Dude, this is Dick's, not mine," Duke pointed out.
Peter pouted. "D for Du'ke."
"Yeah, and also D for Dick and D for Damian. You gotta look at the whole name, man, not just the first letter."
"Bad Du'ke!" Peter grabbed the present and defiantly went to put it in Damian's lap. "D pesent for Dami."
"Seriously?"
While that was going on, John had pushed a large package over to Bruce. "John, you didn't even look at the label. This is Alfred's, not mine."
"Big present for big B." John walked away to get the next present.
Jack, who'd been industriously and correctly handing out gifts, discovered why Damian was arguing with Peter. He grabbed the gift in question ("Dis DICKIE!") and went to give it to its righful owner. Peter twittered angrily, and Jack righeously twittered back without looking.
Peter pouted again, then got a crafty look. Acting nonchalant, he loitered until Jack had scampered back to the gift pile under the tree, then grabbed Dick's present and gleefully raced to put it back beside Damian.
By this time, everyone had given up trying to correct the children and was struggling to hold back laughter as they watched the show unfold. John continued to distribute gifts based solely on their physical attributes ("Pretty present for pretty Loud Shiny," he announced when he handed to Stephanie a box with sparkling metallic wrapping paper and Cass's name on the label).
Peter continued to sneak behind Jack, undoing his little brother's work. When Jack discovered this, he burst into a furious round of bird-scolding and then started trying to fix the wrongly delivered gifts. Peter openly grabbed them back, so the next one Jack seized, he ran with all the way out of the room. Peter ran after him. A minute later, both boys came rushing back, each grabbed a present, and ran out again in different directions.
Gift distribution had turned into a who-can-hide-the-most-presents contest. The rest of the family watched through the security camera feed Bruce had pulled up, cheering on one boy or the other and making commentary.
When the gift John was holding got snatched right out of his grasp, he stared at his empty hands for a minute, then went to pry bows off the remaining presents. He carefully arranged them along his arms, then started to twirl, admiring the sparkles catching in the light.
Once the living room was completely empty of gifts, everyone waited in anticipation. Peter and Jack finally returned, gloating at each other in bird language.
"Boys," their father said.
They both froze and stared at him.
With a straight face, Bruce asked, "Where are all our gifts?"
John smirked. The guiltily aghast expressions on the younger boys' faces as they realized they'd just stolen all their family's Christmas presents set the family in question howling with laughter.
When Jack burst into tears and Peter hid, it turned to soothing, still-grinning reassurance, and Dick said, "It's okay, baby birds, a gift hunt is more fun, anyway."
Thus was the start of a new holiday tradition in the Wayne household.
o.o.o
A/N: Breezy art on AO3