Hey guys! Sorry I didn't get this one out in time for the end of February, but it's only March 2nd so that's pretty good, right? Right?!

So before anyone says it...I know. An Xmas chapter in March. For the second year in a row (if you've read my other story Realize). I'm sorry! Hahaha. But this is the last time it'll happen. I promise!

Finally we have some non-Blossom POVs this chapter. And as the clever title implies, yes, this chapter focuses exclusively on the blues. Don't worry, next chapter will focus on all 6 of our heroes and heroines!

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, settings, or properties from The Powerpuff Girls, Craig McCracken owns them. I also don't own Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Cocoa Puffs, Audi, The Supremes, The Beach Boys, the song 'Eternal Flame' by The Bangles, or the song 'Fly Me to the Moon' by Frank Sinatra.

Sorry for any errors!


Chapter Thirteen

-Boomer's POV-

Three days before Christmas, I sat on the Utonium's white couch and watched as Bubbles began rearranging the blue string of Christmas lights on the 9 foot tall white tree for the fifth time.

I knew that keeping busy decorating and fussing over the decorations that were already up was a sort of coping mechanism for her—something to keep her busy and her mind occupied on something. She'd been at it since we had all finished our finals weeks and Winter Break had started. My brothers and I were staying at their home over break, in a guest room Professor had set aside for us, since nobody was allowed to stay at the UofT dorms over the break, and I'd had plenty of time to observe her behavior over the past week and a half.

Her sisters had been doing the same thing—Blossom baking copious amounts of cookies that no single person could ever think to eat in their whole lifetime, and Buttercup kept busy in the garage with Butch, helping him do some regular maintenance on our cars.

I think it kept their minds off of their current conditions. I didn't blame them one bit, and I knew that my brothers and I would probably have to take up some distracting hobbies soon as well. As for Professor, he'd been holed up in his lab just like he had the week before, working tirelessly on perfecting the emergency Chemical X shots. We had barely seen him, aside from mealtimes, when Blossom made sure that he had something to eat.

I blinked, continuing to watch Bubbles.

She had to reach up on her tip toes to even reach midway up the tree. I could tell she was frustrated about no longer being able to float into the air on command for the simplest of tasks—she grunted and strained, stretching her fingers as far up as she could. Then she would fall back onto her heels, her arms dropping back down to her sides, slightly out of breath from the arduousness of the reach. Then she drew them in, folding them together for warmth. My heart tugged.

My girlfriend had always been short. But never before had I seen her look so…small. So vulnerable. Fragile.

That was the way I had always thought humans looked. So maybe it should have made sense in a way for the girls to seem this way now. But it didn't make any sense at all.

It had happened so quickly.

At first, all we'd had to focus on was the sudden absence of the girls' powers. But once that had sunk in for a few days, and then a week, and then three, other unforeseen things started happening.

Blossom's semi-regular headaches went away with each use of the Chemical X vitamins, but there were other things that the vitamins couldn't get rid of—like stomach aches, random muscle aches, and the strangest of all: allergies. The day that Professor had brought home their live Christmas tree a week ago, Buttercup had been thrown into a sudden fit of sneezes. Nobody had any clue what had her sneezing nonstop—until she'd left the room, was seemingly fine for a while, then came back into the same room as the tree and had an even bigger sneezing fit.

After that, the tree had to go. Professor disposed of it and went to buy the artificial white tree instead. At least it matched the rest of their house.

And Blossom seemed to have developed an allergy to certain kinds of tree nuts. She had been baking cookies with pecans in them, and after tasting the dough, her throat became itchy and began to swell up. Professor had given her a couple of his heavy-duty allergy pills and thrown out the rest of the dough. Since then, Blossom stuck to recipes without nuts in them at all, just to be safe.

There were also other, subtler things: visible signs of fatigue like dark circles, tiring after walking all day or even after running for a short time, having to squint to see even things not too far away, asking someone to repeat themselves as they talk, louder and less graceful footfalls as they walked, struggling with extremely dry skin or dehydration. Visibly human. Strangely imperfect. They were still themselves—yet they were somehow not themselves at the same time.

That would be us, too. I wondered if seeing this happen to them first would somewhat prepare us for it when it did finally happen.

I stood up, walked up behind her, and wordlessly folded her into my arms, wrapping my arms around her waist. Her hands closed around my hands as she settled back into me. Before, her hands were always the perfect temperature for us, always warm. Lately, they were colder. She seemed to be more vulnerable to temperature changes. All of the girls did.

"Do you need any help?" I asked her, trying to keep the worry out of my voice. I wanted to help her so she wouldn't feel frustrated and give up.

A slightly muted smile was on her face as she looked up at me. "Sure, sweetie. That'd be great." She pointed to an ornament hanging on a white branch to her right. "That ornament there—the snowman shoveling snow—can you move it for me?"

I carefully took the ornament off and held it gingerly between my hands—it looked so breakable and I knew that one was her favorite. "Where do you want me to put it?"

She pointed slightly above her head, smack in the middle. "Right there. I want to be able to see it from anywhere in the room."

I put it where she wanted it, then stepped back to let her observe. "Like that?"

She reached over and squeezed my arm, grinning. "Perfect." She continued looking, then pointed to silver bow near the left side of the tree. "That bow—could you move it, too? I want it here instead."

I picked it up, moving it to where she wanted it to be. I did this for a couple more ornaments she asked for, and then the both of us backed away from the tree and stood back on our heels for a moment, examining it together.

"Hmm," I said after a moment, looking at the tree for another second and then turning my gaze down to her. "I think it looks great. What about you?"

She pressed her lips together for a long time, scrutinizing it more, her nose scrunched up and her eyes squinted. Cute as hell. Then she lifted her hand, pointing to the very top of the tree. "The star," she paused. "It's crooked."

I turned back to the tree, tilting my head as I focused on the star. Then I straightened, still staring at it. It was, indeed, slightly crooked. "You're right," I told her. I looked back down at her, smiling. "Should I fix it?"

She smiled back, reaching over to hug my arm with both of hers and leaning her face into my shoulder. "Could you?"

"No problem," I told her, stepping toward the tree and winking at her. "It'll just take me a second."

Lifting up off of the ground and into the air towards the top of the tree, I reached up toward the star with my hand—then without even the slightest warning at all, it happened.

It was the strangest feeling. There was a sudden disconnect—like a thin thread inside of me snapping—and I plummeted straight down into the tree, bringing a few ornaments down with me as I crashed onto the carpeted floor.

It left me stunned. For moments, I was just blankly staring up at where the star still sat on the top of the tree, much further away than it had been seconds ago.

Bubbles was right next to me, stooped down and speaking to me in a panicked voice. It was like I couldn't hear what she was saying at first—the shock was overwhelming even my ability to hear. My full hearing came back in patches. I heard her shouting, "Boomer? Can you hear me? Are you hurt?"

Then, finally, I looked over at her, feeling numb confusion on my face. "What happened?" I asked her, frowning. My voice sounded far away.

She was smoothing a hand down the side of my face, seemingly trying to ground me and get me to focus on what she was saying. "Sweetie, you fell. You began to fly to the top, then you suddenly fell." She took my face between her hands. She repeated, "Are you hurt?"

I'd fallen? How had that happened? I shook my head, not comprehending what she was saying to me. I looked away from her for a moment, spotting at her favorite ornament on the floor next to my socked foot and becoming distracted. "Oh no," I said absently. "Your snowman."

"It's okay. It's not broken, it's fine," she brushed it off, still holding my face. "You're really out of it. Listen to me. Honey, I think it's your powers."

Her saying this brought me back to focus, and my gaze snapped back to hers. "What?"

"Your powers," she repeated. There was fear all over her face. "I think it might be happening."

No.

As soon as she said this, I made to get up from the floor. She let go of me, letting me stand shakily. I had to make sure, I just had to.

Concentrating, I willed myself to lift into the air again—and nothing happened. My heels wouldn't even leave the ground. My heart began to pound. I looked up into the frightened face of my girlfriend, her fear mirroring the fear inside of me. "Oh God."

We held each other's stare for a few more moments, feeding off each other's fear, then Bubbles turned her head and shouted, "Blossom! Brick!" I just stared down at my own shaking hands, breathing hard, queasy.

Neither of us had said it, but we knew.

It was happening again, and if it was happening to me, it was happening to my brothers, too. Right at that very moment.

It was starting.


-Bubbles' POV-

As I descended the steps, the tiny jingle bells on my white and blue snowflake fuzzy socks jingled and jangled, announcing my arrival to anyone who was near. I gripped the side rail as I came down the stairs. Using the handrail was something I never used to do, but it had become a habit recently.

I felt so clumsy all the time. I was constantly tripping over the carpet and my own feet, as well as slipping on the linoleum in the kitchen. It was practically like I didn't know how to properly move my body. Really, though, I knew that I was getting used to not having my natural grace that my superpowers had given me anymore. Sometimes it felt like my limbs were too long for my body, for all the lack of coordination I handled them with now.

I knew my sisters were struggling with this too. And I knew the boys soon would too.

A couple of days ago, after Boomer and I had experienced his flying abilities failing him out of nowhere, Blossom and I had taken him and Brick straight down to Professor's lab in a panic. Professor tested them both, and Butch after we'd gone to go get him and Buttercup, and the discovery was made.

The boy's powers were fading now, too. Officially. And weeks earlier than Professor had originally guessed.

Professor had said theirs were fading away slightly differently than ours. Instead of fading in spots and gradually going away over a few days, their abilities seemed to be disappearing in large chunks, without even a trace. So instead of them being able to get used to their absence slowly, it happened suddenly—for instance, one hour their super hearing had been intact, then the next hour, they had muffled human hearing. With these sudden changes coming at them so unrelentingly, with no time to prepare, it left them all feeling disorientated and stressed.

It was a slight relief that the boys were staying with us over the holidays, so that Professor could keep a close eye on them and we were right there to help them through this, but it also left a certain stressed air in the house.

All of us were trying to cope with what was happening to us, and some days it was tense. I was trying my best to stay upbeat for everybody—as always, I felt like I was the only one that everyone could count on to make them feel happy. I tried to smile, I tried to laugh, even when the reality of what was happening would sneak up behind me and take me into its vice grip and the idea of being happy felt impossible.

Everyone needed me. Maybe if I pretended I was okay, everyone would be.

Now, it was the day before Christmas. Despite all of the decorations I had worked hard on putting up to make everything look festive, the house felt quiet and cold. To say that no one was really in the holiday spirit was an understatement. Still, I tried my best to lift the mood whenever I could.

Finishing my journey down the stairs, I went straight into the kitchen. Blossom was already in there, sitting in her fluffy pink robe and eating breakfast with Brick, who was also still in his pajamas and whose long dark coppery hair stuck out at all angles from his head. Everyone else was still asleep—or in Professor's case, in the lab.

As I padded toward the kitchen table, the both of them turned to look at me. I noticed that they saw me approach them a little later than they would have before. Slowed reaction times was something else that was new to all of us at the moment. Blossom smiled. "Morning," she greeted.

"Good morning," I replied, voice groggy. I glanced at Brick. Noticing the stress lines in his forehead, I offered him a soft grin. "Morning, Brick." His mouth was full of toast, so he didn't reply, just smiled slightly and nodded at me.

Blossom looked down at my feet, then pointed at them and said, "Nice socks."

"Thanks," I said. I picked one foot off the linoleum, giggling and waving it at her and making the jingle bells tinkle. That had even made Brick chuckle slightly, shaking his head at me.

Smile fading a little, my sister asked me, "How are you feeling?"

I shrugged as I went over to the cabinets and looked inside of them. "Tired. But I guess that's kind of normal now." After pouring myself a bowl of cereal and sitting down at the kitchen table across from them, I looked between them. "What about you guys?"

"I'm all right, actually," Blossom said. I wasn't sure if that was true or not, but I didn't push her. She looked over at Brick with worried eyes. "I'm not so sure about him, though."

Irritably, Brick frowned slightly. He finished chewing and swallowed. "You don't have to talk about me like that. I'm fine," he protested.

She reached over to smooth her thumb over his stubbly cheek, and the grouchy frown immediately melted off of his face. "I'm just concerned about you," she told him. She looked back over at me. "He woke up with a migraine this morning."

I froze with my spoon halfway to my mouth. "Just like yours?"

She only nodded, her lips pressed together grimly.

"Professor gave me a shot. It's gone now," he insisted in a soft voice. He reached up with his hand nearest hers to take it in his. He laced his fingers through hers. "I'm okay now. Don't worry."

Blossom sighed, looking only slightly less worried. "Tell me if anything else comes up. As soon as it happens. Okay?"

Brick only gave her a genuine crooked grin, bringing her hand up to plant a kiss on it.

A calm silence fell over the table as each of us finished eating, and then Brick and Blossom got up from their seats and went to go wash their dishes in the sink together. I finished off my cereal, then stood up from the table too. "I'm gonna go wake Boomer up," I told them, and then made the journey back upstairs to the guest room.

I pushed the door open as quietly as I could. Inside was Boomer on one of the three futon beds, sleeping soundly. Butch had spent the night in Buttercup's room with her, where he still was now, since Professor was too busy to notice.

I came a little closer to Boomer's sleeping form. It was something I didn't get to see very often, but had seen a lot of the past week. Long hair in a mussed tangle all around his head, soft and peaceful face. When he slept, he tended to either curl up into a ball like a little kid or splay out his long arms and legs across the entire bed—currently he was in a ball.

The sight was adorable, and I hated to wake him up and spoil his blissful slumber, but I had to make sure he wasn't feeling badly like Brick had when he'd woken up. So I reached down and gently shook his shoulder.

"Boomer," I whispered. "Sweetie. Wake up."

He stirred, turning slightly and cracking open bleary eyes. "Hmm?"

I leaned closer to him so I could keep my voice soft. I wasn't sure which volume was appropriate now. "How are you feeling? Does your head hurt?"

Boomer, still halfway under the haze of sleep, took a few seconds to comprehend what I had asked him, staring up at me with puzzled eyes deep azure, and then took a few more to figure out how to answer. "No," he finally mumbled in his husky morning voice, rubbing his eyes with a hand. "No, I feel okay. Really tired."

I smiled down at him. "Okay," I came closer and peeled back his blanket. "Go back to sleep for a while, then. Can I join you?"

Even still half asleep, he grinned up at me at my question and opened up his arms so I could settle inside them. "Of course."

I crawled underneath the blanket and settled in between his arms. He stretched his legs out and wrapped his arms around me, drawing me in close and resting his chin on top of my head.

Within minutes, we both drifted off to sleep.

#

Christmas morning was different from all of the Christmases that I'd had before.

All of us slept in until nearly noon, not waking up in the wee hours of the morning to tear open presents as we always did as kids. I wonder if that was because of how tired all of us where, or if that was just part of growing up.

Professor had gotten me and my sisters one present each, as he always did. Also as usual, my sisters and I had gotten each other one present each, and one for Professor from all of us. This year we'd gotten him a nice new lab coat—it was made of a thicker material, so he wouldn't get cold down in the basement during the winter months, and it had Utonium etched in pretty black embroidery over his front pocket.

Our gift exchange with him was full of forced smiles and hugs, all of us feeling the weight of trying not to ruin Christmas with our sadness, but at the same time not being able to quite move past it, as if it was a giant elephant sitting in the middle of the room.

Boomer and I had decided weeks ago that we wouldn't exchange gifts this year. Our circumstances right now were too complicated, and we didn't want to add on any more stress than we had to. Besides, for me, him being there with me for the holidays was enough. I hadn't been sure of it, but when I noticed that Buttercup and Blossom hadn't exchanged any gifts with Butch and Brick, I realized that they had done the same thing.

After the gift exchanging had finished, all of us gathered in front of the TV to watch holiday movies. We had watched two when Professor excused himself to go back down to the laboratory for a couple of hours. During those few hours, the rest of us split up to do things amongst ourselves.

Boomer and I went outside to get some fresh air. The air was frigid, so naturally we bundled up, especially since we both tended to get cold much easier these days. All of the Christmas lights on the neighbors' houses were alit, white sparkly ones and festive rainbow ones, flashing red and flashing green.

Then, on one house down the street, I saw a lone house covered roof to ground with blue strings of lights. The blue was stunning—the shade of blue was frigid-looking itself, and lovely. But it also looked sort of lonely. I wondered if a family lived in that house, or if it was someone who lived alone. I wondered if they were as lonely as that shade of blue.

Finally looking away from those blue lights, I looked at my boots on the ground. It hadn't snowed recently, and so it left the outdoors in that weird state where it felt like winter on the skin and in the lungs, but it didn't quite look like winter.

It almost always snowed in Townsville right before or on Christmas, so this left me feeling unexplainably strange. Unsatisfied, somehow. It hardly felt like Christmas at all.

But maybe that was what it felt like to grow up. When the glitzy veil of childhood lifts, and you see the world for how it is, maybe even the magic goes out of birthdays and holidays where it had always been before. Maybe Christmas would always feel this way now.

Hours later, all of us gathered and ate Christmas dinner. Conversation was scarce, and we kept a holiday movie playing on the television for noise to avoid awkward silences. The jovial pretense had run out, and even I had gotten tired of forcing it.

All of us were tired, so we called it a night after we had all finished eating. After hugging each other and saying goodnight, we all retired to our rooms, even Professor going to his bedroom to sleep.

The holiday had started quietly, and it ended quietly.

#

The days after Christmas were just as quiet and even more dull.

We continued spending quiet time separately or with each other, and the days between Christmas and New Year's blended together the way that they tend to during those few days, the odd regular in-between days with no holiday to celebrate yet but still having another one coming up soon.

And yet, even on New Years Eve, it didn't really feel like a holiday. Professor told us early on in the day that he had to make a run out of town for something having to do with the emergency shots, which he said were just about perfect. So he packed into the car that morning and left on his errand, and all 6 of us were left to our own devices for the rest of the day and into the evening.

We all hung out for a bit, talking and having a late breakfast, and then split off into pairs. Blossom and Brick left to go ice skating downtown after she begged him to take her, and about an hour after they had left, Butch and Buttercup left to have lunch and roam the city in his car.

Boomer and I had the entire house to ourselves.

It took some persistent badgering, but after I found a fun recipe in one of our many cookbooks, I convinced Boomer to make it with me.

"I still don't understand why we need to make an entire cake for New Year's," he said to me with a laugh on the drive over to the grocery store. We were on our way there to get some extra ingredients that we didn't have sitting around in the kitchen. He drummed one hand against the steering wheel. "We still have about a million and three of Blossom's cookies left over, and I'm pretty sure those are gonna be stale and gross soon."

I smiled, thinking of the tons and tons of homemade cookies that littered our kitchen countertops. "True," I said. "But I just wanted to make something special for New Year's. Everyone might want some of it when they get home, and I thought it would be a nice surprise."

"Surprise, sure," Boomer allowed, making a left hand turn onto the street that the closest grocery store was on. "But by the time school starts back, we're all gonna be about 15 pounds heavier than we were when break started." I laughed.

We arrived, and after Boomer parked we headed into the store, hands held and swinging between our bodies.

We picked a nearby cart, and I climbed inside of it and sat down with my knees up, grinning up unashamed at my boyfriend as he smirked down at me.

Boomer pushed the cart through the individual aisles as I read what ingredients we needed to buy off of a list I'd compiled on my phone. He would hand me the ingredients as he found them on the shelves, and I would carefully set them beside me inside the cart.

After a little while, we had found all of the ingredients we needed, but we continued going down aisles, finding other things to stock the fridge with. I spotted my favorite brand of canned iced coffee and got a package, then saw the raspberry variety, which was Blossoms favorite, and also put it in the basket. As we went down the cereal aisle, Boomer spotted his favorite—Cinnamon Toast Crunch—and picked it out, and then I spotted Buttercup's favorite—Cocoa Puffs—and he handed them to me as well. Boomer picked out some beef jerky for Butch, and then some of Brick's favorite protein bars.

When we came out of our grocery shopping-while-hungry daze, we saw the abundance of food we'd bought and decided to stop right then and there. Pulling up to an empty checkout counter, the cashier gave me a dirty look for sitting in the cart, but he didn't say anything.

Our items were rung up, bagged, and the ludicrous price was paid as well. I finally climbed out of the cart as we loaded the numerous full paper bags into it, and after moving the bags into the backseat of Boomer's Audi, we left back for home.

Loading all of the groceries into their rightful places in the kitchen—or at least places where we could find space—took us awhile, but it was well worth it. We ate a quick lunch and then got to work on the cake.

"Which one? Oldies or Classic Rock?" I called to him from the stereo in the living room, trying to decide on a radio station to blast. I would've picked the Pop station if it were available, but for some reason the reception wasn't picking it up.

"Oldies," he called back.

I turned to the radio station, turned the volume up as high as I thought it needed to be so we could hear it clearly in the kitchen, and the sound of The Supremes blasted through the house.

Jamming to the sounds of yesteryear, we measured ingredients, stirred them together, with a brief flour fight in between, which covered both our clothes in a dusting of white. Finally, we finished all the preparing and poured the end result into two identical round cake pans, putting them into the preheated oven.

Immediately, I went into the broom closet and got the mop out. "We'd better clean this flour off the floor before Blossom gets home and loses it," I told him, and he laughed in agreement.

I mopped as he wiped the counters clean, and then we put all of the pots and pans and measuring cups that we'd used into the sink. By the time we were completely done cleaning, the two layers of cake were done baking. We took them out of the oven to cool.

We sat on top of the counter for a while, side by side, listening to The Beach Boys and lip-syncing the words that we knew. Soon another song came on, and it was a woman who crooned about her lover, wondering if they felt the same way she felt about them, and whether or not their love was an 'eternal flame'. Boomer gently coaxed me off the counter top as he stood, too, and then he wrapped his arms around me, leading me into a slow dance with him.

Smiling and leaning into him, my arms wrapped around his torso like a hug, I closed my eyes.

For a minute or so, we stayed like that, silently swaying to the music. Then Boomer interrupted the quiet. "Don't you think it'll be like this," he started, and I patiently let him continue a few beats later, "When we're older and married and have a place of our own?"

For a moment I stayed where I was, then I looked up, eyes locking with his. He looked almost gravely serious. I felt my heart pound. "Of course it will," I finally answered, my voice soft. "It'll be just like this."

The song we had been dancing to stopped, the DJ made a comment or two, and then 'Fly Me to The Moon' by Frank Sinatra started to play.

Boomer stopped swaying, his expression as serious as ever. He kept his arms around me, and they tightened the slightest bit as he said, "Bubbles, I don't fully understand what's happening to all of us now, and I don't know what's in store for us in the future. I don't even know what tomorrow will be like. Maybe things will be okay. Maybe they won't." He swallowed hard, his eyes probing mine, as if they were searching for something. "The only thing I'm certain of is that I love you. That I'll always love you."

In the view of his vulnerable gaze, and with his vulnerable words, my heart twisted and skipped and raced. It didn't race the way it used to, though. The pace of my heart was slower—the pace of a human's. But with Boomer's words, in his adoring gaze, it paced just a bit quicker—not nearly as fast as it would have months ago, but at a pace that reminded me of what I was: alive. Not what I used to be, but still alive. Blood pumping, thoughts racing, skin pulsing with feeling. Alive.

Slowly, I reached toward his face with a careful hand. I let my fingertips trace the side of his face, my eyes following the movement; his brow, the outline of his cheekbone, the tip of his nose, the curve of his soft lips.

My hand traveled down his chin, brushed against his Adam's apple, my eyes pausing to watch when it bobbed as he swallowed hard. Even slower, my fingers trailed down his chest, then came to a rest above his chest cavity, right where his heart was. In the past, I could have heard his heartbeat just by concentrating. Now I couldn't hear it at all. I faintly felt the drum of it through his sweater. "Boomer," I asked in a quiet voice suddenly, "Could I listen to your heartbeat?"

I looked up to see him nod in a slight daze, his eyes lidded.

Removing my hand, I replaced it with my head, turning and pressing my ear against his chest. His arms tightened around me once again, holding me against him. His heart thrummed against my ear, steady. It wasn't at the pace it used to be, either. It was just slightly faster than mine. It wouldn't be long until it became just as slow as a human's heart. With my ear against him like this, the pounding of his heart echoed in my head, and I could hear the whooshing of air as he breathed in and breathed out. Slightly unsteady. Nervous. My eyes were closed, but I knew if I looked, his whole face would be red.

Human but not quite human. Heart pounding. Blood rushing. Alive. Mine.

"Boomer," I said to him, voice quieter than ever. "Come up to my room."

At the sound of what I'd said, his heart sped up again. Slowly, he pulled back from me. "Bubbles," he started. His voice was uneven and sure enough, his face was flushed. "Are you sure?" He threw one quick glance at our abandoned warm cakes on the counter.

I looked up at him steadily, being 1000% sure of what I was saying to him. "Boomer, I love you." I reached up with both of my hands, holding his face between them. "Take me to my room."

The cakes had already been forgotten. Boomer picked me up as I put my hands on his shoulders, and my legs wrapped around his waist. Carrying me up the stairs as I held his face in my hands again, pressing gentle kisses all over it, he pushed my bedroom door open with his foot and set me down on my bed. He quickly spun to close the door, only pausing a moment before he turned the lock on the doorknob.

Padding back over to my bed, his eyes locked with mine once more as he stood over me. His light hair, wild and tangled, hung like a sheer curtain around his hesitant gaze. Beautiful. Again, he asked me, "Baby, are you sure? I just want to be sure that you're ready."

I nodded. For a moment, I let the gravity of what was about to happen overwhelm me. Then, though my nose, I breathed in, and a calm came over me. And in that moment, I knew I really was ready for this, and I had been for a while.

I reached toward him, tugging his t-shirt up, exposing his stomach to me. I leaned in, pressing my lips indulgently against the tight skin and muscles. Then I moved slightly upward and pressed them there, breathing out as I did, air warm against his skin. Goosebumps rose across his stomach. I moved once more and pressed my lips to his skin again. I spread both of my hands against the small of his back, then curled them inward, letting my nails brush lightly across the skin there.

Boomer took in a shaky breath. "Bubbles." The way his voice sounded, deep and hungry, made goosebumps raise on my own skin and a small, flickering flame in the pit of my stomach stirred.

After one last feathery kiss against his stomach, I lifted my gaze to lock with his again. The blue eyes that I loved were dark and desperate with desire. I reached up toward him, needing him against me, and he came down to me, his lips crashing down onto mine. He kissed me deeply, languorously, with a burning behind it that made me realize just how long he'd been wanting this too.

He lifted my thighs with gentle hands, helping me scoot back on my bed, and then turned us over so that my weight was on top of him.

As the sun began to set outside my window on that New Year's Eve, bathing the room in orange, then a twilight blue, and long before anyone else came home, we burned and melted together. Through gasps and touches and a heavy haze that singed through my mind and tightened around my soul with a force that I had never experienced before, we became one.

The year ended in a way I had never previously known, and the brand new year started hours later, opening up and endless in its possibilities.

Little did we know what it would bring to all of us.


So, just so you guys know, from here on out, I may be lowering the amount of updates to once a month, MAYBE twice if I can manage it. The reason is because at this point, at Chapter 13, a little more than half of the story is already over. And since the last half of the story is super intense and a little complex, I want to spend a good amount of time perfecting each chapter as possible so they're at their best. Plus, I figured that a little more time between updates would give some folks time to catch up with the more recent updates.

Also! I've now put this story up on AO3! Wahoo! So for those of you that prefer AO3's platform/layout better, you can now go there to read it or download a .pdf to read on the go! I'll put the link for it on my livejournal, since this site seems to hate outside links on profiles now.

ALSO. I've decided to post up a playlist for this story! So to see which songs highly influenced me as I wrote this chapter, check out my livejournal for that as well! I'll be updating it with new songs as I update chapters.

So many notes. Ah. Sorry.

Anyway, look forward to Chapter 14! After the girls and guys have had this bit of down time, an unexpected blast from the past appears. Stay tuned.

Don't forget to leave me any comments or feedback, I always appreciate it.

-MsButterFingers