Right it's now Christmas for the team. This will probably be three chapters long, as a lot is going to happen this Christmas!
Oh and this chapter is dedicated to Cass and Em, because they're reading all my stories and I love them. =)
It's December 2009, Emily is 39 and Hotch is 44.
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"The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family all wrapped up in each other." – Burton Hillis.
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Hotch hummed along to the radio playing 'Fairytale of New York', as did Emily, as they both moved around the kitchen preparing the small dinner they were planning on eating the next day for Christmas.
It was only eleven in the morning, but Jessica had wanted to see Jack before she went to her parents place for the holidays, so he'd spent the night at hers, giving Hotch and Emily the perfect opportunity to bond the night before, and now to make a small dinner for the next day.
It really was only small, as there was only three of them, and none of them were particularly heavy eaters, especially Jack, who was going through the faze where he refused to eat anything green.
The one exception to Jacks no green food rule was... much to Emily's disgust and amazement... boucle sprouts which Hotch was in the middle of washing right now as Emily refused to even touch them, when the phone began to wring loudly from the table in the living area.
Hotch wiped his hands on the cloth that was lying on the counter, before making his way over to the phone.
"I'll get it." Hotch called sarcastically, once he saw that Emily, who was trying her best to make a homemade stuffing by following an online recipe, wasn't even making an effort to move towards the phone.
"Thank you dear." Emily replied cheekily. "Oh and remember, if it's my mother, you have to tell her we already have plans so we can't go to her function party thingy." She added.
"So lie basically." Hotch replied.
"Yea... more or less... unless you want to go to one of mothers functions." Emily retorted.
Hotch shook his head quickly, indicating that meeting Emily's mother again was the last thing he wanted to do, as he finally reached the phone.
"Hello?" He said once he picked up the receiver.
Hotch stood and listened to the hone, nodding his head every now and then as if the person on the other end could see him, but not actually getting a word in edge ways. This led Emily to believe that it was Dave that was calling, as he had a habit of talking nonstop until he'd said everything that needed to be said.
"Ok... I'll ask Emily, though I doubt she'll say no so we'll see you around four." Hotch said finally, before replacing the phone on the stand and walking over towards Emily, who was wiping her hands on the same cloth Hotch had used, to try and remove her failed stuffing attempt.
"That was..." Hotch started, but Emily got in before him.
"Dave." She finished, smiling cheekily at him as she said it.
"You do realise how creepy that is?" Hotch questioned, as he slowly snaked his arms around her waist and pulled her flush against him, as she put her arms up to rest on his shoulders.
"Yes... that's why I find it so amusing." She replied with a wink. "Now what did Dave want?" She asked.
"Well his new book is selling well, and that has meant a new... and bigger... house at Little Creek, and since none of the team have plans of their own, he invited us all around to spend Christmas with him." Hotch told her happily.
"But wouldn't Reid be going to see his mum? Or to visit Austin's parents?" Emily asked. "And wouldn't Morgan be going to see his mum? Not to mention that Jayje and Will are probably going to JJ's family or Will's with Henry." She added.
"Emily, you know that the team are never able to make plans like that in advanced... plus there's currently a good eight or nine inches of snow on the ground, so there's no air traffic going in or out of DC." He told her in reply to all her questions. "Why do you really not want to go?" He asked then, reading her like a book.
"Well..." Emily started, as she pulled back slightly from their embrace and placed her hands on his forearms. "This is Jacks first Christmas since... you know..." She trailed off awkwardly.
"Since a psychopath brutally murdered his mother while he was hiding in the next room." Hotch finished, as he watched Emily nod her head slowly and sadly. "I know that... believe me, it's all I can think about... will this Christmas be good enough for him? What if he misses her to much? Will he be happy?" Hotch told her sadly.
"Aaron... I'm sure this Christmas will be better than good, and of course he'll miss her, but that's natural." Emily reassured him. "What I'm talking about is... whether it's a good idea to have him around so many people when he's missing her, and when he's sad." She told him, as she rubbed his arms up and down slowly and soothingly.
"I think it'll be good for him." Hotch confessed after a moment of thought. "The more people he's around the less he'll think about it... plus he's always asking to see his aunts and uncles, not to mention his favourite cousin Henry." He told her. "And Christmas is a time for family after all."
"I guess you're right there." Emily admitted.
"Face it darling, I'm always right, you can just never admit it." Hotch teased.
Emily was about to remind him of one of the several time's he'd been wrong... today alone... when Hotch, sensing this, bent down and captured her lip in a slow and brief kiss, that only lasted for a moment, but like every time Hotch touched her, managed to send shockwaves down Emily's spine... even after more than a year together.
~.~.~.~.~.~
"Holy hell!" Emily exclaimed when she stepped out of the car into the soft snow and looked up at Rossi's new house... well it was more of a mansion really.
"Well he said he could afford a bigger place." Hotch told her as he trudged around the car in the thick snow that was still falling to help Jack get out of the car.
"Yea, but when he said bigger I thought he meant an extra room or something... this place is the size of the white house!" Emily replied, still in shock as she looked up at the obviously spacious two story wooden cabin, which stood overlooking the now frozen lake, with giant windows taking up most of the front of the house so you could take in the view.
"Let's not be dramatic." Hotch laughed, as he resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the look on Emily's face.
"Yea Em, wouldn't your houses have been bigger than this when you were growing up." Rossi said with a smirk, as he stood in the doorway watching as Emily and Hotch both held one of Jacks hands, so the young boy wouldn't slip, and walked up to meet him at the door.
"The places I lived in were easily ten times this size." Emily replied. "But that's not the point, they had function rooms and ball rooms and a huge kitchen... this pace is an actual house." She informed him.
Hotch and Rossi rolled their eyes at her enthusiasm as they walked through the hallway and into the living room at the back of the house, where the rest of the team were already sitting with mulled wine and boxes of biscuits.
"Damn! Look at that view!" Emily exclaimed again as she gaped at the view of the pine forest, which now had ten inches of snow covering the ground and the trees, which was leaving a brilliantly white sparkle on the land.
"My words exactly." JJ informed her, from her seat on the couch, with Will's arm around her waist and Henry resting in her lap.
"Mine too." Garcia added laughing, as she sat, curled into Kevin's side on another couch.
"No they weren't." Kevin reminded her. "Yours were more 'Eek! Oh my god! Look! Oh my god! I must be dreaming!'" He told her, which caused Garcia to slap him playfully on the chest.
"Sorry Baby Girl, but Kevin is right... only you were higher pitched than that when you said it." Morgan joked, as he lay stretched out on the floor in front of Garcia and Kevin's couch.
"Uncle Dave." Jack suddenly called, which stopped the adults banter immediately.
"Yes Jack." Rossi replied as he walked over to the small boy.
"Where's your tree and decorations?" Jack asked, confused as to why there'd be none up this close to Santa coming.
"Well, seeing as I only just moved in here, I didn't have many decorations so I told your dad, and Emily, and your aunts and uncles to bring their decorations over, and we can decorate a room each, and then how about we all make the tree together." Rossi told him with a smile.
"Awesome!" Jack exclaimed excitedly before turning to Hotch and Emily. "You guys remembered decorations right?" He asked, suddenly worried that they'd forgotten.
"Aw darn it." Emily replied in mock frustration.
"I knew we forgot something." Hotch added, also looking deject.
"What!" Jack shouted, looking panicked as his little eyes grew in shock at the fact that they'd forgotten.
"Don't worry." Hotch said suddenly, looking down at a worried looking Jack, as a smile graced his face. "Like we'd forget the decorations."
"Phew!" Jack sighed dramatically as he wiped his brow. "'Coz you know Santa might not come if the house isn't decorated properly." He informed the entire room seriously when he seen that they were all smiling at him.
"Well then in that case you better come and help me and daddy get the decorations out of the car." Emily told him, as she put her serious face in place to mimic Jack's and reached out to grab his hand.
~.~.~.~.~.~
An hour later and the team had congregated back in the sitting room, which was the only room of the house that was still undecorated.
The rest of the house was now bursting with decorations and colour, and no two rooms looked remotely similar due to everyone's different taste in decorations.
The hallway was covered in small statues of Santa and snowmen, and other modern, slightly expensive looking decorations, curtsy of Emily, Hotch and Jack.
The kitchen was decorated in a traditional but also modern looking style thanks to JJ, Will and Henry, with tinsel draping over the work tops, and all of Rossi's jars having been replaced with Santa and snowman shaped jars instead.
The more formal of the two living rooms... because yes, there were two in this never ending house... looked like an explosion of colour had occurred in the centre of it, thanks to Garcia and Kevin of course. The walls were covered in bright Christmas lights, designs and pictures, and everything else in the room and some sort of bright decoration sitting on it.
Morgan and Rossi had been in charge of the dining room, and it now had a reindeer statue, about the same size as Jack, sitting in one end of the room, with a hug gold and red wreath sitting on the centre of the dining room table.
Reid and Austin had been left in charge of the conservatory, and it now had a mixture of Austin's modern statuettes and some of Reid's classic Christmas decorations, like old snow globes.
"Are we going to decorate the tree now?" Jack asked, as he looked up at the giant artificial tree... because Rossi refused to get pine needles all over his carpet.
"Yea buddy, me, you and daddy can do one part of the tree with our decorations and the rest of the team will do the other parts of the tree." Emily told him, as she held their box of tree decorations in her hand.
"Kay!" Jack replied happily, as he dug his hand into the box and retrieved a small crystal snowman, complete with a painted scarf and hat, which he ran to the tree with and hung carefully from one of the branches.
The rest of the team followed his lead, each using their own decorations, and occasionally stealing someone else's if their part of the tree looked bare, and within an hour the tree was shimmering as each of the decorations caught the light that came through the window.
"That's a job well done." Morgan commented, as he stepped back to view their handy work from a distance.
"No it's not." JJ replied as she also took a step back to view the tree.
"Why? What's wrong with it?" Morgan inquired, looking at the tree in confusion.
"Oh yea, JJ's right, we're missing the most important part." Garcia agreed, also looking up at the tree.
"Someone care to fill me in?" Morgan stated, still confused as to what they were missing.
"The angel on top." JJ told him. "But don't fear, because the great and almighty JJ has brought one." She added happily before pulling a tall golden-blond haired angel out of the bottom of her box, with golden glittery wings and a white dress.
"Wow Jayje, that's beautiful!" Garcia gushed when she saw the ornament in JJ's hand.
"It was my grandmothers." JJ replied as she walked closer to the tree. "Come here Jack, get up on your Uncle Derek's shoulders and put this on top of the tree." She told the young boy, who was staring in awe at the angel.
"Really!" Jack replied happily, as he ran over and let Morgan scoop him into his arms.
"Really really." JJ replied with a smile, as she handed the angel off to Jack and watched with the rest of the team, as he reached up and placed it carefully on the top of the tree.
Once Jack was down on the ground again the team smiled contently as they sat back down around the tree and watched the snow fall outside the window.
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There, the second part of this will be up soon, and there will definitely be three chapters now by the way. Tell me what you thought! =)