Merry Christmas!

As always thanks for reading and sharing your thoughts. I hope you enjoy.

Since the man in the suit was here, Patrick had been occupied all day, every day. It started to feel personal to wait for him during his break times only to be stood up for the tenth time in a row. It was certainly to Alex's enjoyment that I grew frustrated with this new addition to the Jane family, that I was sure about. And the fact that Patrick became more private, barely telling me about where they took him each time they disappeared. For a few days, I blamed it on stress or thought it had been our agreement that didn't sit right with him, though he declined that having anything to do with it. Just as he declined keeping anything from me. He was lying and I could feel it gnawing at my insides how much mistrust grew so quickly. And then he started pushing me away when I tried to cuddle up too closely, kissed him too passionately.

All the time he evaded me, I spent sorting my own confusing emotions and seemingly leaving them in more chaos than before. Each time he gave some week excuse why he couldn't talk right now, he undid more of my sanity and slowly I was feeling it crumbling. Was I making things up or was he really distancing himself from me?

Once again, I found myself at his motel room door, shivering with the early winter cold and a carefully wrapped, shapeless bundle in my hand. I bit my lip, debating if I should knock or just wait for his break. But he didn't have breaks when I was too obviously waiting in the courtyard.

I knocked three times.

The suited man opened the door, wearing the same slacks and dress shirt minus his pretentious hat. His tie was tight enough around his neck for excess skin to bulge over the collar but not nearly tight enough for my liking.

I put on a grim smile.

"Yes?" he said in a very posh tone, clearly ignoring the obvious fact why I was here. Of course he acted up as Jane's personal bodyguard after he took over their room already.

"I want to see Patrick." I said, trying to sound polite. If Alex granted him so much power, I didn't want to directly spite him.

"He's busy. Playtime is for weekends." Something twinkled in his eyes and somehow his words felt like an invitation to fight him.

"He's working on weekends, too."

"He's a slow learner." His Irish accent became more pronounced the more agitated he got. Now even spitting mean, sullying lies we both knew were not true.

"Breaks help with that, I heard." I snarled but regained control immediately. I reminded myself that he only wants me to act out of line and give him a reason to openly disapprove of me. I wouldn't give him a reason. "It's his birthday. I'm sure you can spare him for five minutes."

Commotion in the room behind the door arose and Patrick appeared behind the suited man's broad shoulders.

"I'll handle it, Mr. Barlow." Patrick's voice sounded strange, seemingly adapting the man's loftiness, and he pushed through the frame without waiting for an answer.

"Five minutes." the suited man barked and slammed the door harder than necessary.

Even now Patrick seemed to push me away with his body language. Making me wonder why I took two steps back when he joined me under the arcades. Maybe I just didn't want to push him too hard since he had expressed discomfort with closeness lately. Maybe I was just scared of the whole persona he had put on.

"Sorry for disturbing you." I said and immediately regretted apologizing. Why should I?

"It's fine."

It was clear that it was not fine. His shoulders were tight. He avoided eye contact and somehow still stood taller than usual. As if he was ready to fight even tough he clearly didn't want to. Not even his hands were in his pockets as usual when he was on edge.

"You've become a hard to reach business man." He wore new shiny leather Oxfords that were no use on fair grounds. He'd ruin them in a day in mud or scratched them up during setup. Still, I was glad that Alex was investing some money in his son. Maybe he could buy him a warm jacket next instead of useless crap.

The pained expression in Patrick's eyes made my heart ache. It took me a minute to remember the gift in my hand. I extended it and promptly wished I had put more care into finding better paper to wrap this in than parchment and a blue bow.

"I got something for you."

Patrick took it and began unwrapping it with lazy fingers. Not ripping the paper once with his delicate pulls.

"It's not much. But I thought you could use them."

He pulled out the pair of wool gloves I had spent every free minute of the last two weeks knitting. Gosh, did I hate knitting but it was the least expensive version to try to keep him warm in the coming months.

"Harald helped me make them." I explained, a little embarrassed at the lackluster birthday gift in the face of his new fancy shoes. I so wished to be able to buy him something less scanty but two yarn balls and a favor from Harald was all I could afford.

"Happy Birthday, Paddy." I tried to sound cheerful while I also tried really hard not to hug him.

He kept staring at the gloves like they were the most ridiculous thing and I started to believe that, too.

I bit my lips and tried to come up with excuses when he didn't say anything. "I know they're not fancy dress shoes. I just thought… They said it's going to snow next week. I didn't have time for a full jacket."

Patrick pulled me into a hug and surprise wouldn't let me wrap my arms around his chest immediately.

"Thank you." He murmured, muffled against my neck and he remained like that for a long time. I let him have it, silently thankful for him to allow me to be close again, even just for five minutes of his day.

Finally, he moved and I wanted to step back before he felt the need to push me away again, but his arms remained around me.

"I will explain. Meet me tonight. The trailer." The whisper barely reached me but the intensity of it still made my spine crawl.

I nodded barely. "I miss you." I said and hoped it would encompass all the confusion I felt.

His hands led my chin into a kiss. The first in days, too many days. And of course in that moment someone slammed his bare palm against the window from the inside of Alex's room, driving us apart.

"Thank you." He said again, pressing his gift to his chest as he walked backwards and almost crushed into the door. He almost looked normal again with a small smile gracing his lips. And finally I understood what it was that changed his whole being so much. It was worry that almost crushed him with anxiety and made him strain against it as if it constantly sat on his shoulder, whispering in his ear all the bad things that could happen.

"See you." I mouthed, too afraid the men waiting for him would hear, and I left before Patrick closed the door behind him.

Turns out, tonight was a broader term. I waited longer than I'd care to admit in Alex's parked trailer with a plate of cookies on the table in front of me. Scared to miss him, I'd left soon after dinner. Even wearing more or less matching blush underwear. Granted, the bra was more pink than the panties but I'd figured it wouldn't matter in the dark. Why I even put any thought into it, I wondered after an hour of no Patrick and two cookies lost to frustration eating. Maybe I should've brought a book. Or maybe I shouldn't have let my hopes get so high.

Two hours and I felt more than ridiculous. Almost falling asleep in a dark trailer while I could very well be charged with breaking and entering.

I was shaken awake by the door opening. Blinking against the dark and my sleepy eyes, the shadow figure that sneaked in became Patrick. I was simultaneously angry at how long I've waited and relived that I did wait for him.

"Why does it always have to rain when we meet here?" he laughed and pulled his outer sweater over his head, carelessly throwing it in the sink. He was so much himself right now that it was annoying. If it was so easy for him to meet and be normal, why did it took him two weeks to do so.

At my bitter expression, he stalled and the smile fell off his face.

"Did you wait long?" He asked more timid now.

"What time is it?"

"Eleven."

"Then the answer is yes." I groaned as I moved into a different sitting position on the uncomfortable bench and rubbed my stiff neck.

"Sorry." He scooched next to me, forcing me to move again. "They left late for a drink."

"Mh." I made and forced me to put on a better mood. This wouldn't be ruined by bickering, not if I could help it. "I brought birthday cookies."

He didn't really acknowledge them but instead went right for a kiss. Not a quick one but lingering and deep. He towered over me and was all movement, never comfortable enough to rest or close enough to stop pressing up against me. I sighed into it because I was glad and at the same time my lips were too tired to keep up with his shenanigans. My arm strained with the effort of keeping me upright when all he did was try to push me on my back. Finally, I lightly pushed him away and it hurt because of how hard it was for me and how easy he'd done it so often.

"Just because you're kissing me now doesn't mean you're not avoiding me!" I scowled and had real problems to not be offended by his foolery.

"I'm not-" My lips pursing was enough to stop his evasion in its tracks. "I try to keep you out of what Alex and his friend are planning. The Boss wants to start a whole new gig. Not a circus or fair. More like a service. A medium scheme. That's why Sean is here, he's one of the best con artist I've ever seen. Claiming that he's real. Like a real medium. He's so good that I sometimes catch myself believing him. Talking to dead people and all that nonsense and Alex told him I'm the same. They want me to be his apprentice and get a new show going. He's pressuring me to improve my cold reading and learn his hot reading. But I don't want to do what he does."

"What does that mean? What does he want you to do?" I interrupted him, trying to take in what all this meant. Even if Patrick didn't want to do it, he's indebted to the Boss and will be obliged to do whatever he asked of him as long as he's here. And what happened to the rest of us- I didn't even want to think about it.

"I'm doing cold reading for my show. Making strangers trust you enough to spill everything they want to hear in subtext. But hot reading is another level. You get information on your targets beforehand and lie to their face knowing their weaknesses. Not about the carnival stuff like good fortune or a new love. But their dead daughter telling them that she didn't suffer when she died. And Sean makes big bucks from the show he puts on. He targets vulnerable people and ruins them and he doesn't even admit it."

I blinked nervously. "Sounds illegal."

"Depends on how far he's pushing it. It's a scam and it's terrible. Bad enough that I have to lie to people at the carnival but I can't look at loving parents and lie to their faces."

"Did you tell him, you're not a real psychic? If he takes himself so seriously, he wouldn't want an impostor, no?"

"He pretends like the hot reading is necessary for connecting with the souls. Everything else is supposed to be his clairvoyance."

"But you're not clairvoyant." I declared like it was the solution to everything.

Patrick just sneered at my obvious remark. "I'm supposed to pretend. Learn Sean's tricks. I'm watching him while he steals grieving people blind and they make me replicate everything he does. It's all a big game. Most of what he does is so obviously fake, I can't believe it works. But that's where the vulnerability comes in, I suppose." Disgusted, he looked around the room, searching for anything to redeem himself.

"And what if you pretend to suck at it?"

"I don't have to pretend. I do suck at it. I can't come up with good enough stories to tell. Not when I look into their faces."

Rueful, I smiled at him and grasped his hand. "I'm glad you can't. I'd be worried if your conscience would agree with it."

Again, he sneered in desperation. "Tell me what to do then. I can't forever follow my bad conscience or the Boss will make me regret it. Or my dad. They are already getting tired of my failure and suspect I'm manipulating the practice and I didn't even try to yet. I can't stretch it until spring. Sean already has a commission lined up for who knows when. Yesterday if he had any say in it. I don't know what to do. Tell me what to do, Ruskin."

I scanned his face, searching for an answer to his begging. But there was none that was completely satisfying. No best solution, just bad and worse. "How bad is the commission?"

He looked puzzled as if he didn't know why I'd asked. But he must've thought about this solution, too. "Rich widow wants to speak with her late husband."

He said it like it meant pretty bad.

I bit my tongue before I answered. "Maybe you should do it. Just to get your dad off your back, of course."

What I meant was 'Just so you can stay'.

His eyes spoke of an anger I hadn't seen coming. "I'm not a psychic, Annie! They don't exist and the whole thing is the worst kind of lie."

"I know that."

"Do you?"

Ouch. Maybe I deserved it. Proposing to betray his morals just so he could stay was naive at best and egoistical at worst.

I huffed and grabbed a cookie. Damning another one to die to my frustration.

For the first time, he acknowledged the plate, too, and followed my example.

The silence was suffocating and I desperately needed to fix this situation. "I thought these two weeks would play out differently, you know. I've been scared of your birthday all summer and then after our… you know – I thought all worrying was redundant. We made a plan and I was so sure that everything would work out for us. Well, that lasted a whole day at least."

"Sorry." He repeated again and the more he said it, the less I wanted to hear it.

"No, don't. It's not you. It's this." I gestured around and slumped against the backrest. "This carnival. It's a curse. It destroys good people and fosters the bad."

"It also fostered you. Can't be that bad." Patrick smiled to himself while he played with the fingers of my left hand.

"It also tried to kill me. Multiple times." I breathed, watching his fingertips caress the lines on my palm.

"I still want to leave with you. Together. But I don't want you to get pulled into this scheme."

I chuckled and reciprocated the caress, trying to follow his lines with my middle finger without looking just as he specialized in.

"I'm no use in fooling old people out of their money."

"But you're great for blackmailing me into doing worse and worse things."

"Have they mentioned something like that to you?" I sat up, shocked that they would go to these lengths but on second thought, Sean's gray cold eyes spoke exactly of those measures.

Patrick shrugged and it told me all I needed to know. He let his head fall back, watching invisible stars at the trailer's ceiling. "Do you think we will look back one day and realize it was all pointless? All the worry."

His face showed me worlds and futures he was imagining. Hope. Just the way he was daydreaming beside me gave me the sliver of resilience I needed.

"I hope we will. Means everything went well."

A smile and he closed his eyes.

"It will end well. I know it will." He said it with so much conviction that it was hard to fear even now.

"I thought you're not psychic?" I chuckled and kissed his knuckles.

"Just this one time I am. I know that everything will be ok." He looked at me with half lidded eyes and I felt it in his gaze. Safety. I kissed him and he didn't swerve and I didn't hesitate.

He brushed my curtain of hair over my shoulder and pulled me closer yet again, almost pulling me on his lap.

"You can avoid me during the day all you need to but at night I want this." I murmured, nearly out of my mind with tiredness and two weeks of non of him.

"Specify 'this'." He barely had time to speak between kisses, pupils blown wide enough to oust the blue.

I kissed his hand that was still tangled with my fingers. "This." Moved to his lips, kissing the corner of his mouth. "This. - You. Anything."

I finally let myself be pulled onto his lap, straddling him.

"Gosh, I missed you." he grinned, barely able to breath and I loved the sound of it.

"I can sneak out every night. We can meet here. Spend at least some time together."

"Yes." His hands wandered from my knees over my sides to my arms and wrapped them around his neck. "Yes." A slanted smile graced his lips before I kissed them again.

"And I want you to talk to me about your worries. Before you're bottling it up and look all tense and grumpy."

"I don't want to worry you if it's not necessary."

I sighed. "Don't be ridiculous."

"Never. I'm told I'm tense and grumpy."

"Idiot." I laughed and lead his lips to mine, drowning any protests. "We should've bought new condoms." My voice was so close to a purr that I barely recognized myself.

Patrick hummed amused and didn't break our kiss while he fished for his discarded hoody. He rattled a small box before throwing it on the table behind me. His hands too busy to find a way under my pullover to hold something else but me.

"You think one stack isn't enough?"

"For today? Hmm. Maybe." I joked and moved on to his neck. My tongue wet the skin under his ear before I kissed the spot. My fingers tangled in his blonde locks until he moaned. "You and your secrets. You're unbelievable."

"I bought them two weeks ago already. Just in case."

"Tease!" I hissed, almost biting his lower lip in frustration before I hopped off his lap.

He silently observed me pull off my shirt, wiggle out of my pants and lose my socks.

"Don't just sit there, Jane! I've waited two weeks."

His smile was glowing when he joined me with the box in hand and his touch almost made me forget every bad second of the last weeks.