Castle in the Air
By Steampunk . Chuckster
Summary: Sarah has opened her dream bookstore just before the holiday season, but when a corporate monopoly announces their reduced-price brick-and-mortar is going in a block away, she must band together with her fellow small businesses to fight for their lives, even if it means getting past a slew of bad first impressions to work with Chuck, the owner of the comic book shop next door. AU Charah.
A/N: Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own Chuck or its characters, and any similarities in this fic to any corporate entities are just coincidence... shh.
Sarah hated how her parents had somehow made Chuck Bartowski, of all people, less talkative. But the awkwardness of the last few hours had done a number on him, she was sure.
He wasn't even doing his nervous rambling.
No spiraling.
She'd be concerned there was something wrong with him if she wasn't one hundred percent certain that being around the constant snipping and bickering of her parents literally all night hadn't rendered him quiet.
And of course, because this was her mom's house, the television set had since ended up being turned on. Jack made a snide remark about Emma's lack of culture, always going to the TV before a book or something else that would expand her mind.
It was rude, especially in front of Chuck. And it had embarrassed her mom, but Emma wasn't the type to let herself be cowed. Instead of turning off the TV and going quiet, she'd grabbed the remote, looked him in his eye with an icy hard blue gaze, and turned the volume up. He'd scoffed and rolled his eyes, smirking.
Now the TV was still on, albeit turned to a lower volume to allow for talking over it. But nobody was doing any talking.
Sarah was close to calling it a night. She'd count her losses, and she'd spent the next week apologizing profusely to Chuck for bringing him into this. Even if he did say the most perfect, wonderful thing out on the porch.
I'm glad I'm here.
He was such a gift.
Sarah'd had boyfriends, and not all of them were bad guys. She'd been happy through most of her relationships with all of them, especially the shorter relationships if she was honest. But none of those guys had been so eager to dive in headfirst, the way Chuck was. And she'd willingly gone in with him, and that headfirst feeling kept showing up alongside these moments when she found it really hard to breathe. That I'm glad I'm here comment from him was definitely one of them.
How do you even respond to something that wonderful?
She was in agony, mortified all night that he was seeing so blatantly what her childhood was like. The only thing missing was her mom throwing shit at her dad and his condescending laughter afterwards.
She'd tried in that moment out on the porch to find a way to apologize as sincerely as she could, while they had time alone, and he'd said he was glad he was here with so much clarity and meaning.
Sarah knew Chuck meant he was glad he was here with her, maybe even for her. But she wondered if he also might've meant her parents, too. He was glad to be with her family. Perhaps he was even glad she'd invited him, in spite of how tense and awkward so much of it was.
The fact that they couldn't even fucking behave themselves for a few hours when her new boyfriend she clearly wanted to make feel at home in their family was right there in front of them. Just being normal for a few hours was apparently not important to either of them.
It pissed her off, in spite of how much of a trooper Chuck was.
And she was deeply embarrassed.
Chuck had lost his whole family except for his sister. His whole entire family. In the worst way—just gone in a flash with no clue as to what happened, all these years not knowing if they were dead or alive, fearing the former, but the latter being hurtful in a different way. She couldn't even imagine having that burden in your heart, in your soul.
She had to at least admit it to herself; there was a part of her that wondered if maybe her family could be someplace he could go to feel like he was in a normal familial situation. At least sort of. A dad and a mom. Her. To have a place where he could sit at the table, eat burgers, feel welcomed. Like he was part of something.
That went right out the window.
Her dad acted like such a childish jerk, her mom took the bait, and then there was the yelling and arguing and mean-spirited bickering.
And it hurt worse that she let herself think that would ever be possible with her parents. What in the hell was she thinking?
Meeting Chuck, becoming friends, forging a partnership in taking down the monopoly, and having this quickly grow into something much more intense, had made her feel like good things were possible. And she'd stupidly applied that to her own family.
"So how-how was the store today, Sarah? Busy?" her mom asked, sipping a glass of white wine.
Sarah glanced up from her lap where she had her own glass propped in one hand. She smiled and nodded. "Very. Yeah. I think I had a line almost all day. It's gonna take me days to go through what was bought and figure out what I can let go of and what I need to order again. The shelves look all barren in comparison to how they looked even two days ago."
"That's great, Darlin'," her dad said. "It's what you deserve. You have great books on those shelves."
"Thanks, Dad."
"I'll come and take a look at it soon, Sarah. Things have been piling up," her mom insisted. "With my job at the casino and then that phone job I told you about. It pays almost as much as the casino is paying me and I get to work right from that table," she gushed, pointing back at the table where they'd eaten dinner.
"Does it have benefits?" Sarah asked, trying to keep this relatively normal conversation going.
"Mhm. Not as many as I'd like, so I'm keeping my health insurance plan the casino is giving me. But I get vacation and paid sick leave. Sweetie, you helping me with that new phone business really made it possible." Sarah felt Chuck giving off a certain energy next to her and she inwardly smiled.
"What new phone business?" Jack asked.
"Oh, the phone I used to have wasn't cutting it for this job. I needed a smart phone and I needed to be able to download these, erm, special apps. They want me to log my progress using some timecard app and send it to my boss. Sarah found me a cheap smartphone plan, got me the perfect phone, exactly what I needed. It's worked like a dream," she gushed at her daughter.
Sarah turned to look at Chuck. His eyes widened a bit, and she wondered if he'd be annoyed with her for it, but… "I can't take the credit," she said in a rushed breath, turning back to her mom. "Chuck's good with tech stuff like that. He suggested that phone to me, and I looked into it and thought it'd be perfect."
Emma blinked, then turned to Chuck with the biggest, most dazzling smile. "Well. You get better and better the more I learn about you, Chuck."
"Oh." Chuck cleared his throat, running his hand that wasn't holding his wine glass down his pant leg nervously. "No, it wasn't—It's nothing. I used to work I.T. so I came into contact with that sort of problem all the time. I couldn't…not help."
"So he's a big-brained tech guy, too," Jack put in, crossing his arms at his chest. "Interesting."
"Why is that interesting?" Emma asked, shooting him a dubious look.
"Just think it's interesting, that's all. Nice of you to help, kid."
"Nah, no big deal."
"Mhm, no big deal," Sarah drawled, smirking at him. "You just put together a whole page of details and whatever else I needed to make the right choice."
"Sounds like something someone out of your comic books would do," Emma gushed.
"That's what I said!" Sarah thumped Chuck's bicep with the back of her hand, beaming at him as he blushed.
"Well, thank you, Chuck. Really. I feel like I need to repay you somehow," her mom tried, but he cut his hand through the air adamantly.
"Absolutely not. You invited me into your home for a delicious Christmas Eve dinner. You've more than repaid me."
Emma sent him a dubious look but she was still smiling wide. She reached over to nudge her ex. "Sweet boy," she'd muttered.
"Yeah, uh huh," Jack drawled flatly. Sarah wondered if her dad was a little peeved he hadn't been the one to save the day. He hadn't even been in LA—he'd been off on some con somewhere—so he had no reason to feel any sort of way about it. Except grateful that Chuck had done Emma and Sarah both a huge kindness.
"What about you, Chuck?" Emma asked then. "You only read comic books or does anything in my daughter's bookstore appeal to you?"
"Oh, I read the kind of books that only have words in 'em, too," he chuckled. Emma chuckled with him. Jack made a childish little lip curl face, glancing away from the conversation. Sarah couldn't help wanting him to leave. If he couldn't be polite when he'd been the one to extend the invite to Chuck this morning in the first place, he could go and find something else to do that didn't make his lip do that stupid crap where Chuck could see it and have his feelings hurt.
"What kind?" Emma asked.
"I'm a big fan of Sarah's science fiction section, and her fantasy section is cool, too. She has an amazing selection, she's an incredible buyer. I think she's got a really good eye. She finds the coolest stuff I didn't even know about." Sarah felt herself blushing, even as she gave him a gentle swat to his chest with the back of her hand and rolled her eyes. And she couldn't keep the shy smile off of her face either. "But I think where her store has really picked up in the last month especially is her children's section. Now that it's expanded, she broke fiction and children's fantasy into two, and the picture books and the non-fiction kids books are awesome. So much stuff about sharks and dinosaurs. But I've been buying and reading a lot of her kids fantasy and adventure—"
"Of course you have."
Sarah sent a blazing look in her dad's direction, her jaw clenched. He'd stopped Chuck in his tracks with a snarky little mumbled response. She was ready to throw him out herself.
Whether her mom liked it or not, whether this was her house or not.
"Now what's that mean?" Emma asked, sending her ex a glare. Maybe her mom would throw him out for her.
"Nothin' bad!" Jack insisted, an innocent look on his face. He shrugged with both arms thrusted out to the side. "It just makes sense you're super into reading those kids books…" Sarah waited for the other shoe to drop… "…since his beach house is full of kids toys."
Thump.
There went the other shoe.
Sarah hand not holding her wine made a fist. She was ready to defend her boyfriend, considering her dad wasn't even supposed to see the inside of Chuck's beach house, since it meant a lot that he'd invited Sarah into it and she was his girlfriend for God's sake. He didn't even understand the importance of what Chuck had let him see when he brought him in to wash up in the bathroom. He didn't get the trust Chuck had shown him. He was throwing it back in his face.
But before she could drag him for filth, Emma spoke up. "Oh, stop. Toys. A grown man is allowed to have collectibles."
Chuck spoke up, calmly and precisely. "Some of what I own are collectibles. But he's right in that a lot of the things I own are simply…toys. Toys that kids play with. I collect toys."
"Oh," Emma breathed, pulling her lips in between her teeth.
Sarah bristled, ready to bark, AND WHAT'S WRONG WITH THAT? Her mom wasted her damn money on card games and slot machines. Her dad wasn't any better with his stupid old car fetish. Those weren't fucking toys? Those were toys that were effectively murdering the planet.
"See?" Jack said, gesturing at Chuck with a snort. "Toys. I mean, not saying it's bad. It makes sense a guy with a beach house full o' toys would like kids books, too. He's like…a kid in a grown-up's body. Huh, Chuck?"
"You got me there, Jack," Chuck drawled, and Sarah felt something in the look they exchanged. Like something had happened in some prior conversation that she didn't know about. Chuck was meeting her dad step for step with the look he was sending him, though. She didn't know why she thought it was hot, but she did. He didn't seem to want to let her dad walk all over him just because he was her dad and that was impressive and spoke wonders about his inner strength. Maybe her dad was just pushing him hard enough and he was done with it. Either way… hot.
But then Emma cut through the tense air with a biting, "Well, if I had the choice between a grown-man who has toys in his house and a guy who bounces in and out of prison, I'd pick the fella with the toys."
Sarah's jaw fell open, her eyes wide.
Jack spun to fix his ex-wife with a shocked look as well. And then he dropped the look and laughed, even though Sarah felt tension in the laughter. Sarah had learned all too well from him how to guard her own features, and she did so, quickly wiping the shock off of her face.
Chuck was none the wiser as he thrusted his hand towards Emma with his palm up. "See? Yes. Thank you. That's the spirit." He chuckled.
She needed to get Chuck out of here before this blew up even worse.
"It's getting late," she said, slicing through the air that dripped with bitterness. Chuck could not know Emma's words were meant to address Jack's many brushes with the law. He couldn't. That was not happening tonight, of all nights.
Not when she was spending the whole next day with Chuck and his people, his sister who'd become such a massive friend and ally to her personally, his sister's boyfriend who was so sweet and happy and wonderful, and Morgan who was simply so very…Morgan.
She didn't want the truth about her dad hanging like a dark cloud over her and Chuck.
"Oh… Do you have to go already?" Emma asked.
Jack rushed out, "It's almost eleven, Ems."
"Really?" She glanced at her watch. She seemed almost a little giggly now, like the multiple glasses of wine were finally hitting. "Oh gosh. Time flies when you're having fun."
She had to say it. And she was doing the playacting again, just like that. Sarah inwardly rolled her eyes.
Emma climbed up to her feet. "I guess I can let you two go, then. But please take some pie with you. Maybe buying three pies from the store was too much, but that's little ol' me, always getting too much because I'm afraid I won't have enough." She giggled, gathering up everyone's empty glasses. "Let me just put these in the kitchen and I'll walk you out."
"Can I help you straighten up?" Sarah asked, also standing. She tossed Chuck a bit of a glance and he seemed to understand it, bounding to his feet as well, handing her his own glass.
Emma snatched them from her with a teasingly chastising look. "Absolutely not. Your father will help me."
"Yeah, I got it. You two kids can skedaddle," Jack said with a shrug. He still looked mad, but Sarah thought he was hiding it well enough that Chuck wouldn't pick up on it.
"Let me just get the pie plates," Chuck said, and Sarah was so grateful to him as he grabbed them, stacked them, and her mom finally relented to allow him to do at least that much to help.
Because he didn't mean to leave her alone with her dad, but it was exactly what she needed to happen. She rushed to him as he slowly pushed to his feet and she grabbed his arm, gently but adamantly.
"Dad, don't take it out on her. Okay? Please no blow-out fight. Nothing that'll make her break her nice plates or the wine glasses. Please don't. Especially not when she's had so much wine. Please."
"Hmph. I guess I kind'a deserved the crack."
"Yeah," she said quietly, giving him a look through her eyelashes. "You did. Stop trying to take chunks out of my boyfriend. If she didn't take a swing at you, I was gonna."
He shrugged. "I know. He's just all…rich."
"So what? With your background, you should like him for me because of that."
Jack rolled his eyes. "I don't like the rich guys, which is why I steal from 'em."
Her mom and boyfriend would be back any moment, so she leaned in close. "Mom's crack was too much in front of Chuck, so I'm telling you now, and you can relay it to her. He cannot know." Jack snorted, amused. She pulled on his arm. "I'm serious. I'm crazy about him. I don't know what he'd think if he knew what you do, what you are."
"Maybe if you're keeping that from him, that's a lack of trust."
"Stop it."
"I'm just saying."
"Dad. I don't ask you for anything. Ever. And you constantly ask me for things and more often than not, you get what you ask for from me." He looked contrite at that at least. "I am asking you for this one thing. He can't find out you're a conman."
Jack held up his hands in surrender. "Okay."
"And you're telling mom?"
"I'll tell her."
She let go of him as Emma and Chuck filed back in, and then she moved to the door to grab her coat. Chuck beat her to it, grabbing it and helping her shrug it on. She sent him a grateful smile over her shoulder, turning to give her mom a tight hug.
"No throwing things tonight," she whispered in her ear.
"Oh, never," Emma groused, pulling back and smiling happily at her.
Chuck got his own coat on just in time for Emma to pounce at him, hugging him tightly.
Sarah smiled at the exchange, the way Chuck let out a sweet bubbly giggle and hugged her back, and then she turned to give her own dad a hug. It didn't give her that safe feeling this time. And she didn't get why. It was the same king of bear hug he'd given her since she was a kid. But it felt…tainted by something. It sort of broke her heart.
Chuck stuck his hand out towards Jack.
Jack took it and smiled crookedly, then reached up with his free and and thumped it on Chuck's shoulder. "We'll keep in touch, Charlie. A'right?"
"Sure. Absolutely." They let go of one another's tight grip and the older…couple…walked the younger one out onto the porch. "Thanks so much again for inviting me. The burgers were grilled to perfection."
"Ey, if I can do one thing right, it's grill a good burger," Jack said, shoving his hands in his pockets and shrugging.
Sarah let Chuck walk her to her car first, waving at her parents as they headed back into the house. The smile died on her face as the door shut behind them. She spun on Chuck as he opened her door for her.
"Chuck, I know you said you're glad you're here out on the porch a few hours ago, but I'm still so sorry I put you in that awkward, tension-filled…" She searched for the right word… "…fire pit, ugh."
"It's okay. I'm still glad you invited me. I'm glad I came. And look, I'm still in one piece, and I'm still…here." He shrugged, as if it was as simple as that. "Hey, do you wanna spend the night? I know, you haven't been home in…a bit. I mean, sleeping in your own bed, and you probably miss it. But since you'll be at the beach house tomorrow for Christmas celly anyway, I was thinking…"
"Can I meet you there? I need to pack a bag if I'm gonna be there tonight and all day tomorrow."
That seemed to settled it. He beamed at her. "Yeah, of course."
"That'll mean after midnight, though…"
"Pfft. Please. Whenever."
"Okay. See you soon?"
"See you soon."
She kissed him, because she wanted it and because he'd more than earned it. And she got into her car and waited for him to get into his before she pulled away. An irrational part of her thought if she left him here alone, even as he was in his car, one of his parents would run out, make him roll down the window, and tell him Jack Burton was a criminal, a conman, and everything would fall down around Sarah's ears.
}o{
He'd meant to sleep in.
He really had.
But too much wasn't rattling around in his mind, too many thoughts, too many worries, everything nagging at him all at once. He'd tried to fall back asleep when he saw it was barely five in the morning, having gotten only four hours or so of sleep. But he'd ended up just lying there holding onto Sarah as she slept soundly, for how long, he didn't know.
He finally opened his eyes, very carefully extracted himself from her sleep-grip, and did what he usually did when he had things relentlessly raging in his brain.
Chuck Bartowski utilized his surroundings. He grabbed a zip-up hoodie, shrugged it on, went downstairs, and hopped his little fence to trudge through the sand and fog to the water's edge.
He scoped out the line of damp, packed sand. The tide had come up pretty far last night. And it made the last half of the short journey to the water a little easier on his calves. There were little aches and pains here and there that he hadn't slept off, only getting four hours.
Maybe if he'd been able to sleep even just a few more hours, it wouldn't be so bad. But too much was happening in his brain, last night's admittedly messy Christmas Eve dinner with Sarah's mom and dad getting under his skin worse than he'd expected it to.
He hadn't let it tinge the hour or so he spent out here by the water with Sarah when she arrived with her packed bag. She'd made it before midnight and she'd promptly wanted to go out and walk by the water. This place had a tendency to do that to people.
They'd walked some, hand in hand, and then they'd stopped, plopped down side by side, and talked, she'd apologized some more for her parents fighting, and then they'd climbed up to their feet to keep trudging along, stopped, sat, talked some more. They'd talked, talked, talked. About anything. About Cadabra.
She'd admitted to him that she didn't get why her dad was still in town; he never stayed in town longer than a week at a time because of his job. A job Chuck felt like she didn't want him asking too much about. So he hadn't. That was nagging at him, too.
He'd admitted to her how hard it had been to juggle the many duties of being CEO of Volkoff Industries, how many bureaucratic bullshit meetings there were, how often he had to tread very fine lines, so many of them all at once but he only had two legs and he just couldn't keep up. How afraid he was that he'd run the place into the ground. All he knew were I.T. jobs, waiting tables, babysitting people's kids, and for a short time, selling video games. He'd seen his uncle in action a little bit, sure, but there was no time for a learning curve when you were the CEO of a company that huge.
Giving those reins to Vivian McArthur had been a no-brainer. She'd tried so hard to guide him through everything, not a bit of bad blood in spite of Alexei giving the company to his random not-even-blood nephew and niece. He knew she'd had to practice a lot of patience with him sometimes because his response to things would always be some form of "I don't understand why we can't just—" and she'd have to say, "Because that isn't how it's done." His "Why?" would always get deep breaths, glances up at the ceiling… Giving her the job of CEO had been a win for everyone.
He and Sarah had talked about Vivian. She'd asked quite a lot of questions about Vivian, in fact. And he only wondered now, after hours of not thinking anything of it, why she'd been so interested, and he further wondered if he shouldn't have gushed as hard about the other woman as much as he had.
Sarah didn't seem like the type who would get jealous. She was so secure, confident, easily the most gorgeous human being to ever live. She was smart, super cool, funny, adorable. After coming back into the house post-beach-walk, they'd rinsed off their feet in the tub, which led to teasing wrestling, which had resulted in christening the bathroom rug, and things moved to the bed and he decided to at least be frank in his own head—Sarah Walker had at least one more thing going for her and that was that she was mind-blowingly fantastic at sex.
But there was something underneath all of her questions, not quite jealousy, but maybe? He couldn't put his finger on it.
It was bothering him on top of everything else.
How did someone only in their thirties get a job that high-up in the company if she wasn't related to his uncle? Where'd she come from? What school? Wait, she has an accent? From where? How'd someone from England get here? She had time to get a law degree, too? And pass the California state bar exam, and wasn't that one of the hardest in the country?
The questions had kept coming.
She'd circled back to Vivian more than once, too.
Like she was half in awe of her, and then half…he didn't know. That weird maybe-jealousy-maybe-not-jealousy thing.
Chuck stood in the early morning fog, breathing it in, damp and cool in his nostrils, filling his lungs with it and letting it out slowly.
His family wouldn't be arriving until closer to eleven. He could just go back in, clean off his feet, and climb back into bed with Sarah, bask in the warmth of her, bury his face in her nice smelling hair…
The brunch cooking extravaganza wouldn't start until closer to ten-thirty anyway…The mimosa pouring, the gift giving, the Twilight Zone marathoning…
But his feet stayed half buried in the sand, the waves trickling over his toes, the Pacific Ocean pretty damn cold this morning.
He couldn't get over Sarah's mortification about her parents last night. She'd apologized so much for it that it had admittedly started to frustrate him.
He'd made her go quiet when he'd told her that sometimes there were people out there who loved each other down to the deepest depths of their beings but they just couldn't be together. Because when they were together, they fought terribly, "like hyenas". He didn't really know where the hyenas thing came from and she'd given him a weirded out look for that.
He hadn't meant to make her hurt, but he thought she had been hurt when she'd admitted he was probably right. And he still felt the sting of it. He imagined it was a pretty sucky feeling, knowing your parents just weren't right for each other, that they weren't supposed to be together, knowing you came from a coupling like that, wondering what that said about your existence.
God, he was so fucking glad, oh so selfishly, that those two people who maybe didn't go together tried to force it anyway.
Because Sarah Walker existed, and in just the months from late summer when she showed up at the Victoria Shopping Center with the glint of Castle in the Air Bookstore in her eye 'til now, she'd made it so that Chuck could not picture his existence without her in it. Any path he imagined for himself going forward, she was there.
It was intense, but it was what he had in his heart anyway.
He was going to keep it in his heart for a while, too. Not even Ellie or Morgan would be privy to that information, and especially not Sarah herself.
Maybe he could whisper it into the fog.
Chuck snorted at himself. He'd been reading too many of Sarah's books.
He got it now, why she relied so much on books, on stories, why they were so important to her. It made him ache, picturing a cute little blond kid with just one wooden door and paper-thin walls keeping her from the sounds of her parents screaming at each other, at best bickering over trivial things like banging dishes too much while emptying the dishwasher, or "where were you all night when you said you would be home for dinner?", or anything else he could make up in his brain. All she had protecting her was that door and whatever book she could lose herself in enough that the sounds of fighting faded to the background.
How many worlds had she melted into? How many times had she imagined the good parents, the caring older characters in those books, were her real parents instead of the ones she had. Maybe he was projecting his own practices onto Sarah. Because he'd done that all the time with comic books when his parents disappeared. What if Professor X was taking care of him? Clark and Lois? Aunt May? Uncle Ben? Arthur Curry and Mera Queen of Atlantis, once Princess of Xebel?
Chuck understood Sarah's book obsession, how deeply it had gotten inside of her that it became her dream, her future, to open a bookstore of her own and share that obsession with others. He understood it on a much deeper level now.
And he wasn't just trying to say the thing that'd make her feel better when he told her he was glad he'd gone last night. He was glad. Infinitely glad.
It had opened a door into Sarah's life that he felt particularly blessed he was allowed to walk through, witness a deeper part of her existence, understand her better. And maybe she thought he had some pity or whatever, but it wasn't pity he felt. Not at all. He admired her even more deeply than he had before.
She didn't just survive all the bullshit she went through to get here, she fucking thrived in spite of it.
Chuck distantly heard the sound of sand shuffling behind him and he knew she'd either been woken up by him leaving or had woken up on her own, maybe because of whatever was slamming around in her own head.
He didn't turn to look at her until she was standing next to him, leaning her shoulder into him. "Morning."
"Mmmm," she hummed, taking a deep breath and smiling out at the foggy Pacific. "Morning. I've never seen the beach this foggy before I don't think. I usually tend to sleep in too late." He chuckled in amusement as she rolled her eyes at herself. "It's beautiful."
"Isn't it?" He glanced at her again. "Did I wake you up? I didn't mean—"
"No, it wasn't you." But she didn't say what it was he noticed.
"Everything okay?"
"I'll spare you yet another apology about my parents' behavior last night…"
Chuck groaned. "Sarah…"
"I said I'm sparing you. I'm not gonna do it." He gave her a side eye and she giggled, pulling her lips between her teeth. "I guess nobody's ever seen that mess but me and now you have and it's…I don't know, I'm trying not to be so uncomfortable about it."
Nodding, he slipped his hand into hers and squeezed. "Feel what you need to feel about it. I'm still here and I'm not going anywhere. If anything, I just admire you all the more."
"Because I survived having parents like that?"
Chuck sent her a long look. She kept her gaze focused out on the water and he saw a small thread of bitterness in her face. He waited for her to turn a curious look on him before he responded, looking her right in her eyes. "No. Because in spite of what you had to battle through, in spite of likely doing a lot of stuff on your own, you're doing more than just surviving. You're living your dream. And nobody dropped it in your lap the way my uncle dropped V.I. into mine, Sarah. You fuggin' took it on your own and that's so rad."
Her tongue darted out to wet her lips, her eyes flashed, and then her mouth was on his, her arms winding around his neck, fingers in his hair. Chuck gathered her up and kissed her back with everything in him, feeling a desperate sort of need building inside of his chest, deep in his stomach.
She broke the kiss, sucking in a deep breath. "It's cold out here. We should go inside where it's warm."
"Mhm."
"Specifically that bed."
"Oh."
Oh God, her wolfish grin as she combed her hand through his curls. He felt one of her fingers catch on a small tangle and his body lurched awake at the momentary sharp pain of his hair being pulled.
Chuck broke her embrace and turned to face away from her. "Hop on the Bartowski Express, miss. I'll take you where you need to go." He bent his knees a little and she laughed near his ear before she let out a cute little squeak and her weight slammed into his back, her legs wrapping around his hips.
He caught her with his hands around her thighs, keeping his footing, and he trotted through the sand on the way back to his house, her laughter ringing wonderfully in his ear.
}o{
She had no idea what this music was. All she knew was that Chuck had clapped his hands together once as they pulled pots and pans out of the various cupboards to start getting the food prepared for their massive Christmas brunch extravaganza, and he'd dashed out of the kitchen, yelling, "Música!"
And now a woman was singing something about "Gee Whiz, It's Christmas", and she was enjoying the beat a lot. It sounded old, maybe from the 'sixties.
She swayed her hips as she broke apart the webbed clumps the hashbrowns had formed and flipped them meticulously to cook them. She pursed her lips, looking down at the shredded potatoes he'd taken out of the freezer and tasked her with cooking in a giant skillet. "Is it supposed to freaking take this long?" she finally asked when he stepped up next to her and looked into the skillet as well. "I feel like I'm doing something wrong."
"No, you aren't. Just let it sit like this for a while and then turn it over."
"So I am doing something wrong. I've been turning it a lot." She huffed.
"Oh. Don't worry about it. Just let it sit for a bit now that you know."
"I've never cooked these before."
"They're going to come out super crunchy and tasty. You're good!" He leaned in to kiss her temple adorably. And then he swung onto her other side, lifting the splatter screen to use tongs to turn over the bacon. "Mmmmmmmm baconnnnnn!"
Her stomach was absolutely growling.
After spending a long time in bed, they finally slowly crawled out from the warmth of his sheets, shared a shower so that it went quicker, got dressed, and sat at the table with coffee and delicious little scones Chuck had bought for this morning. "We'll share them with the others if we want to," he'd said mischievously.
It was the most relaxing, nicest morning she'd ever had, she thought. But then ten o'clock came and went and they were forced to stop lounging around. The food prep was a lot more intensive than she'd figured on. Chuck was serious about this thing. And she thought Ellie being a fantastic cook was part of it. He was hosting this time, he said it was the first time in a few years that he was hosting instead of his sister, and she could tell he was nervous about making sure everything was ready perfectly on time for Ellie and Awesome and Morgan's arrival at eleven.
It sounded like such a chill thing when Ellie had texted her about how excited she was that Sarah would be joining them. Grazing on delicious brunch food, bottomless mimosas, half-watching Twilight Zone which Sarah had never seen before, and laughing. Ellie insisted she'd be going out by the water a lot too because "MY BROTHER HAS A BEACH HOUSE FFS!"
She also wondered if it wasn't simply that he was hosting, that he'd be cooking the food and prepping everything this time. She wondered if her being here this time added to his apparent lack of chill now that they were starting to cook everything.
He wasn't like a chicken with its head cut off or anything but there was an apparent lack of chill in the way he was looking over his shoulder, counting things in a breathy voice, his eyes wide, pointing all over the kitchen as if trying to mentally go through his checklist of what needed to be finished and what needed to be started in its place.
As eleven neared, the masses of potatoes had earned their golden brown crisp, the bacon was heaped in stacks with grease catching napkins slipped here and there amidst the pile, and "perfectly scrambled eggs" formed a mountain inside of a CorningWare dish he'd said his sister gifted him when he bought this beach house.
"Knowing Ellie, they'll be here any minute," Chuck said, popping open his fridge. "You said you already put the champagne in to chill, right?"
"A long, long time ago, Chuck," she said patiently. "You were standing right here when I did it."
"Oh, yeah. Okay good."
Sarah glanced at her watch. "It's still fifteen minutes to eleven. Maybe we should move everything to the oven?"
"No, she'll be here. Give her a minute. Trust me." He shut the fridge, meeting her curious look with a smirk. "Ellie is always early to things not hosted by her so that she can help the host. Like clockwork. She—" There was a knock at the door and he chuckled, gesturing at it. "Annnnnnd scene."
The bookseller had to gape at how impressive that was. No one could accuse Chuck Bartowski of not knowing his sister, that was for sure.
"I'll get it," she said, squeezing his shoulder as she brushed past him. "You get the glasses and the orange juice ready."
"On it!"
Sarah rushed through the first story of the house and unlocked the door, swinging it open to reveal Chuck's big sister, Sarah's friend, and the man Sarah had started to think was some sort of hot statue given a chance at humanity by a kindly fairy godmother or something.
She was chuckling as the neurosurgeon dove in to hug her, carefully as she was holding a large paper sack full of something that smelled amazing. Like carbs and sugar.
"Hi! Oh my God, I'm so glad you're here with us," Ellie said immediately, giving her an extra squeeze with her free arm.
"C'merrreeee!" Devon stepped in to bear hug them both.
Sarah giggled, and when they all broke apart, she stepped back to hold the door open wider, letting them in. "What's that amazing smell?"
"Oh. I got new aftershave," Devon said, beaming. "Thanks for noticing. It's kind of like a crisp spring in the middle of a Japanese bamboo forest."
There was silence for a few moments as he looked between the two women, none the wiser.
"Devon. Honey. I think she was talking about my scones."
"Oh, the scones! Shit. Right. That makes sense. Ellie made scones."
Sarah took pity on him as he blushed a little and chuckled, embarrassed. So she stepped in, took a whiff, and crossed her arms, giving him an impressed look. "You're right, though. That thing about the little spring in the bamboo forest in Japan? Not too far off at all. It's really nice."
"Nailed it!" He held up his hand and she laughed, slapping it with her own.
They were all gathered around the food, scooping it onto their plates when Morgan burst into the front door with a loud, singing "The fuuuuuuun has arrriiiiiiiiived."
Sarah grinned in the direction of their newest addition to the party, even as she heard Ellie grumble, "Does he have to do that every time?"
Morgan ambled around to where everyone was gathering and beamed happily. "Feliz Navidad, mis compañeros! Salutations!"
"Merry Christmas, buddy!" Chuck set his plate down and rushed over to give him a side hug.
"Your loud entrance aside, Merry Christmas, Morgan," Ellie said, rolling her eyes and smiling.
"D'you think you can forgive my loud entrance if I've brought Grimes family traditional Mexican tamalesssss?!"
"Tamales and eggs!" Devon blurted, putting his own plate down and hurrying to the much shorter, bearded man, taking the bag he held up off of his hands. "Morgster, you're a gift!"
"Please, I'm blushing…"
Devon put the gift down on the counter top with the rest of the food and dug in the bag as Chuck sidled up next to Sarah and muttered, "Morgan's mom and aunties make the best tamales on the planet."
"On the whole planet!" Devon added, lifting one of the wrapped tamales out and groaning happily. "They're still hot."
"Hey, hey. C'mon. Of course they're hot. They've been working on these all morning. You think I'd travel without the proper mechanisms necessary to keep them nice and toasty for my favorite people?" Morgan waggled his finger. "Nevah."
"Toasty? What'd you stick 'em in the toaster?" Devon asked.
"Ahhhhh!" Morgan waggled his finger and narrowed his eyes at the taller man, and then everyone laughed and continued the food procession.
Ellie took the lead on pouring mimosa, as the "token bartender" (her words) of the group, and Sarah soon discovered that the woman was a magician.
That first sip was so good, and the second.
And the food was fantastic, even the potatoes, she was pleased to note.
What surprised Sarah was the way everyone plopped down in the living area instead of at Chuck's large kitchen table that had plenty of seats. Morgan was even on the floor instead of using a chair, shoveling food straight from the plate he'd propped on the coffee table right into his mouth. "Perfect height!" he'd insisted with his mouth full as Ellie gave him a look.
It felt so much warmer, so much more comfortable, than last night had been with her own family. She felt like she belonged in this space, with these people, the way they talked over each other, raising their voices, their laughter. Ellie's consternation over Morgan speaking with his mouth full. The banter and bickering was full of love and respect. There was nothing sharp or genuinely mean, there was no actual spite. No unresolved bitterness.
"Thirdsies!" Chuck announced after some time, gathering up his plate from where he sat next to her on the couch and leaping up to his feet.
"How about before we do third helpings, we open gifts?" Ellie asked then. "I mean, you're the host, you can do what you want. But I'm just thinking for time's sake. We don't know how long Morgan can hang around."
Morgan turned to give her a doe-eyed look, gaping a little. "You… But… For me? Really, Ellie?"
She shrugged and rolled her eyes, humor in her pretty features. "Well, you know it'd be really annoying trying to get your presents to you later."
It hadn't even remotely occurred to her that any of said presents would be for her. Chuck's little tree he'd put up in the corner last night, had a smattering of brightly colored, wrapped gifts. Not a lot, which was kind of refreshing.
So she decided to be almost like a referee in the process, bounding over herself to start passing them out. "I've got this part. You guys just do the opening."
She was particular proud of the four gifts she'd snuck into Chuck's apartment from her trunk while he was out on the patio sweeping earlier. Maybe it was a cop-out, the bookstore owner giving books as gifts, but she hadn't had the time or the energy to go on a full gift hunt.
Sarah had a whole meltdown last week, sitting at the counter of her bookstore when the place was relatively empty one morning, realizing this would be the first Christmas since she and Chuck began dating a few weeks ago. Getting him a book, just like she was doing for everyone else she was buying gifts for, felt like not nearly enough. She needed to think harder, really get into the spirit, delve deep.
So she got to work.
Granted, she also found a book she thought he'd love.
Those thoughts took a backseat now though as she handed Devon a gift with one hand and turned to pick up another with her other hand. Only to find that Ellie's name wasn't on it, nor was Devon's, or Chuck's, or even Morgan's. It said "To: Sarah" in a lovely cursive scrawl. Underneath was: "Love, Ellie".
She stilled, her hand hovering over it.
It was a small box, about the size of her hand. She picked it up and pulled it close to her chest, then looked up at Ellie with a smile. She had no business being weepy over it, and she willed that sensation away, instead smiling harder when Ellie finally looked up from trying on the new slippers she'd just opened from her brother.
They met gazes and Ellie gasped, flapping her hand at Sarah. "Yes! Open it! Open it open it!"
"I'm still passing out the rest of the g—"
"Pffft. Open my gift first. Go on."
Sarah giggled, feeling a swelling sensation in her chest as she shifted to plop onto her backside, folding her legs in front of her. And then she tugged at the paper, ripping it off with one smooth move of her fingers under the seam, revealing a small box that looked like it might have jewelry in it or something.
Giving the other woman a bit of a questioning look, ignoring the way Chuck and Morgan were pretend battling with the katanas Morgan gifted Chuck, even pretending they were in a poorly dubbed martial arts film as they did it, Sarah popped the top off of the box.
Sitting amidst the white protective fluff in the box wasn't a piece of jewelry. Rather, it was a golden key with a gift card of some sort attached to it. Sarah lifted it into her fingers and turned the card so that she could read it.
Isabella's Day Spa By the Beach
Full Treatment Gift Card
Sarah gasped, looking up at the neurosurgeon again. "You didn't! Is this a pass so that we can go to the spa?"
Ellie beamed. "You're so sweet that you want me to be there, too. But no, this is just for you. I mean, we can go together sometime too, sure. But you work your ass off and you need a day to yourself where you can just relax and be pampered." She held her hands out to the side and shut her eyes, taking a deep breath, pushing her flat palms down as if meditating.
"This is the most thoughtful thing, Ellie. God, thank you!" She was actually deeply grateful. A spa day. She'd never actually…done that before. And she felt silly saying that out loud. They'd think she was… She didn't know what. Her brain was being unfair.
So she climbed up to her feet, crossed the tumultuous gift opening festivities, and stooped down to wrap her friend in a tight hug as she sat in Chuck's plush chair near the couch. "Thank you so much," she breathed. "I'm doing this as soon as the holidays are over."
"Good!"
As she pulled back and continued to distribute presents, she sought out the presents she'd wrapped for everyone else and handed those out, watching with no small amount of pleasure as Morgan opened his boxset—the Ninja Samurai trilogy by Yamamoto. With original art on the spines of the three books that, when put next to each other, formed a shimmering, golden Samurai clan helmet, ghost mask included. She got a hug that was almost a tackle, and a high-pitched, "How did I not even know about this series?!" And now his head was in book one, even as he had other gifts he hadn't opened sitting next to him.
Devon had been harder, since she'd only spent time with him a few times in the last few months. She'd needed Ellie's advice for him. But when she found out he was a big fan of Roman history, she bought him a two-part series on the Roman Empire that was written by one of the most lauded and accessible historians still writing. In hardback. Because apparently Devon preferred hardback. He'd been jazzed about it.
Sarah bent over backwards to snag an old edition of Kate Chopin's The Awakening for Ellie to add to her used book collection. It was as pristine as a book from the nineteen-twenties could be. She'd searched for first editions, but those were going for tens of thousands of dollars and…well…no.
The gasp she'd gotten from Ellie. The way the woman squealed, "Oh it's one of my favorite booooooks! This is beautiful, look at the patterns oh my God! The binding! The engravingssss look Devon!"
Devon had chuckled with a, "Uh huh, the engravings. Very cool, babe."
And finally, she watched Chuck unwrap his gift. The genuine glee in his face at turning it over and seeing what it was made her insides sing. "Nnnnooooo waaaaaay!" He looked up at her like a kid whose parents just brought him out to the garage to see their new bike. "This isn't really…"
"What if I told you it is really…?" she teased.
"Well, what is it?!" Ellie asked, leaning forward in her chair, the suspense apparently too much for her.
Chuck held up the books. "El, remember when I was a kid and I got these from the school library and brought them home all the time?"
"Oh my God," Ellie gasped, seeing them. "Our parents didn't buy them for you because they said you could always just get them from the library. And when you asked what if someone else checks it out, they said 'don't worry, you're the only kid weird enough to want those'."
Everyone cracked up as Chuck narrowed his eyes at his sister. "It's true, they actually did say that, but thanks. Thanks so much for pointing it out to everybody here. Appreciate it, sis."
"You're welcome," she giggled.
"Geez, I only mentioned these that one time in your store…" Chuck said, going back to the books, running his fingers over the covers.
"Mhmm, when you said my children's section needs work because I didn't have the…whatever series that was so huuuge." Sarah sent him a dubious look and Ellie snorted.
"Oh no, Chuck. You didn't tell her it was a huge series, did you?"
"It was huge to me, okay." He stuck his tongue out at his sister. "Cairo Chronicles is a six book series about these kids who—"
Ellie groaned a, "Oh not againnnnnnn", clearly just teasing her brother as he tried to explain the books to an out-of-the-loop Devon Woodcomb.
Chuck paused for only a moment to let her get it out of her system. "The kids all have different abilities, kind of like Doom Patrol or X-Men. But they're like…not curses, they're actually cool powers. Very subtle." He cleared his throat, maybe realizing he was going too deep into detail, and he rushed on. "Their parents are all on this team of excavation-type anthropologists unearthing the secrets of ancient Egyptian tombs. So there are mummies and cool curses and shit. But the twist is that the kids in the books are fighting against evil British colonial generals and shit who want to steal the artifacts and take them to the British Museum instead of leaving them for the Egyptian people and their own historians. They team up with one of the mummies in book three. It's so cool."
"And Chuck went to school dressed as a mummy when he was in second grade." Ellie smiled hard at him. "Well, in toilet paper. He made us all stand there and wrap him up with toilet paper and tape."
Sarah laughed happily. "Oh God, I can just see it. Little curls popping up out of the toilet paper. Was it for Halloween at school or something?"
"It was January," Chuck muttered glumly. "I got locked in the bathroom by Marc Watts because he said that's where toilet paper goes." He sighed heavily and shrugged.
Devon smothered a snort by covering his mouth. "Sorry. I'm sorry you went through that. But it's pretty cute you just wanted to go to school as a mummy on some random day in January."
"These books made an impact. And now I have all six." He sent Sarah a look that made her soar.
"I guess I kind of took a chance that you didn't have the Cairo Chronicles already even though you brought it up on three separate occasions while in my presence. I knew you probably wouldn't have first editions, though." She pursed her lips and twisted them to the side shyly.
"These are first editions?! This came out in the 'eighties! Oh man, they're in such good condition! Look at my guy Ramses II on the cover here." He pointed at a mummy that was chasing the kids out of a tomb on the cover of one of the books. "Aw man, this is the best." He set the books to the side and crawled down onto his knees to kiss her solidly. "Thanks, Sarah."
"Oooooooooooo looks like Sarah scoooooooored—" Thump! "Ow!" Morgan rubbed his bicep and sent Ellie a salty look as she glared, her fist still up, ready to knock him again if he continued his behavior.
Chuck reached around Sarah and grabbed a few gifts, setting them next to Sarah. "I know this trick. It's the oldest trick in the book. You pass out everyone else's gifts first so that you get all the attention when you're opening yours."
"Shut up," she chastised with a laugh, giving him a gentle smack on his shoulder as he stretched across her body to grab more. And then she realized there were more presents than the one Ellie brought for her. One had Morgan's name, one had Devon's. …And one had Chuck's.
She grabbed that one first. So sue her for being curious. It was a long box, over a foot tall. And as she scooted it closer, she found it was kind of heavy too. "What did you do?"
"Don't worry about it. Just open it."
She narrowed her eyes, smiling at him, then tore at the paper. The box was plain white, with oblong holes for carrying it on either end, and a lit fit over the top of it snugly. She popped the lid off and looked inside.
"Oh God, Chuck really?" Ellie groused.
Sarah could only laugh at him, picking up one of the many comic books lined up inside of the box. They were covered in plastic sleeves with cardboard slipped in each one, likely to keep them in good condition. "What's Birds of Prey?" she laughed, shaking her head. "I should've known you'd do this. You are persistent."
"What can I say? I'm determined to get you liking something comic book-y. And I think I found the one." He scooted closer, carefully maneuvering the comic book out of her hand. "This is the first issue of Gail Simone's run. When I tell you she absolutely sent these badass women to new badass heights, I mean it. Like, genius. You will love these girls. Love. Them. So many layers. They're such baddies. In, like, a good way."
"One of them's in a wheelchair, huh?" she noticed. "That's kind of cool. Representation."
"That's Babs. Barbara Gordon," Morgan cut in excitedly. "I helped Chuck find 'em all for this. I mean, for months we—" Sarah caught Chuck sending him a severe look and she smirked at the exchange. "Uh, I mean… ahem. Babs is Batman's biggest ally's daughter. She's Batgirl. Well, and then she's Oracle. There's a lot of really intense…um, arguing…over whether Batgirl is better than Oracle, or vice versa…"
"I know you don't care about that now, Sarah… But you will," Chuck insisted, squeezing her bicep. "You will."
"There are so many in here!" she laughed, giving Chuck the biggest grin she was capable of. She was reading between the lines, here. Chuck had been constructing this Christmas gift since before they'd even started dating, maybe even since before they'd become friends. And he'd enlisted his best friend's help in finding all of these. It was so insanely sweet.
"Just fifty-two of them. Not so bad. They're quick reads." She sent him a flat look. "Just try it."
Sarah held up a hand by her shoulder. "I'm going to. I'm going to. This is a very sweet gift."
"You seriously got her comics, I can't," Ellie chuckled, throwing a balled up napkin at her brother's head.
He giggled, batting it away. "Hey, now. I worked hard to find these."
"And me!" Morgan piped up, raising his hand high above his head.
"And Morgan," Chuck amended.
She gave his sleeve a bit of a tug to pull him in closer as they all continued to open presents, and she felt that deep sense of belonging assail her. This was more of a home than she'd ever had, more of a family. And part of her was guilty for thinking that, when she'd just been with her parents last night. But everything here felt so good, so right.
And it wasn't even noon yet, but she already knew this was the best Christmas she'd ever had.
A/N: Thanks for reading, everyone! Please review if you're able.
'Til next time...
-SC