Christmas Eve

"What should I wear tomorrow?" Shiv asked, wiping down tables in the Brewberry on Christmas Eve.

"Tomorrow?" Becca questioned, "What are you doing tomorrow?"

"She's going to Daryl's for dinner." AJ inserted, cashing up from the register whilst Becca and Lyla were tackling a deep clean of the coffee machine.

"Oh, yeah." Becca said.

"Does someone want to impress?" Lyla grinned.

"No." Shiv defended, "I just… don't know what to wear. I've never gone to someone else's house on Christmas. It's different for so many families. There's a girl in my dorm floor at college… her and her family wear pyjamas the whole day. Even at the table during dinner."

"That sounds good, actually." AJ realised, placing her hand on the little swell of her stomach, which was starting to get a little noticeable if she wore any kind of fitted top.

"Just wear what you're comfortable in." Lyla shrugged.

"What about my hair?" Shiv asked as all three of them turned to her, "What?"

"Someone is definitely trying to impress." Becca concluded, "Which is fine. I mean… it's only taken you about a year to figure it all out." She rolled her eyes.

"Nothing is going on with me and Daryl." Shiv made clear, "He just didn't want me spending Christmas by myself. And I know his mom well. It's not a big deal."

"If you say so." Lyla hummed.

"I think you should curl your hair. You could come to my place tonight and I'll put rollers in for you." AJ suggested.

"Really? You won't be busy?" Shiv asked.

"No, I done all my Christmas wrapping last week. And it won't take me long." AJ nodded.

"Ok, thanks." Shiv smiled.

They'd shut in the mid-afternoon due to it being Christmas Eve and would also be closed Christmas day and the day after, to give them all a well-deserved holiday rest after the crazy past few weeks.

"Can we just exchange gifts now?" Becca asked impatiently.

"Not until Nico gets here." Lyla said.

"And not until we've cleaned this place." AJ added.

"Does Phil not have folks to go visit for the holidays?" Shiv asked, moving on to another table to clean down.

"No, his parents are dead, and his brother is in prison." AJ said.

"Merry Christmas." Becca scoffed as AJ nodded, "Don't you think it's crazy that this is your first and last Christmas you'll have just the two of you. Before the baby comes." She said.

"I didn't think about that." AJ realised, "God, we better make the most of tomorrow then. Next year we'll be up at the crack of dawn with a screaming baby." She said, remembering to still keep her twin secret.

"But you get to play Santa." Shiv smiled, "That's so exciting."

"Yeah, it is." AJ smiled as she thought about lying out Christmas presents for her children to open in the morning. The more time went by, the more she felt herself envisioning herself as a mother.

Just as all four of them were about to turn around and tell whoever it was coming through the door that they were closed, they noticed it was Sheriff Peterson, so they opted to just stay silent.

"Sorry to disturb." He said, "April, do you have a second to talk?" He asked.

"Yeah." AJ nodded, walking out from behind the counter, "Let's talk outside." She said, heading over to the sheriff and following him outside whilst the girls carried on cleaning. They had a good enough friendship to not gossip and speculate about something so serious.

"Sorry it's not a good time." Sheriff Peterson said again.

"It's fine. We were just clearing up to shut for the holidays." AJ said, "I'm hoping you have some good news for me. It would be a nice Christmas present."

"I have news. Don't know if it's good or not." He shrugged, "It seems like Todd's parents have been actively trying to assign him a lawyer since the day he got sentenced. They've been actively trying to get him to appeal, and since there's no way around the actual case, they've been told that the only way he could successfully appeal is if you retract your statement, or you make some kind of forgiveness statement. Like restorative justice." He said.

"How do you know this?" AJ folded her arms.

"Heard it through the lawyer grapevine. DA that works for New Jersey state gave me a call. Apparently, these parents of Todd's have been relentless." He said.

"I am never going back on my statement, nor will I ever forgive that sorry excuse for a human being." AJ made clear, "I'll be dead before I do either."

"The good news is we can likely assume that Craig was hired by his parents to… scare you into making a statement. They visited him a lot when he was in New Jersey State prison. It all checks out."

"Is it enough to arrest his parents?" AJ asked.

"We gotta find Craig first. Get him to talk." Sheriff Peterson said, "But… we are making progress."

"You mean you're actually starting to take it seriously?" AJ asked.

"I was always taking it seriously. We just didn't have enough evidence. Now we got some." He said.

"Because you're finally doing something. You're calling people and investigating it. That's all I wanted." AJ said, "What about Shiv's computer? You get anything from the email?"

"We couldn't get a trace on the IP address." He shook his head.

"So, what's the next step? Just keep waiting for Craig to appear again?" AJ asked.

"We're going to do our best to find him and put him away. Given the fact he's broken his parole, he'll be back in prison for a long time." He nodded.

"And the parents? They'll be punished?" She asked.

"If Craig gives them up and tells us he was doing their bidding. Yes." He nodded, "If he doesn't, we'll keep surveillance on them. I'm in communication with the officers at the New Jersey Precinct that dealt with your case." He added as AJ nodded.

"Mija, is everything alright?" Aunt Nico asked, appearing from behind with lots of gift bags and wrapped Christmas presents.

"Yeah, tia. All good." AJ forced a smile, "The girls are inside. I'll be there in a minute."

"Ok, baby." Aunt Nico nodded, looking the sheriff up and down before heading into the Brewberry.

"More cops will continue to patrol the town. Morning, noon and night." He nodded to her, "I hope you can somehow enjoy the holidays. I promise you, we're working on it."

"I'll try my best." AJ nodded to him, "Thanks for updating me." She said, before heading back into the Brewberry where the girls were getting all their Christmas gifts out for each other, ready to exchange like they did every Christmas Eve.

"Everything ok?" Lyla asked AJ with concern.

"Yeah. Fine." AJ gave her a reassuring nod, "Let's exchange gifts." She smiled.

"What kind of update is that? He's just telling us everything we know already." Punk shook his head, standing in their kitchen later that night making dinner whilst AJ sat over at the table, relaying everything the sheriff had told her today.

"Yeah, I know, but at least he's getting concrete evidence now. Speaking to DA's and keeping in contact with the New Jersey PD." AJ said, "He said if they get Craig and he throws Todd's parents under the bus then they could go to prison too."

"How can it be this difficult to find one guy? He's got an APB on him for Christ sake. Surely some police department has to get their eyes on him. And what the hell is he getting out of it anyway?"

"Uh… money." AJ said obviously, "Todd's parents are rich."

"And then he has the cheek to tell you to have a good holiday?" Punk turned to her, "I would have had something to say about that."

"That's probably why he spoke to me on my own." AJ scoffed, "If there's one thing I've learned from you through all of this, above the fact you're ridiculously protective, is that you have zero chill. Whatsoever."

"You're right I don't. Not when it comes to you, and the babies." He nodded, "Stupid fuck telling you to have a good holiday when there's some guy out there actively trying to terrorise you. He's a moron."

"He might be." AJ agreed, "But… I think he is trying. He seemed genuine today. He's found out so far that Todd's parents are trying to get him out on appeal, and he's found out about Craig getting visits from them. It's not much but he's doing something." She nodded, "And he's got more police presence on the streets. I actually have felt safer with there being more cops around."

"He's got until the new year to find Craig." Punk said.

"And then what?" AJ folded her arms unhappily at him.

"As a former lawyer, I have PI connections." He told her, "I didn't want to bring it up in case it scared you."

"I don't need you going rogue, Phil." AJ scoffed, "We've been over this."

"I'm not going rogue. That's the whole point of a PI. They do the work for you." Punk shrugged.

"Why would you even have those kinds of connections? Shady ass." AJ shook her head.

"They can come in handy on the job." Punk shrugged.

"Just let the sheriff keep working on it." AJ said, "And we will enjoy the holidays. The girls reminded me today that… this is our first and only Christmas just the two of us. Isn't that crazy?"

"Oh, yeah." Punk realised, "That is crazy. We're gonna have two other mouths to feed next Christmas."

"I know." AJ widened her eyes with amazement.

"Did you guys exchange your gifts?" He asked.

"Yeah, it was fun." AJ smiled, "Lyla got me a heated blanket. It's so cool. And Shiv got me the cutest sweater. My aunt spoiled all of them as usual." She said.

"You're all adorable." Punk nodded.

"You and the boys didn't exchange gifts?" AJ grinned teasingly.

"As a matter of fact, I did get them something. The little shits didn't get me nothing." He shook his head.

"Oh." AJ laughed a little sadly, "What did you get them?"

"New work aprons. This one has their name printed on it." Punk nodded as AJ laughed a little.

"Wow, I bet they were thrilled." She chuckled.

"They should have been. Wasn't cheap." He scoffed as AJ smiled, getting up from the table and walking over to him, hugging him from behind.

"I bet they secretly loved it." AJ assured him as he turned to the side and kissed her head, "Do we have everything in for tomorrow? Enough food?"

"Enough food for about fifty people, yeah." Punk nodded, turning around to face her.

"We're gonna have a great Christmas. I want to remember this one." She nodded, taking his hands in hers, "Nothing else needs to matter. Not for the next couple days."

"Yeah." He said softly.

"Shiv is coming round tomorrow so I can put rollers in her hair by the way." She said as Punk raised a confused brow, "She wants to have nice hair for going to Daryl's for dinner."

"Of course she does." Punk nodded, "I feel like the old woman at the end of the Titanic movie, waiting on them just getting together." He said, "It's been eighty-four years." He mimicked in a croaky voice as AJ laughed loudly, leaning her head on his chest as he smiled. Hearing her laugh was and always would be his favourite thing ever.

"You sound like Linda." She chuckled.

"Hey. Mean." He gasped as she smiled, looking up at him as he looked down at her with equal amounts of love in their eyes.

"Do you wanna just skip dinner?" She said quietly, wrapping her arms around his neck.

"We'll have it after." He said, suddenly lifting her up and putting her over his shoulder as she giggled, "You'll need some sustenance after I'm done with you." He slapped her ass as she giggled over his shoulder, getting carried off into the bedroom.