Work Text:
“Fuck you, you cock sucking bastard.”
The door to the quiet Berlin apartment flew open, allowing one snow covered, shivering Lovino Vargas to stalk inside. Gilbert followed, chuckling and shaking the damp from pale, windswept hair.
“Don’t laugh! You threw me into a snowbank.”
“I wouldn’t have done it if you hadn’t thrown that snowball.”
“I wouldn’t have thrown the damn snowball if you weren’t such a bitch.” Satisfied with his insurmountable comeback, Lovino stomped into the living room, shedding his soaked clothes haphazardly along the way. Stripped down to his boxers, he pulled the worn throw from the back of the couch and curled into as small a ball as he could under it.
Gilbert only laughed harder. Years of self-discipline had him collecting the other’s clothes out of habit, though the shit-eating grin never left his face. “So I’m a bitch now? You know, it’s not too late for me to kick your sorry ass to the curb.”
A single hand burst forth from beneath the thin blanket, honoring Gilbert with a most glorious one fingered salute. A muffled, “You wouldn’t dare,” followed.
“You never know,” he replied, leaving Lovino to his own and wandering the ten steps it took to reach the kitchen. His voice rose to compensate for the distance, “The night’s still young!”
Lovino ignored him. He was cold. Too cold. Decorative quilts were not a substitute for—for anything, really, but like hell was he dragging his ass all the way down the hall to find something else more suitable. It was Gilbert’s fault he was chilled to the bone, so it followed that it was Gilbert’s responsibility to warm him. “So fucking stupid…”
Suddenly something warm and heavy clonked down on the top of his head. “Any other night I’d call you out on that, but it’s Christmas Eve and I’m feeling generous today,” announced his lover. He knocked against his skull again. “Either move out of there or let me in, cuz you’re letting the drinks get cold.”
“…” The lump that was Lovino shifted until green eyes stared into red. “What is it?”
“Hot chocolate.” Gilbert nudged his way under the covers and offered up a steaming mug. His grin grew wide when thin fingers reached forward and snatched it from his hands, and wider still when Lovino took a cautious sip only to spit it immediately back into the cup.
“What is that?!”
Gilbert winked. “Peppermint schnapps.” He followed up by taking a long swallow from a mug of his own, watching delightedly when Lovino gave the drink a snort sniff before taking another mouthful in and swallowing it down. “It’s good, isn’t it.” It was more of a statement than a question.
“You would spike the freakin' hot chocolate,” Lovino grumbled. He slurped it loudly while giving him a pointed look over the rim.
Heaving a great sigh, Gilbert’s gaze traveled up the wall and fixed on a faraway point. Despite his best efforts to keep a straight face, the edges of his lips twitched. “I can take it back—“
“No.” Lovino’s protest came out strong. His flush came on even stronger. He turned and burrowed into Gilbert’s side, burning face hiding itself against a strong shoulder. Embarrassed heat expanded in him, blossoming out to fill his chest and curl his toes.
At least he wasn’t cold anymore.
Lips pressed firmly in his hair and a surprisingly soothing voice spoke there quietly, “We can’t let it go to waste, right?”
A short nod. “Right.”
Gilbert laughed again, softly this time, before shooting upright. At Lovino’s confused look, he shook his head and reassured, “Just wait here.” When his lover still seemed unsure, Gilbert leaned down and kissed him, a gentle touch of their mouths, before pulling away and running off down the hall.
A few stomps and an alarming thud later, and a new cover fell across Lovino’s shoulders, this one heavier and large enough for two. A new heat sprung to life against his side, and when he turned to look, he saw flames, centers white hot, dancing and licking at the edges of a simple fireplace. He was mesmerized for a moment, in that way that only fire can mesmerize, until, “…Gilbert. Is that an electric fireplace?”
“We’re in an apartment building in the middle of Berlin.” He rolled his eyes before settling down next to him once again. “What do you think?”
“That you and your fireplace are really fucking lame,” Lovino snorted. “Who even has one of those anyMGPH—”
Gilbert had learned years ago that the best way to shut Lovino up was to kiss him until he got so caught up in it that he couldn’t even remember what he had started on about in the first place. So he did. He parted Lovino’s lips with his tongue, traced the roof of his mouth, along his teeth. He swallowed Lovino’s first surprised gasp and the small, content sounds that followed it. And when Lovino turned in his lap to wrap his arms around his neck and dig his fingers into the back of his hair, clutching for purchase as he pushed himself closer, Gilbert called his plan a success. It was a slow kiss, building in a smooth crescendo only to fall back down into complacent smooches and lingering breaths. When Gilbert finally pulled away, he couldn’t help but be proud of the way Lovino’s eyes had glazed over in contentment and simmering lust.
So it caught him by surprise, then, when Lovino schooled the beginnings of a smile into a ridiculously adorable pout and threatened, “I should kick you off the couch for that. Cutting me off when I’m trying to ridicule you.”
Gilbert gave an ugly snort and leaned in to catch Lovino’s ear in a teasing whisper, “You wouldn’t dare.”