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Percy woke up to the sound of the front door opening. He reached across the bed and noticed that Luke’s spot was cold. His hand went to Riptide, the pen beneath his pillow. Quietly, Percy got out of bed and slipped into the hallway. The carpeted floors kept his footsteps quiet. He lifted his chin, scented the air and only smelled Luke. No, not just Luke. Percy distinctly smelled pine. It wasn’t the same as Thalia’s pine tree scent - Thalia also smelled like ozone - so Percy’s curiosity was piqued.
Percy found the source of the pine scent in the living room. A six foot pine tree was in the middle of the living room. The base was in a red bucket. Arms were wrapped around the wide tree, trying to keep it upright.
“Is that a real tree?” Percy asked. He walked around it to see Luke.
His boyfriend’s face was scratched from the sharp branches and he was sweaty even though it was cold. It was no wonder that Luke looked rough; he must have dragged the tree all the way up to their apartment by himself. Luke’s expression turned to relief when he saw Percy. “Yes. Help me get it in the corner, Percy.”
Percy helped Luke move the tree across the floor to one corner. Once it was propped against the wall, Percy stood back to stare at it. “Why did you get a tree?” They didn’t celebrate the holidays. Neither of them was religious and Luke bristled whenever the Olympians and Greek holidays were mentioned.
Luke wiped his face on the inside of his t-shirt so his reply was muffled. But it sounded like he said something about his dad. Luke and Hermes didn’t get along even after the war was over. Usually they used Percy as a go-between if they absolutely had to speak to each other. Which wasn’t often. Luke knew that sometimes Percy and Hermes spent time together and he put up with it, but he didn’t like it.
Percy sighed. “So we’re, what, celebrating Christmas this year?” he asked. He loved Luke with all his heart, their rocky history forgiven, but sometimes Luke’s antics tried him.
“That’s the plan.” Luke knelt down beside the tree and began to fiddle with some screws that Percy hadn’t noticed before, securing the tree so that it would stand up on its own. He knelt by the tree, looking up at it. His boots were crusted with snow.
Percy happened to glance down and saw the axe on the coffee table. Did Luke go out and chop down a tree himself? It would have been much easier to just buy an artificial one, or even go to one of those pop up Christmas tree farms. Finding and cutting down your own tree seemed like a lot of extra work. Percy tilted his head, studying Luke, wondering if there was more to this than just pissing off the Olympians.
Luke stood and offered Percy a smile as he walked past him, out of the apartment. It was a few minutes before Luke returned, arms ladened with shopping bags. He set everything on the coffee table, ignoring the axe, and began to pull items from the bags. There was a strand of LED Christmas lights, a strand of garland, boxes of glass ornaments, and a tree skirt. Luke took the reel of LEDs to the tree and began to string them around top to bottom.
Percy picked up one of the ornament boxes and studied them. They were decorated with glittery snowflakes and delicately painted North American birds. He carefully set that box down and picked up another ornament box. This one had snowmen decorating the bulbs, smiling cheerfully up at him with charcoal smiles. A third box had tiny reindeer carefully painted on the ornaments. The fourth box was just glittery stripes set against a matte background. Percy read the price tags and his eyes widened. These weren’t cheap ornaments. Again, Percy looked to Luke.
There was something about Luke’s body language that said there was a little bit more to this than just making the Olympians annoyed. He was careful as he laid the strings of lights just so, making them hang perfectly.
Percy picked up the garland and ripped the tag off. He joined Luke beside the tree. “What did your dad say?”
Luke bit his cheek. He wove the lights around the tree again before he answered. “He said that he always hated how mom kept putting up a tree every year even though she knew that it was for a different religion.” Another loop around the tree with the lights.
May Castellan putting up a Christmas tree surprised Percy. The few times that he’d met her, May had seemed very much into the Olympians and everything to do with them. She even had beanie babies of all the monsters. Percy didn’t really know what to make of it.
Luke continued, “Her family used to celebrate Christmas. Or still do. I don’t know. I never met anyone from mom’s side of the family.” He finished with the lights and then crawled over to the outlet to plug them in. A moment later, the lights turned on. They were pretty white lights that illuminated that corner of their living room. Luke pulled himself from beneath the tree.
Percy felt himself soften toward Luke, his irritation over Luke’s war against the gods vanishing. Of course this had something to do with that, but it also had something to do with his mother. Luke loved May even though she’s been dead since the day Rachel was made the Oracle. He started wrapping the garland on the tree. It was made to look like pine needles and pine cones and red berries.
Luke flashed Percy a grateful smile. He retrieved the tree skirt and unfolded it. The design was of stylized reindeer pulling an empty sleigh through the forest. It was pretty and Percy had to admit that Luke had good taste. Even when he insisted on getting in the way to lay out the tree skirt perfectly.
Percy worked around Luke to hang the rest of the garland. Once he was satisfied with how it looked, he stepped back.
Luke wrapped his arms around Percy’s waist and kissed his neck. He gave Percy a light squeeze, then moved away. All that was left was to put the ornaments on the tree. Luke sliced his pocket knife through the tape and took the lids off the boxes.
Percy began hanging ornaments. He was very, very careful not to drop any. The carpet might be soft enough not to break them, but Percy didn’t want to take that chance.
Together they hung ornaments until the tree’s branches were full and they were out of ornaments. Then they stood back and surveyed the new addition to their apartment. Luke put his arm around Percy’s waist and rested his cheek against Percy’s head.
“It looks nice,” Percy ventured. He leaned against Luke, took comfort in the familiar touch.
“It does,” Luke agreed.
“No topper?” Percy asked, indicating to the branches at the very top of the tree, which lacked decoration.
“I thought about a star but that feels like it’s pushing it,” Luke admitted. The idea of an angel topper wasn’t even considered. The only good thing about Luke’s rebellion against the gods was that while he toed the line, he never actually stepped over it again. Not like when he was younger. As if reading Percy’s mind, Luke turned his face to kiss Percy’s hair. “Thanks for helping.”
“You could have woken me up. I would’ve gone with you,” Percy said, knowing full well that he would have been pissed if Luke actually got him up to tromp through the cold woods.
Luke snorted, seeing through Percy’s lie. “I appreciate the sentiment but I was fine on my own. It’s cathartic to cut down trees.”
“This one didn’t have a dryad attached to it, did it?” Percy asked, worried suddenly about mud and centipedes in their bed.
The look Luke gave him was so dry it was almost insulted. “There were no dryads attached to this tree.”
Percy turned his face to plant kisses begging forgiveness on Luke’s neck.
Luke made a satisfied rumbling noise in his throat. He caught Percy’s lips in a kiss. “You know, it was very cold out there in the snow this morning.” His tone was suggestive. “The sun wasn’t even up.” It was only just beginning to rise.
Percy smiled knowingly. “Oh, my poor boyfriend,” he said, playing along. “Come to bed and I’ll warm you up.”
And so he did.