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“You made this for me?” Eliot looked down at the soft mass in his hands, holding the gift like a bomb that could go off any second.
“Yeah! It’s a hat, made one for you and Parker. I’d read this article, see, that said you should have a hobby that doesn’t involve screens just to like take a break? So I remembered nana teaching me how to do stuff like this and thought I’d give it a go between cons, sometimes on them if I was waiting in Lucille for a while you know? I just-“
“Thank you.” Eliot cut off the rambling, it was usually a soothing sound, but right now the words were filling him up and pushing the feelings he’d buried down deep a long time ago towards the surface. He distracted himself with carefully turning the hand-knitted bobble hat over in his hands. The wool was so soft, a contrast to the rough calluses adorning his fingers and palms. It was a cheery red, with white woven into the wool strands for texture. It was a simple pattern, but executed with the expert precision Eliot had come to lo- appreciate from the hacker.
“It’s no problem.”
Eliot looked up and found the words he so desperately wanted to say forming on the top of his tongue, coiled and ready.
“I found them!” Parker dropped then into the conversation. Quite literally, as she had disappeared upstairs as soon as Hardison announced he had a present for them both and had now decided to take the express route down. Jumping.
“Dammit Parker.” There was no heat behind his words, and the thief simply ignored him and shoved a fabric lump into his hands.
Tucking Hardison’s gift under his arm, he inspected the new prize. As he unfolded the blue fabric bundle, he realised what he was looking at.
“Parker, did you, umm, buy… us both hats?” Hardison was looking at her with confusion and a softness that made Eliot’s tattered heart ache.
“I made them, did you make this one?” Parker had torn into her own present from Hardison, and was looking at the black bobble hat with an excitement usually only reserved for stolen goods.
“Yeah, Baby, I did.”
“It has strings to tie it on my head!” Parker proceeded to do exactly that, grinning and fiddling with the pom poms at the end of the ties.
Eliot stayed quiet, turning the soft, fleece lined beanie over in his hands. It was a deep rich blue, and the lining was brighter with a pattern similar to his favourite bandana. The words were so close to spilling out now, but almost more pressing was the lump sitting in his inside left pocket, practically burning him the longer he kept them hidden.
“This is wild man, only thing weirder would be if Eliot had got us hats too!” Hardison was joking, but his smile faltered when he looked at Eliot. An Eliot who found himself unable to look at either one of them in the eye. “Eliot?”
“Are you okay? You look a little sweaty, are you sick?” Parker slapped her hand to his forehead looking concerned.
“Ow, Parker no I’m fine.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“Yeah dude, you can tell us you know. If this is too much…?” Hardison, beautiful caring Hardison with his heart not only on his sleeve but wrapped around his entire being like a shield, broke down that final barrier in his soul.
He opened his mouth to speak, to let the words loose.
He couldn’t form a syllable.
With a growl of frustration, he dug his hand into his coat pocket, tugging out two carefully constructed woollen beanie hats. A purple one with delicate lacework for Hardison and a black one for Parker that featured complex ribbing for decoration.
He couldn’t say a word, but when he looked at how the two handled the carefully crocheted pieces, how they looked and caressed them, he wondered if he even needed to.
“You know, I’m gonna have to marry you now.”
Elliot's head snapped round to Hardison so fast he felt something pop in his neck.
“It’s marriage or you legally become my brother because once nana sees this that’s your only option.”
“Hardison-“
“I’m takin’ this home to nana. You Just wait. She’ll probably send you an invitation to your own wedding.”
“Can I come?” Parker looked up from the hat, where she had just been casting a thief’s gaze over every detail.
“Baby, Nana already told me I have to marry you so we can just make it a double wedding.”
Satisfied, she nodded and returned to her careful examination.
“I can’t-“ Eliot couldn’t vocalise it, didn’t know if he would ever have the words to explain. But Hardison softened anyway.
“Don’t worry, we got time. What you say we give these hats a test drive?”
Eliot nodded. He thought that the next person to understand him like that, without words, beyond words, would terrify him to the very core of his being, but here? Standing with Parker and Hardison having all created something to ease a minor discomfort simultaneously? Well that just felt like something special. He tucked the words he couldn’t say into every stitch, and it seemed that maybe, if for once in his life he was lucky, those same words were etched into his own gifts.