Work Text:
Christmas had always been one of Garreth’s favourite holidays. Spending the days leading up to it around the castle with his friends, bringing his partner MC home for the actual holiday, and just being with people he loved was always the highlight of his year. For most of his life, he’d enjoyed the whole season. In fact, one of his mother’s favourite stories to tell about him was centred around one of his first Christmases.
When he was small, he was quite an escape artist. From the second he could crawl, he was always on the move. Once he could walk, he would wander around, pick things up, and then drop them as he moved on to the next thing. This was all fine and cute most of the time, but when it was around the holidays, and he would throw glass ornaments on the floor after plucking them off the tree, things became much riskier. His parents tried everything they could to keep him away from the tree, to avoid him cutting his little feet on the broken shards, but tiny Garreth was determined to get his hands on the shiny baubles. Even hanging them out of his reach didn’t work- he always found a way to grab them.
In the end, his mother decided to keep him around her at all times. Always keeping an eye on him. At first he had thrown tantrums, but in the end he realised he liked being with his mother. He would toddle around as she cooked and baked for Christmas dinner with his aunt, and once he was a bit older he would help around, too.
When he was 3 years old, he tried to help his mother bake some cookies for his siblings and cousins. He didn’t really do much to help, he mostly just sat there and watched, sometimes handing his mum ingredients, but he felt like he was being very helpful. Things were going well, until he picked up the flour to carry it to his mother. He made it halfway across the kitchen with the bag held firmly in his arms, until his clumsy toddler feet caught on a slightly raised tile and he went crashing to the floor. The flour exploded all over, covering him completely and scattering. There was so much of it that his fiery ginger hair looked almost blond.
He cried and cried about it, both because he’d spilled the flour and bumped his head on the way down, until they’d cleaned up and started over.
Even now, so many years later, his mother loved to talk about that. Especially since Garreth had become much more competent as a baker. At least he didn’t cause that much chaos these days.
Well, most of the time.