Work Text:
Christmas Eve
New York was never quite the wonderland the Christmas movies had promised. There was no soft powder drifting past warm-lit windows, no fresh white blanket muffling the streets like a secret. Only sludge - grey, granular dirt - congealing in the gutters and lacing its way across the sidewalk. It clung to her boots with grim determination, leaving a stain along the suede that would probably never come out.
Of course it was the new ones. The nice ones. The ones she’d told herself were a practical investment because they were low heeled and, therefore, could go from boardroom to back alley in an instant. Meg sidestepped her third oncoming shopper too wrapped up in their own festive emergency to look where they were going, and decided she hated Christmas.
At least she hated this version of it: all raw wind, sharp elbows, and festering expectations. The cold had teeth, but the sky above was worse, one long blanket of static grey casting everything in the flat, fluorescent light of a doctor’s waiting room. Above her, a string of Christmas lights fizzled against the sky, half-burnt and blinking like they regretted ever trying. A speaker somewhere was coughing up Jingle Bell Rock with all the enthusiasm of a dying smoke alarm.
It was bleak enough that, if this were a Hallmark movie, she might be due an escape. A small town covered in snow that actually stuck, and locals with flannel shirts and heartfelt life lessons. She’d find herself in a community that ran on gingerbread and emotional sincerity, open a year-round Christmas store, and learn the true meaning of whatever it was she was meant to be missing.
But that would require a higher tolerance for whimsy than she’d ever possessed, and significantly fewer moral compromises. She doubted the women in those movies had either the cynicism or the criminal record that she’d been carving out with startling efficiency.
Best stick with the city, at least it knew who she was.
It was Christmas Eve. In previous years, she’d be on the train by now with New York fading behind her and Esme at her side, both of them hauling tins of sugar cookies that had become increasingly deranged the longer the decorating had gone on. They always started strong, snowflakes, bells, the occasional rogue reindeer, and descended slowly into chaos as the eggnog kicked in. Esme insisted on making it herself, a homebrew situation that tasted like melted candlewax and optimism.
They’d be trying not to laugh as Meg fought with the sleeves of whatever festive sweater Esme had bullied her into wearing that year. Once it had had bells. Actual bells. She’d threatened to cut them off with her teeth if Esme didn’t stop smirking.
The Coopers had always welcomed her. Loud, open, chaotic in a way Meg had never fully understood but couldn’t help circling like a moth. Esme’s mother would fuss over her as if it were a competitive sport - offering second helpings, warm socks, unsolicited advice. Siblings would sneak her extra prosecco and drag her into card games she didn’t know the rules to. The house itself seemed to swell with noise and warmth and people who knew where they stood with one another. No secrets, no strategy - just collisions, reconciliations, and the kind of messy love Meg had spent most of her life mistaking for myth.
Not this year. This year, there’d been no invitation. Maybe Esme assumed she wouldn’t want to come, or maybe she’d just learned not to ask. Meg wasn’t sure which stung more.
They still texted, occasionally. Fragments rather than conversations. Meg had sent a single-line message that morning: Merry Christmas. Hope you’re warm. Three hours later, Esme had replied: You too. Look after yourself, OK?
The message said enough, but not what Meg had quietly wanted. But she hadn’t earned more. She’d made this distance. She didn’t get to resent it. Maybe next year would be different, but she’d learned to stop counting on different.
She’d stopped spending Christmas with her own mother somewhere around husband number three. They’d tried it once, the first year Haemon hadn’t come home. But without her brother’s steadying presence to keep the temperature down, she and Eurydice had made it to eleven-thirty and then detonated over lunch. They spent the rest of the day speaking only in cutlery.
Since then, Meg had braced for the twice-yearly phone call, one at Christmas, one on her birthday, usually slotted between her mother’s second and third glass of wine. A breathless recap of every minor success her cousins had accomplished this year, followed by a semi-structured lament about how Meg had wasted every opportunity life had ever afforded her. And if only she would come home, let Eurydice introduce her to someone suitable, someone solid, someone who didn’t live in ‘that godforsaken city of bad taste and worse judgement’ - then maybe she’d end up in the kind of life you could put in a Christmas letter. A proper life. The kind with shared bank accounts, legacy schools, and just enough smiling to keep the neighbours reassured.
How’s that working out for you, Mom? Meg thought to herself with familiar venom.
“I just don’t know why you insist on making things so difficult for yourself, Megara,” her mother would say, as if Meg had simply mismanaged the very easy task of being her daughter.
But this year…Meg had to admit – her mother might have a point. She tamped down that thought before it could breathe. Maybe the men in her family had had the right idea after all. But that was a whole different story.
She had the passing, slightly evil thought of giving Eurydice the honest update this year. Laying every detail out. The whole sorry spreadsheet: the deal, the danger, the man who never let go. She imagined her mother’s initial horror recalibrating in real time. The questions shifting. The morals quietly set aside in favour of more practical concerns: “Well…at least he can provide.”
Meg snorted softly at that, breath fogging the air, and turned into Gramercy Park.
The Brownstone was quieter than she’d ever known it. She wasn’t scheduled to be here. Wasn’t scheduled to be anywhere, in fact. But she swiped herself in, boots still damp from the sludge, the wet soles squeaking faintly against the polished floor as the door closed firmly behind her. Quiet wasn’t unusual here - too many secrets for noise - but this was different. This was empty.
It wasn’t that Styx officially closed for Christmas, but it seemed even organised crime observed the holiday season. Most of the clientele they did business with would have vanished to ski chalets and beach villas by now, spending their blood money on guilt-laundered family time in reputation-safe locations, like all respectable crooks.
There was probably some internal memo about it somewhere, she thought. A gentle reminder that Styx, in all its high-functioning illegality, still prided itself on decorum. No hits after the 23rd. No wire transfers on public holidays. Respect the season.
Meg rolled her eyes at the thought. She didn’t like the way she was starting to sound. Like someone who'd been here too long.
She was halfway across the entrance hall when she heard the soft creak of weight on the staircase. Anton, winter coat buttoned high, a weekend bag in one hand. He moved the way he always did, like someone who didn’t need to check a mirror to know everything was exactly in place. He paused as he stepped off the final stair.
“What are you doing here?” he asked with mild suspicion, the kind that made her wonder how many spreadsheets her presence was now throwing out of sync.
Meg shrugged, shifting her weight slightly. “Just dropped by to finish a few things.”
“You should go enjoy your break.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
Anton lifted the bag slightly, as if to confirm the obvious. “Just heading off.”
She let her gaze shift deliberately to the staircase behind him. “Hmm. I assumed you lived here.”
That earned her something unexpected - a short, clipped laugh. A real one. She realised, with a small jolt, that she’d never heard it before. It startled her more than it should have.
“Contrary to appearances,” he said, mouth curling just slightly at one corner. “I do occasionally leave the building.”
“So, you running from something or just feeling seasonal,” she asked, with sly curiosity.
Anton’s brow lifted, the motion almost imperceptible. “I didn’t realise I reported to you now.”
Meg gave a dry, unimpressed sigh. “You’re a real slice of holiday cheer, Anton.”
“And you?” he countered. “Any big plans?”
She considered lying. Something about a friend’s place or a party or an out-of-town thing that didn’t exist. But the truth sat cold, and she was too tired to dress it up.
“Just me, a bottle of absurdly overpriced wine, and enough pasta for a dinner party I’m not having. Very traditional.”
He didn’t laugh this time, but looked at her with something like understanding flickering beneath the surface. Not pity. Anton didn’t do pity. But something in him shifted, as if she’d revealed more than she meant to. For a second, Meg forgot she was standing in the front hall of a criminal empire. It could have been anywhere - two people in winter coats, lingering longer than they needed to. Waiting on something they weren’t saying. Her eyes drifted, slow and idle, toward the upper landing. Anton caught it, because of course he did.
“He’s not here,” he said.
Meg didn’t look back, “Wasn’t asking.”
“Didn’t say you were.”
The silence returned, this one held its shape a little longer. That was the thing about Anton - he rarely pressed. He didn’t need to, he left the weight of observation right where it landed, and let you carry it yourself.
He adjusted the bag in his hand and turned toward the door, already on his way out, pausing just before the threshold.
“Kill the lights when you leave?”
Meg nodded once.
The smile he gave her was small, but it felt like one he meant.
She didn’t have much to do, just a few emails, a loose thread in a report she could’ve fixed from home. Mostly, she was just circling the quiet, occupying space she didn’t know what to do with. The building was so still she could hear her own coat swish down the hallway. Even the heating system was slowly winding down, leaving the radiators clanking softly.
She rounded a corner near the back staircase - too fast - and collided, full force, with someone coming the other way.
“Shit-” she startled, she reeled back half a step, instincts tensing.
“Easy,” Flynn grinned, catching his balance like it was all part of the plan. “Not a ghost. Not yet.”
“Flynn,” she exhaled, half-scolding.
There he was in all his glorious charm. Hair mussed under a beanie, a paper bag tucked under one arm, and entirely unshaken for someone who’d just barrelled into her.
She glanced at the bag. “What’s that, bribery or blackmail?”
“Just spreading a little festive cheer to our favourite Scrooge,” he said, going for innocent and missing by a mile.
She held up a hand before he could elaborate. “Don’t tell me. I need all the plausible deniability I can get.”
Flynn gave her a smirk. “That’s the spirit.”
He glanced around the empty corridor, then back at her. “What’s your excuse for hanging around this hellhole on Christmas Eve? Because if it’s to burn the place down…” he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a lighter with a flourish, “…I come prepared.”
Meg gave a slow blink. “Tempting.”
“But?”
She shrugged. “Nowhere else to be.”
Flynn’s grin faltered just slightly. “That, Nutmeg, might be the most depressing thing I’ve ever heard,” he said. “But don’t worry. I’ve got just the thing to cheer you up.”
Meg folded her arms. “Please don’t say carolling. Or matching pyjamas.”
Flynn gasped, scandalised. “You think selling your soul to New York’s most sociopathic boss gets you out of Touristmas?” And before she could protest, he tugged her toward the nearest exit, his grip warm, insistent, and utterly unbothered by her resistance.
Touristmas - credit for the name was still hotly contested - was a tradition she half-suspected they’d let die quietly this year. But no, apparently not even being on Hades’ payroll would stop Flynn from dragging her through their annual descent into festive nonsense.
It was simple in theory: a long, meandering walk through the city, dodging last-minute shoppers and wide-eyed families with matching scarves, taking in the lights like they hadn’t seen them all before. They played tourists in their own city, each adopting an elaborate persona that had to be maintained for as long as possible, no matter how absurd. The more unhinged the backstory, the better. The loser - determined by an obscure and constantly shifting rubric of character commitment, voice work, and public embarrassment - was forced to concede a full year of bragging rights.
The highlight of the night was always some horrifically on-brand New York attraction. The sort of thing neither of them would be caught dead at any other time of year. She hadn’t realised until now how much she’d been hoping it wouldn’t happen. Or maybe just how much she’d hoped it still would.
There had been… ‘highlights’ over the years.
Saskia and “Ranger” Mike, for one, star-crossed lovers from Montana who’d met at a syrup festival and never looked back. They’d braved the Empire State Building together, Flynn narrating their ascent in a heavy drawl while Meg tried not to hyperventilate on the observation deck, clinging to the rail and muttering about her will.
Then there’d been Quentin and Claribel - minor royals from ‘Greater Blighty’, in town to fund their original musical inspired by their governess who had disappeared under suspicious circumstances. Flynn’s accent had shifted three tax brackets over the course of the night. Meg’s tiara had given her a headache for three days.
This year they decided up Anika and Torvald of Glögglandia. A proud and definitely real Scandinavian micro-nation ‘just near the fjord.’ Flynn looked faintly wounded when a server blinked at him in confusion. “You’ve never heard of Glögglandia?” he gasped, clutching his chest like someone had just spat on his flag. They were obsessed with ranch dressing. Or rather, as Anika had declared in a thick, indeterminate accent: “Rrrrænsh. Zis is your national sauce, yes?”
The night always ended the same way: one of them crowned the victor - usually by shouting it loudest - and an elaborate bodega feast assembled from impulse decisions and poor nutritional judgment. They’d eat cross-legged on the floor of someone’s apartment, passing around whatever liquor had been gathering dust at the back of a cupboard, pretending it didn’t taste like poor decisions.
It was stupid. And ridiculous. And completely theirs. And today, it felt like something from another lifetime.
Flynn’s pick this year was skating in Bryant Park. Meg had protested, naturally, citing weak ankles, thin patience, and a long-standing preference for activities that didn’t involve blades strapped to her feet. But Flynn had simply beamed, wide and unbearable, and offered her the most dangerous thing in his arsenal: a look that dared her she couldn’t do it.
Now she was lacing up rental skates that smelled faintly of mildew and humiliation, muttering curses under her breath while Flynn tried - and failed - not to look smug.
The rink glowed under strings of white lights, festive and obnoxiously picturesque. Around them, couples zipped by in practiced loops while teenagers clung to each other with performative terror. Meg gripped the siding in open protest to every choice that had led to this.
“This is a mistake, Torvald.” she announced.
“You say that about all my best ideas,” Flynn replied, already inching away from the edge like Bambi on a death wish.
They made it about ten feet. Arms out for balance. Meg shuffled forward with the solemnity of someone crossing a minefield. Flynn, to his credit, was only slightly worse.
“Real graceful,” she muttered. “I feel like a swan.”
“An angry swan, the type that hisses at toddlers.” He said as he skidded by her.
Meg snorted - but then, encouraged by her own momentum, tried to pivot and change direction. Her blade caught on something - ice, air, fate - and she pitched sideways. Flynn reached for her a second too late and went down with her. They landed in a heap, limbs tangled, pride bruised. There was a moment of stunned silence, before they both burst out laughing. It was loud and sudden and real, echoing off the ice and the cold winter sky. Meg lay there, flat on her back on the ice, eyes closed, breath steaming in the air above her. For once, she didn’t care who was watching. It was ridiculous. And it felt better than anything had in weeks.
Flynn propped himself up on one elbow, and in shaky stages, staggered back to his feet. He looked down at her still there on the ice, and said - in a thoroughly mangled accent that may have once been Scandinavian, but had now travelled through Bavaria and back: “You seem to be in some trouble there, Anika.”
Meg groaned. “Just help me up, Flynn.”
He blinked. “Gee, I don’t know who this… Flynn is you speak of.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Flynn.”
“Sorry, miss. Torvald only knows honourable Glögglandians.”
“Flynn.”
He grinned, dropping the accent. “Megara Susan Kallis, are you tapping out?”
She glared at him from the ice, the laughter still caught in her throat. “Yes. Now help me, you theatrical menace.”
Only then did he reach down, gripping her wrist and hauling her upright in one slightly wobbly motion. Together, they skated – stumbled - back to the edge, clinging to the edge like war survivors.
“You’re going to be insufferable about this,” Meg muttered.
“Win’s a win, sweetheart.”
“You had an unfair advantage. You know I don’t have the ankles for this.”
“That’s your excuse for everything you’re bad at.”
“Fine,” she said, peeling off one glove with her teeth. “You are the undisputed king of Touristmas. Long may you reign.”
Flynn bowed, exaggerated and courtly, only narrowly missing a second fall, “Thank you. And, as my first royal decree, I require coffee.”
She shivered. “Great. And as your loyal subject, I demand you buy it. I’m freezing.”
He offered his arm like a gentleman. “Come, peasant. I’m a benevolent ruler.”
And off they went, skates unsteady, limbs chilled, laughing all the way.
By the time they started the slow walk back toward the loft, their feet were sore, fingers stiff, and adrenaline from the fall was mellowing into something looser.
Flynn steered them off course, as always, diverting through the streets with the best lights, the kind that made the city look like it hadn’t completely given up on magic. Whole blocks glowed under garlands strung between lampposts. Storefronts competed for attention: moving dioramas, velvet bows, glowing trees suspended mid-air. It was all too much, and somehow not enough. They made a game of rating the displays. Flynn gave bonus points for anything that looked structurally unsound. Meg docked them for every forced metaphor and overuse of glitter.
Around them, the streets buzzed with the panic of last-minute shoppers - parents dragging children, husbands looking increasingly rattled, people darting across intersections like their lives depended on gift wrap.
The day had disappeared entirely now, the last of the light swallowed behind buildings. They stopped at a coffee cart glowing faintly against the dark of Christmas Eve. A halo of steam rose from its roof vent, lit gold by a string of fairy lights someone had wound haphazardly around the frame. The effect was oddly beautiful - like the part of a dream that lingers just before waking.
Flynn squinted at the hand-scrawled menu, taking entirely too long to compare the merits of ‘double marshmallow’ versus ‘peppermint swirl.’ Meg crossed her arms, breath fogging in front of her with every exhale. Her toes were starting to go numb. She didn’t complain. Not yet. But she was dangerously close.
Neither of them noticed him at first. Which was strange, because he wasn’t exactly subtle - tall, broad-shouldered, carrying a tray stacked with six coffees and moving with the kind of over-careful balance that screamed this is going to go badly.
He wasn’t a tourist. Not by the look of him. More like someone who’d grown up in the city but had never quite adjusted to its elbows-out rhythm. Everything about him was too open, too hopeful. Like he still hadn’t learned that eye contact here meant danger, or flirtation, or both.
Meg turned to the counter and caught the tail end of motion. A sideways step, a twist of momentum, and then, contact. One of the guy’s cups lurched on the tray. Wobbled. Tipped. Flew. Lid popping off mid-air, and a wave of heat splashing directly down the front of her coat. She froze - not from the heat, but from the sheer audacity.
The man in question blinked at her, stricken. His mouth opened, then closed, like he wasn’t sure whether to apologise or throw himself into traffic.
Up close, he was handsome. But not in the way most men in this city were handsome, There was no angle to it, just a strong jaw, warm skin, cheeks already flushed from the cold or the shame or both. No affect. Just…sincerity.
And right now, that sincerity looked like it wanted to sink into the pavement.
“I…oh gosh, Miss…I’m so sorry…I didn’t see you…” he stammered, voice low and breathless, tray now tilting dangerously in his arms as he fumbled for napkins, for words, for dignity. One fluttered to the ground. Another caught on a breeze and disappeared. Meg didn’t move, didn’t speak. She just stared at him, expression stormy, steam rising from her coat like a smoke signal. And somewhere behind her she heard Flynn snort, like he was physically restraining a laugh, like he knew this was about to get a whole lot worse.
Meg opened her mouth - not to shout, but to eviscerate. Her unique brand of commentary that didn’t need to raise its voice to bring people to their knees. The eyebrow she arched in his direction could’ve been classified as a weapon. The pause before she spoke? Devastating.
But the guy beat her to it - still fumbling, still trying to piece together a sentence from the shards of his own mortification.
“They’re…uh…they’re for the shelter,” he said, breathless. “Late shift volunteers. I should’ve…”
Meg gave him a glare, the way she might at an art piece she found profoundly disappointing.
“Oh, very nice,” she snapped. “A good deed and property damage. You really do it all.”
She was about to launch into a full blown take down when Flynn, sensing a massacre in the making, slid in like he’d done this before.
“Woah, woah, woah,” he said, all bright cheer and disaster management, slipping the tray out of the guy’s hands before more casualties joined the count. “Let’s not let caffeine escalate into felony assault.”
The man blinked. “Oh no! I would never… I mean, I didn’t…”
Flynn waved a hand, dismissing the panic in the guy’s voice, “Not you, Champ.” He jerked his head toward Meg, who was now dabbing at her coat furiously with a napkin, blotting ineffectively, muttering curses into the wool, “Her.”
“Looks like you’ve got pretty decent aim, though” Flynn added. “Bonus points for hitting the most terrifying woman in Manhattan. Bold choice.”
“Standing right here,” Meg said testily, shooting them both a look that could have curdled eggnog.
The man looked like he wanted to apologise to the fabric itself.
“I’ll pay for the dry cleaning,” her blurted. “Or the coat. Or - I don’t know. I’m really sorry.”
Meg didn’t answer. She was still focused on the spreading stain, anger still flaring hotter than the coffee.
“She’s got twenty like it,” Flynn said breezily, steering the man away from the immediate fallout zone. “She’ll survive.”
The man looked sceptical. Flynn handed the tray back with uncharacteristic gentleness, steadying it in the man’s grip like he was disarming a bomb. “Go on. Before she starts billing by the minute.”
“Thanks,” the man said quietly. Still stricken. “Sorry again. Happy Holidays.”
He lifted the remaining cups toward them like a peace offering, or a prayer. There was something in his face - an impulse, maybe, to say something else. To stay. But he thought better of it and turned to make his escape, tray wobbling slightly in his hands, ears red, shoulders hunched like he was bracing for a hit that never came.
Flynn watched the man disappear into the crowd. “Poor guy,” he said, turning back to Meg. “I think he’s going to have nightmares.”
“So will I. This was cashmere.”
Flynn tilted his head, “Don’t sweat it…looks like he can pay for your dry cleaning after all.”
Meg looked up, frowning. “What?”
Flynn reached into his jacket pocket and, with a little flourish, pulled out a brown leather wallet.
Meg stared at it, then at him. “Flynn!”
He held it up like it was a perfectly reasonable object to have acquired. “What? Consider it reparations. Emotional distress. Cashmere trauma. The man owes you.”
“You stole his wallet?”
“Temporarily relocated,” Flynn said. “And honestly, I think it was a subconscious reflex. You can’t put someone like that in close range with a tray full of hot beverages and not expect me to lift something.”
“It’s Christmas Eve.” She reached for the wallet. He held it just out of reach.
“Exactly. The season of taking.”
“Flynn.”
He sighed, gave a little shrug, and dropped it into her waiting palm. “Fine. Spoil my festive fun.”
She took it with a groan, slipping the wallet into her coat like it physically pained her. “You’ve made this my problem now. You realise that, right?”
Flynn winked, “Teamwork.”
She elbowed him quickly in the ribs, already moving into the crowd. “You’re definitely getting coal.”
She spotted the guy a half-block up, tray still miraculously balanced, moving with the cautious urgency of someone who very much wanted to disappear into the night and never speak of this again.
“Hey!” she called, jogging a few steps after him. “You dropped this.”
He turned, confused, just in time for her to hold out the wallet.
His face lit up with such palpable relief it was almost painful to look at. “Oh - oh no. I didn’t even…I’m always losing this. Thank you. Seriously. Thank you so much.”
Meg raised an eyebrow. “Might want to keep a tighter hold of this. City like this… people’ll take advantage.”
He looked down at the coffees, then back at her, sheepish. “Guess I should be grateful it landed with the one person in Manhattan who’d give it back.”
She huffed a quiet laugh, folding the wallet into his hand. “Yeah, well. Even I surprise myself sometimes.”
“I really am sorry. About your coat.”
Meg shook her head, “Forget about it. Trust me - I’ve walked away from worse.”
He hesitated, shifting his weight. “Can I - at least buy you a coffee? To, you know, repay the damage?” Like he’d forgotten he was still corralling a tray of them.
She shook her head. “Generous. But I think we’re safer keeping additional hot liquids out of your hands, Wonderboy.”
That startled another smile out of him. “Wonderboy?”
She gave a noncommittal shrug. “Suits the whole do-gooder aesthetic.”
“Huh, thanks. I’ll just try not to spill the rest.” he blushed. “Have a good Christmas.”
Meg held his gaze a second longer than necessary, then tipped her chin. “You too.”
And just like that, she turned and walked away, coat stained, wallet returned, slipping back into the crowd. He watched her go, still holding the tray - five cups of coffee and a warm feeling he couldn’t quite shake.
It was colder here. Cleaner and sharper than the biting cold that tore down the city streets. Here it settled in and made itself known. It was the kind of cold that felt most like him.
Snow clung to the roof tiles and lay untouched across the lawn. The trees respected the hush - their branches bare, their outlines etched like charcoal against the grey. The gravel crunched underfoot. The only sound. Each step left a perfect imprint, sharp and solitary, winding down the slope like a breadcrumb trail no one would follow.
He didn’t come out here often. The housekeeper drew the curtains and kept the sheets crisp. The gardener trimmed the hedges and cleared the drive. The place didn’t need him. But he made the trip once a year. A token visit. A check on the grounds.
At the foot of the hill, half-swallowed by bramble and frost, stood the glasshouse. It shimmered faintly against the pale sky, its ribs catching what little light remained. He reached the door, turned the key in the lock. It stuck, at first - partly cold, partly lack of practice. Finally, it gave with a low, metallic clunk.
Warmth pressed against him, wet, dense, and insistent. Orange blossoms clung to a branch overhead, out of season but still persisting. The air fogged faintly against the glass, a slow whisper on every pane, thick with the scent of citrus peel, damp soil, and something else sweeter underneath. Living things.
He stood still for a moment, letting his eyes adjust. The breath of the place was different. It didn’t wait for him. It carried on living whether he arrived or not.
He didn’t like it here.
Or rather, it didn’t suit him. Too warm. Too alive. The heat felt smug in its insistence, clinging to the collar of his coat like fingers. The way the air pulsed and moved - it grated against something in him that preferred polished floors and high ceilings, stone and silence, and the clean, dry cold of places that made no promises of life.
And yet. This place wasn’t chaos. It wasn’t wild. Nothing here had grown by accident. The glasshouse ran on its own closed system: sealed, pressurised, climate-controlled. No seed took root without permission. No leaf unfurled without the correct variables being met. The temperature, the light, the watering schedule - all measured, all curated. Life, but only under leash.
That, he understood. Give them what they need. Keep the air just breathable. Let them think they’re in control.
He moved slowly down the stone path, gravel from outside still clinging to the soles of his shoes. He didn’t glance at the potted herbs near the entrance or the Asphodelus standing too proud. The trailing vines near the roof made too much of themselves for his taste. He had no patience for plants that preened. But at the far end of the room, tucked beside a cracked mosaic bench, stood a single terracotta pot.
The fig tree.
Spindly. Unruly. Not much to look at. It had never taken to the wire frames the gardener tried to train it against. Its branches curled like stubborn limbs, refusing to grow straight, refusing to be posed. But still it clung on. Still it put out its soft, broad leaves. Still it remembered how to live. It did better, apparently, when its roots were confined. A shallow pot. Limited space. Restriction made it thrive. He appreciated the irony.
He thumbed gently through a few of the leaves. A quiet ritual. He didn’t give a damn about the plant itself, but the fig tree had been her favourite. Not because it meant something, or because it flowered, but because it had been difficult. She used to say it had a mind of its own. That you couldn’t coax it, only wait for it. And when it produced fruit, it did so on its own schedule, like a secret it had decided you were finally allowed to know.
He’d rolled his eyes the first time she said it. Now he said nothing at all.
He didn’t water it. The system would take care of that. He simply stood there a while, hands in his pockets, coat still on, letting the warmth work against him. Letting himself stand in something living. Just for a minute.
Then, quietly, he turned and left the way he came. Outside it was snowing again.
They barrelled into the loft on a gust of cold air and leftover laughter, Flynn mid-story and gesturing like the drama depended on it.
“I’m telling you,” he insisted, kicking the door shut behind him. “Swimming pool-sized vault of cash. You could do laps in it. Butterfly, backstroke, breaststroke…”.
Meg dumped her keys in the bowl and shot him a look over her shoulder. “You’re confusing this with a cartoon again.”
“Thief’s honour! I’m going back with goggles.”
She snorted, peeling off her coat. The loft was dim, untouched since she’d left that morning. No tree, no garlands. Nothing festive except a faint pine scent from the candle Esme had gifted her last year - unlit and gathering dust on the shelf.
Flynn scanned the place with dismay. “This is bleak. Like, Dickensian orphanage bleak.”
She sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “Never got around to it.”
He said nothing, just nudged her shoulder with his own as they moved into the living space. They unloaded their haul onto the coffee table - a mix of chaos and holiday impulse: a tin of Danish butter cookies, chocolate-dipped pretzels, bodega trail mix with three kinds of candy in it, those weird marshmallow snowmen that always tasted faintly of cardboard, two instant ramen cups ‘for nutritional balance’, peppermint bark, and a half-smashed bag of kettle chips Flynn insisted were ‘limited edition.’
Meg kicked off her boots and crossed to the speaker tucked by the window, thumbing through a few old playlists until something halfway festive crackled to life - Ella Fitzgerald easing her way into Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. Low and scratchy and warm.
From the kitchen, Flynn was rummaging in the cupboards like he was raiding the place. “Hello, what’s this?” he said, pulling out a dark bottle with a French label neither of them would attempt to pronounce.
“Don’t even think about it,” Meg said, glancing over her shoulder. “That’s actually good.”
“Which is why,” he said, holding it to the light, “I think it’s time we elevated our Touristmas experience.” He turned, triumphant. “Do you think you can mull this?”
She scowled at him, “With what?”
Flynn held up his treasures like a magician at the world’s saddest reveal: a single cinnamon stick, and a pack of orange Tic Tacs.
She blinked. “You are not putting Tic Tacs in my wine.”
“I’m just saying,” he grinned, “they’ve got citrus. They’ve got… zing.”
“That’s not zing, that’s chemical warfare.” she said, but she moved past him to flick the stove on, and he took that as a win.
Flynn was pulling down mugs and muttering about the absence of a proper ladle, when she spotted it. A package. Wrapped in plain parcel paper, square-edged and string-tied, sitting too neatly on the end of the counter, like it had been waiting. She didn’t need to check for a tag to know.
Flynn clanged something behind her - a triumphant noise. And she moved quickly; opened a cutlery drawer, slipped the package inside, shut it. By the time he turned around, she was already reaching for the bottle like nothing had changed.
They settled in, the city quiet behind the windows, the lights low and golden. It was their own brand of celebration - no rules, no rituals, nothing festive except the mood. Just the two of them, a lopsided feast of corner-store snacks and overpriced wine they’d done unspeakable things to.
To her surprise, it actually wasn’t bad. She’d intervened before Flynn could drop the Tic Tacs into the pot, plucking them from his hand with the same deadpan look she’d used to stifle worse ideas. She’d substituted with a slightly bruised blood orange from the fruit bowl, sliced into circles and dropped into the warmth with cloves that were definitely beyond their best.
Flynn had called her a killjoy. She’d called him a recidivist. And the wine had simmered anyway. Now it sat between them in mismatched mugs, cinnamon curling at the surface.
Meg took a sip. Let the warmth sit on her tongue. Let herself feel the calm of it all. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d sat this long without checking the time, or her phone. She reached for it now, almost out of habit - then paused. Her hand hovered, and then fell away.
Flynn reached into his jacket pocket, and held something out like he was handing her the punchline to a private joke.
“Merry Touristmas,” he said.
Meg took it, a laminated scrap of paper, cut just slightly uneven. On it, in Flynn’s messy, looping handwriting, were the words: Redeemable for one (1) dramatic escape. Offer never expires.
She let out a breath, somewhere between a laugh and something smaller, more fragile. It stung - the truth of it, the impossibility - but it warmed her too. His loyalty was relentless, even when she didn’t deserve it.
“Thanks, Flynn,” she said quietly. And she meant it. She took another sip of wine, then stood. “Hang on.”
She crossed to the shelf by her desk, flicked through a sketchpad, tugged free a single page. When she returned, she passed it to him without flourish - just a torn edge and graphite smudge. A sketch of him from across a diner table that she’d drawn ages ago. Half absent-minded, quick strokes and fading lines - but somehow, still him. All ease and grin, and that one brow always halfway raised like he was about to call your bluff.
Flynn looked at it for a long moment, “You never get my nose right.”
“That is your nose,” Meg said, settling back down.
But he tucked the drawing carefully, reverently, into the inner pocket of his jacket.
They made it through nearly all the terrible snacks. Most of the chocolate-covered ones, at least. The sour-cream-something chips were quietly abandoned halfway through the bag.
Stories rolled between them - old ones, new ones, half-true ones - laid out like cards on the coffee table between the dregs of their mulled wine. The playlist began to loop somewhere around midnight, a quiet background of jazz and strange covers of holiday songs they only half heard.
Flynn drifted off not long after that, mid-sentence, slouched on the couch, mouth faintly open. Meg rolled her eyes with a fondness she didn’t bother hiding. She retrieved a blanket - one of the softer ones - and threw it over him with care. Then fetched a glass of water, placing it within arm’s reach. It wouldn’t be touched. That wasn’t the point.
She hovered a moment, watching the rise and fall of his chest beneath the throw. He’d always been able to fall asleep anywhere – subway trains, rooftops, bad apartments. And here, tonight, it felt like the kind of safety neither of them dared to count on.
He’d given her this. A day pulled out of time, when everything else had paused. No deals. No duties. Just them, like they used to be. Like maybe they still could be, in some version of the world she didn’t quite believe in anymore. She stood there a moment longer in the hush of the loft, letting their day settle into her skin like warmth from a long-faded fire.
She thought then of the guy with the coffees - the way he’d looked at her like kindness wasn’t complicated. She wondered where he was spending his night. Ladling soup somewhere, probably. Smiling at strangers and meaning it. Her gaze drifted back to Flynn, limbs akimbo under the throw. There were still good people in the world. Whether they came in the form of golden retrievers with terrible coordination - or certain thieves who knew when to show up and make the day feel like it mattered.
Eventually, she pulled herself away, bare feet quiet against the floorboards as she crossed the room. Her body was tired in that good, slow way - limbs softened by wine and warmth, heavy with the quiet of the night. But she didn’t make it far.
Her steps slowed as she passed the drawer, as if drawn by some inevitable string. She didn’t even sigh as she opened it. The package sat exactly where she’d tucked it. She lifted it out and let it rest in her hands, like it was holding something more than weight. No card, no note, no mistake about who it was from.
Across the room, Flynn gave a small, muffled snore, shifting under the blanket. Meg looked over at him - at the ease of him, the comfort. Then back at the package. With a quiet breath, she turned and climbed the stairs, carrying it with her into the dark.
Upstairs, the mezzanine was dim and still, the lights of the city slipping faintly through the windows below. She settled cross-legged on the bed, the package balanced in her lap. She stared at it for a long moment, like it might explain itself, like it owed her that much. It didn’t.
Then, carefully, she loosened the string. Peeled back the parcel paper, slow and cautious. Inside was a small frame. Simple. Elegant. Heavy with intention. The stamp on the back bore the name of a gallery uptown - one she knew only by reputation, the sort that didn’t put prices on walls, because if you had to ask, you weren’t meant to be there.
She turned it over.
Yellowed paper. Bold lines in deep, certain pencil. The unmistakable form of a New York stoop, the sweep of shadow behind it, and a lone figure stood on the step - legs bare, face lost in the heat of the city. She knew it before she even clocked the signature. Not the painting, something more intimate, a preparatory sketch.
Summertime.
She stared at it, her chest suddenly too tight. She hadn’t been back to the Whitney since that day with Theon. Before any of this had started. Before the world she’d fallen into and the one she’d lost.
She’d never told him about the painting, never would have.
This was how he worked. A memory pulled from a life she thought she’s buried. It looked like thoughtfulness, felt like something close to intimacy. But it was power: You don’t have to tell me things. I already have the answers. I know you.
There was a card nestled behind the frame, as if it had been waiting for her all along.
Merry Christmas, Nutmeg.
Her breath caught - not from sentiment, but the sting beneath it.
Bittersweet. Familiar. Inescapable.