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Like it did every year, February 9th crept up on Simon without him noticing it.
When he was growing up, his forgetfulness hadn't been too much of a problem. Back on Osiris, all of the preparations were done for him. He would be taken to be fitted for new clothes at some point in early December at the same formalwear boutique his family patronized for every special occasion, then the family would go out for lunch. The outfits were always ready the week before the festival, which meant it was also haircut time. River had always hated getting her hair cut and by the time she was four she'd learned how to leverage sitting quietly in return for extra pineapple cake. Their parents hosted a party every year and Simon and River would sit at the top of the stairs and watch the parade of floral arrangements and banners and huge painted lanterns trickle into the great room. The tradition changed very little when he made surgeon and began his adult life—he was still taken to the formalwear boutique (his mother had insisted that it would not do for her son to be seen in the same New Year suit as the year before and she knew he would never book the appointment on his own) and still taken out to lunch (but with more scrutiny focused on him alone now that River was away) and there was still the spectacle of party staff in and out of the Tam estate (though he no longer had the free time to spend watching them).
This year on Serenity, it crept up on him even faster without the reminders of suit fittings. One day it felt like every planet they stopped on or got news from was hosting a spooky harvest festival and then suddenly fuel stations all had a bright red and gold display of candy boxes. Simon wasn't even sure where Christmas had gone, but when he voiced this out loud, Wash reminded him that they'd been three weeks into a month and a half long flight that had departed from the Core on Christmas, so of course Simon hadn't seen as many displays of Christmas décor; he'd been sequestered on the ship and then they'd been in the Black.
There hadn't been much of a Christmas celebration on board either, which Simon had sort of expected, considering the captain's current attitude towards the faith he'd been raised in. Simon was under the impression that most of the enthusiasm around holidays and celebrations on the ship was held together through Kaylee's willpower, seeing as she'd brought out crumbling garlands to string across doorways and a few fake tree branches that she artfully arranged on the galley table. Shepherd had given a Christmas sermon for Kaylee and Jayne that Simon and Inara had sat in on to fill seats and show respect. The gifts had been fairly bare bones: Simon had bought a jacket for River (it was a nice one and once he filled the pockets with candy it pulled double duty as her birthday present) and managed to find a roll of unusually nice pink and white striped ribbon at a flea market that he'd given to Kaylee. River had begged several washed clean medicine bottles off of him two months earlier and she'd filled them with sequins and beads she found before sealing them with solder and giving them to Kaylee. Kaylee's present to him and River had been popcorn balls—similar to the ones she'd shared with the whole crew, but a special batch with more expensive marshmallows and a little bit of cinnamon.
Simon guessed that Chinese New Year celebrations on Serenity would be similar. A few presents between folks who were used to giving each other things, maybe a toast led by Inara. He planned on his usual yearly ritual: clean his space and cut his hair in the week before (or more likely ask Inara if she could help him with it) and see if he couldn't find a red envelope for River. He would have liked to find a new dress for River; something red, ideally, but there was nothing affordable in any of the stores he found himself in during January. Her hair was also getting a little too long for Simon's comfort (he grimaced every time he saw her leaning close to the spinning engine core with her hair hanging around her face) but he didn't want to upset her by insisting she do the traditional cut, even if it was only an inch or two.
He didn't really give the upcoming holiday another thought until they landed on Beaumonde for refueling the first week of January and Kaylee slipped off to do some shopping. She came back with the replacements for two tools that she'd been complaining about for nearly a month as well as a pack of thirty red envelopes.
"I figure everyone is going to want to give at least one," she said firmly, distributing them after dinner. "But don't seal them, okay? Because if you leave them unsealed and just tuck the flap in or use a little sticker, then I can collect them and we don't have to buy new ones next year."
Reusing things that most folks Simon grew up with would have tossed out seemed to be the norm. Over the next week, Kaylee produced more decorations than Simon would have thought possible to store in a bunk that was already housing an enormous fluffy ballgown and three bins of overflow scrap metal and also an entire woman. There were strings of collapsible paper lanterns, couplet posters, and plastic versions of paper cuttings that could be affixed to the bulkhead by wiping them with a damp cloth and smoothing them onto the metal. Kaylee appointed herself the director of décor and Wash and River were happily serving as her lieutenants.
Jayne gave Kaylee back most of his share of the red envelopes since he had to send his money home via Cortex and not in a physical lai see, but he hollered for them all to come look when he did his next transfer at the post office and showed them the little seasonal red envelope animation on the screen.
"We should have a bit of a party," Inara said one evening as they were all cleaning up. "I know we're doing lai see, but I'd love to celebrate with all of you this year. I was with a client last year," she explained to Simon, "but no one has requested my company for Spring Festival."
"A party with a big dinner?" Wash asked hopefully. "If we change our trajectory just a hair, we can pick up food for that the day before on Greenleaf."
The journey to Greenleaf saw them all buzzing with excitement over the idea of having an excuse for a big dinner of real food. Wash turned on the ship-wide audio system and played a bit of holiday music, including several unbearably schmaltzy songs from a children’s Chinese New Year album that must have been a staple in every single household in the ‘Verse, because Simon found that not only did he know them, but he was also unfortunately singing the chorus under his breath as he got ready for bed.
Simon chipped in like everyone else for the shopping on Greenleaf, providing a little bit of cash to the pool meant for the meat and fish and also buying three packs of dumpling wrappers and a big round tin of candy and one bottle of millet wine. The weight of the upcoming celebration really only hit him when the crew returned to the ship at the docks on Greenleaf after doing business and buying supplies and the captain walked up the ramp with a net bag full of oranges in one hand. By the time they were breaking atmo, he was arranging them into pyramids on the galley table. He noticed Simon standing in the doorway and scowled at him.
"What?"
"Nothing, nothing. I just didn't think you'd be the one to buy the oranges."
"Well, ain't they good for you?" Mal snapped as he continued to balance the oranges. "Got vitamins and whatnot? I don't want my crew getting sick."
"Of course," Simon agreed, trying his very hardest not to giggle.
Inara took charge of the logistics of the dinner, seeing as it was her idea. She wrote out a whole menu in her perfect handwriting, despite the fact that the paper was quickly subject to all the chaos of the kitchen. The prep was a mess, and Simon eventually assigned himself to washing mixing bowls and making sure that any and all surfaces were cleaned as quickly as possible. The dumpling filling went into refrigeration and then Mal kicked everyone out of the galley so he could make some sort of Shadow-specific fried snack that made the whole room (and him and his coat) stink of oil.
Simon awoke the next morning and put on his vest with the red and white squares, seeing as it was the only red garment he'd packed. For a minute he considered putting on his little round glasses; it would definitely get a laugh out of River and Kaylee, but it would probably also get a laugh out of Mal and Jayne, which he was less interested in.
"Xīn nián kuài lè," River sang out as Simon knocked on her door. She flung her door open dramatically to reveal she had a red scarf borrowed from Inara that she'd tied at the corners and was wearing like a jacket. She struck a few exaggerated model poses to show it off.
"Xīn nián kuài lè," he returned, laughing, and gave her the lai see he'd put together before pulling her into a hug. It struck him how different this sort of celebration was from the kind they’d had back on Osiris, with the brand new outfits and catering and lai see full of sums that were so high they were really meant to go directly into investment accounts. Here on Serenity he gave her pocket money out of his cut from jobs anyway and he'd managed to somehow double the amount for the holiday, but her face lit up and she did a complex little celebration dance up and down the hallway, twirling to let her borrowed scarf flutter and billow around her. Simon could not remember her celebrating so freely during her childhood.
The morning was spent doing usual tasks around the ship. Seeing as they were flying and not making deals with shady characters, Simon didn't anticipate any actual work for himself, and figured that he could take a break from looking at brain scans in order to sit in the lounge with River and play a tile laying card game for a while. When she got bored with that and wandered off, Simon went over the medications he had her on and made sure that none of them reacted badly with alcohol—it would be nice for her to be able to have a little glass of the millet wine if she wanted.
Cooking for the dinner started right after lunchtime. Inara delegated tasks with an efficiency that suggested party planning had been a class at the Companion Training House. Simon was relegated to dumpling duty with Book and Zoe. Once he got the hang of it, it was fun. He found it easy to fall into a rhythm and didn't realize how absolutely mesmerizing it was until he felt someone shake him gently by the shoulder and found he'd been ignoring Book and Zoe.
"Oh, sorry."
"Not an issue. You have something on your mind?" Book asked.
"Not really," Simon admitted. "I just…the dumplings…it's very meditative."
"Mm, true! We should find you something like this for a hobby. Sewing or origami, maybe."
"Like cleaning guns," Zoe offered. "I get the same way when I do my big monthly full arsenal check. Just turn on some music, turn off my brain a little, and let my hands work."
When it came time to actually cook everything, they came to the quick realization that it was best if just a few of them stayed in the vicinity of the stove so they didn’t crowd each other. Kaylee, Book, and Wash took over, cooking rice and boiling noodles and making sure the fish wasn't burning and arranging the dumplings in the pan in batches of eight. Simon assigned himself clean-as-you-go duty again while Inara occupied herself with setting the table to her precise vision. Jayne put himself on bartender duty until Zoe noticed he'd already downed a good portion of the baiju and took over. Mal was quietly setting up bowls of snacks and passing them off to Inara to arrange on the table.
River sat on the couch, her eight lai see lined up in front of her on the coffee table like she was the dealer at a casino.
"Everyone gave me one," she said smugly when Simon took a minute from cleaning to check on her.
"That's wonderful," Simon murmured. It really was: to see her sitting there with the proof of the affection the crew had for her was better than any present he'd ever received during his childhood.
"Everyone," River said again, her smirk intensifying.
"River, you don't need to be so—wait, Jayne included?"
"He gave me half a credit and one of those cellophane fortune telling fish that flop around in your hand."
"Is that right?"
"It says I'm cursed," she told him solemnly.
"I don't think that's true."
"Maybe you're cursed too," she suggested, holding out the scrap of plastic. "Try it."
The fish told him he was passionate.
Dinner was a feast; rice, noodles, fish, green beans, and dozens of dumplings. They'd be eating leftovers for at least two days. For dessert, Inara surprised them with soft little taro cakes that left crumbs everywhere and they opened the tin of candy Simon had bought. Eventually, Mal slipped out of the room and they listened to his bunk door open and after a moment he returned with a stack of lai see in one hand. He sat back down and shuffled the stack of envelopes in his hands.
"Well, I guess it's bonus time," he said, starting to distribute them. "It ain't much, I know, but it's something, so I better not hear anyone complaining."
"Where's mine?" River asked sweetly. Mal tsked at her.
"You already got yours. It's right there by your plate. And Inara, I figured…you worked with us on the Lassiter heist, so you get a crew bonus too."
Simon caught Zoe's smirk, even if Mal didn't.
"Harrow sent us a gift too," Wash chimed in.
"Who?" Jayne asked.
"Warrick Harrow, off of Persephone. The cattle guy," Wash explained. "He sent us a pretty good chunk of change, said he was glad to have a reliable contact. We're to split it evenly he said."
"There's something for you, son," Book said, retrieving a wrapped package from under one of the couches and handing it to Simon. Simon took it with a smile and then realized that Book was not handing packages to anyone else and was in fact sitting back down. Everyone else looked at him with expectant faces.
"I uh—”
“Just open it," Inara encouraged.
Simon opened it and found…pants. A perfectly serviceable pair of black canvas pants with reinforced knees and what looked like upwards of ten pockets.
"It's from everybody," Kaylee told him immediately.
"We noticed one of your pairs of slacks is starting to fall apart," Book added. "These will last longer."
"I noted down your size when I was on laundry duty," Wash said.
"You didn't have to…I mean, I could have bought myself some new pants."
"Bì zuǐ," Jayne snorted. "You don't spend your money on nothing 'cept medicine and your sister."
"Besides," Zoe cut in. "Divided between the eight of us, it really didn't cost that much at all."
"Eight? River—"
"So you're allowed to buy me nice dresses but I can't help buy you pants?" She asked, looking mortally offended.
"It's a matter of ship safety," Mal grumbled. "Can't be stitching folks up if your pants are falling down."
"Well, thank you," Simon said. "This has been one of the best new year's celebrations I've ever had, and I really do mean that."
"Someone go check the engine," Wash joked. "Maybe it blows up every time the doc gets misty eyed."