Work Text:
Stocking Stuffer
"Look, Mommy! Look! Look what I gots!"
Adrian Underwood squinted her eyes, barely able to contain the snowstorm of emotions as she watched her daughter bounce up and down in front of the lit Christmas tree, waving a brand new twenty-one inch Maru doll. "That's great, baby! I'm so proud of how good you've been! Santa's brought you so many presents this year!"
"How many he bring you?"
Adrian looked over her shoulder, at the unlit tree in the background that was not visible by the web camera she was talking into. The tree was scattered haphazardly with gifts, but the ones that Santa was supposed to have brought weren't there, leaving it significantly less billowing than it had been in previous years. "Oh!" she gushed theatrically. "He left you and John so many, Cariño!"
"Did Santa leave lots for you and Daddy?" John Juergens asked, popping into the background with a Christmas gleam rivaling the twinkling tree in his eyes. He was wearing his favorite baseball pajamas, draped with a brand new toy tool belt around his waist, and clutching a glimmering new Transformers action figure to his chest.
"Absolutely!"
"Open one, Mommy!"
"Yeah, open one!"
Adrian laughed, attempting to cover up the sadness she felt from leaking out her eyes. She wagged her finger at the camera. "You know the drill, you two!" she cheerfully chastised. "We don't open presents until we're all here together!" She watched John run off screen, then saw her daughter turn her head away to look at whatever John must be doing, before the little boy ran back.
"Open yer stocking!" John bounced up and down excitedly. "Mommy says to open yer stocking!"
"John!" Amy Boykewich's voice scolded off-screen.
"You did!" John yelled back.
Adrian smirked and leaned closer to the screen. "I appreciate you trying to make me feel better this year you guys, but I'm fine, really. Ricky will be home tomorrow and we'll definitely be making up for lost time."
"Was 'makin' up fer lossed time'?"
Ben Boykewich scurried onto the screen and scooped his daughter and her new doll off the ground and spun them around, eliciting shrieks of delight from the little girl. "It's nothing, Baby." He shot a half mock glare at the screen. "Thanks, Adrian."
Adrian sat back into her seat as Amy appeared on screen, carrying two clear mugs of hot cocoa topped with mounds of whip cream, each with a candy cane poking out the side. John immediately rushed her and Adrian couldn't help but laugh as she saw her daughter follow her step-brother's lead as soon as Ben allowed her little feet to hit the ground. "Well I should go," she spoke up. "Looks like the four of you have a lot to do today and judging by the time, I'm sure you need to start getting ready for the big Christmas Feast and Leo's."
"Nonno Leo!"
"Tell Nonno Mommy said ciao!"
"We will," Ben promised, waving his hand.
"Thanks, Ben." Adrian pressed the edge of the palm to her chin and blew two kisses off of it, aimed at the children. In return, she caught two kisses and then wiggled her fingers. "Bye, babies! Merry Christmas!"
"Merry Christmas!"
"Don't forget to check your stocking!" Amy reminded at the last second, before Adrian flicked the switch on the web camera, leaving the latter no time to respond.
Adrian let her head lull back, staring blankly at the ceiling. It was as white and cold as the snow that blanketed the ground outside. As much as she loved the joys that came with building snowpeople and snowball fights, they were lost on her this year, with no one to share it with. Instead, it was actually keeping her family – specifically, her husband – away from her.
When the children had been young, she and Ricky had alternated the kids with Ben and Amy every year, so each couple had at least one child on Christmas Eve and then they'd switch Christmas Day, which would be the reverse order the following year. But that had only worked for five years, before the kids had become so close that neither couple could bear to keep them apart from each other during the holidays, forcing them to agree upon a new arrangement, this being Adrian and Ricky's first year without the kids.
Conveniently, it had also been the first year that tremulous winter weather had also kept her husband's plane from flying in on time. And it wasn't just a delay. A delay she could've handled. It had been a full on cancellation, delayed until December 26, when all the magic of the Christmas holiday would be over.
"No kids, no husband, and one lonely Latina in a rented cabin in a place ironically named 'Heavenly.'" She shuffled to the window and wiped her hand across it, wiping away a few streaks of perspiration. She leaned her forehead against the frozen glass and the exhaust from her lips fogged the glass. Halfheartedly, Adrian used the tip of her cranberry holiday colored manicure to draw RU+AU surrounded in a heart and watched it until her breath disappeared, taking the image with it.
Turning away from the window, Adrian once again faced the unlit tree and presents. The cabin was hers and Ricky's until the New Year, so various gifts that Grace and Jason had mailed from New York were there, along with presents the kids had wrapped for their parents, and ones that of course Adrian and Ricky had wrapped for them. The night prior, the Latina had been busily stuffing stockings and wrapping up the last of Santa's gifts when she'd gotten the call and the enthusiasm had fled her like a fugitive.
Not bothering to allow her eyes travel to the fireplace, she trudged across the cabin to her room and pushed the door open. She fully intended to crash immediately onto the bed and sleep until the following day, only to notice something odd in the darkness. Straining her eyes, she bent down and reached for the fuzzy shape on her comforter. "What the…" As she held the object up to her face, she realized it was her stocking. More than that, she realized it was heavy. "When did I stock this?" Confusedly, she slid her hand into the mouth of the stocking and wormed it all the way down to the toe, where she felt something hard and lumpy. Pulling it out and holding it up to her face, she realized with a gawk, "Coal?"
"Looks like you've been a very bad girl."
Adrian's fingers curled around the dark lump as she processed the familiar chuckle. Her hair flung around her head like a bat cape as she whirled around, spying a tall, chubby, red and white figure in a long white beard and cat eye glasses leaning against the wall, having been hidden behind the door. "Oh yeah?" she peeped, barely able to restrain the glee in her vocals. "And just where do I rank on the Naughty List?"
"Numero uno," he replied, holding up a white gloved index finger.
"And you came to set me straight?" Adrian inquired, sashaying closer and closer to the merry man. "Where's your sleigh?"
Santa pulled his spectacles to the edge of his nose. "Why?" he squinted. "Would you like a ride on it?"
Adrian squealed and tossed her arms around his neck. "You got my letter," she breathed into his beard.
"Jolly Old St. Nick always does."
"Don't you mean…" she wound her fingers into the fibers of the beard and tugged, revealing an apple smooth face. "…Jolly Old St. Rick?" Without allowing him to answer, she pulled him away from the wall and pushed him down onto the bed, using him as her buffer.
"Merry Christmas," Ricky crooned from beneath his wife, casting his hot breath onto her full lips.
"But your flight was cancelled until tomorrow!"
"And who told you that?" he asked mischievously, tracing the curves of Adrian's backside as he spoke.
"My…mother. Oh." She slipped her fingers beneath the edge of his hat and flicked it off. "You're very, very good!"
"That's why they call me a Saint."
Rising onto her knees, with one on each side of Ricky's torso to keep him pinned to the bed, she replied most seductively, "And I've got no shame being the sinner to your so-called 'saint.'" She held up her hand, still cupped around the lump of coal, and tossed it to the floor. Then with a smirk, she frisked her hand down the side of his face, leaving a black streak. "Looks like I've already got you dirty."
His hands flowed over the swell of her hips, into the pull of her waist, and then one peeled back her PJ top as the other followed the warm current of her spine. As Adrian lifted her arms obligingly, he tugged the shirt up and over her head, revealing a stunning new Victoria's Secret Santa red bra, encrusted with little emeralds in holiday fashion. Ricky cupped his hands around her waist, pulling her down to his level to capture her in a kiss, only for his wife to turn away, causing him to kiss her neck instead.
"I can't believe I thought I was going to spend the holidays without you," she purred as she unzipped the coat of his Santa suit to reveal the ripples of the bare chest she knew by heart. Pulling his arms out she added, "Ben and Amy were onto this, weren't they? That's why she kept trying to get me to go check for my stocking."
Ricky sniggered as he sat up, pushing Adrian backwards onto his lap. "But you're always the stubborn one, aren't you?" He wrapped his arm around her waist and began to pull her close.
Adrian suddenly wriggled and swung herself around, enabling herself to wrap her legs around Ricky's waist from her position on his lap, giving her full access to the waistline of his velvet pants. "How else do you get on the Naughty List?"
"Oh, I could think of a few ways…" He stood up and wrapped one hand around her pert rump and the other around supported her back. Since high school, it had always been one of their favorite ways to start out a romantically charged evening.
"This is what you call taking the holiday by the holly," she explained before grasping both sides of Ricky's face and pulling him into an intensive lip lock that could've shamed mistletoe. "You ready to go all the way, Old Man?"
"Baby," he husked into her ear. "The North Pole is all yours. Take Santa ho ho home!"