Day One
Day One:
On the first day of Winterfic, Hazel gave to you, the Lions decorating gingerbread houses!
***Very slight Vaincre spoilers—basically just that the Lions, in the month of Dec, are not having a very good season***
“Oh no.”
Remus looked over just in time to see Finn’s icing bag more or less explode over the table. He looked down at it, horrified, while Logan beside him threw his head back and laughed, leaning into his shoulder.
“Only you, Rouge.” Logan wrapped an arm around him, palm going up to stroke his hair back from his face lovingly. “Only you.”
Celeste laughed as she set yet another bowl of another type of candy on the table. “God bless plastic tablecloths.”
“Honey, you cut your hole way too big,” Leo laughed at Finn. “I told you to show me before—okay, here take mine and squeeze—no, that’s too hard. Oh my God, Harzy.”
“I don’t have control,” Finn was laughing hard through the words, leaning back against Logan. “I don’t know Knutty, I have no idea what I’m doing.”
Logan was leaning with his elbows on the table now, face down into his forearms and shoulders shaking.
Half of the team was at the Dumais’ long dining room table, the rest on fold-outs around the edges. The tables themselves were covered—and Remus really did mean that—with bowls of candy, chocolates, frostings, anything one could think of. Logan’s dream feast, Finn had said when they’d all walked in, Celeste standing proudly beside her work. And lining the edges of them all were the forms of gingerbread houses, waiting to be decorated.
It was as rowdy as the locker room after a win, all of them sitting down like that. Sirius had stuck close to Remus’ side as they sat down beside Thomas and Noelle, who had flown in for the holidays. Logan and Finn had jostled each other as Leo pulled them into seats beside him. Finn was already making a mess of course, and Remus saw Leo edge his own neat work station subtly out of harm’s way. Logan hadn’t touched his gingerbread, too interested in eating the candy.
Remus let out a small sound when he felt his chair move beneath him, but it was only Sirius, who had reached down to scoot them close together.
“Hi,” Remus smiled.
Sirius looked soft and warm in a beanie that said Let It Snow and a long-sleeved henley, dark blue, the buttons open at the collar and revealing the chain of his necklace.
“Can we do one together?” Sirius asked. “I don’t trust myself not to be as bad as Harzy over there.”
“Oh, not so competitive now, huh?” Remus smiled. “That’s unlike you.”
“I don’t feel like being competitive, I feel like being close to you.”
That made Remus want to ditch the gingerbread all together. He tapped their foreheads together and nodded. “Okay, Gumdrop.”
Sirius made a face. “What?”
Remus laughed and reached into one of the many bowls on the table. He pressed the sugary dome to Sirius’ lips. “Gumdrop.”
“Gumdrop,” Sirius repeated, and let Remus place it in his mouth before chewing hesitantly. He swallowed and wrinkled his nose. “Non. Gumdrops are no, but you…” Sirius smiled and leaned in. Remus could taste the sugar on his tongue. “I prefer you.”
“Hm,” Remus kissed him again. “You can frost me later.”
“Wow, I am listening to true love,” Thomas said from his other side. “Just—just true fucking love.”
Sirius gave him a playful shove. “You’re supposed to be listening to your girlfriend.”
Noelle pointed her own frosting bag at Sirius from Thomas’ side. “Nothing I was saying could have compete with that.”
Remus laughed and threw a gumdrop at her.
It felt like the holidays now, even if they all only had a short time off. Even with the unseasonably warm weather. Sirius didn’t seem to mind, but for Remus it made the world feel off kilter. He wanted the snow, and the ice, and sweating in your hat while shoveling the front walk. But this. The smell of sugar, getting to be with his entire team, flying to see his family tomorrow morning, Reg coming, too. This was a good first step towards Christmas.
He watched Sirius with an amused expression, fumbling the icing bag in his large hands.
Remus picked up the scissors. “Need some help there?”
“Ouais.” Sirius laughed and leaned into him. He watched as Remus carefully made a small hole in the tip. “D’accord, what first? The top?”
“The roof?”
“Yeah, yeah, the roof. What I meant.”
“Can I make little tiles? And then we can put those little red guys on them.”
Sirius nodded. “Oh, the ones that look like goal lights?”
Remus let out a laugh. “You would say that. Here, let me—hey.”
He’d reached for where he thought the bowl of Red Hots were, only to find them tugged out of reach by a sheepish Finn.
“Hi,” Finn said.
Remus waved at his house, which looked like it had experienced an ice storm with the amount of frosting on its roof. “You’re not even using them yet.”
“But I’m eating them!” Finn said.
“Eat something else.”
“He could,” Leo held up a small red candy for Finn to take delicately from between his fingers. The gesture could have been a kiss, it was so sweetly done. “But he only likes the Red Hots.”
Finn took it, chewing and winking at Leo. “You’re red hot.”
Leo smiled before his eyes travelled past Finn to Logan. he let out a laugh, eyebrows going up. “Oh—oh my God, Lo.” He reached around Finn and pressed the back of his hand to one of Logan’s cheeks—which was bright pink. “You’re so flushed, you’ve had way too much candy already.”
“Mmm,” Logan only replied with a grin, then closed his eyes and dangled another sour rainbow strip into his mouth, tongue out until it had pooled there. He looked at Leo as he chewed. “You don’t like watching me eat candy, Leo?”
Leo, clearly fighting a smile—and sporting a deep flush of his own now—sent a pointed look at Adele and the other kids at the other end of the table, but they were too engrossed in their own gingerbread houses to notice.
“Well.” Leo took a breath.
“Come here.” Logan said, and when Leo looked suspicious, he laughed, picking up another rainbow sour-strip. “Allez, come here, Le.” He put one end of the strip between his teeth and held the other out to Leo. “Hmg, ‘ake ‘he eng.”
“That wasn’t French or English,” Finn said.
Leo rolled his eyes but leaned forward and took the other end from Logan’s fingers.
“Aw,” Finn said. “Wait, I like this.”
Logan didn’t pay him any mind, just began to pull his end of the candy in with his tongue and teeth, Leo doing the same, while Finn was left between them, eyes going back and forth between their faces. When their lips met, Finn noticed Remus’ look and flashed him a thumbs up and a wink. Logan smiled into their kiss and stayed close to Leo as they broke apart.
“I’ve had too much candy?”
Leo gave a half-hearted, fully-smitten shrug.
“Can you two do it again?” Finn asked. “Just for, like—science.”
Logan snorted, but he picked up a red hot and held it up at Finn. “Come and get it,” he said and put it between his teeth.
Remus laughed as he watched Finn smile, and he caught quite a bit of a glimpse of Finn’s tongue going into Logan’s mouth.
“Wow, Harzy,” Sirius called. “Interesting technique.”
“That’s my baby brother you’re kissing there, O’Hara.” Noelle pretended to wrinkle her nose. “Cool it, bro.”
“I cooled it for a long time, Noelle Tremblay.” Finn barely turned away from Logan as he said it, actually took Logan’s jaw between his fingers and angled him the way he wanted for another kiss. Logan looked like he was melting with being kissed stupid—or crashing from a sugar high. “I’m red hot now.”
Noelle smiled. “D’accord. Okay. Touché.”
Leo flicked the side of Finn’s head. “C’mere, watch me pipe. And keep that sugar pile of yours away from my masterpiece.”
“Are you talking about the house or Logan?” Finn asked.
Logan made a face and pushed him towards Leo. Finn wrapped an arm around Leo’s waist, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Show me, lover.” Finn watched his face with a smile. “Wait for it…there it is.”
Leo looked at him. “What?”
“You stick your tongue out when you concentrate. When you’re baking, stoping pucks, anything. It’s adorable.”
“Hm,” Sirius said from beside Remus, who was carefully making small looping tiles on the slants of their roof. “Do you think Leo’s gonna be better than us?”
Remus popped a red hot into his mouth. “I knew it. I knew there was no way you were going to be calm about this.”
Sirius just gave a shrug and picked up an icing spatula. “I’ll make a pond out front. For skating.”
Remus just went back to his work, smiling. “Okay, baby, whatever you want.”
They worked in silence for a moment, Sirius making a careful oval on the front cardboard of their house, Remus finishing one side of the roof and beginning the next. He glanced over at Thomas’ with a snort—he had just written GO LIONS on his roof and looked like he was trying to make their lion logo out of candy on the other side—pretty neatly, if Remus had to admit.
“Hey, no stealing my idea,” Thomas said, shouldering Remus protectively.
“I couldn’t if I tried, T.”
Down the table, it looked like Finn’s exploded icing—times ten. The Dumais kids, some of the Weasleys, plus James with Harry on his lap, were practically covered in frosting. Harry was as red-cheeked as Logan, beaming as his father made two little dinosaur marshmallows dance in front of him.
“I was thinking,” Sirius said suddenly from beside him.
About babies? Remus supplied silently. Sirius had been going over to the Dumais’ a lot, spending a lot of time with the kids. Maybe it was something he’d want one day, too.
“And before I say,” Sirius continued. “I love your family—”
“Our family,” Remus said.
Sirius smiled, grey eyes crinkling at the corners in a way that Remus was noticing just a little more lately. It made him unbearably handsome, and Remus wanted nothing more than to be there to watch him forever. His smiles. His large, capable hands. The way he grew his hair out to his shoulders and then cut it short again. His careful, attentive eyes when he was listening to a fast conversation in English.
Remus rubbed a quick palm over Sirius’ knee before going back to work. “What were you going to say?”
“I thought maybe next Christmas, we could go away. Just us.” Sirius drew a bowl of chocolate chips towards him, popped a few in his mouth, before beginning to place them at the places where Remus’ roof tiles met. He made a questioning sound, and Remus nodded. “We only get a few days, but—somewhere sunny. Private beach somewhere. Or even your lake cabin. Big fireplace, maybe skiing.”
Remus could only lean into him and smile. “That sounds nice, baby.”
“But I know you don’t get to see your parents a lot, and Jules, so—and I know Christmas is one of those times. So, don’t worry. We have the summers—and the All Stars break—they can all think again if they think I’m not done with All Star skills competitions, merde.”
“No, I like the idea of Christmas.” Remus watched the careful way Sirius was still placing the chocolate chips on their house. So small in his big hands. “Just us.”
Sirius smiled, sliding a few more chocolate chips into his mouth. “Forever.”
Remus knew his smile probably looked hopelessly smitten, but he couldn’t help it. “Yeah?”
Sirius didn’t even seem to realize, too intent on his decorating. He even picked up a few and replaced them more precisely on where the small frosting crescents overlapped before leaning back again. “Ouais. Okay, how does that look?”
“Yeah,” Remus said again, nonsensically, and leaned in for a kiss. “Hey, I love you.” He kissed him again, the corner of his mouth—the dimple right at the corner that had begun to never quite go away. “I love how you look when you’re focused. It’s one of my favorite things in the whole world.”
Sirius tapped their foreheads together. “Stop.”
“No.” Remus shook his head. “Never.”
Sirius held up a chocolate chip, and Remus let him place it between his lips, savoring the melting sugar on his tongue.
“I mean it.” Sirius took Remus’ hand and kissed over his knuckles. His eyes lingered on them, thumb bumping over them gently. “Forever.”
Remus nodded. It had been a hard month. His first December spent in the NHL. It wasn’t how any of them had dreamed it, probably. Remus ran his fingers through Sirius’ freshly cut hair, looking sweet with his beanie. Remus just wanted this tension out of his shoulders already and this, tonight…this had released some of it.
I want to be there for you, Sirius had said after that horrible, horrible game. That almost fight. I want to be with you. For my entire life. You know that, don’t you?
“Forever,” Remus agreed, and nodded across the table. “Now steal those rainbow things from Logan for me.”