Author: SkyLark
Beta: ShenLong Deb
Rating: PG
Warnings: Heero's POV
Pairing: 1+2
Archives: http://www.gundam-wing-diaries.150m.com/gw/SkyLark/gwSkyLark.htm
Disclaimer: I do not own Gundam Wing, or its characters. I just love playing with them.
The Invitation
I saved the newest addition to my growing tree ornament collection to go on last.
This year it's a silver star with the engraved words 'Peace Through Earth and Space' etched across the middle. A fitting choice, given how this marks the tenth Christmas without so much as a threat to the tranquility that had been so hard fought for.
And like every December first for the last decade, the ornament arrived in a simple box that had been wrapped and tied off with a bow. There was no return address on the package that it came in, but it wasn't needed for me to know who it came from.
Following the Mariemeia incident, I had made it a point to stay away from everyone and everything that I had known to find myself. That meant traveling more than a couple of times a year to wherever the wind took me. Yet somehow, there was one person who always managed to find me.
Not that it bothered me that they bothered to keep tabs on me. After all, I have to admit I would have been hurt if he didn't, given our history. He was the only person who I could ever say understood me better than I gave him credit for up until the day I disappeared.
Over all of the time that had passed, there was never a request from them to meet, or a spontaneous appearance on whatever was serving as my doorstep. No. He respected that I needed my space to figure out how to survive in a peaceful world.
But I could always count on receiving three things from him every year- a birthday card for the day that Doctor J's records had reported to be twelfth of July and a Christmas ornament on the first of every December. Birthdays and the Christian holiday were only two occasions that ever really matter to him, even during the wars, thus the consistent acknowledgment of them after the fact.
The cards I collected, stored in a safe box without even considering throwing them away. For a while, I had absolutely no idea what the hell I was going to do with a Christmas ornament, nor the ones to follow the next couple of years.
I never was one to celebrate the season before, those kinds of traditions being lost to me thanks to my endless training and preparations to control Wing Zero. In fact, the first time I ever had a glimpse of the holiday festivities was through my fellow pilots. Once I stepped away, I had been intrigued enough to look into the history of each and every holiday on my own.
Still, I was caught by surprise when I opened my first wrapped box to reveal a toy soldier tree ornament. Because I didn't have a tree, let alone the interest to get one just because of one decoration to adorn it, I hung the offering over my computer desk where I spent most of my evenings journaling and exercising other self-discoveries.
That had become the mantle from which the snowflake and angel that followed were also displayed. However, once the forth year brought a gold bell, I decided that the ornaments deserved a more fitting home.
It was the first Christmas that I went out in search of a Christmas tree. Settling on a small version that fit fine on an end table in my living room, the four ornaments were the only ones that I bothered to decorate it with.
Come the eighth year, the tree had doubled in size and was far too barren to my liking. I broke down and purchased lights, tinsel and a gold star for the top. And something... changed for me when I stared at the final product.
Those ornaments had been an invitation. They were meant to help me appreciate something that I never had before... to just enjoy life a little and appreciate what I had the way most people saw the Christmas season. Of course, that gratitude was meant to carry on every day.
And I suddenly realized that I had walked away from one of the best blessings I ever had... something that was right in front of me at a point in my life when I never would have used 'blessed' to describe me.
I spent the next couple of years doing more of a checking in on the giver. Taking the same time and care as he obviously did in keeping up on me, the process only made me realize how lonely I was without his presence...
Which all solidified my choice to reply to his invitation with one of my own. It was sure to arrive on the first of the month, yesterday.
There was a lot that needed to be right. Finally finding a place where we would both be happy, I set aside any desire to ever wander off again. I found my own peace and contentment in the life that I am paving for myself... with one rather large piece missing.
Standing back, I appraise the tree that now stands tall enough that it almost touches the ceiling in the living room of my now permanent home.
Much to my liking, every detail is perfect from how the colored lights and tinsel are strung to the placements of his ornaments along with the balls and other trinkets that I've added to the arrangement.
Like my life, however, it's not complete just yet.
Now my mind begins to wonder if this year I'll have a visitor. I left the request that I had sent pretty open, leaving me vulnerable with the possibility that it might go unaccepted. Maybe too much time has passed. Perhaps I was too distant, physically and emotionally, for him to want to show.
Thankfully, there are still a couple of weeks before Christmas actually gets here for him to have the time he needs to consider what I've offered to him.
Just as I begin to head into the kitchen to prepare something for dinner, I'm surprised by a knock at the door. Frowning at the rare sound, I turn back and peer through the peep hole out of an old habit to always be aware of who is coming up on me.
And the sight of the person on the other side comes with a surge of elation and nerves.
My fingers fumbling a bit in my haste, they managed to unlock the door so that I can open it to the violet-eyed, heard-shaped face that had been missing from my life for longer than they should have been.
To no shock on my part, my visitor smirks a simple, "Hey."
"H-hey," I stammer, something that I hardly ever do. At his back, I note the start of the first snowfall of the year in these parts has begun and a cold breeze splashes up across my face. All but jumping aside, I insist, "Come in."
Stepping into the foyer, my best friend begins removing his black scarf and thick coat for me to hang in the closet while he kicks off his work boots. There's little conversation between us as he gets himself settled, but we never really needed to talk too much to get each other.
Once he sets foot into the living room, an awe comes over my guest's face when he blinks up at the Christmas tree in the far corner. Moving towards it so slowly that it's as though he's trudging through sand, he slowly takes in every detail from top to bottom... his gaze lingering when it falls on the ornaments he had sent to me.
Then, he finally snickers and without looking back at me compliments, "This is... pretty damn good, 'Ro." I can't help the hitch in my throat in hearing the nickname he had given me so long ago.
As I reach his side and our eyes meet, he grins, "Guess you can tell I got your invite." Reaching into the pocket of his jeans, he holds up the ornament that I had sent by its red string.
It was as plain a message as I could possibly send in the shape of a green tree with all the trimmings and a ribbon carried by a white dove on either end to drape its middle with the words, 'Our First Christmas Together.'
Unable to help my smile, I comment, "You didn't take long to respond."
Laughing, he shrugs, "Well, I figured why wait? Ten years is long enough."
This was the one and only thing that I have ever known to hope for as far as any gift... his understanding, forgiveness and acceptance of what I was giving in return. Instead of there being a feeling of guilt for how long it took for us to get here, as I had expected, all that I can think of is how much I'm actually looking forward to the future for the first time in my life now that I know who I'll be sharing it with.
Caught up by the emotions that urge me, I follow them as Odin Lowe had taught me. In one swift motion, I close the distance between us to pull my partner into my arms and press our lips together. Thankfully, he takes the reins from there to deepen the kiss that takes it to a whole level of intensity that I've never known.
After we come up for air, I bite my swollen lip before whispering what I had always known... but only recently figured out, "I love you, Duo."
He beams at that, resting his forehead against mine as he replies in kind, "I love you, too. Merry Christmas, Heero."
No matter what might come for the season from this point on, I already know that it's only going to get better and better from this night forward.
OWARI
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!
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