Chapter 2
The boy is staring at her with eyes so wide it's almost comical.
"It's all real," he murmurs under his breath.
"All of it."
"Yeah!" Ivy says brightly.
"Isn't it awesome?
But I should probably leave these and get going...still got all of Peverell and stuff, so...where's your tree?"
He gestures slightly to the aforementioned tree in the corner of the room, which is tall and glimmering with lights, laden with so many decorations she's surprised it hasn't collapsed.
"Wow.
You guys arewaybetter than the last house."
"That's down to Jett, mostly," he replies, and she sees a smile flicker across his face for the first time, pale and fleeting in the dim early morning light.
"Is Jett your brother?" she asks as she kneels and begins to arrange the presents carefully on the ground underneath the tree.
"Yeah, he's four," he replies, and she feels her heart warm slightly at the fondness in his tone, because she is atotalsucker for happy families.
"Well, you should tell him that Santa Claustotallyloved his decorations," Ivy gets up with a smile, brushing off her clothes as she does so.
"Will do," he replies, expression matching hers.
She looks at him for a moment, then sighs.
"Well, oughta get going," she says lightly, carrying the now empty sack to the fireplace and peering up the chimney with disdain, attempting to plan her route up it and back to the sled.
"Don't knowhowanyone expects me to get back up that thing without breaking a leg, I mean,really– "
"Wait!" It seems that during Ivy's inspection of his chimney, the boy has somehow conjured up a plate of carefully iced cookies, as well as a tall glass of milk.
She blinks in surprise.
"Jett makes these every year," he explains, and his tone is, for some reason, bordering on apologetic.
"Well, with my help...anyway – usually I have to eat them because Mom and Dad always forget and I don't want him thinking Santa doesn't exist," here, he stops and lets out a breathless laugh, probably realising the ridiculousness of the situation.
"So...do you want some?"
"Oh my God,yes," Ivy says, perhaps a little too eagerly.
"I'mliterallystarving – you would notbelievehow hungry you get doing this – " she makes a grab for a cookie, stuffs it in her mouth, and makes a face that she's sure is either mildly pornographic or wildly disgusting.
"Thish ishsho gud," she manages through a mouthful of shortbread.
"Oh myGod," she swallows.
"Youmadethese?" Ivy questions breathlessly, already reaching for another.
"Jett made them," he corrects.
"I just...helped."
"Of course," she nods.
He holds out the glass of milk for her and she takes it gratefully, chugging it down at a speed that could probably equal that of light.
"Someone's thirsty," he says lightly.
"Thank you so much," she takes another cookie.
"This is seriously the best Christmas present ever."
"Do you even get Christmas presents?" he asks curiously.
"Hm, no," she mumbles through the shortbread.
"Why not?"
"I don't know," Ivy swipes some crumbs from her lips with her sleeve, pensive.
"I guess our family doesn't really celebrate it."
He snorts.
"Well,that'sridiculous," he says.
"But true," she finishes off her final cookie and brushes her sweater off.
"Nice sweater," he comments, grinning.
She glances down at it, a deep red with white and green reindeer all over it.
"Matches your hair."
"Hey," she says in an insulted tone, tugging at the auburn plait self-consciously.
"There's nothing wrong with it," he replies.
"I just never really expected for Santa to be a redhead, is all."
"Yeah, well, fifteen minutes ago, you didn't think Santa evenexisted," she huffs.
"And I'm not even Santa," she adds.
"Hector was too lazy to wake up and we couldn't even get him in the sled because he's so damn lethargic, so Mom panicked and made me go instead."
"Right," he nods, but shakes his head immediately after.
"This is crazy," he says, not for the first time during their conversation.
"You'll probably get used to it," she says, a little apologetically.
"Although...if you could kinda not mention this to anyone else..."
"Who would believe me?" he grins.
Ivy has to admit he has a point.
"If you run into Hector next year, maybe pretend you don't know about this," she warns.
"He likes knowing he's the centre of attention.
He'll probably throw a tantrum if he finds out that you already know about the big bombshell he'll end up dropping."
"Right," the boy nods.
"Is he ginger, too?"
Her eyes narrow playfully.
"No.
He is not."
"It was just a question," he holds his hands up in mock surrender.
"Of course," she turns back to face the chimney, stepping carefully into the fireplace, then looks back.
"Thanks for the cookies," she grins.
"Seriously, they weregood.
And I mean good.
Like, amazing good.
They were – "
"You're welcome," he cuts her off with a smile, and now that her eyes have adjusted to the darkness, she can see it properly on his features, which are almost blunt but soft in nature.
"I never got your name, by the way."
"I'm Ivy," she says.
"Ivy," he repeats thoughtfully.
"Yeah, with a long I at the beginning," she tells him, just in case he didn't catch on it the first time.
"I never got your name, either."
"I'm Luke."
Luke.
Typical Rustavian name, but, she thinks, it suits him.
"Well, Luke, thanks again for the cookies.
And say hi to Jett for me," she adds with a soft smile.
"Do you need some help getting up there?" he nods at the chimney with a knowing smirk.
"I've managed to get up the past forty-one million chimneys quite easily, actually," she sniffs.
"Okay," Luke shrugs, but the glint is still in his eye.
Ivy gets around halfway up before she calls down and saysokay, maybe it would help if Luke gave her a one-up.
Or three.
ONE YEAR LATER
The next time Ivy falls (yes, falls, she hasn't quite got the hang of this yet, and it's not evenherdamn job) down Luke's chimney, she's still royally pissed off at her brother and hiscompletelack of responsibility, and she doesn't really notice that she's in Luke's house at all, because, come on, they all look kinda the same anyway.
So, what she is not expecting is for a vaguely familiar voice to say, dryly; "How nice of you to drop in," and then add, after a pause; "literally."
"Oh," she says dumbly after a moment, and it's pitifully feeble, but hey, at least she hasn't broken anything.
...she hasn't, right?
"Hey," Luke says, and she can't see his face, but she can hear the laughter in his voice, and she's seven hundred percent sure it's because of her.
"Go on," Ivy grumbles, but there's no real bite to it.
"Laugh.
But it's not like you could do much better."
"I'm not laughing," he says, but she can finally just see his face, and his eyes are bright, and all it takes is a disbelieving look on her part to set him off into fits of laughter.
Ivy rolls her eyes and feels her way through the dark to the kitchen table before sitting patiently at it and waiting for him to finish.
"I'm sorry," he gasps eventually, still breathless, and Ivy can't help but snort a bit as well - his laughter is infectious.
"It's just...funny...how you...and you..." he trails off, takes one look at her, and collapses back into a series of snickers.
"When you're done..."
"I'm done," Luke tells her, although with all the chortling he's doing he doesn't seem very done at all.
Eventually, though, he does manage to get his laughter under control, enough for him to point to the plate nearby and say; "for you."
"Forme?" Ivy repeats excitedly, eyeing the plate, which is laden with enough iced cookies to probably feed Luke's entire town.
"You seemed to like them last time," Luke responds with a knowing grin.
She make an eager grab for the first cookie her fingers can reach, bringing it to her lips and sighing blissfully after the first bite.
"Seriously, these are the best," Ivy tells Luke sombrely, accidentally showering herself in a cascade of biscuit crumbs.
"How do you evenmakethem?"
"Family recipe," Luke chirps.
"If I told you I'd either have to kill you or marry you."
"I'd marry you for these," Ivy informs him gravely.
"They're that good?"
"They're that good," she agrees, swallowing down her first biscuit and reaching for her second.
"Well," Luke says with amusement, "I'm glad you think so.
How's life been since last Christmas Eve?
Any particular reason it's still you and not Hector coming down my chimney?"