12 Days Of Shipmas (A Multi Fandom Compilation)

Twelve Drummers Drumming (SnowBaz from Carry On)

SIMON

I'm not sure how long I've been lying on mine and Penny's couch for, but it was sort of light outside when I started. Now it's dark. I just can't seem to find the energy to move, other than the shivering that set in a little while ago. I'm cold, even with my wings wrapped around me, but there aren't any blankets nearby and I can't seem to get up.

So I'm cold, and I'm numb, but I think that's sort of comforting. I was too filled up with messy thoughts earlier, crashing round my skull like a hurricane. The numbness has quietened that down, I've hugged myself into a chilly, empty oblivion and for now, that's enough.

My eyes are sore from dried salty tears, and every now and again my chest shudders with a dry sob, reminding me I'm still here, in my flat, crammed with nothing but nothingness.

I want to disappear.

The front door opens and I jump where I lay, but almost immediately I curl back in on myself, only dimly aware of someone stepping inside from the bright light of the landing. "Simon?" Baz calls. "Bloody hell, what are you doing moping in the dark?" He laughs and closes the door, but something even icier slides down through my guts, and it's all I can do to turn and bury my face into the corner of the sofa, hands clasped and hugging to my t-shirt, wings tight against my body.

I expect him to flick all the lights on behind me, to bring me kicking unpleasantly back into reality, but he doesn't.

I hear soft shuffling noises, and I picture him toeing off his shoes and placing his shopping bags down. He'd left to buy presents hours ago, teasing me about how I wasn't worth the trouble and probably wouldn't appreciate what he was going to get me. I knew he was joking, I knew it, but somehow it had burrowed into my brain and dug up a shed load of stuff I had purposefully not been thinking about all December.

But here we were, on Christmas Eve, and there was no more hiding away from the truth.

I squeeze my eyes shut, thinking Baz has shaken his head at me and gone into the bathroom, leaving me to my sulk, when a cool hand slips over my hip, and the couch dips with the weight of another body.

"What's wrong love?" he murmurs, a kindness that still surprises me clear in his words.

I manage a small shake of the head. "Nothing," I tell him, my voice coming out in a rasp. But he knows I'm lying, I don't have to see his face to know. He just presses his body up to mine, his hand clasping my tensely entwined ones, his lips brushing against the back of my head.

"Why are you sad?" he tries again, managing to get his other arm under my neck. He trails his fingers across my clavicles and sends shivers over my skin. (The good kind this time, it wakes me up a little bit.) "I didn't mean it, about the presents. You know I've spent half the Pitch fortune trying to impress you, which is pointless because I know you'll be impressed with little more than a pair of socks and a dog whistle."

I can't help but close my eyes again and let through half a smile. He must see it or feel it because his hands become a little more active, stroking my chest and my stomach as he plants tentative light kisses against my hair. "Are you fretting your present isn't good enough for me? Because I was serious about that thing you did to me the other night, I'll have that as my present any time."

I smile again, but it's short lived and I fold in on myself once more, the grief and anger I've been shoving down trying to burst its way back through.

"Love?" he whispers. He rarely calls me that. Only when he knows we're alone, and manages to shake off that resilient vulnerability that won't leave him be. Or if he's smashed off his face.