steve!! i miss him too :( what about a cute kbd christmas fic?
kbd —the harrington's start preparing for christmas. mom!reader, 2k
When you get home to absolute silence, you assume your kids have been abducted and your husband murdered. When you find the laundry baskets have been moved off of the stairs and the mountain of little shoes by the door has been lined up neatly, you guess the killers must've cleaned after it happened.
You forget the stiffness of your back and pinched toes. Arms full of grocery bags, you shoulder into the living room with your tongue between your teeth. “Oh,” you say, breathing out, “good. You're alive.”
Your girls are sitting in a wavy row. Avery lays with a long leg hanging over one couch arm, littlest Wren by her side swaddled and propped with pillows. Dove sits at Wren's other side with her rainbow Teddy bear in her lap. Bethie, precious sweetheart, is sleeping smushed against the opposite armrest with Steve's sweatshirt over her lap.
“Hey, honeys,” you say quietly, so as not to disrupt their mild moods, “everyone okay?”
“Yeah, mom,” Avery says without looking away from the TV.
“What about you, Dove? You okay?”
“Yis,” she says shortly.
You turn to the TV, confused. What could be interesting enough to hook them both? Even Wren seems to be watching the TV, her tiny face demure.
“What's this?” you ask, squinting, before a familiar white beagle takes to the screen. “Oh, it's A Charlie Brown Christmas!”
“Mommy, can you please be bit quieter, please?” Dove asks.
You snort and hurry past them to the kitchen. The smell of homemade cinnamon rolls envelopes you, the heat of the oven warming your wind-nipped nose. “Hey,” you say, though you can't actually see your husband anywhere.
He pops up from behind the kitchen table with water dripping down one wrist, a rag in hand. “Hey!” he says, ditching the rag in a bowl of suds, quick to wipe his hands dry on his chest and stand. “I didn't hear you. You forget how to yell?”
“And disturb the peace?” You sigh in relief as he takes the heavier bag from your wrist to push onto the clean countertop. “Thanks.” He takes the other bags. “Thanks, baby.”
“Y'welcome,” he says easily. He looks like he's had a long day in that his shirt is wet in four different places and in three different colours, but he looks happy, cheeks a red hue and almond eyes creased with a familiar fondness.
Steve's pretty much always happy to see you. You lay claim to at least two of his smile lines, and you love to feel them with your fingers to affirm that they're really there, he's really happy, in this life you made together. (An exhausting, lovely life.) You raise your hand to his cheek and cover one such wrinkle with your fingertips, tilting his face into one palm. “You've been busy today,” you say gently.
“So busy. All the bedrooms, the bathrooms. Soon as I wipe down the baseboards in here, I'm done.”
“Want me to do it?”
“No way. You'll take all my glory.” He presses his smile into a flat line, though the love stays behind in his eyes.
“I'm gonna look at everything just as soon as I put the groceries away, I can't believe it,” you say, kissing him chastely, then the corner of his mouth before pulling away. The soft brush of his lips lingers on yours, but nothing feels as good as the way he looks at you. “You didn't have to do it all, baby, I would've helped.”
“Christmas will be here before we know it,” he says with an unbothered shrug. “It creeps up on us every year. I figured I better get the jump on it if I was gonna get it done, but then they've all been so weirdly well behaved. Dove hasn't cried once.”
“Bethie's sleeping, you know?”
He takes your arm before you can turn away and works you into a hug.
“I know,” he says, cupping the back of your head. “Was Wren alright?”
“Best big sister is looking after her.”
“God, we don't deserve her. She's not stressed, is she?”
Avery loves being a big sister, but you're both wary of how she might feel responsible for things she shouldn't have to be responsible for. “She looked fine. They were watching TV.”
Steve gives you a steady, soft squeeze. You press your nose down into his shoulder with your arms curled around him to breathe him in. He smells of disinfectant, the sugary Christmas one that the girls can't get enough of. Avery begs him to spray down the bath before she gets in so it'll smell nice, and every time he promises her he'll buy her a bottle of bubble bath, but a little disinfectant isn't bad for her, anyways. From over Steve's shoulder you can see he's used it well, every surface sparkling clean, no corner or speck of grime left to survive.
You kiss his shoulder. “You really didn't have to, Stevie, but thank you. It's amazing in here.”
He hums into the side of your head. “I love you.”
You totally, totally get it. You'd clean a hundred houses for him, even with four girls badgering you as you go.
“Love you too. You finish the baseboards, I'll put the groceries away, and we'll sit down before they realise they're being well-behaved.”
Steve likes your plan, leaving you with a last little squeeze to get done cleaning. You sort through what's in the fridge, throwing away stuff past due, noting on the whiteboard stuck to the fridge what's about to go bad soon, as well as the dates for the meat. What you've bought today should last for at least two weeks, but it never really does.
You keep some of the Christmas goodies on the counter and hide the rest away atop the cabinets out of sight.
Avery runs in as you're taking off your shoes. “Mom, Bethie's crying about something.”
“Oh no. Thanks, babe, I'll be right there.”
You sneak a peek at Steve before you go. His brow furrowed in concentration, the muscle of his upper arm tenses and releases with every scrub of the baseboard. It's… Well, you married well.
Beth cries on the couch, she and Dove pulling at the same dark blob of material while Wren looks on in quiet confusion. She's too small to sit, laid on her back, but she's started turning her head, following people and their movements, and when she sees you, she smiles. It's a very Steve-like expression.
“Hello,” you say, picking her up carefully, kissing her little head. “Let's get you out of the splash zone, sweetheart.”
“Mom, she took daddy's hoodie!”
“I want it!”
“What if I go get another one of daddy's hoodies?” you ask, attempting a swift defusing. “How's that? We can all have one.”
“I want this one,” Beth insists.
“I want it,” Dove says, glaring at her older sister.
Bethie is a gentle soul that won't pull it out of Dove's hands, even when she maybe should. She cries and balls her hands into the fabric to stop from losing it completely, sending you a desperate frown, “Mom, please, I had it first.”
“Yes you did, honey. Dove.” You look her straight in her little face, knowing this won't end well. “Bethie had it first, okay? You can have it later, but until then, I can go get you one for yourself.”
Dove hates that. Wren hates that Dove hates it, and everybody starts crying. Avery didn't follow you out of the kitchen, likely kept behind by Steve to save her from the coming massacre, but she'd probably start crying too from the sheer overwhelming volume.
Can't have everything, you think.
“Dove, don't make me call daddy in here. Take your hands off of daddy's sweatshirt. Now, please.”
Dove shrieks and lets go of it, throwing herself down off of the couch to cry into the beanbag instead. She kicks her legs, and Beth looks shocked at the outcome, any victory overwritten by guilt. She climbs off of the couch with her arm already held out to give Dove the sweater, but you stop her.
“That's yours, baby, you keep it. Daddy gave that to you.”
“I'm not being a good sharer,” Bethie says.
“There's enough to go around,” you promise her. Dove's just showing off ‘cos you've said no, not because there's something special about that sweatshirt. Sure, it has a reindeer on the chest, but Steve has tens of Christmas sweatshirts.
You get to a point as a parent where the crying becomes white noise, and you can manage one at a time or none at all. Bethie nods, and you lean down to give her tearstained cheek a kiss before turning to Dove with Wren grizzling in your arms. She can't decide if she's upset or not, it seems.
“Dovey, don't be angry at me, please? Let's go get you another one. Okay? You could even have one of mommy's, if you wanted.”
Not good enough. She cries and cries and cries until Steve enters the room, his confusion dramatised as he holds out his hands to her. “Dove! What's wrong, sweetheart?”
“Mom won't– mommy won't–” She sobs. “I want that one.”
“Mommy's just doing what I asked her to,” Steve says, bending down at the waist to meet her eyes. “So be mad at me, okay? Mommy didn't do it, I told her that that one's for Beth. How about we go and get you another one?”
Dove immediately takes his hand, appeased now she has someone on her side. You flop down on the couch as they walk away together with one last child to soothe. Wren goes down easy. All she wants is some shushing and back patting.
“Is it over?” Avery asks, tiptoeing back into the room.
You laugh. “Yeah, it's over. Sorry.”
“I'm sorry for hiding,” she says.
“There's nothing wrong with sitting somewhere quiet when things are too loud, bub. You gonna come and finish your movie? We can get dad to rewind it for us.” You hold out an arm. She sits in front of it with a smile like she's been given the world.
You really don't deserve your girl.
Steve and Dove return changed. Steve's in clean pyjamas with wet cheeks, Dove drowned in one of Steve's snowman sweaters. He rewinds the movie without being asked, and he squeezes in beside Avery, and everyone lets out a simultaneous sigh of relief.
He finds your shoulder across the back of the couch, feeling along it like he knows every curve and divot. It doesn't take long for you to settle in and relax, soothed as the girls had been by a touch of comfort. Your attention flickers between his peaceful face and the baby as she snores on your chest.
“Snoopy is sooooo bad,” Bethie whispers happily, looking to her big sister for an agreement.
“He's mischievous,” Avery says.
“That's a big word,” you say, “where'd you learn that one, honey?”
Steve pats your arm. He doesn't say anything, just lets you know he's there with you.
“We're reading a book about Santa at school and they said all the mischievous kids end up on the naughty list.”
“That's not necessarily true.” You kiss her forehead. “You girls are mischievous, but you're still good girls.”
“I'm not mist-jiv-us,” Beth denies.
“You're the most mist-jiv-us,” Steve says, “I know what you're up to, Bethie bear. I always know.”
“I'm not up to anything!” she denies, giggling at his accusatory tone.
“I am naughty,” Dove says.
You and Steve laugh at the same time. “Only a little,” Steve says.
“A lot!” Avery says.
Dove just laughs and lays back against Steve's chest. Avery languishes between you and Steve like a princess, propping her leg over your thigh, and Beth snuggles into your arm. You breathe in the smell of Wren's hair, totally relaxed in the squeaky clean depths of the living room, your family finally in one place.
Steve deserves a great, huge, heaping thank you, but you don't have anything to give him. You turn to him over Avery's head, trying to think of what to say to him to express how grateful you are for all that effort and love, years of it, but when he meets your eyes you know he already knows what you want to say.
“Can we pretend there's mistletoe or something?” he asks, looking down to your lips, his own pursed into a longing pout.
“Yeah, Stevie,” you say, lifting your chin invitingly. “Wow, look, there's mistletoe! You know what that means.”
You can feel the shape of his smile when he kisses you, and though he keeps it short and sweet, that evening his hand stays on your arm for hours drawing hearts between iterations of your name, one loving letter at a time.
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