Archive of Our Own ^beta

Not mine, making no money, intending no copyright infringement.

Part of the SAC-2003 at http://www.kardasi.com/Advent/2003
Much thanks to flaming muse for another great beta outside of her preferred fandom! All remaining comma abuse is solely my own.

Silly and sappy and hopefully sweet. Please excuse any liberties I've taken with canon or with gingerbread men. :-)

Jim could smell the spices long before he opened the door to the loft. As they were fairly common scents of the season, he hadn't realized at first that the nutmeg and ginger were coming from his own kitchen.

Intrigued, Jim quickly disposed of his keys and coat and hurried in to see what Sandburg was up to.

Gingerbread men?

"Hey, Jim!" Blair said brightly. His apron and his face were liberally smudged with flour, he had a bit of red-brown dough caught in his hair, and he looked radiantly happy. "Isn't this great?"

Jim watched as Blair put a pan of raisin-buttoned fellows into the oven and set the timer.

"I wouldn't have pegged you as a gingerbread man type of guy," Jim admitted.

"Why not?"

"I don't know, really... you don't like anthropomorphic food? They're sexist?"

Blair laughed. "They're tradition, man!"

"Yeah, but not your tradition, right?"

"I'm an anthropologist, Jim -- all tradition is my tradition. I'm a tradition-aholic, especially at the holidays."

"But Christmas isn't really your holiday, is it?"

"Eh, you know me, I'm sort of pan-religious. Besides, there's nothing inherently Christmasy in the gingerbread man -- he's really a generic winter thing."

"I just can't see you and Naomi making gingerbread men somehow."

"Well, you're right, it's more of a Blair tradition than a Sandburg tradition -- she never really had the time or the patience for cookies."

"Whereas you are a paragon of patience," Jim pointed out dryly.

"Hey, I've managed more than a dozen men already! Um, that didn't come out right."

Jim laughed and leaned in to kiss the end of Blair's floury nose. "Lucky for you I know what you meant -- especially since I know how well you manage me," Jim said, giving Blair a stern look at which Blair just laughed.

"Aw, you know you're the only non-gingerbread man for me!" he said, reaching for Jim's hand.

"No way, Sandburg -- you're a mess!" Jim admonished, taking a quick defensive step back.

"Do you want to get dirty with me?"

Jim raised an eyebrow.

"Let me rephrase: would you like to help me with the gingerbread men?"

"So you're not suggesting we get naked to decorate them, or use the icing on each other, or give them naughty bits, or anything like that?" Jim asked with a saucy expression.

"Now you are surprising me," Blair said with a chuckle. "Feeling playful this evening, are you?"

"You looking like a Pillsbury Doughboy wannabe is putting me in a silly mood, I guess -- but I wasn't really suggesting any of that, you know."

"I know," Blair agreed. "Though maybe we could save some of the icing..." he added suggestively.

The timer interrupted them, and Blair took the tray out of the oven.

"That's the last of them that needed baking. Will you help me decorate the ones that are already cool?"

"Sure, Chief," Jim said, watching Blair gently lift the hot cookies off the tray and onto a cooling rack. Rolling up his sleeves, Jim moved to the sink to wash up.

"So, Chief, is there any significance to the fact that tomorrow is the start of Hanukkah? An attempt to merge traditions or something?" Jim turned off the water and dried his hands.

"No, man, this is just the first chance I got to make them. You know me, I'm not too formal about any of this, just whatever works out."

"'You know me' -- you've said that twice tonight. I do know you, Blair... but sometimes I think that you assume I know more than I do. Maybe you think because you are always talking to me that you must have told me things about your past, and about your beliefs, so you assume I know them. But I don't know as much as I'd like."

Blair looked thoughtful. "You do the same, don't you, assume I know things you haven't told me?" he asked.

"Nope."

"Come on, Jim, there are a lot of things that you never talk about!"

"Yes, but the difference is that I know I'm not telling you," he told his partner, smiling warmly to take the sting out of the words.

"I think you tricked me," Blair grumbled.

"I'm not trying to, honestly. It's just... I don't know, maybe it's the season, maybe you've drugged me with all the ginger in the air, but I just feel like hearing Blair stories. I want you to tell me about holidays with Naomi, and whatever else you want to tell me."

He and Blair held each other's gaze for a long moment before Blair replied. "OK, I'd like that -- so long as you have to talk, too."

"That's fair. But... only happy stories tonight, OK? Let's leave out all the less-than-pleasant memories, we know we both have those. I want to hear your good memories -- you are so happy right now I don't want to ruin that."

And so, as they drew the outlines of coats and boots on the gingerbread men, they swapped tales of seasons past. Jim had little to say about childhood Christmases, but kept Blair entertained with funny anecdotes involving Blair's friends and acquaintances on the force. Blair regaled Jim with a mish-mash of Hanukkah, Solstice, and Christmas celebrations around the world.

And all their gingerbread men got big smiles drawn with glaze that Blair insisted on tinting red.

When they finally declared victory, Jim suddenly grabbed Blair and pulled him into a tight hug.

"No, Jim, you're going to ruin your sweater!"

"Oh, screw the sweater! God, what it does to me to see you like this, so happy and alive and without a care..." He hugged his partner tightly until Blair made a small squeak of protest.

"Sorry, Chief," he said, relaxing his grip only slightly. "It's just... I can't explain it very well, but it just... it just makes me so happy, like I can relax for once, to see you so open and bouncy..."

"I think I understand -- it does me good to see you looking the same way. Our emotions feed off each other's, I think." Blair stroked Jim's back, trying to keep the worst of the mess on his hands off the sweater. "Though you aren't that bouncy," he added with a smile.

"Bouncy enough," Jim answered, thrusting his hips at Blair and moving his hands from his Guide's back to cup his ass.

"Feeling frisky now, are we?" Blair teased.

"Well I certainly am, let's see about you," Jim said, his hand looking for his partner's erection under his apron and finding it. "Yes, we are," he announced before claiming Blair's mouth in a thorough kiss.

"Come upstairs with me?" Jim asked when they broke apart to catch their breath.

"Without cleaning up the mess first?" Blair asked with a mixture of mirth and amazement in his tone.

"I need you now, Blair. The mess isn't going anywhere."

"I love you, Jim. Happy Amalgamation of Winter Holidays."

"To you too, you nut. Now come on," he said, turning and walking toward the stairs. "And Blair?" he called over his shoulder. "Bring that extra icing."

End Gingerbread for Hanukkah by ainm: [email protected]

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