Thirteen Days Until Christmas
Tenor
It's Julius' day off work, which means Luke wakes them all up with the announcement that it's time to decorate the tree.
Like Eden and Julius, Tenor has never done this before.
When he was growing up, his mother decorated the tree according to the theme and colour scheme of that year and he and his sisters were forbidden on pain of death from touching it and potentially ruining part of her design.
So now, standing in front of the massive evergreen that sheds pine needles everywhere, clutching a tangle of silver garland in his hands, he feels very unprepared.
The tree is still mostly bare, with only one crooked string of lights which Eden and Luke are currently bickering over because she is adamant that it has been done incorrectly, whereas Luke is arguing that they actually just need more lights and then everything will look right.
Julius is still engaging his best efforts to anchor the whole tree straight and failing miserably, muttering mutinous things about their supplies of matches and gasoline under his breath the whole time.
They've been at this for an hour, the mid-morning sun now cutting through the windows and catching flecks of dust in the air.
The house smells like pine and coffee, and Luke has set his computer up to play the Charlie Brown Christmas album, which seems to be steadily raising Julius' volume of threats regarding the tree's limbs.
Tenor tries to intervene with Eden, offering to string the garland to see if that will fix what's wrong with the tree.
She looks at him, her eyes catching on the proffered decor and appraising it, then darting over to the tree.
She catches her plump lower lip between her teeth and hesitantly nods while frustration and anxiety roll off of her in waves.
Tenor glances at Luke, who just shrugs, and then Julius, who sighs and gives the tree another wary shake. As always, the bastards never offered him any clear answers.
He and Luke try stringing the garland up, making sure it's not 'crooked,' whatever that means on a goddamn Christmas tree, and then standing back so she can look at it.
"It just… doesn't look right," she murmurs, barely loud enough for them to hear.
For some reason, Tenor feels a desperation in his chest, tugging at him to make things right for his omega. Why the fuck did he care about the Christmas tree? He didn't know. But for some reason, this was of paramount importance.
Tenor crouches beside her, placing gentle hands on her hips. She always settled better with physical touch. "Doesn’t look right how, baby?"
She shrugs, hugging herself tightly around her middle. "I don't know. The lights are all... uneven. The garland is... droopy. And these ornaments don't match at all." She throws a glance down to the tub at her feet and the pile of felted reindeer and stars in the other package.
Luke straightens, brushing pine needles off his hands. "We can fix this, baby. Why don't you just show us where you want them?"
Eden shakes her head quickly. "It’s not just that, it's just… something is wrong."
Julius softens, kneeling down on her other side too so they're closer to her eye level and she doesn't have to crane her neck. "Hey," he says quietly. "It's okay, baby. It doesn't have to be perfect."
She tenses under his hands, squirming uncomfortably like she wants to break away and go fix whatever is wrong but isn't sure how. "It does," she practically wails, and to his great horror, he can see tears welling in her eyes. "It has to be perfect. I can feel it. And I don't know how!"
Ah, fuck. Abort mission! Abort mission! System failure!
"Aw, baby, it's going to be okay. It's just a stupid tree. We could burn it if you want. You want me to burn it? Will that make it all better?" Julius sounds way too damn hopeful about that option and Luke's purr briefly turns to a growl before softening again.
She cries even harder at that. "Nooo," she wails. "I love the tree, I just want to fix it."
NEST. It's time for her nest. Something was catastrophically wrong, but Tenor was sure a nest would fix it.
"You want to go back to your nest, baby?
" He looks up at her in time to watch Luke wipe away her tears and snot with his sleeve.
Okay that was a little gross but whatever.
"We can call this one a day and tomorrow we can have another go at it if you want.
Or not. It could just be a plain tree. I bet Martha Stewart loves undecorated trees. It's rustic or something."
"Okay," she says through her sobs.
He wastes no time in lifting her and running her to the nest, tucking both of them into the layers of blankets. When she finally calms, he looks over at Luke where he's resting behind her and mouths out 'I will kill you' to the dumbass and his dumbass tree.