We Survived the Snowmageddon

[worktodo]

Who: Albert Rosenfield (worktodo) and whoever is congregating at the Justice Farm for the Christmas holiday!
Where: El Rancho del Justicia, aka Albert's house in Saffron City
When: Anytime between Monday the 24th and Wednesday the 26th!
Summary: A lot has changed in a month, but some things never do. Losers getting together to fail their way through the holiday season is one of them.
Rating: Individual threads may vary, but let's go with G overall and warn otherwise!
Log:

Despite generally doing a very excellent Grinch impression, Albert doesn't actually hate Christmas. Granted, it's not one of his favorite holidays the way that Thanksgiving is — it's a little too overdone, a little too commercial, lacking in some of the spirit of togetherness in favor of the spirit of consumerism — but it is decidedly a holiday, and once again Johto has presented him with a situation where he is forced to make a choice. For the second time this year (by Albert's reckoning), Johto appears to have done everything in its power to prevent them from putting on a holiday, including but not limited to summoning up the actual apocalypse. The question that begs to be asked, therefore, is simply: is Albert willing to surrender Christmas in the face of all these apparent attempts to ruin it?

The answer, naturally, is: oh, hell no.

It is, however, an undeniably different atmosphere from the one that filled the house on Thanksgiving. Most of the occupants of the house are worse off now than they were then, be it emotionally or physically — some from spooky encounters, some from harsh truths, and some from going out in the apocalyptic snow like the damn fools they are — so if there's slightly less pep and enthusiasm saturating the grounds, that could certainly be why. Any decorations applied to the outside of the house have been battered at best and outright wrecked at worst. But as the slightly paraphrased song lyric goes, "Though the weather outside is frightful, by the fire it's so delightful", and the interior of the house is a thankfully different story.

On Monday, Albert will be spending the Eve of Christmas largely in the kitchen, having allotted the whole day for getting all the components of Christmas dinner prepared and readied in advance; on Thanksgiving, it's a fundamental part of the holiday tradition to run around the kitchen like a madman trying to get dinner to the table on time, but for Christmas, he'd rather everything just go smoothly. Early arrivals are welcome to hang out in the cozy parts of the house, grab some cocoa, and carefully avoid him; otherwise, they might get drafted into menial labor like shoveling out the front walk or putting the finishing touches on the interior decor before the party officially kicks off.

By Tuesday, it's all Christmas all the time; there is no victory quite so sweet as the one that comes hard-won, and as far as Albert is concerned, the most effective "screw you" to Johto's Snowmageddon is putting on an occasion that is positively bursting with holly and jolly anyway. Somewhere near the kitchen, Zack the Porygon2 is contributing by blasting from his Gear's speakers a concert of every Christmas song he knows (of which there are three: "Feliz Navidad", "Grandma Got Run Over By A Stantler Reindeer", and the Weather Girls' "It's Raining Men"). A stately (albeit slightly lopsided) Christmas tree that is probably the Johto equivalent of a Douglas fir is set up in a corner of the living room near the fireplace — which is burning merrily — and its branches are decorated with makeshift ornaments like Pokeballs and paper throwing stars along with the standard colored bauble variety. Stuff your presents below; there'll be time for opening them later, but for now they're part of the decor. There's holly on the piano and fake candles in the windows, and you better believe at least half of those doorways have mistletoe strategically placed near them. Don't get caught! (Or do, if that's what you're here for.)

The one new and interesting addition to the house can be found in a corner of the living room, where a little space has been carved out for a small end table topped with coasters, a chair, and a tripod apparatus just the right size for holding a standard Pokegear. Got someone to call and wish a Merry Christmas? Do it from the comfort of this corner like it's Masterpiece Theater.

But however Tuesday is spent, there's sure to be a lot of love, gifting, and good Christmas cheer. Or else.

When Wednesday comes along, it'll be the standard post-Christmas wind-down — leftovers aplenty in the kitchen, trash bags of crumpled wrapping paper tucked into the corners, and a nice low-pressure environment in which to interact, gush over gifts, and enjoy the spirit of the season a little longer before getting right back to work on Important Business. For some, that might mean playing in the snow or having a snowball fight; for others, that might mean coordinating federal agent business for the future. But either way, it's another Christmas survived, and that's what really matters, right?


[OOC: Just like last time, this is an open log for everybody coming to Albert's for Christmas! Feel free to start your own threads as you please — open them to everybody, close them to specific people, whatever works for you. Just make a note in the header of what day it's taking place on and who all's invited, and have fun, everybody! Also, for people who aren't physically present at the Farm on Christmas, feel free to use the designated Skype Thread™ to chat with them over video anyway!]

Comments

[tapestodiane]

<sub>[She'll likely notice the beads beneath the wrapper before she gets it off to reveal the bracelet inside. He stands by her side as she opens it, close but not hovering.]

[Like any other gift-giver, he'd like to see the reaction, so he watches her face rather than her hands despite having noted the delicate way she's opening the gift. He already knows what's there, after all.]

[What he doesn't know is what she'll think of it.]</sub>

[doitrockapella]

[She doesn't know what she was expecting to find when the paper came off, honestly. She'd felt the beads, of course, or at least the presence of something rounded over and smooth, but somehow the thought that it might have been jewelry never clicked in her head as she'd briefly considered what it possibly could have been. A bracelet would've been too mundane of a gift, perhaps, or too predictable, or too...

...significant.

But it's a bracelet, and it comes into sight as the paper lifts away, and for a moment she just looks at it, the warm polished colors a lovely contrast to the white of the paper. Beads, a clasp, and a claw. A bracelet. A gift for her.

(It's a, um...oh, right, a netsuke! Of Bear. It's for me?)

She runs her fingertips gingerly over the beads, stopping for a longer perusal of the claw, and as she's tracing its sleek lines, the word leaps to her mind — Coyote.

No, not coyote, not in Johto...but that's what he wants her to see when she looks at it. Raven and Coyote, the trickster figures. They'd talked about them before. He'd asked her if Raven's story was her own.

Maybe now Coyote's is hers, too.

She looks up and over at him, breathes in, swallows; for once her thoughts are showing on her unguarded face as clearly as if they've been written on a chalkboard, and she discovers a second later that she's holding the gift in her hands like she thinks it's made of glass.]

[tapestodiane]

<sub>[As much of a raven as she is ... to him, a she just might be more of a coyote. It's not the simple explanation of trickster that does it, either; they both already knew. No, it's about what the coyote does. He's playful, resourceful, intelligent and inspiring. More importantly, he uses that inspiration and charisma to urge people to change their lives, to learn from their mistakes.]

[It wasn't a conscious decision on his part, to pick the coyote (or well, the equivalent). Things just happened that way sometimes. But after remembering and quietly reciting the keywords he knew about the wild dogs his decision for the gift had only solidified further.]

[The original idea is from a girl he only barely remembers, but he recalls her necklace, her animal claw. They're linked together, her and Carmen - he knows this with an intuition he doesn't ever bother questioning. There's a link to him, too. And a boy.]

[But maybe, right now, none of that is important., What is is the look on Carmen's face, the stunned touched silence, and he quietly takes the bracelet from her to help that. He opens the clasp and slips the bracelet on her left wrist, letting the claw rest against the back of her hand, and then takes a moment to kiss her, softly.]</sub>

[doitrockapella]

[It fits. The beads circle around her wrist like a handcuff and the claw is smooth and cool against the back of her hand, and he's kissing her but her mind isn't there — it's still lingering on the strange new weight against her left hand, and the gradually dawning recognition that he must've known this about her, just like he knew the basis for her connection with Raven when he transposed it onto Coyote, just like he knows everything about her in one way or another. It fits like it was made for her. And that's good, because now that he's put it there, it's never coming off.

It's as she kisses him, her fingers tracing over his neck and shoulders as always, that she feels them pass over the cord beneath his shirt and remembers that she's never seen him without Algiz, either. Not since she put it there.

Oh. Is that what he's done?

She thinks it is.

And the world realigns.

Suddenly it makes sense, and the recognition bubbles up inside her in a way that makes her want to laugh against his mouth. Leave it to him, Special Agent Dale Cooper, her detective, to find a way to give her for Christmas the one thing she'd always wanted all along, beneath the chases and clues and conundrums, the crimes and capers and challenges. The weight of the bracelet is light and negligible and yet she can't stop feeling it, this new pretty clasp that she'll never take off.

When she pulls away, it's not because she's tired of being kissed (as though such a thing were even possible), but because she wants to see his face; she doesn't have the words to say what she thinks of this, not in any language she knows or any she could try to force through Johto's translation, but she can show it, and she tries—

For a minute, she just looks at him, her eyes never leaving his as she strokes her hands through his hair again (slow and affectionate, something that's evolved beyond her earlier petting into the outright urge to please him by it), and then she simply steps into his arms and puts her head on his shoulder, implicitly waiting to be held.]

[tapestodiane]

<sub>[It's no surprise that she understands the significance of what it means. It's clear in the way her touch shifts on his skin and even moreso when she withdraws to look at him - it's right there in her eyes. As is the fact that she wants him to spot it.]

[And he just looks back, in turn letting her see all the affection he has for her, the way that he's in love with her ... because it's indesputable by now, it really is, has changed from just the flirting and the pursuit and into something he just really wants to hang onto. That's not what the bracelet is, though. It's not meant to be a claim because he'd never lay claims on her. But she'd told him once that all he has to do is ask her to return and she will, and maybe that's what it's supposed to be.]

[Not a question, but a reminder of one. A token of the fact that he wants her there.]


[He leans into the way she pets him but when she leans on him, it's her turn, and he doesn't hesitate to put his arms around her.]</sub>

Merry Christmas.

[doitrockapella]

[For a minute, she closes her eyes and just...drifts, content to be where she is and for once finding it possible to just let go of her usual train of thought — where she is, how things feel, the glittering array of stimuli to focus on and memorize and try to make sense of — and stand, quietly, with his arms around her. For a minute, that's all it is: warmth, and safety, and the feeling of being surrounded — no, enveloped — no, encompassed by his embrace and his love.

Because he loves her.

It's Christmas, and he loves her.

You took something of mine, he'd said, and she'd known what he meant. But now, suddenly, she's not so certain of that anymore. After all, it's starting to feel as though he's made off with something of hers, too.]

Don't let go.

[It slips out, soft like a sigh against his shoulder, and she doesn't regret it or second-guess it, or wonder if she'd meant to say something different.]