Ho Ho Ho — Flash Fic Holiday Blog Hop!

Ready for some heart-warming holiday cheer? Click on the image above for some fantastic (and FREE) flash fics from some of your fave M/M authors! And read on for my holiday contribution…

Proof

Lane stared at the ornament. The canned Christmas carols piping through the store’s sound system faded away, as did the crowd animal rumble of holiday shoppers. He forgot the irritation of finding a parking spot, his worry about money, even the constant fear of doing the wrong thing. Again. The transparent glass ball nestled atop its cheesy display of fake evergreen bunches and red ribbon captured his entire focus, holding him transfixed.

The ornament was fragile, the glass so thin and delicate Lane feared leaning closer to examine the useless bit of frippery more closely, as though even his breath might shatter the thing. Why had the shopkeeper placed the ball so prominently in a high traffic area, when only one accidental nudge from a customer could send it tumbling from its precarious nest? One moment of inattention and carelessness promised a disaster of shattered glass, impossible to sweep free of the store’s thick carpet. Someone could get hurt.

Still, the twinkling lights reflected on the curved surface of the bauble just so, mesmerizing him. He needed to move. Jason wanted to pick out an ornament, a special one recognizing their first holiday together. Lane had only met the gregarious florist late last summer, outside his neat little shop near the methadone clinic. Instead of cringing from a scruffy ex-con in a battered leather jacket, Jason had smiled at him. Lane’s scraggly ponytail, three days of unshaven stubble shadowing his jaw, and the prison pallor that had marked him as newly paroled hadn’t put Jason off. He’d chattered. Graciously thanked him for rescuing the enormous spray of blooms and greenery that had been tipping from his overburdened arms. He’d let Lane help carry deliveries to his shop’s van, then invited him back for coffee later.

As though Lane was no more dangerous than the spray of lilies going to some rich bitch’s wedding.

He’d gone back for coffee all right, even though he’d already gotten his methadone and the clinic was across town from the cheap room Lane rented and well out of his way. Groaned through the exquisite blowjob Jason had treated him to in the back of that van too. Kneeling over Lane’s dick, Jason had looked up at him after, a stray curl of sunny blond hair falling over his forehead, his lips shiny with spit, red, and swollen. Those lush fuckable lips had twisted into a beaming smile and Lane had been a goner. Done for. Game over. He’d been hooked on that mouth—and Jason—ever since.

Whatever Jason wanted, Lane made damn sure he got.

A boyfriend with a steady job? Check. Moving crates through a warehouse on the docks might not be glamorous, but it paid well. Just enough to cover his half of the rent and utilities when he and Jason had moved in together.

A lover who wasn’t a junky? Check. Maybe he’d intended to rob Jason that first day. Maybe not. Not one sunset passed without Lane craving a fix, but he hadn’t shaken Jason down for cash last summer or gone looking for heroin since. Instead, he’d become a regular at the clinic that had seemed so depressing and impossible the morning they’d met.

Lane had learned to order the fancy coffees Jason liked, how to uniformly chop vegetables his boy needed while cooking their meals, and that falling asleep with a short, skinny bundle of bones that smelled of the roses Jason worked with settled something deep and troubling inside him.

Lane couldn’t remember the last time he’d cared about the holidays or decorating a tree, but if Jason wanted to invest three hours of a rare Saturday off work canvasing specialty stores and boutiques for a first Christmas together ornament, Lane would make damn sure they found exactly what had popped into his demented head as perfect.

Like maybe this ornament.

He didn’t startle at the arms looping around his waist under his coat or at the warm weight pressing behind him. The familiar scent of flowers wafted around him even before Jason leaned his head against Lane’s bicep. “I thought I’d lost you,” Jason said. “In the crowd.”

“Never.” Not in the crowd. Not to prison. Not to the monkey riding Lane’s back. Anywhere Jason was? That was home. Lane would never be lost again. He shifted his hands to cover Jason’s, now clasped around Lane’s middle, and squeezed to return the hug he still couldn’t quite believe was his any time he wanted. He jerked his chin to the display. “What about that one?”

Blond hair spilling around him like a golden halo, Jason tipped his head this way and that, blue eyes sparkling with interest as he examined the pretty, delicate bauble. “The year is etched in the glass,” he said, his low voice lifting with interest.

“You said my present had to have the year on it.” Not that Lane cared about the damn ornament, whether Jason’s gift included snowmen or penguins dripping scarves, neither of which had passed Jason’s muster as good enough. Nor had the countless ornaments Jason had inspected over the course of the morning. Lane would’ve been satisfied with the crystal heart in the first store they’d visited, but not Jason who knew exactly what he was looking for and wouldn’t stop until he’d found that. “I like the snow,” Lane added, which he supposed was true. Fluffy flakes of God knows what had settled within the clear globe on display, glittering faintly.

“You do?” Jason looked up, transferring his concentration from the ornament to Lane.

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“You aren’t just saying that because you’re tired of shopping,” Jason said, eyebrow arched dubiously. “Because we can stop. I can finish looking by myself later.”

“I’m not tired,” Lane lied. Nothing would convince him to suggest a halt to this mission until their prize had been won. Doing this together was important to Jason. “I really do like it.” He’d liked twenty other ornaments before this, too, but he opted against mentioning that. Smarter.

“Oh.” Glance still suspicious, Jason resumed the obsessive inspection of this store’s quarry. He frowned. Squeezed his arms around Lane’s waist. “You don’t think it’s too…too…breakable? The glass looks thin. If we aren’t careful, very careful, this won’t last a year.”

And when he’d first met Jason, Lane had been positive they wouldn’t last the hour. The day. A week. “This is the one,” Lane said, suddenly as certain of that as he was of the man whose arms held him tight, “and it’s my gift. You wanted me along to pick the right ornament. This present had to be perfect. That’s what you said.” When Jason just blinked up at him, Lane couldn’t resist bending down for a brief kiss. To hell with the other holiday shoppers. If they were offended, they could fuck off. “This is what I want. We won’t break it, I promise. We’ll be careful.”

Hadn’t the both of them been careful so far?

Finally, Jason flashed that smile. The same grin that had conned Lane into helping instead of robbing Jason that first morning, that had charmed him into the back of Jason’s van later. The one that had melted him in ways even Jason’s extremely skilled blowjob hadn’t. “If you’re sure,” Jason said.

“I am.” Lane had never been so sure of anything in his life. No matter how fragile or delicate both he and that ornament were, nothing could be safer. He had faith, not just in Jason. Lane wasn’t the same shaky man Jason had seduced, not any more. Lane had faith in himself. “Now go pay for my gift so I can take you home and thank you properly.”

“All right then.” Jason hugged Lane’s middle tight before perching on tiptoe to kiss Lane again. “Merry Christmas.”

With Jason’s kiss still warming his lips, Lane smiled too. “Merry Christmas, baby.”

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