#luke hemmings holiday fanfiction | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

thruheavenandhighwater · 5 years

Text

Holiday Series - Luke

[Michael] [Calum] [Ashton]

Pairing: Luke Hemmings/ Female OC

Requested By: N/A

Word Count: 3,974

Summary: Coffee shop AU in which barista Luke get stuck working on Christmas.

Luke sighed as he checked the time on his watch. 8:42 am. Less than an hour into his shift and he was seriously contemplating closing up and telling his boss where to shove it. But he couldn’t do that, and he knew it. As much as this job sucked, it was the only one he could find in the city that allowed him enough time off to travel back home a few times a year, so he needed to keep it.

He picked up an old blue rag and began to wipe down an espresso machine when the bell above the door chimed. The cheerful sound signaled to Luke the first customer of the day. He looked up to the door and saw a girl walking through it, a few stray snowflakes following her inside before she was able to close the door behind her.

Her shoulder length brown hair was contained beneath a grey beanie that matched the scarf that she held tightly around her neck. Luke watched her shiver slightly as she stood in front of the closed door, the heat of the coffee shop warming her from the Christmas snow storm that had been raging outside since the night before. Her eyes closed for a moment as she took a deep breath before slowly unwrapping the scarf around her neck and removing it.

She opened her eyes and directed her attention to Luke behind the counter. He felt his breath catch in his throat as she smiled at him from across the room. She pulled off her black mittens, shoving them into the pocket of her coat as she made her way to the counter. Luke suddenly became very aware of the coffee stain on his blue apron and the fact that he’d barely put any effort into getting ready this morning. He ran a hand through his long, blond curls in an attempt to tame them, even though he knew that they always had a mind of their own.

“Morning.” Luke offered with a smile as she got closer to him. Her own smile grew as she greeted him in kind.

“Good morning!” Her voice was soft and sweet, almost like a song in a way that Luke couldn’t quite put his finger on. “You have no idea how glad I am that you’re open today.” She sighed, pulling her wallet from the bag slung over her shoulder.

“Yeah, I guess someone needs to keep the people caffeinated, even on Christmas.” Luke laughed. She giggled along with him, the corners of her lips pulling up just slightly more than they already were. He couldn’t help but to notice that her giggle was somehow even prettier than her speaking voice. The way it fell so easily from her lips made him want to hear it over and over again. “So, uh, what can I get ya?” He asked, his hands gripping the sides of the register a little too tight.

“Uh, just a venti latte, please.” She answered, looking away from him to the wallet in her hand. He rang in her order and read out her total. He pulled his hand away from hers quickly, nearly dropped her money when she handed it to him. She smiled at him again as he handed her change back to her.

“And a name?” Luke asked her, picking up a cup and pulling a marker from the pocket of his apron.

She looked over her shoulder to the empty coffee shop with another giggle. “Are you afraid you’re gonna give it to the wrong person?” She asked, raising her eyebrows as she faced him again.

He felt his cheeks go warm at her question. A small chuckle fell from his lips as he dropped his chin to his chest. “Sorry,” He said. “It’s a habit.”

“It’s fine.” She told him, waving her hand. “It’s Ariel.”

Fuck, even her name is pretty. Luke smiled to himself as he jotted her name on the side of the paper cup. She removed her beanie, running a hand through her hair as she walked to the other end of the counter.

“So, how’d you get stuck working Christmas?” She asked him, leaning over the counter and resting on her elbows as she watched him prepare her drink.

Luke shrugged his broad shoulders, not looking up from his task as he answered. “I usually end up working holidays because I don’t have any family here in the states to spend them with.”

Ariel put a hand over her heart as she pouted her lips. “Oh my, that is so sad.” She sighed. “I mean, my family is far away, too. But I can usually get back to visit them for holidays.”

“Are you from out of town?”

“Oh, yeah.” She laughed. “A tiny little town near Boston.”

Luke hadn’t been expecting that. He finished her drink, capping it before sliding it across the counter to her waiting hands. “So why aren't you there for Christmas?”

This time, it was her turn to shrug. “I'm, like, extra poor this year.” Luke raised his eyebrows as he nodded, that was definitely a struggle that he understood. “Plus, I'm Jewish.”

“Mazel tov!” Luke exclaimed, throwing his hands up next to his face.

Ariel dropped her face, looking down at the paper cup in her hands as she laughed out loud. “Do you even know what that means?” She questioned when she looked back up at him.

“I, uhh…” Luke stammered for a moment, fiddling with the edge of his apron before answering with a giggle. “No, I don't.”

She laughed again at his answer. Her lips pulling up high on her cheeks, showing off her teeth as she smiled up at him. The sound filled Lukes ears and he felt his chest swell with pride that he was able to pull such a beautiful sound from her.

“So how’d you end up in Chicago?” Luke asked once her laugh had subsided.

“School, originally. Ended up dropping out, though.” She answered with a smile. “How about you?”

“Oh, I wanted to be in a band. It wasn’t working out back home, so I packed up and moved here a few years ago. I was completely convinced I’d go back a home a rockstar.” He finished, laughing at himself and his own naivety.

“I take it the band thing didn’t work out?”

“Kind of did for a while, actually.”

“So what happened? Why aren’t you a rockstar?” She asked him as she stood up straight.

“Egos.” He answered simply. “Mine and theirs. They’re still great guys, we just didn’t get on well.”

Ariel nodded, bringing her cup to her lips. Luke watched as she cautiously sipped the hot drink. Her eyes fell closed again and Luke took a moment to appreciate the way the lights in the shop caught the slight shimmer in her nude eyeshadow.

“Well, at least you’re still young.” She told him as she pulled the cup away from her lips, taking a step back from the counter. “There’s still time, rockstar.” She winked at him before turning away. Luke felt his stomach tie itself into about fifteen different knots at the sight.

She took a few steps away from him, stopping at the nearest table and setting her drink down. She began to shrug her coat from her shoulders, revealing an emerald green sweater that hugged her frame beautifully. “Mind if I hang out here for a bit?” She asked. “It’s like the end of the world out there.”

“Fine by me.” Luke answered with a smile. She hung her coat on the rack by the door and sat down at her table, pulling a book from her bag and opening it. The pair were silent for a while. Nothing but the sounds of people outside, snow crunching beneath boots, and the playlist of Christmas songs playing on the speakers around the coffee shop.

The silence was somehow comfortable and unbearably awkward all at once. At least, that was how it felt from Luke’s point of view. Ariel sat at her table, her legs crossed beneath it as she read her book and sipped at her coffee. Since he was on the clock, Luke was trying to find something to fill his time on the off chance that his boss made an appearance. He picked up a broom from the back room and walked into the shop.

“Is this your way of telling me to beat it?” Ariel asked with a smile when he started to sweep up.

“What? No, of course not.” Luke stammered. Why was he so eager for her to stay? He didn’t know her. Hell, they’d barely even spoken since she walked in half an hour ago. “Just, uh, trying to keep busy.”

“Ya know, if you wanted to take a break, I promise I won’t tell on you.”

Once again, Luke felt his cheeks heat up as she spoke to him. He smiled as he leaned the broom against a wall and walked over to where she sat. He put his hand on the back of the chair across from her. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all.” She answered. She placed her bookmark into the spine of her book before closing it and setting it down on the table between them. “I’m sorry, but I have to ask. Where is home for you? I’ve been trying to place your accent and I just can’t figure it out.”

“Australia.” He answered with a chuckle. “West Sydney, specifically.”

“Really? You don’t sound very much like Steve Irwin.”

“Ouch.” Luke whined, putting his hand over his heart and furrowing his brows.

“Sorry!” Ariel said, reaching across the table and placing her hand on his arm.

Luke’s smile quickly grew to a toothy grin as he looked down to where her hand rested delicately on his wrist. “It’s fine. Every time I go home all I hear from my family is that I need to move back because I’m getting an American accent.” Ariel laughed at him. She removed her hand from his wrist and he instantly felt less whole at the loss of her soft touch.

“I don’t know if I’d say it’s quite an American accent.” She said, picking up her cup and bringing it to her lips again. She took a long drink, licking her lips as she set the cup back on the table between them. “But then again, I never got to hear your accent before so who am I to say?”

“If you’ve ever been to Sydney, especially West Sydney, you’ll know that they definitely don’t sound like this.”

“I haven’t been. But I’d love to visit someday, when money isn’t so tight.” She sighed. “I want to see the world. All of it. Every nook and cranny of the every beautiful city the world has to offer.”

“You sound like me.” He said with a grin. “That was one reason I wanted to be in a band, actually. See the world, meet new people, experience new cultures.”

“Well, if the band thing works out, I volunteer to be your merch girl. You don’t even have to pay me.” She said with a laugh as she pushed some hair from her face. “Just take me around the world.”

“Deal.” He answered. “And hey, even if the band doesn’t work out, I’d still happily be your tour guide around Sydney when you go.”

“Well, how can I say no to being shown around a foreign country by a native?”

“I guess you can't.” He told her with a beaming grin.

Just as Ariel was about to speak again, the bell above the door chimed for a second time. Both Luke and Ariel jumped at the sudden interruption. A middle aged man in a long tan coat walked in, shutting the door quickly.

“Storm of the century out there.” The older man said as he walked to the counter. Luke stood from his seat and walked to the back of the counter to help the man. He placed his order, paid, and turned back to Ariel. “Have you been out there?” He asked her.

“Yeah, a little bit earlier. Been here about 45 minutes, though.”

Luke finished pouring his coffee, capping it and sliding it across the counter in same fashion he'd done for Ariel. The man thanked Luke and started towards the door. “If you'll take a nickel's worth of free advice, I'd stay in here as long as he will let you.” He told her, nodding his head to Luke who still stood behind the counter. “It's getting worse out there by the minute.” Ariel smiled at him and offered a silent nod as he opened the door and walked back into the storm.

“Looks like you might be stuck with me for a while, rockstar.” Ariel said as the door closed.

“Could be worse.” Luke shrugged. “At least I've got some company. Hey, you want a refill while I'm back here? On the house.”

“I will never say no to free coffee.” Ariel answered, smiling as she tucked a piece of hair behind her ear once again.

Luke returned her smile quickly before turning his attention to making her a fresh drink. He found himself being extra careful while he made it. For some reason, he was sure that if this drink wasn't exactly perfect, she'd leave before he wanted her to. And he just couldn't have that.

He finished the drink and set it in front of her, picking up her cold drink and throwing it away for her. He decided that he needed to find ways to stay busy again. He began wiping down already sparkling machinery and filling cream dispensers. The pair continued talking while Luke cleaned the entire shop.

They discussed their childhoods, laughing together at notable differences between growing up in America versus Australia. “Wait,” Ariel said, leaning forward, her eyes closing as she shook her head in an attempt to make sense of something Luke had just said. “They really feed that to children?”

“What?” Luke laughed. “It's just buttered bread with sprinkles.”

“I'm sorry, but that sounds disgusting.” She told him, laughing with him as she sat back in her seat. “I can't believe kids would even eat that.”

“Don't knock it till ya try it.”

“Fair enough. Maybe I'll pick up some sprinkles on my next shopping trip.”

A few hours passed when suddenly, Luke's stomach growled loudly from where he was on a step ladder cleaning windows. He checked his watch, it was after 1 p.m. It was definitely much later than he normally ate, but he hadn't even noticed that he was hungry. He was too preoccupied with Ariel and their conversations. Had she really been here for nearly four hours already?

“Hungry, rockstar?” Ariel laughed from her table as she looked up at him.

“Starving, apparently.”

“Good, because I am, too.” She smiled. “Are any restaurants even open today?”

“The chinese place down the street definitely is.” Luke answered. He stepped down from the step ladder and pulled his phone from the pocket of his apron. The part of his brain that never quite left high school wanted to ask Ariel for her number. He pushed the thought away and instead, opened his messages and began to text his order to Eric, the delivery boy from the restaurant. “Wait, you like Chinese, right?”

“Love it.”

Luke’s smile grew as he continued to type out his usual order. “What do you want?” He asked, finally looking up at her.

“Sesame chicken.”

“Rice?”

“Fried, please.”

Luke added her order to the end of his text before tacking on a few emojis and hitting send. “Should be 10 minutes, give or take.” He told her as he replaced his phone in his apron pocket and took his seat across the table from her.

“So,” Ariel started as he sat down. “Am I supposed to keep calling you ‘rockstar’ forever, or are you gonna tell me your name?”

“Luke.” He answered, his teeth showing as he laughed at her. “But if you want to keep calling me rockstar, I’m not going to stop you.”

“No,” She said, her smile growing. “I think I like Luke.” He would conservitavely guess that he’d heard his name approximately 800 billion times in his twenty-two years of life, but hearing Ariel say it for the first time? Easily one of the top five greatest sounds he had ever heard. Even if he’d tried, Luke wouldn’t have been able to contain the joyful grin that quickly covered his entire face.

A few minutes later the door to the coffee shop opened, bringing a huge gust of wind and a man carrying two plastic take out bags with it. Luke stood from his seat and walked towards the man, taking the bags from him and setting them in front of Ariel. He pulled his wallet from his back pocket and started to pull a few bills from it.

“Man, you know mom won’t let you pay.” The guy laughed, shoving Lukes hand away.

“It’s been like three years, she’s gotta let me pay eventually.”

“No, she likes you better than any of us. You’re good for life.” He said, laughing. His eyes swept over the shop before landing on Ariel. “I take it you’re the sesame chicken?” He asked with a smile.

“How’d ya know?”

“I’ve never known this one to get anything other than sweet and sour pork.”

“Interesting.” Ariel said, nodding her head. “I’ll have to keep that in mind.”

“Okay, okay. If we’re done discussing my diet, I’d like to eat now.” Luke commented as he pulled out his chair. “You hanging out?” He asked Eric, turning to look at him as he began to pull take out boxes from the bags.

“Can’t. Mom needs me back to run more deliveries. See ya.” He answered, taking a few steps towards the door.

“Later.” Luke nodded, still unbagging your food as Eric stepped through the door. “Hope you like egg rolls. Looks like Mama Kim hooked us up.” He laughed as he opened a box containing at least a dozen eggs rolls.

“Mama Kim, huh?” Ariel asked as she reached across the table to pluck an egg roll from the box.

“Yeah,” Luke laughed. “I met Eric like my second day in the states and his parents more or less adopted me. Good thing, too. I'd have starved to death if she didn't insist on sending me home with a months worth of food every other day.”

“She sounds sweet.” Ariel said with a smile.

“Yeah, she's the best.” Luke told her as he took a bite of his egg roll.

As they were finishing their lunch, Lukes phone began ringing from his apron pocket. He pushed his chair away from the table as he pulled his phone from his pocket. “It’s my boss.” He said to her, taking a few steps away from the table as he answered the call.

Ariel tried not to listen, sure that whatever the call was about was none of her business anyway. Instead, she focused her attention on cleaning up the takeout boxes that were scattered across the table. She dumped the boxes into a trash can next to the door just as Luke was hanging up his call.

“Did you get in trouble for sitting down at work all day?” She asked as she walked back over to him.

“No,” Luke laughed as he replaced his phone into his apron pocket. “He just wanted to know if we’d had any customers today. Told me to close up shop.”

Was he seeing things or did her smile actually drop a little?

“So you’re finally kicking me out, huh?”

“Well, technically my boss is making me kick both of us out.” He answered.

Ariel returned to her seat and started to pack up her bag. “It’s been really nice hanging out with you today, Luke.” She told him, smiling up at him from where she was stuffing her book into her bag.

“Yeah,” He returned her smile. “Today definitely turned out to be more fun than I thought it would be. I’m glad you came in.” He was searching every corner of his mind to find ways to make her stay just a little longer as he walked to the window to turn off the neon ‘OPEN’ sign. As he flipped the switch, the opening notes to Baby, It’s Cold Outside began to play over the shops sound system.

Ariel gasped from her seat and put her hand over her chest. Luke spun around quickly to look at her, caught off guard by the sudden sound. “I love this song.” She sighed, her eyes falling closed as she began to sway in her seat.

This is it. This was his chance and he knew he had to take it, or risk kicking himself in the ass for the rest of his life for letting it slip away. He took a few slow steps towards her, praying she would respond well to his plan. He listened to the song and grinned to himself as he watched her mouth along with the words.

I really can't stay.

This is it. This is his moment. He took a deep breath as the woman singing finished her line.

“But, baby, it’s cold outside.” He sang. His voice was quiet, too afraid of her reaction to sing much louder than a whisper. Ariel’s eyes shot open, her smile wider than it had been all day as she looked at him. He swore that her brown eyes actually glowed as she chimed in.

“I've got to go away.”

“But, baby, it’s cold outside.” He sang again, slightly louder this time as he put his hand out to her.

“This evening has been so very nice.” She sang back to him as she took his hand and stood in front of him.

“I’ll hold your hands, they’re just like ice.”

“My mother will start to worry.”

“Beautiful, what's your hurry?” Luke placed a cautious hand behind her back, just below her waist.

“My father will be pacing the floor.”

“Listen to the fireplace roar.” Her smile grew along with his as he started to move with her.

The pair spun in slow circles as they continued to sing the classic holiday tune to each other. At some point, Ariels free hand found its way to Lukes shoulder. This was working. He moved his hand to the middle of her back, pulling her into him just slightly.

Before he knew it, the song was coming to an abrupt end. He’d never realized how short of a song it actually is. The last lines of the song played, both of them singing the words to each other, and before he could stop himself, Luke was leaning in. His eyes closed as his face inched closer to hers. He hoped he looked cool, but every single alarm in his body was going off in that moment. The instant his lips met hers, though, all of them silenced.

It was a quick kiss, quicker than he would have liked. But it was beautiful. It was perfect. It was everything that Luke always thought a first kiss should have been. Luke felt her smiling as his lips landed on hers.

Luke broke the kiss, pulling away first. He opened his eyes to see her grinning up at him. A lock of her brown hair had fallen into her eyes. He moved his hand from her back to tuck the fallen piece behind her ear, earning an even wider grin from her as he rested his hand on her neck just below her ear.

“Smooth move, rockstar.” She whispered to him as she leaned forward, her lips pursing as she kissed him again.

~~~

As you can see, this is the first part of a Holiday Series! I’m really excited about all of these and I cannot wait to post all of them! Can’t wait to hear what you all think of this and the rest of the series.

Happy Holidays!

Tag List: @crownedbyluke @thecashtonexpress @blue-skies-are-alright @lmao5sosimagines @therainydays4 @rosecth @thesoundsyoumake @kinglyhemmings @a-little-international @harryandthelesbians @lukescherrypie @ashotofblues @youngblood199456 @rexorangecouny @cashton-queen @tothemoonwithclifford @babylon-uncrowned @asht0ns-world @abitloudforanaccousticset

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irwintry · 5 years

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Hallmark Movie Love Story

Warnings: swearing (he’s a potty mouth in this one folks)

Author’s Note: Christmas BABy!!! this was originally titled “the great snowmobile wreck of ‘18 and the hallmark christmas movie love story” lmao and there’s not even a snowmobile wreck in the story but that’s why i liked it

Word Count: 6.7k

Luke could read off all of the delayed or canceled flights by memory. He had seen them flash on every monitor he passed on the way to his terminal. Meanwhile, unhappy flyers were rushing by him to be the first at the information desk. Their holiday was ruined for sure, but his wasn’t, and that was all that mattered to him. He couldn’t figure out how his flight was one of the only ones on time, though he wasn’t complaining.

Even when boarding, he couldn’t believe his luck. The cruel part of him wanted to run off of the plane and rub the whole ordeal in the outraged flyers’ faces. His complimentary booze called his name, so he stayed put in the comfortable first-class cabin.

The skies didn’t look all that well, and turbulence had picked up right when they reached cruising altitude. If Luke didn’t know any better, he would say that the pilots miscalculated the possibility of the storm hitting their flight path. It didn’t matter to him now– he was up in the air, and everyone else was stuck in New York.

Luke had finished his first mimosa when the pilot announced over the intercom that the storm had pulled north, blocking the flight’s path and therefore preventing it from going farther west. His heart fell as he stared out of the frost-coated window, his eyes barely catching an inch of land below the clouds.

“Fuck,” he whispered and let out a breath. Luke believed he had a fairly strong intuition, and he trusted his gut. Right now, his gut was telling him that things were not going to go his way. If only it had told him that before.

The pilot informed them that they were landing in a town that started with S, but Luke didn’t care enough to register the information. He would buy a whole plane for himself if it meant getting home faster. The other passengers couldn’t say the same. If some of them were cute and desperate, he’d consider helping them, but certainly not the man beside him who reeked of B.O. and the burrito he chose to eat for breakfast.

Luke needed to get off of the plane in order to think coherent thoughts.

The plane touched down before noon, and already, the runway was slick and icy. The snow had started to fall only moments prior, and Luke knew that if it had been raining, it would be coming down in sheets. To his dismay, this was only the tip of the storm.

Karma was most likely going to fuck him up the ass.

There were no flights leaving from the tiny airport, and by the time he were to get onto the highway with the help of a taxi, it would be an hour into the storm. The roads would be closed by then. Luke had no choice but to go into whatever town was nearby and find a place to stay, and he was not happy about it in the slightest. He made sure everyone knew it by the look on his face.

All of his muscles were contorted in order to make a convincing irate frown. His mother would tell him his face would freeze like that, his cheeks all bitten in and eyebrows tightened together. He missed her, he really did, and he would love to see her if it weren’t for the lovely Winter Storm Dalton.

The ride into town was a nightmare– at least, it felt like it was to Luke. The taxi driver seemed content with the conditions, claiming that “not even an inch” had fallen, yet the occasional glance back through the plastic divider sent Luke into a minor panic. The radio station was a constant loop of Christmas oldies, and he wanted to reach up there and punch the off button, but he wasn’t that rude.

Luke didn’t hate Christmas, but if he couldn’t spend it with his family, he’d rather not have the holiday whatsoever.

There were only two motels within miles of the town, both with shiny new non-vacancy signs hung brightly in the office windows, and Luke wanted to tumble out of the cab and die. He tipped the driver a hundred before having them drop him off in the center of town. Before driving away, the driver told Luke about a few places to hit in the town before leaving tomorrow. This caused Luke to snort because he wasn’t even sure he would get out tomorrow, and he certainly wouldn’t be visiting any local art gallery.

He knew he looked fucking ridiculous. Everything on his body was designer, including his hat and coat. Even his luggage would cost most of the citizens of this town their arm and leg. Meanwhile, his shoulders pained him, and the tension had crawled its way up into his temples. He needed coffee.

Luke wandered for what felt like an hour, but it was really only two minutes when he stumbled upon a decent-looking coffee shop named The Coffee Pot. The windows were fogged, and it reminded him that warmth did exist, just not on his body at the moment. He could tell his cheeks and nose were bright red, and his ears were physically hurting his head even more.

The door chimed on his way in, and out of the many times Luke’s presence silenced a room, this had to be the most uncomfortable. All conversations ceased, and the only sound reverberating through the all-too wooden interior was the faint drone of Bing Crosby singing “White Christmas”. He clutched his suitcase and started towards the counter.

“The west coast too warm for ya, son?” an older man shouted from the back corner, and Luke didn’t hesitate to glare at anyone who chuckled. “This ain’t Malibu, sweetheart.”

“Give him a break, Darryl, he’s probably tired from travelin’.”

Luke’s head snapped over to the counter where the next voice came from. Instead of finding another grumpy local, he found you, a soft and smiley barista that clearly would get on his nerves if he spoke to you long enough.

You were leaned up against the counter as he approached you, and you were still smiling as you asked, “what can I get ya?”

Luke wanted solitude. He wanted no one to speak to him ever again. But he also wanted the richest cup of coffee he could get in Buttfuck, New York. “Small coffee,” he muttered, already digging into his wallet for a few dollars. “Darkest roast.”

“Cream ‘n sugar?”

“No.”

“Okie dokie,” you said. “You can put the fifty-cents in the tip jar.”

Luke quirked a heavy, wet (from the snow) brow. “Fifty-cents?”

You nodded. “The coffee’s fifty-cents.” You had already poured the coffee into a to-go cup, and now you were standing with your arms crossed. Maybe Luke wasn’t the only one with an attitude. “Can I get ya anythin’ else?” A sigh followed your question.

“No.”

“Ya sure?” You smirked at him, and he didn’t like that one bit. “We got food. Airplane food’s not quite as good as my world-famous pressed paninis!”

Luke nearly snorted. You were annoying, yet funny. World-famous... he’d had world-famous, and he was positive you hadn’t even come close to knowing what it tasted like. “Got any salads?”

“Um,” you mumbled. “No, I’m– I’m sorry, we don’t.”

Great. Poor service and no salads. Luke wanted to get the hell out of this town. “Fine. Gimme a world-famous panini, then.”

“Oh!” You grinned, your entire body jumping as you leaned your elbows back onto the counter. “Which one? We got– “

He didn’t listen as you listed off the sandwiches, so when you stopped talking, he played the lottery and said, “the last,” before setting down his cash and walking away with his coffee. Luke was normally nicer than this, but his day had been so fucked up already, and he wasn’t terribly in the mood for talking to a cute yet chatty barista. However, he did feel guilty for not saying thank you.

Luke took a seat at a table by the wall adjacent to the counter. Every single one of your customers stared at him as he did so, but just as he opened his mouth to retort a snarky comment, they returned back to their conversations. They were more interested in his rich, LA vibe, and they definitely wondered why he was here instead of there. He would rather be there than here any day.

He winced as he took a sip of his coffee. It was watery like he expected. No good coffee is fifty cents. The person to his right had been staring at his luggage for a good minute now, which for some reason, pissed Luke off to no end. Every little thing that bothered him was heightened due to the incredulous turn of events of the day. It wasn’t even two in the afternoon.

The coffee sat idle as he began to scribble down his thoughts into a random journal he picked up in Munich just the other month. His life was too extreme for the people of this town. They wouldn’t last a day in his boots, nor would he want them to even breathe near his boots. Someone could glance at them and he’d spit.

Luke wrote for a while, his thoughts pouring out onto the handmade paper without even realizing that a hot unknown panini had been placed down right in front of his nose. Also, a few of his crumpled bills had been strewn beside it.

“Few dollars too much,” you said, your face expressionless as you prepared to back away. “This is Spruce Creek, not LA. The world isn’t as shiny as it seems.” And then you were gone, and Luke wanted to laugh.

Everyone here thought they were so philosophical– it killed him. He shoved the few dollars into his pocket before staring at the steaming sandwich. A growl emitted from his stomach at the sight of the pesto running down the crusty sides, and Luke didn’t realize how truly hungry he had been until he reached for the sandwich and took a great big bite. He nearly moaned at the warmth spreading on his tongue. If only the coffee had lived up to his expectations, then maybe he would give this place a little more credit.

Luke pictured you in a city like New York, but he wasn’t sure you could handle the hustle and bustle. You certainly didn’t belong in LA– you seemed like the type that thrived off of snow and hot chocolate. Plus, you also seemed satisfied with the community you created with this coffee shop. Everyone was speaking to one another as if they were longtime friends... everyone but Luke. He didn’t want to be friends with any of them anyway.

Time ticked away faster than he assumed it would. Come mid-afternoon, the sun had set, and people were flooding into the coffee shop for food. They all looked the same to him, and they all knew each other’s’ names. Mid-afternoon slowly turned into early evening, and before Luke knew it, the whole place had cleared. His coffee remained untouched from earlier.

“Hey Curly, we’re closin’ up,” you called from the other end of the café. You were stacking chairs, your apron now thrown over your shoulder like a proper barista would. He had noticed you scrubbing down surfaces, but he hadn’t put two-and-two together.

“Fuck,” he muttered, eyes widening and pen slipping from his grip, though he made no effort to move. Luke had slept in cars and vans and buses, yet not once had he slept on the street. If he truly wanted to, he could go back to the airport and stay there, however, conditions were worsening outside.

The chair in your hands fell to the table with a spine-shuddering bang. Luke was just thankful he didn’t have all that much caffeine in him or else the sound would have sent his nerves flying.

“Where we ya headin’ to?” you asked, continuing your round about the floor.

“Does it matter?” he sighed as he rubbed his temples. “Got no fuckin’ place to stay.”

You didn’t answer as you stepped back behind the counter to shut off the lights to the kitchen.

“’m stuck in this fuckin’ town with all you fuckin’ people,” he said, “and Spice Crete is so fuckin’ small that your tiny ass motels turned me away. Me. I coulda given ‘em triple their nightly rates! So fuckin’ stupid. I’d rather’ve stayed in fuckin’ New York City with everyone else whose flight was canceled.”

“Spruce Creek.”

“What?” Luke snapped. He imagined that his face looked awfully crude.

“The town,” you giggled, shutting off the lights that were behind the camera. You walked over to him and placed your hand on the leg of an overturned chair. “’s Spruce Creek. Although, I wouldn’t mind the Spruce changing t’Spice. Sounds festive.”

He rolled his eyes.

There was another moment of silence as you stared at him, and he was about to say something about it before you said, “so, stay at my place.”

Luke knotted his brows together. Every line in his face deepened with confusion. “What?”

“I’ve got a couch,” you replied with a smile. “It’s not a California king-sized, but it’s some cushion until the conditions clear up. Free of charge.”

He was about to snort. He was about to say no. But he had no other options. Luke was forced to nod and accept your kind invitation. He hated that you seemed so happy about it.

Luke was grateful (truly, he was), but he could not handle your constant chatter. Were all small-town people the same? Did they all talk about nothing that mattered to him just to get under his skin? After you had taken him down the road to the tiny apartment building you resided in, Luke decided he was going to lock himself in the bathroom for thirty minutes of peace. The idea of brushing his teeth and scrubbing off the airplane and coffee shop grime tempted him, though the jingling of a collar snapped him out of his thought process.

A stout and slightly chubby Pitbull waddled over to greet the two of you as you entered through the (god awfully creaky) door. It went right to you, but it soon cowered back into the hallway right when it noticed Luke.

“That’s Grape!” you exclaimed, meanwhile making baby sounds to summon the dog back. “She’s shy when it comes to men. The vet thinks it might be because of her past owner, or something.”

Luke felt the disappointed come and go. Memories of Petunia hit him like a freight train, and it only reminded him further that he wanted nothing more than to be home with her. His eyes fell on the tree in the corner of the living room, and fuck, what a pathetic thing that was. Had you only gotten it yesterday? You didn’t seem like the type of person that had to settle for the runts. The apartment was decked out top-to-bottom for the holiday, so it didn’t make sense that the tree appeared to be seconds away from catching flame.

Whatever. It didn’t matter to him anyway. He was going to be here for a day or two at tops. And, if it had to be any longer, Luke would rather walk home.

And then the tree kept bothering him. “What’s– why’s your tree like...”

You huffed, but you laughed along with it. “Sad?” You shrugged and plopped down onto the hardwood floor as Grape came ambling over. “Couldn’t afford the price of a pretty tree.”

Luke frowned. Now that was unacceptable. “Where’s the nearest tree farm?” he asked you, eyes narrowing on you and the tubby pup that refused to look at him. It truly crushed him that he was not getting attention by that dog. If anything was keeping him back, it would be Grape.

“Um, there’s one behind Martha’s candle shop, so just like a five-minute walk,” you said. “Why?”

“I can’t sleep on a couch facing that fuckin’ thing,” Luke grumbled as he hugged himself with his arms.

“But I can’t– “

“Think of it as me leaving my mark.” He shrugged. The closer he got to closing himself off I the bathroom, the happier he would be. “Buying a tree will hardly put a dent in my wallet.”

You nodded, your lips pulling into a small frown as you lifted yourself off of the floor to stand. “You know,” you mumbled, “you’re gonna find some of the nicest people here in this town. They’ll treat ya like family if you let them. The storm will be over soon, and you’ll go back to your sports cars and model girlfriends. But there’s a warmth you’ll get here that you’ll never get anywhere else. Don’t flaunt things in their faces. People may not be rich here, but they have more worth than you will ever know.” You grabbed your coat from the small hook beside you. “Let’s go.”

Luke didn’t like receiving the cold shoulder from anyone, and for some reason, he hated it coming from you. You, the cute, chatty barista who somehow knew exactly how to piss him off. Yet, now that you were upset with him, the entire town would be on his ass. How could he hurt the sweetheart who owned The Coffee Pot? How dare he? Luke hardly expected to come out of this alive.

He didn’t know how to pick out a Christmas tree– he just saw them in movies and always dreamt of the day he could cut one down and decorate it himself. You, however, knew exactly where to go as you stalked off to the way back. Sure, he was right about there being a lot of runts, but there were good ones too. You certainly had experience in shopping for trees. You handled the saw with ease on the walk through the trees while he stumbled over stumps while the tree wagon nicked his shins.

Luke hadn’t made a snarky comment since you snapped at him, which honestly, he deserved. He was being a bit cruel to the folks around town. They had no say in his matters– it was not their fault that he was stuck in this god-awful place.

“If this fuckin’ thing hits my fuckin’– “

“This one,” you said, pointing to a great Fraser fir standing a whopping six feet (he guessed considering he was slightly taller than it).

Luke’s forehead scrunched. “It’s so– “

“Short?” you wondered aloud. “Mhm. I’ll name her Patrice. Who’s cutting? You, or me?”

He stuttered out a pitiful, “uh, I– uh– I-I don’t– “ before you sighed and kneeled on the snow-covered ground.

His eyes widened at your audacious action, and he wondered if you cared about your pants at all. Luke, on the other hand, was freezing his butt off. He was lucky he had a hat to keep his delicate ears warm, but his hands were numb in his coat pockets. The snow was falling in fat, chunky flakes that greatly affected his vision. The two of you looked kind of hilarious, all covered in snow and such, and you were somehow already well into your sawing. You definitely did have experience.

The word “wait” uttered from his lips a moment later.

“What?”

“I-I wanna try.”

You chuckled and sat up. Your arms were coated in needles, and your entire front side was caked in snow. “Give it a go, then,” you said, handing him the saw.

Luke knelt on the ground as he did his best not to wince at the fact that his few-hundred-dollar pair of pants was now soaked in snow, mud, sap, and many other things he didn’t want to think about. He laid down, just like you had, and shit, he wanted to whine about it so badly.

The floodlights overhead hardly shed a speck of light through the needles, which meant he couldn’t see a single thing of what he was about to cut. You had sawed a little already, so he searched and searched for the itsy divot you created.

“I look fuckin’– how the hell do you do this?” he asked, somehow already frustrated. His arms were cramping, and they hadn’t even moved.

You chuckled from above. When he glanced up (as best as he could through the lower boughs), you had grabbed ahold of the top to balance it out for when he began sawing. “Back ‘n forth.” You motioned it with your hands, and honestly, it looked more like–

“A handjob?”

This made you burst into a fit of unforeseen laughter, and that actually caused him to smile, too.

“Like a handjob, yup,” you said.

He nodded and returned his gaze back to the dark underbelly of the fir. Here goes nothing.

It took a bit of time, coercion, and tears, but Luke finally managed to cut down the small fir. He insisted on lifting it into the little wagon too, but the blunt end of the trunk fell on his toe, so you ended up helping out with that one. Truth be told, he wasn’t sure the experience had been worth it, but he promised you a better tree, and hell, you were getting a better tree.

“Cool beans,” you muttered, out of breath. A few snowflakes had stuck to your eyelashes, and that made him smile a bit. You were really pretty. Brushing off your hat, you huffed out, “now, let’s go get Patricia straightened.”

“I thought it was Patrice.”

You pouted. “Oh. Yeah. Patrice.”

Luke had no idea how he remembered that over you, but he knew that in due time, he would hopefully forget Patrice and this entire experience.

Luke awoke to a slobbery grin by his nose, and before he could register the puppy’s stare, he was being attacked with big, wet kisses. He had almost forgotten where he was as he laughed at the dog’s sudden friendliness, and then he smelled the burning from the kitchen. The half-open French doors separating the living room from the kitchen only hid so much, so the dancing mess that you were could easily be seen. He recognized the song playing softly through your phone as some song from “10 Things I Hate About You”. Honestly, his life at the moment could have been so much worse.

The spatula flew from your hands, and you yelped, causing poor Grape to waddle off in fear.

“Shit, Y/N,” you muttered to yourself, clambering across the bench surrounding the table to fetch the fallen soldier, “that’s not how you make eggs.”

Luke snickered, but he hadn’t meant it to be as loud as it was. You slipped onto the floor, and he heard your dog’s collar jingle from down the hall.

“Mornin’,” you huffed, kicking your legs out and accepting your defeat. “Like eggs?”

“Got ketchup?”

You groaned. “You disgust me.”

Luke cracked a grin.

“But no, sorry,” you mumbled with a shrug. “’m not a big ketchup fan.”

“You disgust me.”

You leaned forward to peer through the glass of one of the open doors so you could view Patrice in her bare glory. “Thanks, again. For Patty.”

He nodded. “Thanks for giving me a place to stay.”

You nodded, too.

“Need any help in the kitchen?”

Luke found out that you burned some toast, and you were about to serve him watery eggs, which didn’t make much sense to him considering the masterpiece sandwich you crafted for him yesterday. Now it was his turn to show you his skills, although they weren’t all that great. He just wanted things to go faster so he could get the hell out of Spice Girl Creek. The weather didn’t appear all that better just from his observations, but maybe it would be okay by the afternoon.

He had plated your breakfast when you said to him,

“Roads are still closed. We’re only in the middle of Dalton.”

Luke nearly dropped your plate. “Are you fucking kidding me?” He set the two plates down and began to pace a bit.

You shook your head. “But you’re more than welcome to– “

“Leave me alone,” he snapped and raced in the direction of the bathroom. Grape followed after him, and she soon began whining after he closed the door in her face.

Luke wanted to scream or cry or something in between. He was stuck in this town with you and all of those other weird old people that only saw him as a fake movie prop. He was real, and he was so mad that everyone looked at him as if he were the oddest frickin’ man who walked the face of the earth. Sure, he was pricey, and sure, one of his outfits cost more than your monthly rent, but that didn’t give them the right to stare. Just because he was untouchable didn’t mean he had zero feelings completely.

Maybe he was being unreasonable. He wasn’t a fucking god. All of Luke’s feelings stemmed from the fact that he couldn’t get home, and he really had no right to take it out on them. He had no right to take it on you, the pretty stranger that was being too fucking nice to him and his ugly temper.

With a sigh, Luke rinsed his face and walked out to join you for breakfast.

You were sat at the table when he walked back in the kitchen, your one hand petting a snorting Grape, the other struggling to pick up a few bites of egg onto a fork. “I’m sorry,” you said to him as he walked in.

Luke shook his head. That was the last thing you needed to say to him. “I’m sorry,” he muttered. “I really don’t want you to think I’m this rude.”

“No, I get it,” you said. “Ya just wanna go home. I get it.”

He sighed and took his spot on the bench across from you. From what he could remember, his grandmother had a table and bench set like this at her old home. They were nestled between three walls just like yours, but in your case, the kitchen was within arm’s reach.

A thought popped into Luke’s mind. “Do you– do you really run The Coffee Pot by yourself?”

You nodded happily. “Well, sort of. My friend Charlie co-owns it, but he moved away last spring. It’s been me and a few other pals for months now.”

“Jesus,” he said, taking a bite of his bland eggs. Ketchup would have been great, and he wasn’t sure he could ever forgive you for not having ketchup.

“So, I work ten to close,” you said as you poured a bit of salt onto your eggs. Not much better than ketchup. “You’re free to sit in the seating area with the regulars. Darryl might give ya a hard time again. Or, you could see all that Spruce Creek has to offer! Although you might not wanna become an abominable snowman, so it’s up t’ya.”

“Hm, I might,” Luke mumbled. He truly did need a head-clearing walk.

“Waterman’s Bridge is pretty in the winter,” you said, “especially when the river is frozen over. It’s just a ten-minute walk east. The local art gallery is nice. I actually have a few works in there myself. And– “

Luke began zoning out when you mentioned the art gallery. He didn’t know it then, but he had been caught up in the movement of your lips as you spoke. That was the first sign, and after that, he lost track.

He dropped by Waterman’s Bridge briefly, but his cheeks were too chapped to withstand the brisk cold of Winter Storm Dalton’s fury. Unfortunately, though he did bring a few beanies and a singular pair of gloves, none of them were thick or warm enough to brace the harsh winter. The next stop was the art gallery like you said. He swore he wasn’t going to visit it, but after you mentioned you had a few pieces hung up, his brain convinced him to drop by.

The building was about the size of your one-bedroom apartment, and the artworks were all cramped and snuggled together like your vintage furniture. This made it easy to spot your creations, and when he did, he found himself going back to examine them. The curator of the place recognized him, but to his luck, they only bothered him for a moment before leaving him be.

Your work wasn’t the worst he’d seen, nor was it the best. Truth be told, he didn’t know what to think about it. He spent a good twenty minutes analyzing the film photographs only to realize there was nothing significant to be analyzed. All Luke knew was that he couldn’t tear his eyes away from your art, and that troubled him. They were special because you made them.

He pictured you stretched out on the floor of your living room, couch pushed against the wall as you painted whatever damn thing that came to your mind. You probably carried your film camera with you everywhere, but he suspected that, since it was a literal blizzard outside, your creative eye was being restricted.

Luke quickly shuffled out of the gallery in order to avoid the gaze of the curator. He started in the direction of your coffee shop, but then he remembered the candle store, and oh, did he love candles. Maybe he would pick one up for his mother. Maybe he would pick one up for you.

“Luke, what a pleasant surprise,” you said as he walked in.

The heat hit him like a sudden gust of wind, and he had to shake the snow off of his coat and boats before walking off of the carpet and onto the hardwood. “Need a coffee fix,” he muttered, glaring at a few strangers (or regulars as you would call them) that happened to stare a bit too long.

“Small coffee?” you asked.

He bit his lip and leaned towards you. “Gotta be honest, your regular coffee is more water than coffee,” he whispered. A part of him wished he hadn’t said that, but then you giggled.

“I told Emily that her coffee isn’t nearly as strong as Charlie’s was.” You took a mug from the rack by the espresso machine and faced him. “All right. Prepare yourself for the best coffee you’ve ever tasted.”

Luke raised an eyebrow. “Bet?”

“Oh, I don’t need to!” you exclaimed. “I already know it’ll be the best coffee. If I’m wrong, then you can have Grape.”

“What?” Luke’s voice escaped him at a higher octave than he had hoped for. “You wouldn’t bet your dog on coffee.”

“Just you wait!”

Luke waited, and truly, he had to admit that you were right. The coffee was damn fantastic, but he wasn’t sure if it was the best he’d had. He would have to try every single cup of coffee he’d tried from around the world to put yours up to the test. But in the meantime, yes, your coffee was the best coffee, and he needed two more cups.

He stayed until close again, his stomach now stuffed with the same turkey pesto panini from yesterday. For the few hours he sat there, half of them were spent admiring you from afar, whether he wanted to admit it or not. Even the stranger next to him elbowed and teased him about it. Luke’s face fell, and he returned back to journaling.

Before exiting into the marshmallow world outside, Luke handed you a heavy brown paper bag.

“What’s this?” you asked, looking inside and fishing out a dark green candle.

“A candle.”

You knotted your brows together in confusion.

“For gratitude,” he continued. “’m not sure what scents ya like– “ He scratched the back of his neck, “–but I figured balsam and cedar was the best– “

Your arms were around his neck before he knew it, and he easily relaxed into your hug. Luke felt himself melt against you, his senses taking in your warmth and your scent purely for a memory stamp. He was slowing starting to realize that he did not want to forget about this experience or you.

“T-thanks,” you said, backing away as a great big smile grew on your cheeks. “This– this is the best thing you could have done for me. Thank you.”

“Course,” he replied. Luke began to smile as well.

Back at your place, you dug out boxes of ornaments. You had only just put them away yesterday once you got rid of your previous tree. A moment later, you invited Luke to help you decorate Patrice, and he jumped at the opportunity.

“What Christmas songs do you prefer?” you asked, stretching your arm out far so you could reach for your phone on the coffee table. The two of you had been untangling the metal hooks from the big ball they had forced themselves into. You let out a soft sound as you bent over, causing something to spark in Luke’s heart. “Traditional or gross modern?”

“I take it you got an opinion,” he muttered mockingly. “Traditional. Gimme that Bing Crosby shit.”

You grinned. “Man of my dreams.”

Luke wasn’t sure if you meant him or Bing Crosby. Whatever it was, it made Luke blush.

“Luke,” you whispered in his ear.

He groaned, rolling over and pulling the blanket higher on his bare torso to keep the chills from hearing your voice at bay. The shutter had already traveled halfway up his spine. In his dream, your fingers were tracing along his bicep as the other massaged his scalp. Your chests were pressed together, and the skin-to-skin contact was making his mind reel with pleasure and intimacy. God, you were so beautiful. How had he not noticed before?

“Luke,” you whispered again. Shit, did your voice get sexier?

Luke hummed, but it came out more like a moan as he imagined your lips sucking and biting–

“Luke!” you shouted, hitting his head hard with a couch pillow. “Wake up.”

His eyes snapped open to find you not in bed with him, but in fact, kneeling beside him fully clothed. Fuck.

“The roads are open,” you said. “Snow’s stopped.”

He jumped up, a grin spreading far on his cheeks. Before he knew it, he was lifting you up by the waist and holding you against him, his hand finding its way into your hair so he could press your head onto his chest.

“I take it you’re happy?” you mumbled against his hot skin.

“So fuckin’– “ His mind interrupted his tongue. That meant he could leave. That meant he had to leave. He had to leave you. Luke frowned and pulled away from you.

“What?” you wondered as you examined his suddenly worried expression.

His hands moved onto your cheeks, his thumbs grazing the soft skin underneath your eyes while he thought about what he was going to say.

“What?” you chuckled out lightly, but you soon lost your smile.

“Jus’ thinking about kissing you,” he said, “before I go.”

You were silent for a moment.

“’m sor– “

“I won’t want you to leave if you do,” you whispered, your hands reaching up to gently wrap around his wrists.

Luke nearly let out a breath, but he hadn’t brushed his teeth. “I gotta shower.”

You nodded, dropping your grip on his wrists as he dropped his on your cheeks. “Course.”

His heart was thumping loudly in his chest as he scurried around the small bathroom. He tossed his clothes to the floor, the toothbrush in his mouth nearly sliding back down his throat before he caught it with a gag. The water of the shower was hot enough by the time he had rinsed all of the toothpaste from his mouth, and then you knocked on the door.

“’m– I’m naked!” he shouted hurriedly.

“Yeah, um– I-I figured,” you stuttered out. He could picture you clutching your arms close against your chest like he knew you did when you were nervous.

Luke walked over to the door and opened it slightly so he could peak his head out. You were standing just how he imagined you would be, except he hadn’t expected to face the thick tension that he knew all too well. Your lips were pulled into a pathetic little pout, and it took every ounce of him not to tug you into the bathroom with him.

“I’m just– I’m– I’m gonna miss you,” you said. “I-I don’t– shit, I– “

Luke reached out and grabbed the back of your neck, pulling you in so he could press his lips against yours in a heated kiss. Maybe it was the steam from the shower, but every single nerve in his body ignited. You were kissing him back with as much fervency as he, and he couldn’t help but let himself taste what he had been missing these past three days.

“I’ll miss you,” he murmured breathlessly, nudging your nose and slowly kissing down your cheeks and onto your neck. “So much.”

You unexpectedly pulled away, your eyes frantic, and your lips tugged into a deep frown. “No, you won’t,” you said.

Luke rested his face against the door. “What d’ya mean?”

“Y-you won’t miss me.” You cracked a smile. “You’ll go back to LA– see your friends and family, and you won’t miss me. You won’t miss this town– you won’t even remember it. It’ll be like some dream to you.”

“No,” he said, “that’s not true.”

“Are you sure?” you laughed somewhat maniacally. “You’re famous, Luke. Famous people don’t belong in a town like Spruce Creek. This is for people who have no other choice.”

He shook his head, but you had already walked into your bedroom and closed the door.

You offered to drive Luke to the airport, but neither of you spoke the entire time. He wanted to say so much to you, though none of the words that popped into his brain seemed right. Nothing seemed right. Leaving you, despite knowing you for the few days he had, felt like the worst decision he was about to face. He trusted his intuition, and it was telling him to stay.

It continued to tell him to stay as he waited three hours for security to open. It told him to stay as he waited with the other five people at the wrong gate before realizing there was only one other gate to wait by. It told him to stay as he sat on his phone for another three hours, looking at all of the pictures he managed to take through the blustery snowfall. It told him to stay as he gathered his belongings and waited for his ticket to be scanned.

And lastly, it told him to stay as he turned around and rushed out of the airport, his belongings banging around on the pavement behind him as he hailed for a taxi.

His forehead had broken out into a dripping sweat by the time he made it to The Coffee Pot. It was minutes away from closing– he knew. Luke tipped the driver before clambering out onto the slushy road. He hoped you wouldn’t see him just yet.

What was he doing? He had a whole life waiting for him back home. What was he doing?

The door chimed as he stepped in, that familiar gust of hot air hitting him as Darryl shouted, “Ay! Malibu’s back! Give ‘em a kiss for me Stan.”

Stan made a disgusted face as every head turned to Luke. Every head including yours.

“Luke?” you gasped.

“My legs hurt,” he said, “so c’mere.” He nodded you over and watched you walk out from behind the counter. Your steps were wary as you neared. “’m done missing out on other chances. Who says I can’t fall for someone I just met? Who says I can’t drop a few things just to be with you for a bit? Who says it won’t work out?” He chuckled. “I just know I’m crazy about ya, and I don’t really know what else to do but stay.”

You grinned, pulling him down by the neck as you pecked his lips over and over. “See?” you mused. “Small towns ain’t so bad.”

He hummed, a lazily smile finding its way onto his lips. “With you, never.”

tags!

@lilhemmo @oh-annaa @youngbloodstyles @tommyswolves @lukeofmine @crystalisinfinite @dammitbands

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the5sosdumpster · 5 years

Text

Spooky Night

Alright it’s halloween and I fuckin love this holiday. I don’t I’ve ever done 5sos blurbs or anything on halloween and I really really wanna. I’ll write short (or long if I get pumped abt a request) blurb based on whatever you send me! I’m so excited for this wow. Link below for where to send your requests. Come distract me from studying the muscles in primates lol. Hope everyone is having a good halloween!!!

Halloween!5sos Night

if i don’t get any we’ll pretend this never happened

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dream-a-little-bigger-x · 6 years

Text

Already planning my holiday content for the blog 👻🎄

Why am I like this??? 🙃🙃🙃

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clumsyclifford · 3 years

Note

hi my love i’m hope not too late but i would like you to tell me about my loves jewish cake, anything you want to but specifically baker calum 🥰 thank you i love you

of course you aren’t too late!!! ESPECIALLY to talk about jewish cake oh my goodness meg i shall die for you i love you. alright let’s see what i can dig up

ha’ahava hazot shelanu + it’s so simple

a cut, per usual

so let’s start WITH:

ha’ahava hazot shelanu

jewish cake was a labor of love for myself. little known fact about me is that i am in fact jewish! :) and around christmas time i always get a little prickly about the surplus of christmas spirit and in this case the amount of fic for it. and i’d sort of had this hesitant idea to write a jewish fic in the back of my mind for a long time, but it felt like a really big divergence from the Cast of Characters that was for some reason a lot more dramatic than any other circumstances into which i could place them, so i’d basically been hesitating for several months. in november we had a brief conversation about it in the club which looked like this

but the idea still made me a little nervous and so i kind of talked myself out of writing it, as always. and THEN, middle of december, iba sent me this 1d fic out of nowhere with this accompanying message:

and i kinda lowkey almost cried!! it was such a jewish fic. i read the word kvetch and i almost lost it. the fic was just so unabashedly jewish. and i was like...well. that’s what ive been wanting to do. so now i have no reason not to do it.

in the ao3 notes i talked a little bit about my internal debate over How Jewish To Go with the fic because on the one hand i really do understand that it can feel alienating going into a fic with zero understanding of the culture but on the other hand since it was MY fic i wanted to make it jewish the way i’m jewish. which is like...............very. i don’t think i ended up striking a balance so much as just deciding to say fuck it and write it the way i would want to read it, but i definitely think that was the right decision for me.

there was actually one more motivator for writing this fic, especially the WAY i wrote it, in eight chapters, and that motivator was that i wanted to break 400k on ao3 before the year ended. i just wanted to have an even number and 400k was a good goal. which i did achieve thanks to jewish cake fic being the 13.6k beast that she is! so that was also part of it

NOW! as for the PROCESS. i created the doc on december 22 and i originally kind of thought it was a little bitchy to write a hanukkah fic after hanukkah had already ended but was reminded that most christmas fic is neither written nor posted on actual christmas which reassured me well enough. i had already had the idea to divide it into eight chapters for the eight nights of hanukkah and i thought that would be a nice way to showcase different aspects of the holiday (seeing family, playing dreidel, opening presents etc) and also in certain cases (like the third chapter where they do some baking) some days that weren’t necessarily hanukkah-driven but just a nice natural consequence of being on break for hanukkah. i wanted it to feel like hanukkah feels to me!! normally i don’t like people seeing the way my outlines look but this one i don’t mind sharing so here’s what i had at the top of the doc for reference while i was writing. not everything in that first list got included but most of it did !!!

i’m not really sure how this fic ended up being cake. i never used to default to cake but for some reason as i was diving into this one it just felt right. that’s all i can say about that. meg you have genuinely shifted my approach to fic i DO default to cake sometimes now and that’s on YOU.

the very first thing i ever wrote down for this fic was this part that ended up going in the summary:

“Happy Hanukkah,” Calum says, smiling at Luke as their fingers intertwine.

Luke murmurs, “Chag sameach, ahovi,” and Calum’s face is aglow in the candlelight.

that was The Moment for me. i didn’t even write the rest of that scene until later but i had those two lines written down straight out the gate and i knew they were gonna close out the first scene because it just Felt Right. and i was right! very cool and fun for me

now the nice convenient thing about having this fic separated into eight discrete scenes/nights/chapters was that i didn’t have to write it in order, and i didn’t. i DID write the first night/chapter first, but then over the course of maybe a week, i wrote (deep breath get ready): the first half of chapter 2 (hemmings family) > the beginning of chapter 5 (the dreidel game) > most of the scene in chapter 7 > the beginning of chapter 3 (where they bake) > finished writing chapters 2 & 3 > started chapter 4 and finished chapter 5 > finished chapter 4 and wrote the rest of chapter 7 > all of chapter 6 > all of chapter 8 aka the proposal. i deliberately saved the proposal for last because i don’t think i could have written it exactly right without knowing the events that came before it but everything else was all over the place as you can see.

a problem i ran into a lot, and i talked to my sounding board and fellow jew sam about this among many other things, was that i had a lot of trouble characterizing very obviously Not Jewish people in a way that made them Very Jewish. not even like, Jewish But You Can Ignore It. i wanted them to be front-and-center jewish like i am and that was hard for me to navigate because obviously my speech patterns and vocabulary as an american jew are extremely different from 5sos’s as australian goyim (non-jews) like i do use hebrew words in my day-to-day communication all the time and i somehow had to keep their mannerisms but also insert mine BUT not insert so many of mine that the fic became incomprehensible and it was just. a Challenge. here’s some insight into THAT crisis

and then again writing the other characters in other chapters

i sent sam the doc when i was mostly done writing it, mainly just to be reminded that at least one person was going to appreciate this fic, which worked out nicely because she very very much did. genuinely i cannot stress enough how insecure i was to write and share this fic. like i’m gonna be really straight up with you meg, i think part of the reason i had calum and luke baking sufganiyot was because to me that felt like a sort of bribe? i basically wrote what felt to me like the least appealing fic ever and then my mission from there was to add stuff in that would convince people to give it a shot anyway. i was trying to make it worth everyone’s while. the baking was my trade-off, i was like “well yeah it’s a jewish fic but maybe she’ll be happy enough that it’s cake and they’re baking that she’ll forgive it for being a jewish fic” yes i realize how kind of hilariously tragic this sounds but !!! you never get jewish fics!!! and you especially don’t get them in fanfiction for obviously non-jewish bands!!! anyway. we’re not gonna get into this whole thing but like. even though objectively i knew that i had been told again and again people would appreciate the fic i still had doubts and knowing something and feeling secure in it are very different things.

also, i didn’t remember this, but apparently i had a lot of problems with writing the proposal! here’s a sneak peek into that mental breakdown

don’t actually think the fic specifies (making life easier for myself) but they have already had dinner in that scene. so now you know.

i could choose to not get this elbows-deep in the details of Crises I Had While Writing This Fic but instead i am choosing to go all out. here’s another thing i had trouble with:

(i did end up using transliteration obviously but i DO think actual hebrew would have been a cool flex)

and as for the title, ha’ahava hazot shelanu is the name of an ivri lider song that i love, and it translates to “this love of ours” and i realize titling the fic in hebrew was a Choice but i did talk to sam about this as well and that went roughly like this

by the way here is the song, i absolutely love it and i cannot recommend it enough. also i’m not sure how glaringly obvious this is but the chapter titles on ao3 are just hebrew numbers. like the first chapter is echad which literally means one. and so on. are they the correct genders? i don’t know ! fuck gendered language.

one more thing and then ill move on but an unfortunate natural consequence of writing a hanukkah fic (at least the way i wrote this one) is that it necessitates presents. so i had to come up with presents for these dumb boys to give each other. and to be completely honest with you i don’t remember how i did!!! the ones calum got for luke were trickier because they were actual things. for some reason this luke was always a version of luke that just kinda like, wore makeup, so that was just a question of figuring out an eyeshadow palette that would be Nice but not obscenely schmancy (i did ask the club for help since i know nothing about makeup but as usual i ignored their replies). but that by itself didn’t feel like enough of a gift, and so i tried to think of something that would be more than just the gift of an object. like, something that would maybe enable luke to spend more time on something he loves. piano music made sense to me because it wasn’t just a thing by itself it was a thing that encouraged luke to play piano and even to improve at it and to learn songs that he could be excited about. so! that was that

the trip to israel gift was a little bit of a retcon situation i really liked the idea that luke had been planning to give that “gift” to calum for a hot sec that he’d have had it ready, but i’d already written the scene where he and mali talk about israel, so i went back to it and edited it a little to hint at the idea (luke plays it off very casually because he is a clever boy) but i thought there was something very romantic in the idea of the israel trip, of luke planning a future with calum and a trip to a place that means so much to him (to me yes maybe luke and i are the same blah blah) and getting to drag calum around to falafel places and teach him words in hebrew and it just seemed like the appropriate trip for these two cute jewish boys to plan so i rolled with it.

okay moving on slightly!! to baker calum <3 baker calum was more of a cameo in the hanukkah fic, in the chapter i wrote with you in mind, but i can talk about it’s so simple here as well because i fucking adore that fic.

it’s so simple

so the inspiration behind the fic came from the “kitchens are for lovers” rhetoric and the realization that that would be the perfect...sort of thesis to build on for a fic for you in specific, because you are, in my mind, a very kitchen-based person, given your baking habit. it actually just worked out pretty nicely for me honestly because i’ve been wanting to write a big Kitchen Romance type fic for a while and you just gave me the perfect opportunity. here’s what i had at the top of the doc for the fic for you

and then once i sort of landed on the idea for the fic, it just made a lot of sense to make it jewish cake because, well, im gonna be real w you, because i identify very strongly with jewish cake and the kitchen-romance aspect felt like a very bella thing in the same way that jewish cake felt like a bella thing. and so i wanted to be able to romanticize these kitchens to share the way that i, bella, feel about them, and that was easy to do when the characters were so similar to me. not to mention this cake already existed in my head as a very settled, domestic duo, and they had their own home and had already had a kitchen-romance scene in the hanukkah fic and the whole thing just fell together perfectly. i had this sentence in my head and it was: “Shabbat in Luke and Calum’s kitchen looks something like this.” the kind of thing you would read in a fic summary right? and especially having it take place on shabbat felt like an extra layer of domestic easy romance to me so that was kind of my guide

here was my "outline” for this:

Romance :)))

obviously calum was going to be the one doing most of the cooking/baking because he had been established as the Kitchen Boy between the two of them and maybe i realized in the course of writing it that while i was luke, you were very much calum. so the goal was then basically to romanticize (1) the kitchen and (2) luke as much as humanly possible for you (see: message sent to helen and ainslee)

unfortunately i was unable to do baker calum justice as much as i would have liked because i could not have him baking anything complex because i can’t bake anything complex and if i had tried to describe him baking something complex and then described it wrong i would have died of shame so that is why he is only baking brownies BUT they have chocolate chips which hopefully makes up for it. also i just stumbled across this which i think pretty well represents the crisis i had regarding baker calum

:)))

re: the soundtrack (so to speak), i wanted to include some songs that i associate with you meg but you see the situation is that some of those songs are 5sos/mali/atl songs and so i couldn’t include those, for obvious reasons, which did narrow down my choices somewhat. fortunately i think the mcfly worked pretty nicely i mean yeah it’s a little obvious that i was forcing mcfly into the story but they deserved to be there. i think i’ve mentioned this but i genuinely have a memory of listening to star girl on a loop in my kitchen at home and in my head the hood-hemmings kitchen looks like my kitchen because i have zero imagination so it felt to me like these songs just belonged in kitchens. and that they’d be inherently romantic. woah i think my brain is short-circuiting i’m not sure i’m making sense anymore. point being i hoped that you would appreciate it nonetheless.

a note about the short introduction, because it’s very unlike anything i’ve put in any other fic to my knowledge. i kind of wanted it to feel like the prologue to a fairytale, almost. i wanted it to feel like the beginning of a movie, when the camera is slowly, slowly zooming in from a Big Picture down to one house on one street and then through the window into the kitchen while the voiceover is very serenely describing the scene. i wanted it to feel like we were in the kitchen before even calum was and that we were standing against the fourth wall watching the fic unfold. and also, i wanted to make the fic romantic as fuck, from the get-go. there was to be no confusion: this fic was going to romanticize the living daylights out of the hood-hemmings kitchen.

(also you may have noticed that despite having “london” in the list of Meg Things at the top of the doc, the fic never actually specifies that they’re in london. that’s because this fic was really an exercise in “how much can i hint that they’re in london without outright saying it so i don’t establish a canon that i may later regret” which went as far as me asking helen what her kitchen floors and counters are made of. like. if you want it to be in london then hell yeah it’s in london but i didn’t wanna lock myself into that decision just in case so i never actually said it but i hope it kinda felt london-y anyway lmao)

so...............i THINK that’s all i have to say. “all” as if i havent just written an entire dissertation but at least it’s done now. i sure did say a lot! that was a lot!!! but also a very very fun and interesting dive into the ~process~ of writing these jewish cake fics. also, for what it’s worth, the way hanukkah fic was received basically calmed all my fears about writing jewish fic, which was a relief for me. so thank you for loving it, i don’t think you know how much that means to me!!!! i love YOU so very much

#kaleidoscopeminds #ask #answered #christ go off i guess????????#i honestly have Nothing to say in the tags because i said so fucking much in this answer #fgldkhgsdflj #here are some other questions i asked helen the resident london expert:#'you guys don't have saturday morning cartoons do you'#'what do you call french toast' to which i was informed that you (brits) don't HAVE french toast #and then i decided to ignore that information and include it anyway because jewish tradition trumps british absence of food #and french toast is jewish CULTURE #'do you guys say suck-up or is there a different thing you say'#i did NOT like the answer to that one #also 'do you guys have dishwashers'#'do you guys do april fools'#helen litearlly went and took a photograph of her counters so that i could see what they looked like. THATS love baby #the fact that i said i had nothign to say and then i continued to say things anyway #thats pretty on brand for me #meg #director's cut #okay im posting this now. FOR REAL #dunno what happened before that was very unsexy but this time for real

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