Archive of Our Own ^beta

“I did it!” Lukey exclaims, breathlessly, as he barely manages to stop himself in time from bumping into Pangi. “Told you so!”

“Yeah, yeah”, Pangi snorts, trying to mask how fond his smile is behind sounding unimpressed. “This is like, one of the easiest pistes here, barely even counts as a red one”.

“You are just mad I am thriving”, Lukey huffs, but his face is still shining with wild excitement. “Let's go to this one next!” he points in the direction Pangi absolutely will not take him to, because he knows for sure that this trail includes two different black pistes, and he is not about to let Lukey kill himself because he got overconfident.

That's not what he is going to tell the guy though, because Lukey is too competitive for his own safety, and would find a way to get there. So instead Pangi takes a different approach.

“Nah”, he shakes his head and kneels to unbuckle his skis. “I think it's time to go if we don't want to rush through the market. I would like to look around there”.

“Fine”, Lukey sighs like Pangi suggested the lamest and most annoying thing ever, but dutifully gets to unbuckling as well. “But you owe me hot chocolate”.

“For what??”

“For holding me back from reaching my full skiing potential”.

Lukey grins at him, Pangi rolls his eyes, and they go to return their rental equipment before heading out.

“Sem, look what I found!” Lukey calls out his name, and Pangi puts down a hand-painted ornament he was admiring before turning around towards Lukey.

He is met with a view of his friend wearing absolutely ridiculous sunglasses: small circular lenses surrounded by a snowman on the left eye and Santa Claus on the right instead of regular rims, with both wide temples having golden ‘2026’ on them.

“You look ridiculous”, Pangi tells him, as he moves closer to fix the glasses so they sit correctly on Lukey's face. “This is atrocious, and I will never talk to you again if you buy it”, he smiles, his fingers lingering next to Lukey’s cheeks as he barely holds himself back from cupping them just to feel how soft Lukey’s face is.

“You have 0 taste, mister, this is a masterpiece”, Lukey argues back, his smile as wide as ever and face flushed.

“I am surprised you even like it, it has”, Pangi makes sure to make a horrified face, “colour on it”.

Lukey mirrors his playful expression and immediately takes off the glasses, putting them back on the shelf like it's fire.

“You are right, I can't betray my brand like that”, he says solemnly and then laughs. “Okay, I think I saw something I want to get for Tubbo’s stocking there, I’ll be back”.

Pangi nods and turns back to looking at the ornaments.

Speaking of stuffing stockings though…

He makes sure that Lukey is not in his field of vision and grabs the glasses to quickly pay for them. Thankfully he has time to do it and hide them in his backpack before Lukey comes back with a plastic green princess crown that you might see children wear at the parties.

“For the Princess of Green”, he tells Pangi, and Pangi snorts.

“Do you want to add marshmallows and cinnamon to the hot chocolate?” the barista in the small drinks and food wagon at the edge of the christmas market asks him.

Pangi nods.

“Both”.

Barista quickly decorates the whipped cream on top with cinnamon and marshmallows and then, to Pangi’s surprise, sticks candy canes in both cups like one might do with a straw.

“Merry Christmas”, she tells him and smiles politely.

“Merry Christmas”.

Pangi takes the cups and heads back to Lukey, who is waiting for him behind one of the pop up plastic tables that were put in this area just for the duration of the market.

“Here, your hot chocolate”, Pangi puts one cup in front of him and sits down across from Lukey.

“Wait, that looks so good”, the other lights up, curiously looking over his drink. It does look like it's directly from an ad, Pangi agrees. He would be upset if it didn't though, considering how expensive it was. “Wait, I am going to take a photo”.

Lukey gets out his phone, but instead of snapping a photo of his own cup, he raises it so that Pangi is in the picture.

“Say ‘candy cane’”, he directs him, and Pangi goes along, letting Lukey take as many pictures as he wants.

“I am going to post it on my instagram”, he informs him as he already opens the app and chooses his favourite photo, adding a ‘cute date🥰’ caption, tagging Pangi and choosing Sia’s ‘Everyday is Christmas’ to play before posting it.

Pangi watches it all with a fond exasperation.

“You know people will go nuts about it?” he asks, when Lukey puts away his phone and finally gets to his drink.

“Oh, I know”, Lukey smiles smugly. “But what can I say, I have a hot guy buying me a hot chocolate, why not brag about it”, he winks at furiously blushing Pangi.

“Shut up”, he groans. Lukey gets the candy cane out and puts it in his mouth, with a pleased hum, holding eye contact. Pangi tears his gaze away and looks at the sky instead.

It's pretty dark already, despite it only barely being 5PM, but the place is lit up with so many christmas decorations that the surroundings are bright like during the day.

It's also snowing slowly with snow flakes as large as cereals, making everything look fluffier than it is. Pangi opens his mouth and catches one with it, relishing the flash of cold before it dissolves in the warmth of his tongue. He smiles. He himself feels fluffy and sparkly like the snow around them. It's his first time celebrating Christmas with his friends he met through streaming, first time celebrating Christmas with Lukey, and something about it is just right. Easy. Like it's the thing that makes the most sense in the world.

“We probably should go soon”, Lukey’s soft voice echoes in his ears, and Pangi needs to blink a couple of times to come back to reality, where Lukey looks at him with a sparkling like snow eyes, and Pangi can't help but return it. It makes sense. “If we want to have time to bake the cookies”.

“Yeah, right”, Pangi answers, his voice unexpectedly raspy, and he clears his throat. “Give me a minute”, he finally takes a sip of his hot chocolate.

It's just as sweet as Lukey’s smile.

“Look at who is finally here”, Aimsey’s cheery voice greets them at the entrance. “Had a good date, guys?”

Pangi rolls his eyes at the teasing, and Lukey just sends a huge smile to them.

“You didn't even tell us that you left the skiing area!” Max appears from around the corner, looking at them with disapproval. “Could've at least texted”.

“You knew we had plans to go to the market together”, Pang shrugs as he takes off his winter clothes.

“Yeah, yeah, still a message would be nice”, Max rolls his eyes, but disappears back into the living room.

“We are planning to start in 2 hours. Is it enough for you to prepare?”

Lukey and Pangi look between each other, having a silent conversation, which Aimsey observes with a very exaggerated ‘I know what you are’ expression, and then nod.

“Yeah, I don't think the cookies will take long”, Pangi answers, putting away his boots and stepping into the house properly, avoiding the mistletoe someone put practically at the entrance.

“We made the dough yesterday, and the rest should only take an hour or so”, Lukey agrees, following Pangi.

“Great”, Aimsey nods. “By the way, Lucas, can you come with me, I need you to help me with something”.

“Sure”.

Lukey heads after Aimsey to the second floor, and Pangi uses this very convenient moment to sneak to the stockings they hanged on top of the fireplace and put the glasses into Lukey’s one, ignoring Freddie’s knowing glances.

He then dutifully goes to the kitchen and prepares everything they need for the baking, when Lukey finally comes back from helping Aimsey.

They spend at least 15 minutes cutting the gingerbread dough with different forms, bickering about anything and nothing and enduring 28292973 jokes that come their way from their friends, who are popping in and out of the kitchen, preparing the table and decorating the place for their party.

As soon as the cookies are in the oven, they are called to help out in the living room, where Guqqie and Molly immediately put Lukey on hanging Christmas lights duty, and Pangi gets to join Tubbo and Tom in decorating the Christmas tree.

“I’m telling you, Toby, this year I am going to woo you”, Tom chats as he hangs a new bulb right where Tubbo was going to hang his simply to annoy him, which is very successful, judging by how Tubbo huffs in frustration. “It's time for marriage number two, don't you think?”

“I would rather throw up, turn my vomit into a smoothie and then drink it again”, Tubbo tells him heartily.

Pangi snorts at that comment, enjoying for once not being the centre of yaoi, as Tom only grins at Tubbo’s comment.

“Bet I will change your mind by next December?”

“No fucking way, I am not betting on that”.

“Because you know you want me and are scared to lose”.

“Fuck you, okay, let's bet”, Tubbo takes Tom’s hand and looks at Pangi. “You are the witness”.

“Of course”, Pangi breaks their handshake. “Good luck. To either of you, I guess”.

Those two start to bicker again, but Pangi is distracted by Christmas lights suddenly being wrapped around him.

“Gotcha”, he hears Lukey's giddy voice, as he turns around to see him grinning widely as he ties the string of lights around Pangi’s waist.

“What's that for?” Pangi asks, confused, but not stopping Lukey.

“Thought you needed to look more Christmas-y”, Lukey replies cheerfully, finishing the knot, but not moving his hands away as he plays with the end of the string between his fingers, so close to Pangi’s stomach, auwgh. “I got myself a hat, see?”

He nods his head to point out a Santa hat he got from somewhere.

“Oh, I see”, Pangi nods as well, smirking. “You are just a Santa Claus, wrapping a present for himself to open later?”

“That I am”, Lukey giggles at Pangi’s flirtatious tone. “You look all pretty with a bow on top”.

He hears Tubbo gagging, and Tommy groaning ‘just get a room already’. They ignore them.

“They work, by the way”, Lukey tells and presses a button that makes the Christmas lights actually light up around Pangi’s body. “There's batteries inside”.

“Nice”, Pangi smiles.

Lukey smiles as well.

“You look so stupid right now”, Pangi blurts out, not even thinking, because Lukey does look just so so adorable beautiful kissable stupid right now under the warm aureole of the fireplace and with colourful lights playing tag on his face as Christmas lights blink around them.

“What the fuck”, Lukey giggles. “I look very cool and awesome”.

“Sure”, Pangi agrees.

God, they are so close to each other.

Suddenly his phone alarm goes off, and Pangi pulls himself away from Lukey’s magnetism, remembering about the world around them.

“Oh, the cookies are ready”, he turns off the sound. “Let's go, we still need to decorate them too”.

They start the party about an hour later, when everything is prepared, and Pangi thinks this might be the best day of his life.

Laughing around with friends in a cottage in the French Alps as they drink champagne and apple cider, eat tasty food and just chat with each other is wonderful. Having Lukey be pressed into him in the armchair they occupy as he passionately argues with Tubbo and Aimsey over something Pangi doesn't know is wonderful. The stupid glasses attached to his shirt (Lukey laughed so hard when he got them out from the stocking).

And Pangi is in an even better mood when they finally decide it's time for Secret Santa they opted for, because nobody would be able to bring a separate present for everyone with them.

Pangi got his person around two weeks ago, and was pretty stoked to see Lukey’s name.

He spent quite a bit thinking over what the best present would be, an ideal balance between joking and sincere, and he thinks he got it perfectly. Which means, it's actually not at all joking, and sentimental as hell, and actually probably not something he should give to his… friend he only has known for less than a year on their first Christmas together, but…

It's insane. But it's also insane how right it felt.

They start with Eryn, who got some new camera equipment and correctly guessed that it's from Tubbo. Guqqie gets hers next. Then Aimsey. Then Freddie. And finally it's Pangi’s turn.

He regrets a bit that he needs to separate himself from Lukey to get the present, but it's okay. There's a neatly wrapped dark blue box with his name on it, and he is very careful as he opens it.

To see a very familiar flannel shirt inside.

He blinks. Lukey was wearing it just this morning, and the boxes have been here since yesterday.

He looks up at Lukey, confused, and gets a bright, but definitely nervous smile in response:

“Thought you might need your own at some point”.

“Oh my fucking god”, Aimsey is the first one around them to react, before everyone starts laughing and teasing them again. Pangi ignores them completely. Not on purpose, it's just he can only see and hear Lukey right this moment.

“I already had one actually”, he tells him, jokingly, trying to hide how much this gift affected him. “But I guess I will have two now, so you could borrow one”.

“So generous of you”, Lukey snorts, but he seems relieved that Pangi liked it.

“You really should open yours now”, Pangi tells him slowly, holding the intense eye contact.

Lukey seems to get the memo that it's going to be something more than serious as he also gets off the armchair to take his own box, wrapped in black and white polka dots paper.

He opens it just as carefully as Pangi did, and Pangi gets to see the look in his eyes when he sees what's inside.

Shock, confusion, softness, fondness, adoration, love.

“Sem…” Lukey breathes out. His voice is just as soaked with a punch of emotions as his eyes.

“I know it's a bit much, but I wanted you to have it”, Pangi rubs his neck and fluffs his hair, looking away.

Lukey is silent for a few seconds, so are others in the room, who seem to politely give them their moment.

“I will take good care of it”, Lukey finally says, gingerly getting an old dog toy from the box and pressing it to his chest. “Which one is it?”

“Wuffy”, Pangi finds the courage to look back at Lukey, and if his heart was beating fast already, then it might just speedrun a record for the fastest marathon now.

“Wuffy”, Lukey repeats, tasting the name and strokes Wuffy’s snout with his thumb.

Someone clears their throat.

“Sorry to interrupt”, Max speaks up, “but I think I am next”.

“Oh, yeah, sorry”, Lukey hurriedly gets up from the floor and Pangi follows him, feeling caught.

They get back to the armchair, both red in the faces, and holding their gifts as the biggest treasure in the world, and if Lukey’s head finds home on Pangi’s shoulder and Pangi gently presses their knees together, then it's nobody’s deal actually.

Pangi finds Lukey on the porch at 5 in the morning.

Everyone went to sleep a few hours ago, and he actually too went to bed, but woke up suddenly with a feeling that something was missing. Which it was, the right side of the bed was upsettingly empty, and he couldn't fall back into sleep until he fixed it.

“What are you doing here?” he asks quietly, getting closer to Lukey, who snaps his head towards him, but then immediately relaxes in relief, seeing who it is.

“Couldn't sleep”, Lukey answers, just as quietly. “Decided I need some air. And cookies”. he raises one of their gingerbread cookies from the plate on his lap.

“Mind if I join?” He doesn't really wait for an answer though, as he comes closer and lowers himself to sit on the ground right next to Lukey.

“Never”.

Pangi smiles at that, and Lukey smiles back, before bringing the cookie he is holding closer to Pangi’s lips.

“Open your mouth”.

Pangi does just that, and Lukey feeds him the cookie.

They look away from each other, and for a few moments there’s blanket-like silence between them, as both watch how the snowflakes still fall down in a slow dance, bright in the dim light of the porch lamps.

It's peaceful. And Pangi shuffles just a bit closer to Lukey, before switching his attention back to the other’s face.

There's actually a stray snowflake that settled right on Lukey's left cheek, and for some reason this one piece of icy lace made the heaviness Pangi has been carrying for months now melt into the light as a feather realisation:

He is completely and utterly in love with Lukey.

He knew it already, somewhat, but never before this thought was comfortable enough to settle properly in his chest.

“Lucas?” He calls his love’s name, just to try it out, to see if it would taste different, and Lukey turns to look at him quizzically.

“Hm?”

Pangi doesn't answer him. Instead he reaches out, like in trance, to wipe the snowflake away from Lukey’s cheek, and his hand just stays there (Lukey’s skin is soft, softer than he thought).

They are close enough that he hears Lukey’s breath hitch at the contact, but Lukey leans into the touch immediately, like he's been waiting for it.

“Sem?”

“Hm?”

“There's a mistletoe in the hallway, right?”

“Well, yeah, there is”.

“Do you think it's close enough to us for me to kiss you right now?”

Pangi smiles.

“I think you don't need mistletoe to kiss me”.

He raises his second hand to cup Lukey’s face properly, and meets the other halfway in the sweetest kiss he’s ever had.