A Collection of Heartstopper Oneshots

All I Want for Christmas Is You - loveinisolation, swise

Summary:

Happy Christmas! Whether you love or loathe this time of the year, we have you covered.

Nick went to St Johns and is now a first year at Leeds, at home on break and happily working a holiday job for extra cash. Charlie is in his last year at Truham and yearning for independence so reluctantly signed up for as many shifts as he could get... despite his lack of enthusiasm for the gig.

We've mixed in bits of the Santaland Diaries by David Sedaris; see if you can spot this sardonic classic amidst the syrupy Christmas spirit!
Notes:

Thank you to Glyphs02 for the beta!

Please tell us if any links break. ☺️
Work Text:
Untitled-Artwork

Christmas music plays over the speakers, blaring the joyful sounds of All I Want for Christmas Is You. It's Nick's favourite, and he bobs his head in time with the music, silently mouthing the words and shimmying his shoulders as he pulls on his green hat, complete with a bell at the very tip, and checks his costume in the mirror. After confirming everything is in place, he pushes out the door of the staff area - the one for employees of the mall itself - and nearly runs bodily into a grumbling figure heading in the opposite direction.

The person jumps back with a shout of "FUCK!" and a hand against their chest in shock.

"Sorry!" Nick says. "Bad timing we have, huh?" He takes the person in: it's a boy around his own age he thinks, tall and slender, with beautiful dark curls. When Nick looks at the blue eyes, he sees that they're aflame with something that looks like irritation, but then the boy quickly turns away from Nick and moves through the doorway and past him, heading off down the hall without another word. Nick watches him for a moment, feeling frozen in place by the brusqueness of the interaction. As the boy disappears around a corner, Nick shakes his head, pushing away any negative thoughts, and continues toward Santaland.

—-

That godforsaken Mariah Carey song is playing again. Charlie is pretty sure it's the third time he's heard it since he entered the mall, and he's only been there for 10 minutes. Maybe Mariah is some sort of dark witch who bends time, making ten minutes feel like hours stuck in a festive hellscape.

Charlie quickly pulls on his costume, wincing as the bell on the hat jingles. Will anyone notice if he tears it off? He's pretty sure it's worth the repercussions if they do.

He abandons the thought for the moment though; he's already cutting it close because he refused to leave even a minute earlier than absolutely necessary, and he knows that any consequences for being late on his first day will be worse than the ones for "losing" the bell on his hat. He'll just have to put up with the jingling for now. He grabs the hat, holding the bell firmly in his hand to muffle the sound, and huffs in annoyance before marching himself out into the screaming chaos of Santaland.

—-

You can be an entrance elf, a water cooler elf, a bridge elf, train elf, maze elf, island elf, magic window elf, usher elf, cash register elf, or exit elf. Nick wants to try his hand at all of them. Right now, he's an usher elf, and he's pretty sure it's the best position because the kids are so excited actually seeing the guy in the red suit. So maybe he doesn't want to try them all ... except he's curious, and he thinks he could be good at all of them.

When Ivy had trained his batch of elves, she'd given him a special smile near the end, and it was the only time she'd shown any warmth, so he's lowkey committed to the idea that he can crack her defenses and be the reason she believes in Christmas again. It's a goal anyway, a way to measure the success of his winter break from Leeds besides the extra padding in his bank account.