BMW Shory ShawnxCory Oneshots

7

The Christmas Triangle

By:Piper

Summary:Topanga hugs Shawn and fixes him a spot on the couch, but is she really happy to see him for Christmas?

Story:

Very little surprised Topanga Matthews these days. She knew that she had just as much of a chance of coming home to a house decorated completely in cork as she had of coming home to find their small refrigerator stocked entirely with chocolate pudding cups. One day in November she'd come home to a complete reorganization of the tiny living room that had included moving the fish tank out onto their terrace. There had been much celebration when the fish decided to live after being thawed from the resulting block of ice.

She clerked while Cory edited copy on Madison Avenue for a pittance and took classes for a Masters in English at NYU. He was home more often than she was and when Dickens, Rushdie, and Waugh became too much, moving things around became the best and cheapest mode of procrastination. (They'd had a long, long talk about ordering from QVC early in their city tenure when Topanga realised that they really did have an egg timer in ever color). It was nice in a way, knowing that she would come home from work everyday and Cory would be there ready to breathe a new energy into her for the evening.

Shawn and Eric had left New York nearly as quickly as they'd arrived. Her husband's antics were enough to give her something to tell her coworkers and secretly she enjoyed being just Cory and Topanga Matthews.

Unanimously they'd decided that while they didn't want to be in the city for New Year's Eve, they wanted to at least try having a 'grownup' Christmas. It was their first Christmas alone as a married couple and that's how they wanted it, even if it meant not seeing their family and friends until a few days after. Claiming the decorating as his mission for the week, Cory promised Topanga that by Christmas Eve when she came home from the firm the entirety of the small apartment would be filled with Christmas cheer.

"The apartment has been Christma-fied! We have eggnog!"

It certainly couldn't be said that Cory wasn't true to his word. Topanga had barely set her briefcase down before a Santa hat was being waved in her face and something the looked like a burnt Christmas cookie was shoved under her nose. She suspected she was supposed to eat it. "Cory! You… cooked!" Instead of eating the proffered treat she kissed him on the cheek instead. It seemed a fair trade.

"We cooked!" The cookie retracted and Cory grabbed her arm, dragging her through the living room and into the kitchen where the smell of burnt baked goods was far stronger than it had been before. There had indeed been cooking and there was indeed a 'we'.

"Shawn." Topanga's voice was as slow as the smile that came to her lips. "What a surprise."

And it was at that. Her mouth moved almost comically as she processed the sight of Cory wrapping his arm around Shawn, both of them wearing red and white Santa hats cocked jauntily to the sides of their heads. She noticed the little things— the way Shawn's hand squeezed Cory's shoulder and the way Cory's head was tilted almost into the crook of Shawn's neck. They were using the potholders they'd made when they'd been in the same second grade class together; crafts that Topanga could have sworn had been boxed up in Cory's old room back in Philadelphia. She lifted a hand to push a strand of hair from her face, trying to pretend that she wasn't noticing that dimple in Cory's left cheek that she swore she never saw unless Shawn was around.