Love is a Language

Christmas Morning

On Christmas morning, Pierre was awoken by someone yelling his name at the top of their lungs and suddenly dropping all their weight on him like they'd fallen right out of the sky. He squeaked in surprise, staring right into Henry's sparkling green eyes. "Up, up, up!" Henry squealed, tugging on Pierre's hands and trying to pull him out of bed. "It's Christmas! Santa Claus came last night! Let's go open up our presents!" If Pierre hadn't been fully awake before, he was now. The mention of 'presents' and 'Santa Claus' (who he knew as Père Noël) had knocked all the sleepiness out of him, and he joined Henry in waking up Peter and John, who had somehow managed to sleep through Henry's excited shouts.

Up and down the hallways, doors were being opened and shut as the children burst into each others' rooms to make sure they were awake. If not, they were pounced on, tickled, had their ears bellowed into, or had their covers yanked onto the floor. When all were declared awake and accounted for, they all ran down to the Christmas tree, calling out what they hoped their presents would be. As they all ran into the room, an excited gasp arose from all of the gathered younglings. Not only did they see presents under the tree for each of them, but some long socks filled with delicious Christmas candies had been hung up on a line stretching from the fireplace to the wall where it was tied onto a nail.

"I see everyone's already awake," Miss Trelawny's sleepy voice murmured. A sudden, sheepish silence settled over the children, and they shuffled their feet awkwardly as they waited for her to scold them and send them back to bed. But, just like the years before, she simply smiled and chuckled softly. "Let me get my camera," she told them, "and then you can open your presents." An excited cheer accompanied her as she turned and left the room. The children dove towards the tree, passing out the parcels and dividing them into piles based on whose name was on the tag. When she came back they ran to get their stockings, searching for their names and calling to the rightful owner of the sock they examined if they found someone else's name on them.

Miss Trelawny was hard-pressed to keep up with her charges as they opened their presents. She snapped picture after picture, trying to get the joy and excitement on each of their faces as fast as she could. Squeals of delight could be heard over the sound of tearing paper and eager chattering about their gifts. The presents were simple things, donated by some of the citizens of their city, though the nicer ones were tagged as being from Santa. Pierre was delighted to find on his gifts that Santa had written "Du Père Noël" on his tags. He was very impressed that Santa had remembered the name that Pierre knew him by the best.

Then, it was time for the children to deliver their gifts to each other. They scurried up to their rooms, giving Miss Trelawny time to catch her breath, before shyly coming back into the room with their little parcels and handmade gift bags and locating the people they were for. More happy noises filled the room, and hugs were exchanged in thanks. John gave Peter a huge hug when he unwrapped his little gift to find an old watch he'd lost some months ago. "Where did you find this?!" he cried, his arms still tightly wrapped around his best friend. "I thought I lost it forever!"

"It was in the river," Peter muttered, his cheeks a slight shade of red as he pried his exuberant friend off of him. "Where you said you lost it. I found it but it wasn't working. I tried to fix it for you, but it needed a battery. So..." He shrugged. "Miss Trelawny let me get some new batteries for your watch when we went to town." John tackle-hugged him again as he crowed his thanks, much to Peter's increased embarrassment. "It's just a watch," he grumbled, though the small smile on his face said that he was pleased that John liked his gift.

Henry tugged on Pierre's sleeve after Pierre finished unwrapping the gift John had hastily tossed him before attacking Peter with gratitude (it turned out to be a hand-drawn card that read "Merry Christmas, French Fry!"). Pierre looked down at him and beamed at him happily. "I have your present for you," Henry whispered bashfully, holding up the little gift bag that Miss Trelawny had let him pick out.

"And I have your present too, 'Enry!" Pierre chirped, pulling a colorful envelope out from behind his back. The boys exchanged their gifts, and Henry eagerly motioned for Pierre to open his first. Pierre took out the tissue paper and felt the bottom of the bag with his fingertips, looping the object he'd found around his fingers and lifting it up. He looked at the sideways 8 in confusion for a moment, then glanced at Henry. "It is very nice," he said, "but I do not understand? It's sideways?"

Henry giggled a little bit. "It's supposed to be, silly!" He pointed at the bracelet. "That shape is 'infinity,'" he explained, "and Miss Trelawny said that infinity means forever." Pierre's eyes went wide, and then he grinned and hugged Henry tightly. Henry hugged him back, wrapping his thin arms around the taller boy's waist. "It's like our promise," he told him. "You know-forever and always?"

Pierre nodded, still smiling from ear to ear. "Toujours et toujours," he agreed, kissing the top of Henry's head. "Open yours now, please!" he told Henry, his eyes sparkling with anticipation. Henry tried to open the envelope as carefully as he could, but it still got slightly ripped up. He pulled out the paper that was inside and unfolded it. On the paper was a lovingly rendered child's drawing of an angel that looked very much like Henry. It had wavy brown hair and big green circles for eyes with long black lashes drawn around them. Henry's angel also had big wings that Pierre had obviously taken a lot of time copying from a picture. The entire picture had been done with colored pencil, though at the bottom of the picture were words carefully and neatly written in ink: "Henry, tu est mon ange. Henry, you are my angel."

Henry blushed so brightly that his entire face looked like he'd sat directly in the sun for much too long. "I-I'm an angel?" he asked quietly, to which Pierre responded with a slow nod. He blushed again, hiding his face behind Pierre's drawing. The French boy chuckled softly, and the sound of his laugh drew Henry out of his embarrassment long enough for him to reach up on his toes and wrap his arms around his neck in another sweet hug. "Merci," he whispered, shyly pecking Pierre on the cheek. Neither of them noticed the click that came from Miss Trelawny pushing the shutter button on her camera.

"De rien," Pierre replied, his cheeks a rosy shade of pink. He wrapped his arms around the smaller boy again. "Merry Christmas, 'Enry. Joyeux Noël."

Henry giggled softly. "Joyeux Noël, Pierre," he replied. "Merry Christmas to you too."
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Translation Notes:
Du Père Noël. From Father Christmas.
Joyeux Noël. Happy Christmas.
Tu est mon ange. You are my anagel.

Author's Note: Yes, the last chapter was a little bit of a filler. I wanted to explore Mister McCrae's relationship with the kids in that particular chapter. There is a method to my madness, I promise. :3

I know this chapter is talking about Christmas Day a couple of weeks before the actual day, but there was absolutely no way I was going to be able to drag it out so that I could have a Christmas Day chapter on the actual holiday (trust me, I thought about it. :P).

To those of you who are still dealing with finals, I wish you the best and send lots of love and luck your way. I have complete confidence in you, as do Henry and Pierre. Be safe and take care of yourselves out there, alright? I hope you have a wonderful day.