#*tara writes

I love both of your ideas and since this fic fill is months late I’ll combine them into one cheese-ball monster :’)

“I’m afraid I can’t make it home in time, Eggsy,” came Harry Hart’s muffled voice on the other end of the phone. He had left for a quick transaction in Russia several days ago and meant to come back to their house before Christmas Eve. This year’s snowfall certainly made it a tough job for Harry to keep his promise.

“That’s alright, Harry,” said Eggsy, not letting the hint of disappointment seep into his voice, lest Harry grew anxious of letting him down. “You can always find a way to catch another flight after the storm’s settled down.”

“I will, Eggsy,” Harry said firmly.

“See you soon,” whispered Eggsy before the call is hung up, by whom he didn’t know.

“So Harry’s not going to be here with us on Christmas morning this year?” Daisy asked. She was standing next to Eggsy during the phone call, holding a plateful of cookies freshly baked out of the oven.

Eggsy smiled ruefully and mouthed a soft ‘No, Daise,’ and when he saw how his little sister’s shoulders drooped down visibly, Eggsy gently ruffled her hair and said, “But he’d be here with us on New Year’s Eve.”

“You’re right,” Daisy exclaimed happily and stood on tip-toe to set the plate on the table, next to a glass of milk which Eggsy had poured minutes ago.

Eggsy led his sister by her hand to the bedroom, kissed her forehead goodnight and wished her a merry Christmas like he did every Christmas. He returned to his own room next to her and texted his mother, who was at her company’s Christmas party, to come home safely after or call him to pick her up, whichever worked for her. 

Then, Eggsy set his phone on his bedside table, a thing he rarely did at 9PM on a weekday, and tried to think nice things, happy thoughts, and without a shadow of doubt they all happened to be with Harry.

*

It was several hours later, a long time after Eggsy had opened the door for his Mum and went back to bed, when he heard the creaking sound coming from outside his window. The leaves rustled as their branches were weighed down by something that was decidedly not a bird.

Eggsy carefully picked up his bat on the floor, a Kingsman gun or umbrella was out of the question for this kind of intrusion anyway, and stealthily crouched next to the shadowy area in his room, where the moonlight could not reach.

He waited. Several broken branches later, his window finally swung open by a man’s hand, one Eggsy thought was eerily familiar.

The index finger immediately pointed up as his other fingers curved into a fist, oddly enough, Eggsy could imagine that the intruder was trying to make a point to him somehow.

“Eggsy, please kindly put down your bat and help me up,” said Harry Hart’s voice, a strange turn of event, as his voice wasn’t supposed to be in London at this hour physically-speaking.

“Harry, you are Harry?” Eggsy said, dropping his bat with a clang.

“Yes, and you are Eggsy, my fiancé, soon-to-be husband,” Harry joked, and Eggsy honestly would find a deserving rebuttal to his smartass comment had Harry wasn’t dangling with half his body out of the window right now.

“You said you wouldn’t be able to make it home in time,” Eggsy complained breathily as he helped pull Harry’s whole body into the room.

“Oof,” Harry gave a little noise of relief once he finally landed on something soft. The soft thing was Eggsy.

“You’re here,” Eggsy grinned, not bothering to move an inch from his current position.

“I’m here,” Harry echoed, cheeks slightly flushed from the exertion of his juvenile climbing and sneaking around.

Hands finding themselves wounding around Harry’s neck, Eggsy leaned upwards to kiss his boyfriend soundly on the mouth.

“Did you lie to me?”

“Not really. I was in Russia and there really was a storm, hours and hours ago. Then I just expedited things up a little.”

“A little?” 

Harry kissed Eggsy back instead of replying, both of them knowing the real answer to it already.

“Did you set out cookies and milk?” Harry said minutes later, mouth no longer attached to Eggsy’s.

“We did.”

“Can I have some?”

Eggsy laughed. “Cookies? Course. Not the milk though, it went bad.”

“Shame,” said Harry, pulling Eggsy up without much hassle at all.

They both trod lightly down the stairs, fighting the urge to giggle like a couple of teenage kids, shoulders to shoulders, barely an empty space between them.

Harry started to work his way into the plate of cookies eagerly, as if he didn’t have a proper meal before coming here.

Eggsy held his hand and beamed at their intertwined fingers, Harry’s ring finger had his engagement ring on, the mission was really over.

“What’s the matter?” asked Harry, swallowing the crumbly chocolate chip bits.

“Nothing,” Eggsy shook his head, eyes shining because he couldn’t help it, “just, merry Christmas, love.” And he brought Harry’s hand up to kiss his knuckles, softly and gently.

Pairing: Hartwin

Summary:

It is a lot of work being in love with a man half his age who wouldn’t give him a second glance. But we can’t all dictate our heart to function like we wish to, can we?

I’m so sorry for filling this prompt probably more than a year and a half late. I always remember that I have prompts in my inbox but could never get to because of irl stuff. Now that quarantine happens, I have more time to write for you guys. I hope you see this and like what you read

Eggsy’s failed her again. She’s always believed in him but this time it is one failure too many. He simply cannot do it even after all that preparation the night before. He even went to bed two hours earlier than usual just in case he slept through the many alarms he had set.

The drape of sadness settling in her eyes when she sees him coming home empty-handed. God, how Eggsy’s heart breaks from thinking about it. Third year in a row it escapes his grasp.

What does he even say when he greets her at the door? When Daisy runs out excitedly, hoping that the promised limited Barbie doll would finally be hers this Christmas?

Curse the damned store for organising a scavenger hunt for their dolls, is the only thought in Eggsy’s mind right now.

Every year they do this. Every. Single. Year.

Fifty limited Barbie dolls hand-crafted for Christmas are sold each year and every year they change their method for customers to acquire it.

You’re thinking of getting in line early for a lucky spot? That’s so two years ago.

Now not only you have to be early, you gotta think and act fast because everyone must solve a riddle in order to get two additional clues for the final answer. Once you have it, you can unlock the whereabouts of the hidden dolls. Of course people can try and simply look for them at every nook and cranny of the shelves. However, upon payment, customers must tell the cashier their answer to the game. Every doll has its own riddle and clues, hence this is a game you can only win by playing it right.

Eggsy looks around and sees the crowd of people clutching their piece of paper and sighs to himself. He isn’t one of the lucky fifty people first in line for the shop’s game. With his experience, he plans to maybe lift one or two riddles from random shoppers and solve them with the help of Lord Almighty Google. Eggsy’s good at being sneaky, it’s one of his strengths.

The people around him though, they cling onto the riddle like its their lives. Even when some of them seem to be wrecking their brain and still cannot find an answer to take home to prized Barbies.

Eggsy’s about to give up and just get Daisy a normal, shabby, everyday Barbie doll, extremely common and not at all limited when suddenly his eyes catches an opening.

There, a sleeve of the paper pokes out from a jacket pocket of a guy standing right next to him. The random man is too busy checking his phone to notice it is close to falling out. He walks briskly to the teddy bear counter, bumping into and politely apologising to innocent bystanders on the way.

Eggsy immediately plans the route to his target and sets out determined. He can do this, Eggsy thinks. Even though he feels immensely guilty because it means taking away the chance of getting the Barbie from someone else.

He gets hesitant when they are about two feet apart. Eggsy watches the man stops suddenly and inspects the wide variety of teddy bears in front of him. Then, he leans forward and starts searching for something at the back. When his hands reappear, they are clearly holding a Christmas edition, nationally limited, and hand-crafted Barbie doll.

Eggsy sighs again, loudly this time, because there goes his final chance at making Daisy happy.

The man’s head jerks up at Eggsy’s voice and turns back, bespectacled eyes questioning.

“It’s nothing, sorry, erm, sorry about that,” Eggsy says, waving his hand in embarrassment.

“You look sad, like you just watched your only puppy died, doesn’t seem like nothing to me,” the man says without sarcasm.

“Wow, you’re blunt,” Eggsy laughs. But he is rewarded with an unimpressed look.

“Well, yes and no. Yes, I’m sad and no, I don’t have a puppy. I’m like this because my only sister wants a doll and I just missed a chance at making her happy. Again.”

“How so?” The man tilts his head slightly, his brown eyes curious.

Eggsy says, “To be honest, I thought you didn’t care much about losing that paper in your pocket which has the riddle in it. I was hoping you either drop it on your way here or I could accelerate the process and be its new owner.”

“Wow, you’re blunt,” the man shoots back, amused.

“Hey, if it didn’t happen, it didn’t happen,” Eggsy shrugs and says his goodbye, “congratulations on solving the riddle. You’re going to make someone you love super happy.”

“Huh? Oh,” the tall man looks at his doll, chuckles and shakes his head, “No, this? I don’t want this.”

Well, that brings Eggsy back.

Then, what he sees will probably be forever imprinted in his memory because the strange, very, very strange man just pulls out black device? Scanner? And unlocks the box using it. He then gently takes out the doll, undresses it, pinches a small chip stuck to its back and dresses the doll back to normal again. Once he finishes with returning the box to its original state, he walks to stand in front of Eggsy and hands him what he, no, Daisy, has been longing for for months.

“Here you go, it’s yours,” he says, nonchalant. Cool as a cucumber that he is.

“What?”

“The doll isn’t what I came here for in the first place. Password at the cashier is, in this exact order: an egg, 2020 vision, and 419. Did you catch it? Repeat them to me.”

“Ah? An egg, 2020 vision? What is that? And 419? That’s the password?”

“Yep. And here’s the paper in case they need proof that you’ve solved it,” he carries on, uncaring of Eggsy’s wide-eyed, unashamed staring.

“Why would you do this to me? You can sell the doll on eBay for so much money!”

The man smiles, it brightens up his stern face and Eggsy is momentarily struck speechless at the sight, “Oh, that’d take too much effort. And I don’t think money is as important as making someone I love super happy. Am I right?”

He is about to disappear into the crowd once again when Eggsy remembers and shouts at him, “Thank you, guy in a suit! Merry Christmas!”

Said man in a suit looks back and grins, he replies, “Merry Christmas, Eggsy.”

eggsy as a barista at a local coffee shop who never failed to get harry’s name wrong despite it being a pretty common name.

“terry?” said roxy, incredulous.

“i gotta get creative once in a while, you know. keeps him on his toes,” said eggsy, a mischievous twinkle in his eyes betrayed his perfect customer service smile.

“this is too much like kids pulling pig tails of girls they like, or in your case, trying to piss off one of our nicest regulars just because you have a crush on them,” roxy commented before filling their caninets with more ingredients. “you have to be careful, eggsy. nice people are scary as hell when their button’s pushed.”

but eggsy simply ignored her warning because really? different inaccurate iterations of the name harry was used during the last three months and not once did harry complain.

at most, he raised his left eyebrow almost imperceptibly at ‘jerry’ and then proceeded to drain the entire cup.

karma was a bitch, however, when harry stopped coming to their shop for two consecutive weeks.

a period of time roxy dubbed as the eggspocalypse. their usual customers threw worrying looks toward eggsy whose eyes, accompanied with dark circles now, were habitually red-rimmed and looked about ready to burst into tears.

harry came back one day, when it was near the end of november. and that was when eggsy really cried.

because the man’s hand and beautiful head of hair were bandaged up to the point that he could only be recognised by eggsy.

“you came,” breathed eggsy, body almost breaking free from the hateful barrier that was the counter between them.

“well, i have to get my daily dose of caffeine, don’t i?” smiled harry.

“you can just do that at home. honestly, do you know how much you can save by making coffee at home?” said eggsy, the barista.

harry’s smile only got softer. “and miss out on the chance of getting my name misspelled by you? can’t really go through a day at work without that.”

eggsy gasped, “so you noticed!”

“i did. i went through uni and everything, you see.”

“but you didn’t say!”

harry looked down shyly, “i thought you hated me.”

“harry! that’s the complete opposite of how i feel!”

“i know that now,” harry tilted his head and looked straight at eggsy, his unwounded hand came up to wipe the tears from the man’s cheeks, “because you said my name right this time.”

and a dozen of onlookers in the shop whistled and cheered when their best barista climbed over the counter to pull a gentleman wrapped in white bandages in for a kiss.

eggsy didn’t get fired though, since his family was the owner of the shop. and their business didn’t take a hit at all seeing as harry refused to get free coffee from eggsy.

and the idea is that they have this huge, mutual crush on each other but are kinda shy and reluctant to show it so they start to make stupid excuses like borrowing a ladle or asking for 100g of baking powder (“that i really, truly need to bake my mum’s birthday cake, harry.”)