#12daysofbluepulse

“Want to buy some mistletoe for charity?”

“Uh-” Jaime paused outside of the pet store – really, who tried to sell junk outside of a pet store? – and turned to the fourteen year old girl who was holding out the basket of carefully wrapped green plants. Though she was too old for them, her dark hair was up in pig tails and her teeth had a little gap in them that was too like his younger sister to ignore. He felt weak as he reached for his wallet. “How much?”

 “Three dollars for one or two for five.” She replied with a hopeful smile.

A buzz reverberated along his spine.  “Jaime Reyes cease. You have no need for this toxic commodity.”

Yeah, yeah. He thought indifferently even as he dug out three wrinkled bills.                          

“Thank you! And Merry Christmas!”

“Merry Christmas to you too.”

He tossed the plant in the passenger seat of his car and drove it home, wondering what in the world he was going to do with it. He spared a misgiving look at the little white berries on the plant, as innocent and tasteful looking as blueberries. He couldn’t hang it up could he? What if it fell? Mistletoe was poisonous to cats.

And probably Bart Allens.

“I think I made a judgment of error.”

“I am pleased you are beginning to see it my way.”

“Oh cállate Khaji Da.”

~

The moment he came home Esmerelda, their ragdoll tabby cat, seemed to instinctively know he had something she wasn’t supposed to get into and proceeded to try to get into it.

“No!” He snapped, snatching the bag off the counter when he spotted a brown paw reaching for it. “This is not for you.”

Green eyes peered over the wooden surface at him. He turned away from the baleful stare, shoving the mistletoe at the top of the pantry before reaching into the plastic bag he got from the store. The jingle caught the cat’s attention, ears flickering madly as he drew the toy ball out and shook it, before chucking it down the hall. The chair she sat on screeched from the dispersal of weight, paws pounding in fast pursuit. He shook his head, unsure why he spoiled her, and opened the pantry, starting to set the cans of cat food in rows on the middle shelf. 

After he finished setting those away, he crumpled the empty plastic into a ball and pulled down the mistletoe, again wondering where he would put it. That was when Khaji gave a familiar hum and that was his only warning before a whirlwind crashed against his back, lean but muscular arms threading around his torso. “I’m home!” Bart chirped in his exuberant fashion, the strong odor of grease, oil and gasoline permeating from him. He chuckled at the vibration that answered him, dropping a kiss to the top of the beetle’s crown through his shirt. “Hello to you too Khaji Da.”

Jaime glanced over his shoulder, seeing the speedster still in his jean jacket of his mechanic’s uniform with a fresh dark stain on the elbow and a smudge of black against his cheek. “Can’t shower first can you?”

“You like my manly musk.” The other brazenly replied, playfully nipping the edge of his ear. His eyes landed on the plant. “What is that?”

“Uhhh, mistletoe.” He said with a shrug as he held it up. “Some kid was selling ‘em for charity. I don’t know why though. I’m not sure what we’re going to do with it.”

“Wait, really? Come on Blue, even I know this one!” Bart sidled around and crouched below the mistletoe with a mischievous grin.

He rolled his eyes, laughing as he leaned down and planted his lips on the other’s in a quick kiss. “I don’t mean like that. We have to make sure Esmerelda doesn’t accidentally eat any of it. It’ll make her sick.”

The younger tilted his head some, mind racing a mile a minute, and then burst out, “Oh! I know a perfect spot! Give it to me.” When Jaime hesitated, he held up one hand like he was swearing an oath. “It’s somewhere Esmy won’t ever be able to get to it.”

“Alright,” He resigned, handing it over with a small sigh. A few leaflets from their junk mail pile flew off the kitchen table as Bart zoomed out of the room, but before they ever hit the ground he returned to catch them, setting them back on the tabletop in a neat pile.

He glanced around the room, seeing nothing had changed, and raised a curious eyebrow. The brunet winked. “You’ll find out.” Accepting that he would be faced with some spontaneous kisses, Jaime decided right then and there to give up trying to find where Bart had hidden it.

~

“Hurry up Bart!” The Hispanic called as he raced up the stairwell of their multi-complex apartment, his armor already sliding down his back. He could hear the faint hum of the bio-ship on the rooftop, waiting to pick them up for the mission they had just been called for.

“Did you just tell me to hurry up? Me?!” Bart cried incredulously as he floundered a few steps behind, trying to speed change into his Kid Flash uniform and spring upstairs at the same time. He wasn’t exactly… succeeding. But he still had time to run his mouth as he grumbled, “The guy who takes five years in the bathroom just to do his hair is telling the speediest person on the planet to hurry up. Unbelievable.”

They skirted around the landing and raced up the last flight. “Better than your two flicks of a comb in that unruly mess.”

“Hey. I rock the windswept look and you know it.”

They came to the top floor of the building, Jaime reaching for the doorknob when a fast hand shot out and grabbed his. “Wait!” He turned to his boyfriend questioningly, puzzled further when he wordlessly pointed towards the ceiling. He looked up.

Being part of the speedster family, Bart was fast enough he could zip out of the building without so much as a blur being seen by the human eye, but for Jaime who didn’t exactly have the other’s ability of imitation invisibility, he always had to escape to the rooftop when responding to a mission.

And hanging there by a small thread, right before the last door he would pass through before facing whatever perils that mission would bring, was the mistletoe.

The gesture hit something inside of him and left him weak-kneed. “Bart…”

“You gonna kiss me or what? Heard it was this crash tradition and all.”

So he did. And it didn’t feel so much like a ‘goodbye’.