#clairy

Steve is a big time baseball star and Mary is his girlfriend and a big time corporate lawyer. (Neither one of them is super invested in their relationship, because gay, but it's pushed on them by Steve's manager and Mary's boss, as it generates good publicity for both of them). Steve suffers a big injury, his doctor tells him it could be the end of his sports career. Steve's manager blows the doctor off, telling Steve to rest over Christmas and he can get back on the field in January. Steve gets a call from his childhood BFF Darci, who tells him that she just published a book and the release event is going to be held in their hometown of Arcadia, and she encourages him to come. Steve decides to go visit Arcadia for Christmas while resting his injury. Mary accompanies him, under instructions from her firm to scout the town for a corporate takeover.

Mary and Steve arrive in Arcadia only to have their car immediately break down. They go to the local mechanic, only for Steve to be utterly shocked that their mechanic is Jim, Steve's high school friend and secret crush. Both of them are flustered and awkward, Steve says he's only in town to visit family for the holiday/see Darci's book signing and Jim agrees to fix Steve's car. Steve overhears a phone call between Jim and Claire and thinks the two are dating and becomes sad. In reality Jim and Claire did date a bit after high school but mutually broke it off and are just friends now.

Meanwhile outside the mechanic shop Claire and Mary run into each other. Claire, a local councilwoman, recognizes Mary as the corporate takeover lawyer and confronts her. Cue wlw hostility.

Car now fixed Steve and Mary continue on their way to his siblings' house. They arrive and are greeted by Douxie, Steve's adopted older brother, who guides them inside. Douxie lives with his and Steve's younger siblings, twins Aja and Krel, and Aja's girlfriend Shannon. Douxie is a waiter/a musician on the side, Krel is a software engineer, Shannon is a liveblogger, and Aja does something completely off the wall like lumberjack/reindeer herder/bear wrestler. Steve is delighted by the reunion with his siblings and easily falls back in with them. He and Mary also let them know that their relationship is purely for business purposes and they aren't romantically interested in each other at all. At dinner Steve inquires about where their parents are, the others are all made uncomfortable by this and tell Steve they still live in town but Steve doesn't have to see them. Steve brushes off their concerns but Mary is intrigued.

The next morning they all go to the book store for Darci's book release. Steve gets there early and he and Darci have a heartfelt reunion. The book signing commences to and Steve's surprise they run into Jim and Claire at the book store. Cue blushing and awkwardness from Steve and Jim, and tooth grinding barely concealed hostility from Mary and Claire.

Shannon sees how obvious Jim and Steve are being and tells Douxie, Aja, and Krel they need to get the two of them together so they'll stop being blushing awkward messes. Delighted at the idea of hijinks they all agree.

Douxie slides in and tells Steve that while Jim is the town mechanic he also bakes on the side and does a lot of the baking for the town Christmas festival and is heavily involved with running it, and that he'd be a great person to show Steve around the town. Steve and Jim both blush and flounder saying they're going to be busy helping Mary and Claire with their respective tasks. Aja chimes in saying Mary and Claire can come along and the four of them can spend time together, shy agreement from Jim and Steve and forced grins from Mary and Claire.

Cut to them doing various holiday activities, Steve and Jim have shy sweet chemistry while Mary and Claire have barely concealed hostility. This ends with Steve's injury being aggravated. Jim, Mary, and Claire push Steve to go see a doctor, which stresses Steve greatly until Jim tells him that the old town doctor died when he slipped on a patch of ice and Barbara is the new doctor.

At the doctor's office Jim and Steve go into the exam room while Mary and Claire hang out in the waiting room. Barbara looks over Steve's injury and says he's fine for now but to take it easy and not do anything strenuous, and that he should definitely make an appointment with a physical therapist. Jim and Steve share an "I'm glad you're ok" moment, which Barbara observes.

Meanwhile in the waiting room the computer system goes down and everyone starts panicking, Mary steps in and begins organizing things, quickly bringing the chaos into order. Claire reluctantly respects her for this.

Barbara later meets with Douxie, Aja, Krel, and Shannon, once she realizes that Steve and Mary's relationship is purely for show she becomes fully onboard with their antics to bring Jim and Steve together. Shannon has a quick moment of realization "Wait are we in a Hallmark movie?"

The next day Jim and Steve spend time with Toby and Darci at their D&D session, Claire declined because she's busy and Mary because she's tired. Toby privately tells Jim his feelings for Steve are obvious and Jim should go ahead and ask him out, Jim says he can't because Steve built up a new life as a big baseball star that Jim has no place in. Darci does the same with Steve but Steve says that Jim is with Claire and Steve can't disrupt their happiness.

That night Mary is frustrated at her bosses hounding her and decides to go out to a local bar to hopefully unwind. Douxie's band takes the stage and to her utter shock Claire is with them as a bassist/vocalist rocking out to punk music. Moment of gay panic from Mary. Off stage she tells Claire she really enjoyed her performance, a flustered Claire says that punk music is just something she uses to unwind from her job as a councilwoman.

The next day they do more holiday activities with the four of them, with Claire and Mary earnestly enjoying each other's company this time. At the end of the day Barbara, Douxie, Aja, Krel, and Shannon arrange for Steve and Jim to have a quiet moment alone (Shannon remains the only one self aware of their Hallmark movie shenanigens). Jim reveals that he and Claire broke up and are purely friends now, a stunned Steve reveals that him and Mary's relationship is purely for publicity. Sharing a moment of stunned elation the two of them agree to try a relationship.

The next day Jim and Steve go meet up with Steve's old baseball team, including Eli, Logan, and Seamus who still play baseball in their free time. They are all are excited to see Steve as he's the only one who "made" it. Steve shyly says after his injury he's considering giving up sports and picking up something less hard on his body. Steve has a great time catching up with them until he's ambushed by his parents. They pull him aside and berate him for potentially giving up sports, calling him weak for not wanting to play with his injury, and make homophobic comments about him and Jim. Meanwhile after hearing the other team members talk Jim starts to feel guilty about pulling Steve away from his glamorous sports star life.

That night Jim breaks up with Steve, claiming it's because their lives are just too different. Steve is heartbroken, and under pressure from his parents and his manager, believes baseball is the only thing he'll ever be good for and makes plans to go back to the big city and back to playing.

Meanwhile Claire overhears snippets of a conversation Mary has on the phone and thinks that Mary's giving her firm the go ahead to take over the town. Claire angrily tells Mary off. A crushed Mary makes plans to go back to the city with Steve, both of them planning on continuing their sham relationship.

Steve tells Eli, Logan, and Seamus goodbye, saying he's split up with Jim and is heading back to the big city to start back up with baseball practice. They're worried about Steve both breaking up with Jim and jumping back in to baseball instead of resting his injury. They go check with Barbara, who is very concerned by Steve's plan to return to baseball, as she knows that's the last thing his injury needs.

All of them meet up with Douxie, Douxie confesses that their parents always pushed Steve too hard to succeed in baseball, and that they got the old town doctor to sweep his injuries under the rug so they could push him further and further. Douxie always wanted to intervene, but because he was a foster kid, their parents threatened to send Douxie away if he made too much of a fuss. They all decide that they can't let Steve and Jim part like this, so they wrangle everyone in town to help Steve and Jim get back together (at this point Shannon is resigned "fuck it if we're in a Hallmark movie we might as well go all the way").

Through hijinks Barbara, all of Steve's siblings, and the baseball team get Steve and Mary to attend the town's Christmas tree lighting festival. Toby and Darci find Jim and Claire drowning their sorrows in eggnog at the local bar. Jim bemoans that he can't get in the way of Steve's dream life and at least this way he can protect Steve's feelings. Toby shuts him down hard, saying that he's not protecting Steve, he's taking the decision away from him, and that Steve deserves to make his own choices and Jim owes him his honest feelings. Claire grumbles about being decieved by Mary, Darci curtly points out that what Claire heard was a small segment of a conversation with absolutely no context, Mary could have been talking about a lot of things, and at the very least Claire should ask Mary for an explanation. Jim and Claire concede and agree to meet up with Steve and Mary.

At the tree lighting Jim reunites with Steve and confesses everything, he says he loves Steve and wants to be with him, but doesn't want to get in the way of Steve doing the sport he loves. He says he'll support Steve at whatever Steve wants, as long as it makes Steve happy. Jim's sincerity has Steve breaking down, he confesses he's been grinding so much at baseball he hasn't enjoyed it for a long time, and his injury gives him chronic pain and he wants to quit but has been doing baseball for so long he doesn't know what else to do. Jim assures him he can spend as much time as he needs to figuring it out.

Meanwhile Claire apologizes to Mary for blowing up at her and asks about the phone call. Mary confesses that she is planning a corporate takeover...of her own company, using blackmail and embezzlement to oust her bosses and put herself on top. She says she loved spending time with Claire, but she also loves being a corporate lawyer, and she could never ask Claire to leave the town she loves. Claire confesses that while she does love her town she doesn't want to be a councilwoman for the rest of her life, and that she, Douxie, and the rest of the band have been talking for months about going to the city to try and make it big.

Both couples happily agree to try new lives together. Jim and Steve in Arcadia, and Mary and Claire in the big city.

Steve's parents storm in and start berating Steve again for quitting baseball just when he's "made it". Jim steps in and absolutely tears into them, saying they never truly cared about what was best for Steve and pushed him to the point of injury. Douxie, Aja, Krel, Mary, Claire, Logan, Seamus, Eli, and the other baseball team members all join in on blasting Steve's parents. Embarrassed, Steve's parents slink away.

The Christmas tree lighting commences, Jim and Steve share a kiss, as well as Mary and Claire. Shannon rolls her eyes "Of course they kiss now, we are in a Hallmark movie after all," Aja slides up to her "So does this mean you don't want to kiss me?" Shannon smirks "Oh I didn't say that".

While the couples are all kissing Krel, Darci, and Toby roll their eyes and share a moment of aromantic solidarity as the only three people in town capable of being normal about this stuff. Darci remarks that she doesn't see the Palchuk parents anywhere. Krel tells her that Douxie mentioned their parents were arrested for child abuse and taken away. Toby comments that it's weird for them to be arrested after all this time has passed but none of them really dwell on it.

Cut to the Palchuk parents' being taken away by Krampus (Strickler) while Barbara and Douxie watch. Through conversation it's revealed that Krampus (Strickler) is Barbara's friend with benefits. After he departs with the Palchuk parents, Douxie asks if Barbara cares to explain how she and Krampus (Strickler) became fwb, Barbara says no she does not.

One year later, Steve has quit baseball and lives in Arcadia with Jim. He fosters animals for the local shelter and works part time as a substitute teacher, as well as various other side jobs around town. Steve still doesn't know what he wants to spend the rest of his life doing, but he's having fun trying out the different options while being loved and supported by Jim and his friends and family. He's started physical therapy and stopped playing baseball completely, but enjoys cheering Eli, Logan, and Seamus on at their games.

Mary, Claire, and Douxie arrive in town to visit for Christmas. Mary gushes about how much she enjoys running her own firm, while Douxie and Claire gleefully share how their band is taking off.

Big Christmas party with all the characters happens, Steve and Jim share a kiss under the mistletoe.