#littlebeasts

Nicky stirred the milk on the stove, it was almost done Nicky tipped the coco powder and sugar into the milk then added a little bit of vanilla that they still had never told Joe about after all these years. He would if Joe ever pressed the issue, but there was something about having one secret after 900 years. An inconsequential secret that didn’t mean anything other than making hot chocolate better than Joe would ever find anywhere else. It was the perfect night for hot chocolate, Joe was out, would be home soon, they could curl up in their bed watch a sappy Christmas movie.

Andy and Nile had gone south for the winter “like normal people” Andy had said rolling her eyes. It wasn’t as if Joe and Nicky had spent 900 winters in the snow but sometimes- once they had started celebrating Christmas, it happened more frequently. There was something about the snow, the way it made everything just feel that more cozy, that Nicky could not get enough They were in New York for the Christmas season, maybe they would meet up with the others after New Years. New York seemed like the place to be from Thanksgiving until New Years, and Nicky wanted to experience it just once, in relative peace. And Joe- well Joe would follow Nicky to the ends of the earth (and Nicky would follow Joe all the way back) so they were in New York. 

The apartment was tiny, a call back to all the different collective housing they’d lived in. The tiny window over a rickety kitchen table, the snow piling up in the corners of each pane of glass, reminded Nicky of the tiny apartment they’d had in Omsk in the 50s. There hadn’t been any vanilla in the hot chocolate back then, Nicky wasn’t sure there was any hot chocolate. But it had been a cozy apartment, probably one of the warmest they’d had, It had been nice to settle down for a little bit after the war. 

Nicky heard the steps creak, and hurried to put the vanilla back, they didn’t want the secret out that easily, before going back to stirring. Turning the heat off Nicky was poring the hot chocolate as Joe walked into the apartment. It was as if the heat had been turned up, but in the most comfortable way, he could not begin to described the feeling every time he saw Joe. after 900 years it didn’t stop just settled. Like a favorte sweater. An apt analogy at the moment because Joe was wearing Nicky’s favorite sweater, he wasn’t sure whos it actually was.