#prompt:candles

[vcg73]

Hummel Holidays 2017: Happy Solstice

Prompt #21 – Winter Solstice (also includes Movies, Candles, Traditions, and Family)

Rare-Pair: Is a trio today.  One Three Hill.  :)

 ~*~*~*~*~*~

 Sitting side by side on the living room sofa, hands folded in their laps like obedient schoolchildren, Dani and Elliott exchanged bemused glances.  Dani flicked the fluffy white faux-fur ball at the end of the red stocking cap she wore and said, “Thoughts?”

 Elliott played with one of the jingle bells dangling from his own red and green jester’s hat. “Santa had an opening for new elves and Kurt got us try-outs?”

 She laughed. “He’s in one of his fabulous hat design phases, but all the mannequins already had jobs at Macy’s?”

 “Someone forgot to pay the bills and this is Kurt’s way of warning us that the heat and power may go out at any second?”

 “No, that would be your apartment,” Dani said, flipping the long knitted scarf around her throat so that the fringed end smacked him in the face.

 Elliott fluffed his own fleecy red scarf with great dignity. “That only happened once.”

 She held up two fingers.

 “No, the first time was in summer and we just had a brown-out. That doesn’t count.”

 “Whatever.  So, back to subject number one. Why are we sitting on Kurt’s couch in the middle of the afternoon wearing silly hats and scarves?”

 Elliott shrugged. “Because he asked us to. And we’re both complete suckers for that big-pleading-eyes thing that he does.”

 She nodded. “He looks like a little puppy when he tucks his hands under his chin and gives you the big eyes. What can I say? I’m weak.”

 Shaking his head to make the little golden bells jingle, Elliott grinned crookedly and Dani laughed, acknowledging that she was not alone in that.

 “Oh, you guys look great!” Kurt interrupted, walking back inside his apartment from wherever he had disappeared to twenty minutes earlier after welcoming his two friends inside with a big smile, handing them each a hat and a scarf, then instructing them to put them on and wait for him. “Here. This is for you, Dani. And, Elliott, this one’s for you.”

 Elliott and Dani each accepted the gift bags Kurt handed them. Like them, Kurt wore a hat - a blue conical item with silver lace around the base and a silver bell at the tip – and a matching blue and silver striped scarf, and he carried a third larger bag. He set the bag on the floor in front of him as he helped himself to a cozy seat in between his two confused band mates.

 Looking from one side to the other, he smiled sweetly at them both. “Over the last year and a half, the two of you have come to mean a lot to me. You’ve been more than friends. You’ve stood by me when people I thought I could count on turned their backs. You’ve supported me and encouraged my ideas, even when other people said they were dumb. You’ve given me space to grow and support to change, when everyone else tried to keep me rooted in the past. And when the going got tough, you two just got closer and that means the world to me. You’ve become family to me, and so I thought it might be nice to share a very special tradition with you.”

 Dani and Elliott were both touched. Elliott cleared his throat and said, “Aw, man, that’s really . . . it was no more than you did for us, y’know?”  

 Dani did not even try to find words, she just latched onto Kurt and hugged him like she’d never let go. Finally, she dabbed carefully at the corners of her heavily made-up eyes and said, “So, what’s with the hats? Yours is awesome, by the way.”

 He grinned. “Thanks! I made it myself.  I’ll explain in a second. First, open your bags.”

 Eagerly, the two dug in, looking even more puzzled at the contents. The two were identical, each containing a candle, a gingerbread man, a brooch shaped like a pumpkin, a small basket filled with assorted snack foods, a bottle of wine and a plastic wine-glass.

 “Happy Solstice!” Kurt said, pulling a similar stash from his own bag, along with a dozen or so dvds, which he spread on the table in front of them.

 The other two grinned at the array of choices. “This is awesome,” Elliott declared. “I never participated in a Solstice party before.”

 “Me, either,” Dani said, picking up a video case to examine. “What gave you the idea?”

 Kurt gestured at the presents and said, “Well, as you know, I happen to be an atheist. My dad isn’t, but he also isn’t much of a church person, so he always encouraged me to go my own way with stuff like that. We continued to celebrate Christmas every year, but when I was about ten years old I read a magazine article about ancient pagan religions and how they influenced a lot of our modern-day holiday traditions. Rites concerning bounty, sacrifice, renewal, and so forth. Masquerades to disguise one’s self from evil spirits was also a big deal, but it’s too hard to watch movies wearing masks, so we went with funny hats and scarves instead.” He flipped the end of his in demonstration. “One of the biggest pagan festival times was the Winter Solstice, so that first year I talked my dad into figuring out a way to celebrate it, and we had so much fun with it that afterward we did it every winter that I lived at home. Until Dad got married again and we decided that having a pagan festival in our living room might seem a little too weird for Carole and Finn.”

 Dani picked up on the unspoken part of that statement. “Wait, so you’ve never shared this with anyone else before now? Other than your dad, I mean.”

 Kurt looked down at his hands, which were rolling the little apple-scented jar candle they held. “No. I kept thinking that maybe I would share it with Rachel one day, or with Blaine, but it just never felt right somehow. I think if Adam and I had lasted longer, I would have shared it with him but, well, things happened and . . .” He sighed, the sound filled with regret for what might have been.

 “And now you’re in a different place in your life,” Elliott said, voice filled with encouragement, not willing to let Kurt dwell on sad thoughts. “You’re giving single life a try, and concentrating on other things. You’ve started living without constant reminders of the past, and moving on with other people, and other things. So basically, this year you have a bounty of friends, a sacrifice of old dreams, and a renewal of going after the things that make you happy, instead of just going along with whatever makes everyone else happy. Am I right?”

 Even Kurt looked surprised at his easy summation. “I suppose you are. I hadn’t quite thought of it like that.” He picked up one of the movie cases and waved it. “At any rate, most of our family tradition involved eating and drinking; though it was sparkling cider when I was a kid; and watching non-traditional Christmas movies together.”

 Dani laughed. “Is that what these are? I’ve been trying to figure out what ‘Die Hard’, ‘Lethal Weapon’, ‘Trading Places’, and ‘Meet Me in Saint Louis’ all had in common.”

 “They all take place during Christmas, that’s right,” Elliott said, nodding and making his hat ring merrily. “And you said you started this tradition with your dad. Having met Burt, I can totally see why you would have some ‘80’s action movies in the mix.”

 “And the older movies are to honor my mom, who adored the classics,” Kurt explained as Dani picked up an old Humphrey Bogart film called ‘We’re No Angels’, raising an eyebrow as she read the description on the back. “That one’s a comedy about murderous convicts, believe it or not.”

 Elliott snorted. “I think I need to see that one. Oooh, you have ‘Gremlins’! I love that movie. Oh, geez, and ‘Batman Returns’. Isn’t that the kind of horrible one with Danny DeVito as the Penguin?”

 Dani snatched the box from his hand. “And Michelle Pfeiffer in the skintight leather cat suit!  I vote we watch this first.”

 Both men laughed, but Kurt obligingly got up to put the disc in. He paused to set up his laptop on a TV tray nearby, plugging in the charger and then pulling up a waiting website showing a continuous loop of a log burning merrily in a fireplace. “Yule log,” he said.

 Kurt offered no further explanation, but the others just nodded and started divvying up the goodies as their movie began to play. Scented candles were lit, wine was poured, and snacks were evenly divided as the three of them piled together on the couch and happily spent the first of what they all secretly hoped would be many happy family Solstices together.

 THE END

[gubabubas-sketchbook]

Howltober - Day 4 [prompt:candles]

Pansy: Why are here so much candles? Ron: Because I wanted to make it special! Pansy: You know, you don’t need to flatter me anymore. Ron: But .. you are special .. to me.