Chapter Text
The house was quiet and cozy and quite cozy. That was what Lance had said the first time he had come over to Adam’s place. Apparently, when you were a teacher at one of the top flight schools in America, you got paid the big bucks.
Lance never got tired of visiting Adam in his home, and Adam never got tired of having Lance over. This time was no exception.
It was the last day before Lance was flying home to see his family for Christmas, and Adam had a plan.
The sofa had been properly fluffed to ‘maximum comfort’ as Lance would say, and the fire was crackling heartily in its place. He had just finished laying out all of the ingredients to make sugar cookies when the doorbell rang.
Adam tried and failed to contain how absolutely giddy he felt as he practically skipped towards the door. He had to restrain himself from literally flinging the door wide open to greet Lance.
Lance stood sheepishly on Adam’s doorstep; he was wrapped in a blue jacket that looked far too cold for the weather they were having. He had a brown scarf that Adam had personally knit for him wrapped around his neck so that it covered his nose and mouth as well. The edges were slightly tattered where he had pulled and tugged at the yarn, and the stitches were starting to come undone. Adam didn’t mind though; it just proved to him that Lance appreciated his gift.
He smiled and lowered the scarf ever so slightly so that the tip of Lance’s nose was exposed to the chilled air. He leaned in and pressed a kiss to the tip of his nose. To ward off frostbite, he rationalized in his head, knowing full well his heart had different reasons. Lance’s cheeks darkened further, but Adam couldn’t tell if it was from the cold or embarrassment.
“I uh- brought some sparkling cider,” he said and raised a small wicker basket with two green bottles in it that Adam had missed in his cursory check. “I couldn’t remember if you liked it or not, but I figured if you didn’t like it I could always take it back home..." He brought his other hand to the back of his neck, rubbing it awkwardly.
Adam smiled wider and took the basket gingerly from the other’s (probably) cold fingers. Their hands touched for the briefest moment (yeah, his hands were like ice), and Adam ushered Lance inside to warm him up. “Come on in." He closed the door behind him, shutting out the cold, biting air. “I set some things up in the kitchen for us.”
He opened his refrigerator and placed the cider in there for later, even though it was so cold outside that they didn’t need it to stay cold. Lance rolled his suitcase beside the door as he hung his jacket on the coat rack and revealed a bright blue sweater underneath. He turned and showed off the front which featured two snowmen asking each other, ‘Do you smell carrots?’
Lance posed comically with it. “So? How do I look?” He tried flexing his arms in different ways, posing as different famous statues, not quite thinking through the ‘Thinker’ pose and accidentally covering up his front.
“I didn’t realize this was an ugly sweater contest,” Adam said as he walked closer to Lance and rested both his hands on his hips. “I would definitely have won." He rubbed their noses together teasingly, and Lance rubbed back. His face lit up with an insanely happy smile from just an Eskimo kiss.
“What makes you say that?” Lance asked. “I think that you’re awfully pretty. There’s no way you would win an ugly sweater contest. Your residual beauty would instantly disqualify you because you have so much of it that they would hate to call any part of you ugly.”
“I mean, I could go looking for my minion sweater and settle this debate once and for all." He laughed at the sudden look of disgust on Lance’s face. “But otherwise, I think I’ll just stick with this old thing." He gestured down to what he was already wearing. The gray material fit snugly around him, and the very ends of the sleeves had holes so that he could stick his thumbs through and still keep his hands warm.
Lance snorted and leaned into Adam’s chest. “I fully agree; please, no minions." His head tucked under the other’s chin. “What do you have planned for us tonight?”
Adam rocked the two of them back and forth slightly and hummed directly into his ear. “I was thinking that maybe we could start off by making cookies… Then decorating them… No eating them though." He said, suddenly serious. “We’re absolutely not going to eat these cookies that we put all this effort into.”
“Ha ha,” Lance said dryly and rolled his eyes. He pulled slightly away from Adam’s warmth to look him straight in the eyes. “I feel like you’ve just issued me a challenge." Adam shrugged, and Lance curled back into his chest. “That’s fine I guess, we just need to make something to warm us up." He shivered against his chest as if he was trying to prove a point.
A bar of chocolate sat on the counter beside the stove, and Adam smiled to himself. “I have the perfect idea.”
---
After almost an hour, creatively cut sugar cookies were baking in the oven, and the two were curled up together on the couch with their heads laid against each other’s shoulders and steaming hot chocolate in mugs warming their hands. The crackling fire filled the room with heat and sound; the light reflected off of both their eyes as they stared into the flames.
In the kitchen, the oven beeped to let them know the cookies were done. Lance yawned and curled closer to Adam. The marshmallows in his chocolate had melted across the surface, and whenever he took a sip, the sugary foam stuck to his top lip. It made a mustache that Adam had first chuckled at, but he now leaned over to kiss off.
“You know one of us needs to get them out of the oven,” Adam whispered. His eyes were still transfixed on the fire, and he made no move to get up.
Lance blew across the surface of his cocoa in an attempt to cool it off. “Your house, your responsibility." He whispered drowsily, his eyes starting to drift closed.
Adam smiled and reached to take Lance’s mug from his hands which were starting to lose their ability to hold cups of hot liquid that Adam did not want to clean up later. He set the mug on a coaster on the table in front of them and wrapped Lance up in the rest of the blanket as he went to check on the cookies.
They were cooked almost perfectly, and Adam rushed to get them off of the still hot baking sheet before they burned or overcooked. He put them on a paper towel so that they could cool quickly, and he brought out the colored frostings from the fridge so that they could decorate them later. He went to the other room to rouse Lance and stopped in the doorway.
On the couch, Lance had fallen asleep. His face was expressionless, and it practically glowed against the firelight. Adam felt the edges of his lips curl upwards in a smile as the other curled the blankets more tightly around himself to try and extract the most warmth and pull it close to himself.
Adam knelt right in front of Lance and gently shook his shoulder. Blue eyes peeked out between caramel lids. “Hey,” the younger slurred through sleep, smiling to himself before closing his eyes and yawning. “‘Re the cooks good?”
“Did you just say ‘cooks’ instead of cookies?” Adam asked and poked the tip of Lance’s nose playfully.
“‘M tired, Adam. Don’ be mean." Lance looked blearily at the other between his long eyelashes.
The older brushed Lance’s bangs to the side so that he could press his lips to the top of his forehead. “Do you just want to sleep here? You can sleep in the bed, and I’ll take you to the airport tomorrow.”
Lance shook his head and yawned. He rubbed his eyes and stretched before mumbling. “No, I wanna eat some cooks." The corners of his lips curved up to a smile like he knew exactly what he was saying was going to bother Adam. His eyes, although still sleepy, glinted mischievously.
“There’s only one cook in this house,” Adam said as he pulled Lance into a bridal carry. He whispered in Lance’s ear. “And he’s not for eating." The younger yelped and adhered to him. All traces of sleep were gone from the long limbs that clung precariously to the blanket and the man carrying him.
He gently set Lance on the counter still wrapped in the blanket, although he hissed when the back of his knees made contact with the freezing cold counter and quickly shifted the blanket under him.
“I’ve got white, black, blue, red, and yellow frosting colors. From those we can make all the other colors, right?” Adam said as he organized the pots of frostings around the otherwise empty counter.
Lance nodded. “Yeah, but I have a question, babe." Adam hummed. “Why didn’t we just start with all white frosting and add food coloring? Wouldn’t that be easier?” Adam stopped what he was doing and placed his forehead against the counter with his eyes closed.
“I’m an idiot." He muttered and lifted his head slightly only to let it fall back with a small thud. “I made all the primary colors with frosting thinking I was being clever and I would be able to impress you with my color knowledge.”
“You’re impressing me with your lack of color knowledge,” Lance teased with a smile plastered across his face. “It’s okay though; I forgive you. We can make even weirder colors this way. Like, we could make fifty different shades of grey.”
Adam raised his head to half-glare at the other. His glasses were slightly askew on his face, and there was a large pale circle on his forehead where the blood had been forced away. Lance tugged Adam to him setting him in between his legs, but Lance was still taller from his vantage point on the counter.
He leaned down and pressed his lips against the cold spot on his forehead. “I think it’s really sweet, babe." He lowered his head so that they were touching foreheads together and breathing each other’s air. “Are they cooled enough?” Adam nodded against him. “Great! Let’s get to decorating!”
Lance hopped down off the counter; the motion caused the boy’s chests to be pressed startlingly close, and Adam was forced to take a step back.
“These are going to be the best-decorated cooks that you ever did see!" Lance proclaimed as he pressed a chaste kiss to Adam’s cheek.
Adam felt his cheeks darken considerably, and he cast his eyes down to the floor. “Whatever you say, Lance. I swear I’m going to beat you, though.”
Lance narrowed his eyes. “Challenge accepted.”
Thirty minutes later, the counter was nowhere near as clean as it had been when they first started. Various amounts of frosting decorated the white tile making it look more like a Jackson Pollock painting than a counter. Adam worried about the food coloring staining the white, but after seeing the smile reaching from ear to ear on Lance’s face, he decided that this was worth the sacrifice.
Lance was much slower at decorating than Adam was, which surprised him. His boyfriend was putting so much effort into the microscopic decorations that in the time he took to decorate one cookie, Adam had finished three and was in the middle of a fourth. Neither of them seemed to mind though, as Adam’s pile started growing larger and larger as Lance was practically sweating over one.
Whenever the older boy tried to take a peek at what was making his tongue peek out ever so slightly between his lips, Lance turned his body away, making sure that the decorations remained hidden.
“C’mon, Lance." He whined jokingly. “You have to show me eventually.”
Lance looked up for the first time in at least two minutes. His brow still furrowed in concentration. “And eventually is not now." He went right back to work. “It’s supposed to be a surprise. This is going to be the best cook ever. You’re going to want to frame this cook.”
A smile worked its way onto Adam’s face. “I’ll frame anything that you want me to." He muttered under his breath, just loud enough for Lance to hear. The other didn’t move, but Adam knew that he had heard from the blush making its way up the back of Lance’s neck.
Adam was in the middle of slathering the top half of a cookie with blue frosting to match Lance’s sweater when he finally proclaimed that his cookie was finished. It still didn’t stop him from hiding the design behind the miniature pile that he had already completed.
“This is the last one I’m going to do," Adam said as he grabbed the white frosting to make snowmen. This time, Lance was the one trying to peek at Adam’s design. “Ah, ah, ah!" He smiled. “This is a surprise, Lance. It’s going to be the best one of the night, just you wait and see.”
He put a few black dots on the snowmen’s front and called it good. On three, they both revealed their secret decorations and promptly burst out laughing. Lance’s cookie wore a grey sweater with raised crocheted designs that matched Adam’s wardrobe almost exactly, and Adam’s cookie was dressed in a blue sweater with two snowmen.
“Did we seriously do each other?” Lance asked through his laughter.
“Of course we did." Adam smiled. “Sorry I couldn’t get the words of your sweater, but a cookie is a bit of a small working space, and there’s a lot of words.
Lance laughed harder. “There are only four words! ‘Do you smell carrots?’ That’s not a lot of words.”
Adam smiled back at the joy Lance was exhibiting. “Okay, it’s four words and a question mark. That question mark makes all the difference.”
“Oh really?” Lance raised an eyebrow. “Hold on, let me see if I can write the words on." He held his hand out for the cookie in Adam’s hand. He handed it over. “Alright, you’re about to see the cook-decorating master at his finest.”
Adam rolled his eyes. “I’d like to see you try topping this beauty right here." He plucked the objectively worst decorated cookie from his pile and put it on display for the other to appreciate. “This right here." He pointed at the cookie to make sure that Lance knew exactly what he was talking about. “This is my pride and joy. You can’t top art at it’s finest.”
Lance giggled, and Adam felt his heart soar. “I think I can beat a green Christmas tree." He said as he got to work trying to fit the tiny letters onto his frosting sweater. “Take a look at some of mine, though. They’re not going to compare to that masterpiece, but I’m proud of them.”
Adam glanced over at Lance’s meager pile and finally understood why it took him so long to decorate. They were amazing — the Christmas tree that he had decorated even had indentions to mimic the needles of a real tree.
“Ah! No!" Lance said, biting his bottom lip. “No." He said again, although this time it was quieter and sounded more defeated. He looked at Adam sadly. “I killed myself." He held the cookie in his hand which had been broken in two, coincidentally breaking the round head from the rest of the body. The words ‘Do you sm’ had been written, surprisingly small in a text bubble above one snowman.
The two of them stared at the crumbling cookie before Adam snorted and doubled over in laughter.
“Don’t laugh,” Lance said, trying to hold back his own laughter but being much more successful. “This is a serious problem. Adam, I’ve cut off my own head, and here you are laughing. Adam. Adam look at me.”
Adam glanced up at Lance and redoubled his laughter. He had set the cookie on the counter and pulled his sweater up over his head so that all Adam could see was the top of his hair.
“I’m dead.”
“Oh my god." Adam wheezed. “Oh my god, wait." He pulled the bottom of Lance’s sweater down so that his head popped out of the top of it. “I need to you break my arms off." He said, already pulling them through his sleeves so that they were wrapped around his torso under the sweater.
“Adam, I can’t. I’m totally 100% dead. I have no head.”
Adam rolled his eyes and threaded his arms through the sleeves. “Fine." He grabbed the cookie that Lance had made in his likeness. He felt bad about breaking it; it was incredibly detailed - at least the sweater was, the face was just two dots and a smile with eyebrows that made him look somewhat angry. After a moment’s consideration, he took out his phone and snapped a quick picture.
He held the cookie up for Lance to watch him break the legs from the cookie, and he immediately let his own legs give out so he could fall dramatically to the floor.
Lance laid down next to him on the floor, wrapping them both in the blanket. His head pressed against Adam’s chest. “We can die together. It’ll be great.”
Adam raised his hand to play with Lance’s soft hair. “We can’t die here.”
“Too late." Lance interrupted. “You have to carry me back to bed.”
“I can’t carry you. My legs are broken.”
“Well, I’m missing my head.”
“We can’t sleep on the floor.”
Lance yawned and nuzzled further into Adam’s embrace. “Watch me.”
Adam hummed and rested his head against the top of Lance’s. “It’s going to be cold.”
“Mmhmm." Lance hummed; he wrapped the blanket further around himself.
“And uncomfortable.”
“Mmhmm.”
“And you might miss your flight because my alarm clock is in my room, and I’m your ride to the airport.”
Lance was quiet for a minute before he softly spoke. “Well, if we’re going to get the bed… I wouldn’t be opposed to moving.”
“Well, then you need to get off of me first." Adam poked Lance’s cheek playfully.
“My motivation just dropped.”
Adam smiled. “I’ll carry you to bed.”
Lance moved faster than Adam had ever seen him move. In a split-second, he was off of the other and on his feet. “You’ve got yourself a deal, babe.”
He pushed himself off of the floor. “Okay, but I need to put the cookies away first." He grabbed a zip top bag from a drawer and began packaging them up. When he got to the two broken cookies, he looked to Lance. “Do I eat you or me?”
Lance smiled softly. “You eat me of course; I get to eat you." Adam nodded and took a bite of the cookie he had made to look like the other. Lance wrapped his arms around Adam’s waist and pulled him closer to whisper in his ear. “Maybe this cook was for eating." He nipped lightly at the lobe of Adam’s ear, making him shiver. “I bet you taste even sweeter than that cookie with no legs.”
Adam turned his head and captured Lance’s lips with his own. Their tongues danced together, and the blanket wrapped around Lance’s shoulders silently fell to the floor. He didn’t even feel cold. Warm hands cradled the younger’s face as they stood in each other’s embrace.
Lance hummed in appreciation, and he pulled back slightly, his entire body willing him to go back into the warmth of the man he loved. He could taste the remnants of the sugar cookie that Adam had eaten just before the kiss and if that wasn’t one of the best things to happen to him, he didn’t know what was. “I believe I was promised a bed." He whispered breathily, his eyes refusing to break the contact between the two.
“I believe I promised to carry you,” Adam whispered back, equally as breathless. He knelt to the ground and picked up the blanket that had fallen, and he placed it right back on Lance’s shoulders before he bent down again to pick the other up. The blue-eyed boy’s arms curled comfortably around Adam’s neck, and his head was tucked against his chest. The blanket dragged on the floor, and he silently hoped that Adam didn’t trip over it and send them both flying.
Luckily, they made it to the bedroom without falling and dying. Adam laid Lance gingerly out on the bed and wrapped him in even more blankets, knowing that the other got cold when he slept despite being a literal furnace to sleep next to.
“Your flight is at eight right?” Adam asked as he laid down next to him and stared into blue eyes that stared right back. Lance nodded, his eyes squeezing shut as he yawned.
“8:15, flight 684. Be there at least two hours ahead of your flight time for international." He said. It sounded like he was reciting them mechanically.
Adam nodded and set his alarm clock to 5:30 then thought about how long it usually takes Lance to get out of bed and ready and changed it to 5:00. “I’ll wake you up and see you off then.”
Lance let his face relax as he felt sleep overtake his consciousness. “Thank you, babe.”
Even though Adam knew the other was already asleep, he heard himself whisper back. “You’re welcome, beautiful." He brushed Lance’s bangs away from his face and pressed a kiss to the other’s forehead before letting himself follow suit.
---
The next morning, the blaring alarm woke Adam immediately. Lance’s arms and legs were tangled between his own. His body was practically radiating heat, leaving Adam uncomfortably sweaty. With Lance’s arms wrapped around him like a leech, he couldn’t reach the alarm to turn it off, and Lance was giving no sign of waking any time soon.
“Lance." He shook the other’s shoulder, but Lance didn’t move in the slightest. He was breathing deeply as he curled more tightly around Adam. “Lance." He tried again, only to get a similar response. “Lance, get up.”
Finally, Lance opened his eyes blearily. “Don’ wanna.”
“I’m sweaty, and you’re clinging to me. That means that you have probably spent all night cuddling something that is very sweaty. Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I think-” Lance was up before Adam could finish.
“Oh my god, I do feel really sweaty." Lance shivered after the loss of warmth from the pile of blankets that he had been under. “This is awful." He stepped into the bathroom to start the water heating up. “Is it alright if I shower first?”
Adam nodded, but he realized that Lance couldn’t see him. “Yeah, go ahead. You’ve got a long flight ahead of you.”
“Awesome." His voice called back. “Can you turn that alarm off?”
Adam chuckled as he reached over to do so.
---
They barely made it to the airport with an hour and a half advance. At least there was no one there at 6:45 in the morning, so all the lines were short.
Every line was short, including the TSA checkpoint.
“This is as far as I can go, beautiful,” Adam said as he handed Lance’s suitcase over and pulled the younger man into a hug. “You have a safe flight and a safe ride back to your house from the airport... And a safe entire trip back now that I think about it.”
Lance chuckled and squeezed Adam’s chest tighter. “You know I will, babe. I really gotta get through this line though, and I want to make sure I have enough time to relax before my flight.”
“You’ll have plenty of time to relax on the flight,” Adam reassured, but he pulled back anyway.
Both of them held unshed tears in their eyes. “I’ll text you when I land in Cuba, unless of course my phone dies, which it might because I can’t remember where I packed my charger.”
Adam nodded and smiled. He pressed a chaste kiss to Lance’s soft lips. “I’ll see you in a month and a half.”
“Five weeks, three days." Lance clarified and kissed Adam once more. “I love you, babe.”
“I love you, too.”
Adam stayed to watch Lance make his way through security and right before he was going to turn the corner into the terminals, he shouted out. “I LOVE YOU!!!” at the top of his lungs.
People glared at him for being so loud so early in the morning, but it was worth it to see Lance jump, turn around, and yell back. “I LOVE YOU TOO!!!”
---
Adam hummed as he cleaned the counter. The food coloring in the frosting had indeed stained the white tile. Lance’s decapitated cookie was still on the counter; he had only taken a bite out of it last night; he smiled fondly at the memory. He was silently cursing Lance and his beautiful smile as he reached for the bleach when something caught his eye. He had left the TV on after watching the morning news, but he had muted it afterward.
On the screen, clear as day, was a picture of a crashed plane. Adam felt his heart lodged in his throat. He didn’t have subtitles on, but the banner that was scrolling across the bottom of the screen read two fleeting words: “NO SURVIVORS.”
He rushed to find the TV remote, turning the volume up as soon as he did. A woman’s voice spoke over the video of firetrucks spraying water on the flaming wreckage. “Flight 684 crashlanded due to pilot error this morning at 9:03, a little under an hour after take off. The flight was on its way to the Santa Maria Airport located just west of Varadero, Cuba with 158 passengers on board." Adam wracked his brain, trying to remember the flight that Lance was supposed to be on. He was going to the Santa Maria Airport.
He desperately opened his phone, having to tap away from the picture of the cookie Lance had made for him as he searched for the text conversation that they had had.
Me: Hey, babbe
Me: Babe*
Me: What’s your flight number so I can track your plane?
Lance <3: Why do you need to track my plane? Don’t you trust me, lol?
Lance <3: 684.
Adam saw the tears on his phone screen before he realized he was crying.
“... it is unlikely that any of the 158 passengers survived.”