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Feeling the bed shake so violently, so early in the morning, had Patrick groaning and rolling over, glaring daggers at Jonathan through slit eyes. The elder grinned, placing a hand either side of Patrick’s head, leaning over him.
“Goooooooood morning.”
Patrick purposely turned his head away, only to glare more daggers at Jonathan upon seeing the clock. “The only reason it’s so good is because I haven’t murdered you yet for waking me up this early!”
“Oh come oooooon, it’s Christmas, Patrick. Wake up!”
“I’m going back to sleep.”
“Fine; guess I’ll just eat all your chocolates- oh hey, look at that you can sit up.”
“Why are you being such a dick?”
Patrick rubbed his face a little and yawned, moving to stretch.
“You normally wake up earlier than this for hockey practice, I don’t see why getting up at 7.42am is such a struggle.”
“Because it’s a day off and I don’t normally wake up until 10am. Or 1pm, depending on how tired I am.”
Patrick was glaring again, but the look of Jonathan in a little elf hat, with bright, childish delight in his eyes was too much for Patrick to take and he broke into a soft smile. “Alright, alright. I’m gonna go to the toilet. Go do... whatever. I’ll be through in about five minutes.”
“It takes you five minutes to piss?”
“It’s going to take me at least three minutes to get up out of my comfy nest.”
Jonathan laughed cheerily, disappearing from the room.
Patrick shuffled through to the living room and groaned, collapsing face first on the couch.
“I’m shocked you didn’t even glance at the Christmas Tree.”
“It’s a fucking tree that flashes with lights.”
“Yes, but just look at it.”
Patrick groaned so loudly, he was sure that it was the reason why the baby next door started crying. Slowly, he rolled over, only to shoot upright.
“How the hell are there so many presents?!”
“When you went to bed at the meagre hour of 9pm, Brent and some of the guys came over with a massive bag of presents from the whole team for you and me. Some of them got us joint presents; people like Seabs and Duns got us presents each. Also, my family sent presents and I think there were some in there from your family too. Which reminds me, your sister said she would come over and drop more presents off.”
“You better not have got me a present.”
“I sort of did.”
Patrick was glaring daggers again.
“Hey, okay, I know we said no presents but I saw this one and I had to get you it. I’ll give you it later.”
Patrick sighed and nodded, getting up to sit next to Jonathan by the tree, picking up a present. The label said it was for Patrick, from the Breadman and Patrick shook it.
“I bet this is Russian tea.”
Ripping the paper open, Patrick nodded.
“Russian tea...”
“Patrick, can we go for a walk?”
Patrick grumbled, reading over the back of a book one of his sisters had gotten him, grunting a little to show that Jonathan didn’t have his attention.
It took for Jonathan to stalk across the room and grab the book from his hand.
“Hey!”
“Hey, hi, Earth to Kaner. I wanna go for a walk.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s Christmas, it’s snowing and I want to go for a walk for you.”
Patrick could have rolled his eyes. But he didn’t, because it was noon, and it was Jonny asking. The blond man smiled weakly, getting up to start stuffing his unruly hair into his beanie. Jonny wrapped the man’s scarf around his neck – trust Sharpy to get Patrick a damn Dallas Stars scarf – before they left the apartment.
Snow twisted around them, and Patrick looked around with a soft smile. Jonathan took his hand, interlinking their fingers as they stumbled through the snow drifts. Silence fell between the two, a comfortable one, and Patrick shifted to rest his head on Jonny’s shoulder.
“I love you.”
Patrick didn’t reply. Just squeezed Jonathan’s hand in the special way he did, smiling weakly.
It took the blond man a while to realise just where Jonny was leading him, and he peered suspiciously up at his Captain.
“Are we headed to where we had our first date?”
“I thought some nostalgia would be nice. I miss those days. Hockey wasn’t on, it wasn’t the most important thing in our lives, and the press were leaving us alone...”
Patrick smiled softly, nodding. “It was easier back then. But hey, the world knows about us now, and they can’t do anything about it.” He squeezed Jonathan’s hand again, relishing at how quiet the forest seemed when they walked through it. The snow put a damper on everything, and Patrick remembered just how much he loved the silence of the woods, the nature.
God, I need to come back to nature.
The clearing where they had had their first date was suddenly right there in front of them, and Patrick grinned, breaking his hold on Jonathan’s hand as he ran into the snow, throwing himself into a pile. Snow fluttered down everywhere and Jonathan couldn’t help but laugh as he watched Patrick.
Patrick made a snow angel before making grabby hands at Jonathan, silently begging his boyfriend to help him up so he didn’t ruin his angel.
“Patrick, I really need to do something now before I lose my nerve.”
Patrick’s eyes widened at the words from Jonathan’s mouth, concern written on his face before he fell silent, crossing his arms.
“You know, when you first came to the Blackhawks, I thought you were an arrogant little shit. I thought we weren’t going to get on at all, and that you’d be traded shortly after getting into the team. But I was wrong and watching you with Sharpy made me realise just how serious you were about playing professional hockey. It made me realise that you weren’t just this obnoxious loud mouth from New York.”
Jonathan licked his lips quickly. “Then we started dating earlier this year, and honestly, it’s been the happiest 9 months of my life. That’s why I wanted to do this. I mean, Seabs was the one who actually had to talk me into it, well, doing this bit-”
Patrick’s lips pressed hard against Jonathan’s concern on his face. “Jonny, shut the hell up and get on with this.” But the smaller male was smiling, wide, and it was that shit-eating smile that said he knew what was going to go down in just a few short minutes.
Jonathan fumbled with the box in his pocket and shakily got down on one knee. The temperature of the clearing felt like it dropped, but, then again, that was probably just his nerves playing up.
He opened it, revealing the white gold ring. A ruby sat in the centre, surrounded by a ring of black onyx, and he couldn’t stop smiling at the shocked look on Patrick’s face.
“Patrick Timothy Kane II, I love you, and honestly, you’ve made me happier then when we won the Stanley Cup together. I love you more than hockey for Christ’s sake, and I was hoping that you would do me the honour of becoming Patrick Timothy Toews I.”
Patrick covered his face, tears welling up in his eyes as he nodded. Jonathan moved to gently slide the ring on the other’s finger, smiling softly as they leaned in for a kiss, not caring as the snow began falling around them.
“Merry Christmas, Kaner.”
“Merry Christmas, Tazer.”