Gift giving

[A belated gift for you all: A KimKy Christmas short story cuz everyone deserves a little cheese every now and then 😊]

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I wasn’t raised with the spirit of Christmas. All that I've ever related it to are overly crowded stores, annoying Christmas pop songs on the radio and everyone trying to sell you something. None of it struck a chord with me growing up and it definitely doesn’t now.. but I know what it’s supposed to be about. Joy and togetherness with friends and loved ones, right? Did I know how to do that? Absolutely not, that’s why Scotty and I were standing in the back area of Spencers looking for Kimrick a sex toy as a Christmas present.

‘What about a sling?’ Scotty asked me as we snooped around past all of the lingerie and blowup dolls.

‘He’s not the kinky type..’ I sighed, putting back the cock ring I was holding.

‘Well that limits things.. Vibrators?’ He asked.

‘No, I got him one of those a while back and we barely use it.’

‘Here, this lovely Black Beauty.’ He held up an oversized jet black dildo.

‘Nah, he’s bigger than that.’

‘He’s bigger than this?! The fuck are we doing here then? Nothin' in here could compete with that.’ He laughed.

‘Uugh I don’t know what else to get him! I don’t have enough money for anything cool or expensive like watches or nice clothes and I’m resorting to fuck toys!’ I groaned out my realization, perhaps a bit too loudly.

‘Didn’t he tell you what he wanted?’ Scotty asked.

‘Yeah, fuckin’ work gloves. Which Dylan already got him. All the cowboy shit is covered by the cowboys which leaves me with nothing. So my only idea was something dirty since the other guys clearly don’t share that side of him.' I angrily set down the butt plug I had picked up.

‘Well what’d you get him last year?’

‘A Dirty Dice game.’

‘Oh.’

‘This fucking sucks. Or I just suck at it, I can’t decide.’ I ran my fingers through my hair in frustration.

Scotty laughed and handed me a plastic package containing two sets of anal beads. ‘Calm down, dude, you said it yourself, this is something only you two share so why not just accept it? Don’t look at it like it’s a dirty gag gift, look at it like it’s.. romantic? Like something intimate. I dunno, just get the beads and some lube and that night you’ll both be plenty happy.’

I groaned even louder and more dramatic than before, snatched the package out of his hands and headed to the register.

––

With black shopping bag in tow, we left the store and headed to the food court to grab some lunch. There were people packed into every store. Jewelry, books, clothing, electronics, toys.. Such a materialistic holiday. As if to say “the more money you spend the more I’ll love you”.

‘Do you two have any plans on Christmas?’ Scotty asked, breaking me out of my defeatist mindset.

‘Not really. The big ranch party is on Christmas Eve then all the guys go home to their families so it’ll just be me and Kim that day. I don’t mind, I just don’t know if we should be doing anything special.’

‘He grew up with traditional Christmases though, right?’ Scotty asked as we joined a line to get some food court Chinese food. To our left we could see a much longer line consisting of mothers and their children queuing up to take pictures with the mall Santa. Such a weird tradition. We watched the people wait in line as we ourselves waited in our own line.

‘Oh yeah, he had it all. Christmas trees, Christmas lights, caroling, leaving cookies out for Santa, stockings and presents, you name it.’

A child started to cry the second she was placed on the Santa’s lap. I looked on as they began the tedious task of getting her to smile.

‘He’s told me so many stories of him and his sister waiting up thinking they would see Santa. But their mom was smarter than them and knew they were up the whole time..’ I laughed under my breath. ‘And then him waking up to his parents making coffee while he shook every present and guessed what was in it until they came in the room and let them open everything.’ I found myself smiling as I watched the next kid get placed on the Santa’s lap. He was a little blonde boy that could’ve easily been Kim 20 years ago. He smiled for the photo and got a high five from his mom.

‘He said one of his favorite traditions was staying up with his mom on Christmas Eve and making “reindeer food” to leave out on their front porch. It was always something dumb like oats and glitter but Christmas morning it was always gone, just like the Santa cookies..’ I smiled, thinking of Kim as a kid setting out cereal for make-believe animals.

‘Man, he must’ve had it good.’ Scotty smiled at me smiling. ‘You’re soundin’ all sappy telling these stories and they aren’t even yours.’

I snapped back to reality and my smile faded back to my default smirk. ‘Yeah, who knew he’d turn into such an asshole, right?’ I laughed.

––

That evening I got back to the house, stomped upstairs and threw the black bag onto my bed. Razor jumped at the sound, having been asleep near the window, bathing in the glow of the sunset.

‘Christmas has always been so fuckin’ meaningful to Kim and I got him a fuckin’ sex toy, what the fuck is wrong with me..’ I sat on the bed and rubbed my eyes with the palms of my hands.

This wasn’t what Christmas was about. Maybe to some people like me and Scotty but not to Kimrick. He thrived on tradition and the joy of the season, not sex. How could I compete with his picturesque Christmas nostalgia when I’m bringing fucking anal beads to the table. I clearly wasn’t doing this right. I’m not one to be sentimental but even this seemed kinda sleazy.

I sighed, deciding to give up, realizing Kim wasn’t expecting anything more or less of me. I moved to slide the shopping bag under the bed as a temporary hiding place when it hit an obstacle, forcing me to roll off the bed to fix shit.

––

Christmas morning, 7:30 am. The coffee maker was on and smelling up the house, a classic Christmas movie played softly on the TV in the background and the fireplace was newly lit and crackling. Kim and I were already up and sitting next to each other on the floor by the fire, chatting and passing our gifts to each other from under his Christmas tree. I wasted no time and almost instantly started shredding into mine.

‘So Wes basically fucked it all up and now Madison has concert tickets to a band she doesn’t even know.’ I laughed as I tore open the box sitting in my lap.

‘If that don’t sound like Wes, I swear.’ Kim echoed my laughter and looked on as I investigated my gift. Inside the box sat my favorite candy, a new beanie and a box of AirPods.

‘Holy shit, thank you!!’ I gasped, knowing AirPods cost a bit more than what I thought his budget would be.

‘Hey, I knew you wanted them.’ Kim smiled, seeing my excitement as I didn’t hesitate to start tearing open the box of wireless headphones.

I stopped when I heard him start to unwrap his gift. ‘I hope you like it.. It's not much..’

‘I’m sure it’s fine.’ He assured.

He lifted the lid of the box once the wrapping paper was out of the way and froze as he saw a single 8x10 picture frame.

In it was a photo of him, his mom and his sister on Christmas morning. He was maybe 6 or 7, building a racecar track with his mom, both smiling at the camera while his sister sat behind them inspecting her new volleyball equipment.

‘I found some photo albums under my bed, I hope it was okay to go through them.. Charlie helped me blow the picture up and frame it..’ I muttered nervously.

Kim stared at it silently. I had all but stopped breathing as I waited for a reaction.

He finally smiled and reached over to me, arms outstretched. I smiled back and obliged.

It was quiet as we stayed embraced in the hug, him seeming to still process what his gift was.

‘Thank you, Kylee. This means a lot.’ His voice was shaky as he then kissed me, soft at first but giving in a bit more, our tongues briefly touching before we pulled apart.

‘No prob, Merry Christmas.’ Was all I could think to reply.

I couldn’t stop smiling as we sat there by the fire for another hour, him sharing stories of what he got that Christmas in the photo I used and even more fond memories of Christmases growing up in the Kimrick household. The joy in his tone was unbelievably contagious. For the first time I thought I did it right and that this was what Christmas was all about.

Also I regifted the anal beads to Scotty. He loved them.

END