Series: Merry Christmas Eve
Author: Emily L.
Email: lavennyfic@gmail.com
Category: Friendship/Romance
Rating: PG (some adult content)
Part: 1/1
Spoilers: None.
Disclaimer: None of these characters belong to me, they belong to Paramount. Don't sue me - I might cry.
Pairing: suggested LK/AS
Distribution: I'm keeping my fic on here for now. E-mail me if you have any requests.
Authors Notes: For the 2012 Holiday Fic Exchange
Setting: Milwaukee, season 5
Summary: The three couples prove their love, while the children stand the test of friendship.


It was a shockingly cold night in Milwaukee and Knapp street was covered in a solid sheet of ice. As Lenny skid-step-skidded across the sidewalk, he realized that the ice had solidified in a rippling pattern, as if a teeny tiny ocean was beneath his feet. If he pretended that he was surfing, it didn't seem so scary when he was about to fall flat on his face.

It didn't help that he was carrying an armful of Christmas presents in addition to his lunch pail. The miniature purple present was Laverne's (a sweater chain with a dangling gold 'L' charm), the medium pink present was Shirley's (a ball for Boo Boo Kitty to play with when she got bored), and the biggest green present on the bottom was for Squiggy (a brown colonial doll house for his moths to live in and a bag of pepperoni, which he assumed was a salami-growing kit.) Christmas was the one time of year when Lenny felt proud of himself - no matter what he got as presents, everyone always seemed grateful. And it was the one time of year when the girls wouldn't kick him out of their apartment.

As he began to climb the steps to the apartment building, he carefully re-stacked the three boxes so they wouldn't go toppling down behind him and slide into the middle of the street, only to get hit by a car. That happened several years before. It's a good thing Squiggy had asked for a stuffed iguana that year and not a real one. Lenny smiled at the thought - Squiggy realized how much Lenny loved Jeffery and gave it to him for his birthday the very next year. Of course, Squiggy told him he gave it to him because he didn't feel like spending money on a birthday present, but that was his special way of acting like he didn't care.

After much wobbling and tripping, Lenny made it up to his fourth floor apartment. He realized that Squiggy hadn't gotten home yet, so he gently placed each present underneath their pathetic little tree - if it could even be called that. It was a tall weed that Lenny had found while walking home from Moby Dominic's a few days earlier. He had balled up pieces of Scotch tape that he colored with marker and stuck them all over the small leaves. By now, it looked like it was on it's last limb, but he'd do anything to make their apartment look more like a home for the season. As he propped up the last present and gave the tree a friendly shake, Squiggy burst through the door.

"Boy, do I stink!" he shouted.

"Tough day at work?" Lenny asked with amusement in his voice.

"Tough don't even cover it! Shirley threw a bologna sandwich at me, Laverne spit milk through her big buck teeth right in my eye, you ran over my big toe with the beer truck-"

"Sorry about that..."
"-honest mistake, it ain't your fault it's as big as a speed bump. And to boot, Old Man Shotz said my hair worm is a 'disgrace to the entire country of Wisconsin'!"

"Boy, your day was almost as bad as the day I lost my lunch at dinner."

"I told ya you shoulda stopped bringin' your lunchbox to Al's! Potsy Webber's got somethin' for scrap metal!"

Lenny guffawed. "But hey, it's Christmas Eve! We got two days off and presents to open!"

"Yeah! I can't wait to see what we get from Missus Babish. Maybe she'll give us back that green blob we left on her doorstep!"

"I don't think so, Squig. I think she shot it with Mister DeFazio's bb gun and flushed it."

Squiggy pouted and threw his body into the three-legged kitchen chair. "That was the best slime Lake Michigan had to offer!"

"Hey," Lenny said. "Forget the blob. Here, open your present early. Maybe it'll cheer ya up."

Squiggy's eyes got as big as saucers as he saw his reflection in the green cellophane. "For me? A shiny green box is what I always wanted! You can stand on it to reach the high shelves, you can chuck it out ya window at the nuns passing by..."

"Not the box, Squig! What's inside the box!"

Squiggy tore open into the box like a raccoon at a landfill. "It smells just like Schullneck's pond!" He ripped the box in half. "A make-your-own salami kit!" He shouted as he held up the bag of dripping pepperoni. "Just what I always wanted!"

Lenny smiled to himself. "I knew it! Every time I saw you look at the meat platters at the company parties and tried to sew all the pepperoni back together into one big log, I figured you'd want the At Home Edition." He paused as he watched Squiggy scramble to open the Ziplock bag of needle and thread. "Squig! Look at the big thing in the box!"

Squiggy's thought process struggled for a minute as he grabbed the doll house by the front windows and turned it around several times. "What's this, a fishin' boot?"

Lenny sighed. "No, dummy! It's a house for ya moths!"

Squiggy dropped the house and gasped. "A very own commune for the best of my friends and family to live in!" He jumped up and gave Lenny a hug. Lenny squeezed back before they separated and pretended like nothing happened.

"Ya like it?"

"It's the best thing what I ever got." He offered Lenny a lame hand to shake, though Lenny would have opted for second hug. "And hey-" he said, diving under the bottom bunk to grab a dusty box, "I got ya somethin' for Christmas, too!"

Lenny shyly took the box from his hand and slowly untied the red yarn, pushing back the toilet paper that had been used for wrapping. As he removed the last square of paper, he smiled. "A mayonnaise jar!"

"To store another clean shirt in. I know one doesn't seem to be enough these days..."

Lenny picked him up off the ground and squeezed him tight. "Thanks, Squig."

"Thanks, Len. Now let's go downstairs to the girls.... I got a bag o' spiders I think Shirl'll really enjoy!"

Again, Lenny laughed, this time rolling his eyes. "Merry Christmas Eve, Squig."

"Merry Christmuss Eve, Len."


THE END