Snowflakes & Sweethearts

[Sophie ♥]

Hey everyone!  Pudding and I wanted to put out a short holiday story, so here you go.  Once again, we have to thank @Selpharia for this one.  She gave us a great writing prompt of "very anime and very gay".   So welcome to our cute short-story about two girls who meet on their third annual school retreat after a long year apart!  This is a one-off, so don't expect more.  And I implore everyone to read Of Capes, Cowls, and Cuddles by Selpharia, because it's super elaborate and really cute!

PDF and ePub versions of Snowflakes & Sweethearts are already available on Patreon for supporters!

~~~~~

Snowflakes & Sweethearts
By: Sophie & Pudding

I sat up and looked around the quiet common-room, decorated with sleeping bags and sleeping girls.  A dim hue poured through the window, the lights outside reflecting off the falling snowflakes.  It was dark and late.  If you listened hard enough, the only thing you would hear was the harsh, icy breeze against the side of the lodge.  I slipped out of my bed roll and shivered as my feet touched the cold floor.  I pulled my bag over my shoulder and left as quietly as I could.

"I was wondering when you'd come." I puffed out my cheeks and had flecks of snow on the little bear beanie I wore. I hugged Harumi tightly to steal some of her warmth. and wondered where the year had gone, the time that passed since last we met. This was our third year… the third time we'd met here in the mountains for our school vacation. Always like this; a few fleeting days. My school booked with the resort across the other side of the hill, so meeting meant fifteen minutes of trekking through whatever snow whipped through the air. But Harumi was worth it.

Kanako and I met two years ago, on nearly this exact same day at nearly this exact same place.  Back then, it wasn't snowing.  What snow there was on the ground had been shoveled and it was easy for her to walk over to my lodge.  Last year, she wasn't so lucky.  This year, it was worse.  I brushed the snow off her shoulders, off her hat, and hugged her as tightly as I could, dressed in my long-sleeved button down pajamas. "I missed you so much..."

"I missed you, too." I melted in her arms the way the flecks of snow on my fleece jacket melted and put my cheek to hers.  We only saw each other once a year, and until one of us could afford otherwise, that would be all it could ever be.

"Come on, the tree's set up in the other room!" I took her mittened hand and pulled her through the foyer, dragging snow in with her.  And sure enough, in the front lobby, between an abandoned check in desk and a three-story wall of windows, was a giant pine tree decorated in baubles, ornaments, rainbow lights, silver garland, and a bright glowing star.  Underneath it, huge gifts were wrapped and tagged for donation.  The day before Christmas - next week - they would get sent out to needing families.

I fished into my pocket as she let me go in front of the tree.  I pulled out the small package, wrapped neatly and elegantly in pink cloth with blue Christmas trees stenciled in the fabric, and held it out with both hands. "Merry Christmas, Harumi..." We'd never gotten each other gifts before, but I wanted to. I remembered her telling me last year how much she'd wanted the soother, and all year I'd remembered it, reminded myself of it, and saved my spare money for it.

I looked down at the small box in her hands, then up in her eyes.  I... I didn't know what to say.  We didn't really do the gift thing last year.  And I knew this was our last year together, but I hadn't expected... took the box out of her hands and held it in my own, like it was the most precious thing anyone had given me.  And I hadn't even opened it yet. "You gotta open it," she laughed, stripping herself of her coat and mittens. "R-right, yeah." I pulled on the string and unwrapped the fabric, taking out the little paper box.  There were no markings on it.  So I lifted off the top and looked in.  Immediately, I slammed the lid back on top and held it to my chest, looking around the room, at the administration desk, up at the balcony overhead, for anyone that might be watching.  My face turned scarlet.

Her reactions were so cute, her modesty, her shyness - she was the cutest girl I might ever have met, and I found her immediately charming. The same way I had in the first place when I first met her, when she'd tried to tell me that she didn't need help, despite the fact I'd found her outside under a tree in weather cold enough for snow. "Nobody else is awake, nobody but us."

I pouted and looked down at the box again.  Nobody is awake, I repeated.  So I lifted the lid off again and held up the pacifier.  It was pink and white, with hearts on the button, and a tiny white handle.  No different than a million other pacifiers, if it weren't for the size.  Maybe it was a trick of the Christmas lights shining colors down on us, but it definitely looked... bigger.  Appropriate, almost.  Wow... "Thank you, Kanako, so much..." I hadn't mentioned wanting one in months, but she remembered.  I tucked it into the bag on my shoulder and pulled out a box, wrapped in gold and silver paper, holding it out with both my hands. "I got you something too."

We'd never discussed it, never agreed to getting gifts, that we'd both come to the same conclusion was... well, it felt like magic, the sort of sparkling, tingling magic, that only happened at Christmas. I gently pried the tape from the paper with the tip of my nail and let the package open like a flower, a little box just a tad bit smaller the one I'd given her, and inside was a little velvet box.  Inside, I was presented with a half heart necklace on chain. And as she swayed left and right and bit her lip, I saw the glimmer of the matching half around her neck. "Beautiful... you're beautiful, it's beautiful..."

I took the box out of her hand and set my bag down on the floor next to her coat.  She took off her hat and lifted her hair so I could wrap the chain around her neck and clip the half-heart into place.  It sat perfectly, dipping low enough that it would hesitate on her shirt when she leaned forward.  And before I knew any better, I leaned in and kissed Kanako on the lips.  Last year, we'd kissed a bit.  This year, I wasn't wasting time.

We kissed and it was tender and lovely and I adored the way we did. I adored the way our lips touched, her soft freckles shining like my own private field of stars. Harumi was a beautiful girl, taunted all her life for her half-Irish bloodline from her father that left her skin pale and doll-like and peppered with freckles, but her hair dark black from her Mom’s Japanese heritage. I thought she looked ethereal.  "I missed you.."

We sat on the couch together, in front of the light of the Christmas tree, with the howling winds on the other side of the glass.  We imprisoned in each other's eyes, lost in each other's lips, and incapable of keeping our hands to ourselves.  First her cheeks, and her neck.  She started with my hips and my sides.  The front of her chest.  Under my shirt.  Then I was on top of her, with my knee between her legs.

We'd never come this far, but we were adults now, and might never see each other again after we graduated.  Neither of us wanted to wait and risk what might come for the sake of patience. One year, Harumi had mentioned having a boyfriend - I didn't know if that were true or not, but I'd had my share of admirers, too. It didn't make this moment any less ours. "You're beautiful..." I whispered, and smirked up at her with her knee between my thighs.

A sharp thud, dull and quiet, broke the silence of the room.  I toppled straight off Kanako and landed on the hard floor in front of the tree, echoing the sound.  I fumbled as close to the sofa as I could and held my breath.  Quietly, through the whistling of the wind, I heard footsteps.  I heard a door creak.  And then... nothing.  I peeked up at Kanako and then the balcony.  Nobody was there.  Finally, I sighed. "That was scary..."

"I wonder what that was... maybe it was Santa Claus." I knew she was looking at me strangely, but for a girl with a soother in her bag I didn't see her having much of a leg to stand on when it came to questioning my adultly nature.

She gave me a sly smile and I knew what she was thinking.  I stuck out my tongue. "Don't even say it!" I climbed up onto the sofa and reached for my bag.  The pacifier was still there.  I thought maybe I’d dreamt it up, that it was too good to be true.  I slipped it between my lips and sucked softly on the nipple.  I wasn't always so accepting of stuff like this: baby stuff.  When I first met Kanako, I hated it!  I remembered sitting outside in the cold, wrapped up in my winter coat and wet pants, trying not to cry.

"I won't say anything, my little Rumi-chan..." I giggled and this time I was the one on top of her, pushing her down into the cushions and running fingers thru her hair. When I stared into her eyes, I did what felt natural and normal: I leaned in to kiss her... on the guard of her soother.

Ten minutes, or an hour.  I wasn't sure.  She whispered words in my ears, words I'd read in text a thousand times.  Words I'd heard on Skype.  Words I heard in my dreams.  But I'd never heard them in person.  She kissed the front of my pacifier.  She drew circles on my stomach.  She spun my hair.  She and I were the whole world.  Finally, she tugged the pacifier out of my mouth and touched my lips.  Her hand was down the front of my pajama pants. "You didn't change yet?" she asked.  I blushed.

We only had such limited time together, and I found myself wondering just what it was she was thinking to have forgotten something so simple. I put the soother back in her lips and tilted my head, grinning. "I guess that means you're going to risk it tonight, huh, Rumi-chan?"

I puffed out my cheeks in frustration.  Two years ago was the last time I risked it.  Our school took a weekend trip to the ski resort and I was too humiliated to bring any diapers.  Through sheer force of will, I thought I could overcome my stupid bedwetting for two dumb nights!  But I didn't.  I woke up in the middle of the night, ashamed and humiliated.  Everyone would know.  Everyone would tease me for the next three years. "No," I mumbled around the pacifier and patted the bag next to me.  I hadn't gotten a chance to change yet.  Everyone took so long to fall asleep! "I'm not stupid."

Not stupid at all, in-fact - Harumi was one of the top performers at her school; she was in a half dozen after-school clubs and always got her homework in on time. She was the antithesis of me, the academic standout, and only our relative meagerness when it came to family income status drew commonality. And the fact we wanted to be with each other. There was that too. "Then let's take care of it, Rumi..." I put my hand on her back, entirely ready to do this for her for the first time.

I pulled the pacifier out of my mouth. "Oh, no no no!  It's alright!  I mean--" She pushed it back in and touched her finger to her lips. "Shhh." And I realized immediately what she meant.  I was being loud.  We were both silent for a moment, until we were sure no one had heard my protests.  I looked up at her with burning red cheeks and talked around the pacifier in a whisper. "I can do it, Kana..."

"Oh no no, you're far too small to deal with that on your own, my pretty imōto~" In the time it took for her blush to conquer her cheeks, I'd unbuckled her bag simply and confidently. I'd never done this before, not with her, but I spent the last year doing both babysitting and volunteering in nursing homes, so I had a pretty good idea now!

At any moment, I expected someone to come down the stairs.  I thought someone would look down over the balcony and see a stranger changing a third-year's diaper on the sofa below.  I thought the smell of baby powder or the sound of the snaps would attract attention.  But all my fears were for naught.  I didn't wear the same diapers on this trip as I did back home - I wore my cloth snap-together ones with the ribbon around the waist.  I didn't want anyone to hear me crinkle. "First time you're seeing me naked and it's like this," I mumbled through the soother.  It was hard to tell if that fact irritated or appeased me.

"First time implies there'll be many more times." I teased her, smiling to myself - this was so much easier than the plastic ones! I positioned her easily, I dug out the powder from the top of her bag and I used far too much, and then I pulled the garment up between her legs and fastened the snaps that rested on her softly defined hips. She was so pretty... "Do you have a cover to wear over this, so you don't leak?" I asked, matter-of-factly, a question that probably caught her off guard at my knowledge. But my hand was rubbing her crotch when I asked, so I think she didn't have much room for protest.

I sat up with a blush and shook my head, working to steady my breath. "Um... n-no.  It's... it's a discrete one.  There's a layer of plastic built in.  As long as I don't sleep too long, I dun leak." The babyish lisp was an accident.  I was slipping.  Two years ago, I didn't know these feelings could exist, and now, because of Kana, I craved them.  Feeling "little", as she put it.  Diapers and pacifiers and her...

"Then you have no more grown-up worries to fret over, do you?" I pushed her back down, my lips on hers and then atop her soother as I guided it back in.  My other hand pressed against the thickness of her padding. Discrete, she'd said. And maybe in sound that was true, but this was thicker than I could have imagined, and she couldn't squeeze my hand away if she tried.

She pushed and rubbed the front of my diaper, and I had to suck harder on the pacifier to keep myself quiet.  Her words built stories in my head like sandcastles, and just as quickly as they came up, she would tear them down and start again.  I curled into her chest, quivering and whimpering.  I muttered her name through the pacifier guard, over and over, until we were both quiet and immobile on the sofa.  This moment... I wanted it to last forever.

I didn't expect our first time beyond kissing to be like this, I didn't and couldn't have guessed. But... I think a part of me might have known, even from the beginning, that this was so a part of her. And as far as Harumi was comfortable going with another person, she’d gone there with me.  I felt... warm, in that knowledge.

I almost fell asleep.  If I had fallen asleep, it would have been very, very bad.  I was dressed in nothing but a diaper and my pajama top lying on another girl in the lobby.  But I didn't fall asleep.  I heard the faint sounds on the stairs.  Steps?  Shuffling?  I listened closely, to be sure, and when I was, I tapped Kanako's shoulder to get her attention.  Someone was coming.  We had to hide!

I hadn't heard it as first, but my auditory memory kicked in.  Quick like two little bunnies, I took her by the hand and led Rumi to the space behind the administrative desk, shushing her with my finger to her soother’s guard and holding my breath to try and hear what was happening.  Was someone there?

I held my bag and my pajama pants tight in my arms.  Kana had to double back for her coat and hat.  We had just managed to hide behind the check-in desk when the woman rounded the corner.  I peeked over the counter, betting on the darkness to keep me hidden.  Mrs. Yoshida stood in the center of the room, looking up at the Christmas Tree.  Was she looking for me?  Had she noticed I wasn't in my bed roll?  But she didn't look like she was in a hurry.  She turned around to walk out, but stepped on something.  She reached down and picked it up: a glove.  One of Kanako's gloves.  Oh no...

"Oh shoot..." I whispered, wincing to myself - my glove. My glove in school colors that were not the same as Rumi's... oh no, the teacher going to think a boy had snuck in or something! If only she knew how wrong she was... I giggled quietly and covered my mouth, trying to stay composed. It'll be okay, it'll be okay...

She turned the glove over in her hands and looked down at her palms.  Then, she put them to her mouth and blew hot air on them.  And speaking as a girl without pants, it was rather nippy in the lobby.  I watched quietly as my teacher went over to the other wall and switched on the electric fireplace, then turned around and looked right at me.  I ducked down behind the counter and sucked on the pacifier to keep myself from hyperventilating.  She saw me.  She saw me!  No, it was too dark.  No, she would have called out.  Right?

We waited, both with baited breath, for the next moves the teacher would make. And then her footsteps began, and got closer, and closer, and I kissed Harumi on the soother.  I got ready to stand up, to take the attention, to save my forbidden friend... but then there was clattering on the floor above us.  Girls horsing around.  And the approaching footsteps faded away into the distance.  Saved at the last moment...

I exhaled, pulling the pacifier from my lips, and putting my forehead against Kana's. "That was scary," I whispered for the second time that night.  Kanako and I waited behind the counter until the footsteps stopped, until all was silent again, and then we waited a little more.  Finally, I pulled my pajama pants on over the diaper and walked out toward the Christmas tree with Kana's hand in mine.  But the fireplace on the other side of the room... it looked so warm and comfortable.

"Come on..." I put both my hands on hers and tugged her over to the fireplace, over to the large plush rug on the floor right in front of it. The snow had picked up outside, whipped up in the wind, and the fire crackled like an instrument trying to play along and keep up, and I felt so serene that we were here... together.

It was our last year, and thusly, our last school ski trip.  Next year, if we wanted to come up here, we'd have to do it ourselves.  We were adults now, after all.  And soon, we'd be graduates.  We were applying to the same colleges together and the same dorm suites.  We even had our first non-ski-trip meet-up planned for the summer!  Our lives were intertwined now, Kanako's and mine.  I leaned over and put my head on her shoulder, staring into the crackling fireplace.  We were thinking the same thing.  We didn't even have to say it.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

I was shivering in my coat with my knees pulled up to my chest.  Tears streamed down my cheeks.  My pajama pants and underwear were soaking wet, and I hadn't even sat in the snow.  The paths were shoveled and the sky was full of stars.  The only sound was my whimpering and heaving as I tried to make myself stop crying.  Then there was the sound of footsteps close by.  I looked up at the girl in the bear beanie.  I'd never seen her before. "Do you need any help?" she asked.  I shook my head, shooing her away with my hands.  I didn't want her help.

“Well, okay.  Choice is the only thing given freely in this world.  That’s what my mom says.” But I pulled down the zipper on my oversized parka, a puffy pink coat as warm as could be that I had gotten for this very trip, and I pulled my arms free to drape it over her shoulders. "I like your freckles, they're like little stars."

...what a weird girl, I thought.  That was my first opinion of Kanako.  She was a very weird girl. "What are you doing out anyway?" I asked, wiping the water from my eyes.  Maybe if I had a reason to stop crying - like if somebody else was talking to me - I'd stop altogether. "I like to walk at night," she said honestly.  Weird indeed. "And what are you doing?" she asked.  I looked away.

"Maybe you just like to come outside and cry?” I’d noticed how wet her pants were when I put the jacket over her shoulders, but it would have been rude to say anything directly. Instead, I offered her, "Sitting in the wet and icy snow you're gonna catch a cold, I have some spare pajama pants if you want them...? Our lodge is just past the hill, and that way you won't be cold."

I didn't know then.  I thought maybe fate had dropped Kanako into my lap.  I thought that her lending me a spare blanket and some pajama pants was some serendipitous miracle.  Six months later she told me the truth.  She knew all along, she just didn't care.  But I cared.  I cared a lot!  And then she started to realize, before I did, that I cared too much.  It wasn't that I hated diapers, but rather, I hated that I didn't.  She helped me up off the cold ground under the tree and together we walked back to her lodge.  Neither of us remembered to bring mittens.  To keep warm, we held hands.
 

 

[Wannatripbaby]

That was so adorable! I'm surprised there aren't a billion comments on it already. Ending it on a flashback was a little weird, but hey, I'm not the literary genius, so who am I to judge? This story was just amazing! I'm surprised you didn't enter it in the "best night ever" competition. Of course, if you two entered that contest nobody else would've stood a chance.

I know I've said this before, but I'll say it again: You & Pudding are just the best. Although Selpharia does come close (I didn't forget about you, Selphie!)

[Sophie ♥]

o_o I didn't know there was a contest going on.. they should probably advertise that better.   Also we ended on the flashback because we sort of eluded to them meeting throughout the whole story and we wanted to show that scene outright.   

[ChloeNova]

That was absolutely wonderful. It was so freaking cute!!! I want more. Make it into a whole sort! Like... a college epilogue or something! <3

[Wannatripbaby]

11 minutes ago, ChloeNova said:

That was absolutely wonderful. It was so freaking cute!!! I want more. Make it into a whole sort! Like... a college epilogue or something! <3

I'm sorry, ChloeNova, but not every good thing is meant to last. I'd rather see a short story end happily than for it to "jump the shark" so to speak.

[Sophie ♥]

Oh yeah.  Right.  Yeah.  Totally!  Haha.. *shoves the shark back into my room* not now Bruce, shh, be quiet!!

[Wannatripbaby]

3 minutes ago, Sophie ♥ said:

Oh yeah.  Right.  Yeah.  Totally!  Haha.. *shoves the shark back into my room* not now Bruce, shh, be quiet!!

No wait! If you actually have plans to continue this then please do so! "Jumping the Shark" (a term coined by the sitcom "Happy Days") is when a show (or story) keeps going on long after the writers have run out of good ideas, but they keep churning out episodes (or chapters) because it's popular and/or lucrative. But I trust that you & Pudding wouldn't do that. You're to good to resort to such cheep tactics.

[Sophie ♥]

XD I get the reference.  And no, we don't have further plans for this one.  We've got something in mind for after Nightmare Asylum.  This was just a cute holiday gift for our readers!

[CDfm]

I loved it and the ending actually being the beginning was perfect in my opinion. The only problem I have with it is that I want so much more of it. 

[YourFNF]

This was so sweet how did I miss this?

@Sophie ♥