Isabella watched her footing as she ventured into the dimly lit gymnasium, cautiously dancing over bits of broken glass and charred confetti butterflies.
Phineas sat in the epicenter of the calamity, the eye in a hurricane of an invention gone haywire, a few limp flowers clutched in his hands.
“Phineas?” she whispered.
He glanced up as she approached, heart catching in his throat because oh.
“….your hair.”
“My hair?”
Isabella’s hands rose to gingerly cup the curls framing her face.
“It looks different, huh?”
“It looks beautiful,” Phineas uttered.
Isabella’s eyes widened, face flushing pink at the unexpected compliment.
“You’re beautiful,” Phineas continued, “you’re so beautiful and I’m so……”
He gestured around himself.
“….so…..busted.”
It had been foolish. To agree to set up for the school dance last minute when their class sponsor caught a cold bad enough that even a teacher couldn’t be expected to suck it up and push through it. To insist on working totally alone so Ferb and the rest of their friends could go to dinner with their dates (or “stag” as Buford and Baljeet put it, they “totally weren’t going together-together” but Phineas didn’t buy that) before arriving. To completely change the theme in an attempt to impress a certain neighbor of his.
He’d thought that maybe. Just maybe. He’d create the perfect dance for her: a butterfly garden, complete with flowers and twinkling rainbow lights and red velvet desserts as far as the eye could see. And then Isabella would arrive and understand, innately, that he’d done it all for her and she’d feel so special and so seen and maybe possibly start seeing him in a more-than-platonic light!!! And then……
And then nothing.
Because Phineas could’ve quit while he was ahead. The gym had been gorgeous, perfectly beautiful but perfectly ordinary. He’d HAD to try and reverse engineer the birthday surprise he built Isabella years ago, to figure out how it summoned butterflies. But instead of butterflies, something went very wrong with the laser light show.
And this was the result.
A battered gymnasium. Broken DJ equipment. Splintered fairy lights. Inedible desserts.
There would be no dance. No chance to sweep Isabella off her feet. No jovial evening shared with friends.
They’d all be so disappointed in him. And he’d likely be in a heap of trouble (though, was the school not partially to blame for this, since he’d been working unsupervised?)
“You’re here early,” Phineas mused as Isabella knelt beside him. “Dance isn’t supposed to start for another hour and a half.”
Emphasis on “supposed” to. Phineas doubted anyone could dance over broken glass.
“Ferb told me you were here all by yourself.”
Maybe Isabella had given up on Phineas liking her romantically, but she hadn’t been able to bear the thought of him setting up an entire dance all alone. She knew firsthand how arduous this sort of thing was, what with all her extra-curriculars, and she loved helping others, especially Phineas, so…
“I came to see if you needed help. Like old times, you know? …and that offer still stands.”
Her words made Phineas’s chest ache with longing because of course she came to help him. Of course she was here, knelt beside him on the dirty floor, sparkling mauve dress and golden wedges and glittering eyeshadow and all.
How did he get so lucky to have a friend like her?
Isabella took a moment to survey the damage.
“I bet we could get this cleaned up in an hour. If we hustle!! We’ve accomplished harder things in an hour. I’ll sweep up the glass, and you can repair the sound booth, and then we’ll tackle the food. But….”
She’d been expecting to enter the gym and be awash with gaudy Eiffel Towers and stacks of Parisian pastries and curly cues and garish pink lights.
“I’m a bit confused, wasn’t the theme supposed to be ‘A Night in Paris’? I saw the decorations Ms. Chesterfield prepared, but everything in here looks like it was brand new.”
“Well, I overheard you say you hated the theme to Holly…..” Phineas replied sheepishly. “I just wanted you to have a nice time.”
Isabella froze, heart catching in her chest as the full implications of Phineas’s words dawned on her.
“….you did this…for me?”
“I mean of course it was for our friends and classmates too! A Night in Paris is a pretty generic theme—no offense to Ms. Chesterfield of course she was working with what she had on a limited budget!!—but. Uh. Well. I guess if it wasn’t for you I….wouldn’t have minded the Paris stuff so much. That was a fun day, when we went to Paris.”
He hung his head and mumbled, “And I should’ve just stuck with Paris, this is what I get for rushing and not thinking clearly.”
“So,” Isabella said, long dormant butterflies slowly stirring in her stomach, “…you did all this to impress me?”
“Well, yes and no? I just wanted you to feel special, I wanted to make you happy, and okay maybe a selfish little part of me hoped you’d be impressed and realize that I—uh….that I…….ugh…….”
Now this truly was a calamity.
“….Phineas…”
Isabella gazed at the boy who’d captured her heart so long ago, daring to consider a possibility that, actually, didn’t seem all that far fetched if she really thought about the last few years.
(I mean he’d showed up to all of her soccer games with a different personalized jersey with her number on it. And organized a massive bake sale to help the debate team when they lost funding. And the first thing he did upon seeing her tonight was call her beautiful. She almost felt silly for not putting it together sooner.)
“Do you….like me? Is that what this is about?”
Phineas felt his entire body flinch, nervous system on red alert, anxiety spiking and sending his heart rate skyrocketing.
This was not happening this could not be happening this could not be how Isabella realized his feelings for her.
“Because, you know….”
Isabella slid her hand across the scratched tile until it met his, gingerly resting her fingers atop his knuckles.
“I never needed big inventions to be impressed by you. Well. Except for that one time, with the pogo stick? To be fair, i was mostly just confused that day rather than needing to be impressed, a plain pogo stick just didn’t seem like you at all. But WOW I should’ve trusted you, that was an awesome day!!!!!!!!!”
She gently touched his shoulder, and Phineas slowly lifted his head to meet her gaze.
“I love your inventions, Phineas. I love them because they’re yours. I think you’re a genius, but what really impresses me is how you use all that knowledge to make others happy.”
She lifted her hand to his face, running her thumb over the freckles dotting his cheek.
“And you really are handsome, you know.”
Phineas could barely breathe, between Isabella’s compliments and close proximity and her hand was so soft and she was still holding his face oh God.
“….Isabella?” he managed to squeak
“Do….do you….like me?”
Isabella just smiled, sliding her hand to grasp the back of Phineas’s head as she leaned in close.
Close enough to count his freckles.
Close enough to meet his nose with her own.
Close enough to…
To…
They stayed suspended for a moment, taut between friendship and something new and far more fragile.
But when Phineas reached out to cup Isabella’s face, reverently brushing a few curls behind her ear, well.
That was all the confirmation she needed.
Phineas had more or less figured out where this was headed and yet, when Isabella kissed him, he couldn’t help but gasp, which made her laugh, which made him laugh.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!!” he giggled, shifting closer to her. “Can we try that again?”
Isabella gave him a playful smirk as she wrapped her arms around his neck and wove her fingers through his hair.
“Phineas, I thought you’d never ask.”
….
And then they cleaned up the gym and the dance was fine and all their friends had fun, hooray!!!!!
Thank you for the request!!!! I will be posting this on ao3 as well and will link to it here😁
Not me being one of the last ones to post my Secret Santa gift lol - life has been crazy.
This is for @authenticcadence18, who I know asked for something with Canderemy. I hope you enjoy the fluff!
(Set in the future, post Candace graduating law school and marrying Jeremy, and because it's me, she works for OWCA lol)
Under a cut for length. You can also read it in The One Shot-inator!
~~
“Why are holiday cards even still a thing?” Candace groaned, leaning back in the dining room chair until her spine audibly cracked. She gave a sigh of relief and then scowled at the pile of cards scattered across hers and Jeremy’s kitchen table. “And why do we know so many people?”
Jeremy chuckled from his seat across from her, finishing the address up on the one he was working on. “Is that rhetorical or serious?”
She grumbled, sitting back up and snatching the next one from the stack. “Rhetorical,” she said with a sigh, eyeing the name scrawled on top in Jeremy’s fancy cursive. Bobby. “I know, I know, maintaining physical media and connections is important. But seriously, why aren’t we just addressing one card to all of Love Handel? It’s not like they don’t all live together.”
“That’s insensitive,” Jeremy tisked.
She shook her head fondly and went back to signing the card.
In all seriousness, Candace wasn’t mad about the holiday cards. She was being maybe a little whiney and dramatic, but this was a tradition she never wanted to give up. Sitting with her husband a week before Christmas, listening to orchestral holiday music over their speakers, drinking spiked hot cocoa…it was worth it.
She’d always loved getting physical mail – it felt more personal than a text, especially on the holidays. Jeremy felt the same way and had introduced her to his family’s tradition of having a day set aside just for card making and present wrapping.
And especially with the boys in their second years of college, farther away than usual…sure, she was still going to see them for the holidays. Hell, she and Jeremy were actually hosting Christmas at their place for the very first time that year (which reminded her, she needed to get more gouda for the charcuterie board). But it was almost cathartic, getting to write them little messages in their cards about how much she appreciated and loved them.
Sometimes she missed their backyard shenanigans. Not that she’d ever admit that to anyone but Stacy.
She handed off Bobby’s card to Jeremy and pulled the next one off the stack, lips twitching a little at the swirled-out Perry. He had protested at the card every year since Jeremy had been looped into what her job with OWCA actually was, claiming that they could literally just text him, but Jeremy had been absolutely adamant. So every year, Candace found an increasingly more ridiculous card to give him, just to watch him roll his eyes and try to hide his fond little smile.
This year, it was a snowman dressed as a platypus, which according to Stacy was hysterical.
She started signing the card, giving careful thought to her words (equal parts snark and sap), all while her smile grew at the sound of Jeremy humming along to one of the songs on the radio.
It had taken her a while to get used to spending her holiday season with her husband instead of her parents and brothers. Three years ago, their first Christmas together in their home, she’d had a meltdown at the thought of missing time with her family. She’d been petrified Jeremy would be mad. Instead, he’d admitted much the same to her – that he also didn’t necessarily know how to do Christmas without his parents and sister. And then he’d reassured her that they’d figure it out together. The next year, their first Christmas as newlyweds, they’d stumbled a little bit then, too.
Now, they had it down to a science.
They only lived about twenty minutes or so from both their families, so Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were alternated between them year to year. It’d been easy, too easy, so of course Candace just had to offer their home for the holidays this year so that everyone could spend it under the same roof. Why she hated herself this way, she didn’t know.
She slid Perry’s card over to Jeremy and sighed, rubbing her temples. He glanced up from Bobby’s card and his wax sealing supplies, lifting an eyebrow. “Okay, hon?”
She dug her fingers into her skin just a little bit more, trying to dull the ache forming behind her eyes. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. I think my eyes are gonna fall out from staring at so many words.”
Jeremy chuckled, setting down Bobby’s letter and stretching his arms above his head. “We have been sitting here for almost an hour. We can take a break.”
“We still have thirty-six cards to fill out,” Candace pointed out, squinting at the menacing stack to her left. “Plus then we have to wrap all our presents, and I don’t even want to think about how full that living room is.”
He walked around the table making grabby hands at her, and for a second she just wanted to be dramatic, so she turned her squinting gaze on him. But she could never say no to his endearing puppy dog eyes, so she relented and took his hands, letting him drag her to her feet. “Come on, take a break,” he said, wrapping his arms at her waist and tugging her close. “We’ve got all day. Plus tomorrow, if we really need.”
“But it’s supposed to be done in one day,” she groaned, thunking her head on his shoulder and draping her arms over his shoulders. For a second, they stood in silence, swaying gently to the Christmas music that was still playing.
“Well then someone needs to stop making friends across the galaxy so we have less cards to sign.”
“Meap is a childhood friend, it’s not like I regularly go to space and meet new people!”
Jeremy snorted, spinning her in a gentle circle around the dining room. “Sure you’re not just stressed about hosting?”
Candace considered the question as they moved, lifting her head off his shoulder and humming. “Hmm, maybe a little. But I know Mom won’t let me stress about it. She’s always been good in the kitchen. It’s just different, is all.”
“Your mom is great in that way. And hey, different isn’t bad,” Jeremy said, twirling her lazily under his arm. She chuckled as she fell back into his grasp. The Christmas song shifted, less “Silent Night” and more Mariah Carey. “I like different.”
She smiled, feeling warm, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Me too.”
His lips settled in a crooked grin, and a boyish spark glittered in his eyes when she pulled back. “Good. Now what do you say we go back to signing the cards for your secret agent platypus and alien bestie?”
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
my pnf secret santa for @pistachions!!! im sorry it's three days late please don't kill me i got distracted-
Full fic below~
Isabella pokes her head through the backyard gate and lets out a rehearsed, “Whatcha’ doin’?” before walking through the snow to where the rest of the gang is assembled around the Christmas tree. There are boxes of ornaments strewn around the pine tree, and she picks one at random to open and begin unpacking.
“You already know what we’re doin’,” Buford points out. “We’ve been planning it all month.”
“What else am I supposed to say when I walk into the backyard? This is my thing.” She untangles two ornaments and pauses when she tries to put them on a branch. “Some of these are missing hooks.”
Baljeet hums. “We have not been planning this activity all month, per se,” he corrects. “We intended to do this three days ago, but Isabella got sick and we had to postpone. The hooks are over here.”
Phineas makes a noise of understanding. “So that’s why we’re decorating the tree two days before Christmas. I thought it was a little late.”
“What’s with the exposition?” Buford demands. “We all know this, we spent an hour on call last night confirmin’ it!”
Ferb uncharacteristically pipes up. “Yes, well, it’s for the benefit of the viewers.”
Isabella turns to stare at him. “The what.”
He pauses. “Ah, yes. Apologies. For the readers.” And offers no further explanation.
“Why do the Flynn-Fletchers have so many ornaments anyway?” Isabella asks Baljeet under her breath, tossing one box to the side so she could start on another.
Baljeet responds, equally quietly, “Have you met their parents? They just like to collect things.”
Buford interrupts, not bothering to keep his voice down. “You have eight volumes of useless shoelace facts, Baljeet.”
“You have life-sized molds of all your friends!”
They continue arguing, while Isabella furrows her eyebrows. “When did we need to know anything about shoelaces?” she mutters, before turning her attention back to the box of ornaments. Right at the top, there was a shoelace curling into a word.
She squints. “What’s an ‘aglet’?” Isabella wonders.
Baljeet and Buford pause in their fight to consider this.
“I have no idea.”
“Aww, look!” Isabella coos, hurrying over to Phineas to show him. “There’s a little ornament of you and Ferb, that’s adorable!”
Phineas starts to open his mouth to respond, but pauses at the actual ornament. “Uh. That’s just an orange triangle and a green square, Isabella.”
“There is one with a smaller Perry as well, Isabella,” Baljeet calls from beside the tree. “You should put them together.”
Isabella grins and rushes over. “So they can be a little family, that’s perfect!”
“But that’s just a turquoise rectangle!”
About an hour after Isabella arrives, Candace bursts in through the back door in a fury. “What are you brats doing?” she demands, stomping her way through the snow.
“Decorating the tree!” Phineas responds brightly. “We asked Mom if Ferb and I could do it with our friends this year, and she said yes.”
“It’s the twenty-third,” she snaps. “Why are you doing it now?!”
Ferb responds— again, he’s awfully chatty today, “The author got distracted with schoolwork and family stuff, so she wrote it a little late.”
“What are you talking about?!” Buford and Isabella demand in unison. Ferb blinks slowly at them, like a cat, and then walks away.
Phineas corrects him. “Isabella got sick so we had to postpone. Do you want to help? We would’ve asked you the first time, but you had a date with Jeremy, so–”
“Yes!” Candace agrees immediately. “The more involved I am, the easier it will be to bust you.”
“You are going to bust your brothers for putting up Christmas ornaments?” Baljeet asks a little confusedly.
“They’ll do something wrong sometime,” she says darkly, a wide grin overtaking her face. “And when they do, they’re going down, down, down.”
She cackles a little darkly as she makes her way to an unopened box of ornaments, continuing to chant down, down, down as she goes.
“I’m happy I’m an only child,” Buford comments.
“I know, right?”
“Well, I think we’re about done,” Phineas declares, hands on his hips as he stares at their handiwork. Beside him, Ferb raises a camera to snap a few pictures.
“It looks great, Phineas!” Isabella agrees, clasping her hands together. “Candace, why are you sulking?”
The teenager in question hugs her legs further into her chest. “Not one bustable activity…”
“They have ornaments for every one of their projects,” Baljeet points out, angling a miniature rendition of their rollercoaster towards her.
Candace sighs dramatically. “I tried that last year,” she mopes. “Mom just thought it was their imagination running wild.”
“I’m beginning to think your mom is the problem here,” Buford grumbles. “How do you miss an elevator to the moon in your backyard?”
“Oh, it looks lovely, boys,” Linda gushes, lowering herself down to pull them both into a hug. “And it’s so wonderful that you helped, Candace!”
“Yeah, whatever,” Candace grumbles, putting the full force of her teenage angst to use into her sulking.
Linda laughs. “Oh, so dramatic,” she teases, and pulls Candace into a hug of her own. Candace doesn’t hug her back, instead standing there like a disgruntled kitten.
Lawrence exits the house at the same time as Linda returns inside. “Oh, yes, it’s very nice, children! Though, I could have sworn that it wasn't a pine tree a few days ago…”
“Oh, we switch it out every year,” Phineas explains, carrying a stack of boxes into the house.
Candace freezes comedically. “What?”
Phineas turns to her. “We have a button on the side of the house that flips the tree from a Christmas one to the one it is the rest of the year. I’d try to show you, but it might ruin the decoration–”
He’s cut off by Candace speeding inside. “Mom! Mom! Mom!”
“Ten bucks says it doesn’t work,” Buford challenges.
“Nobody in their right mind would take that bet, Buford,” Baljeet denies. The bully scowls.
“That’s ridiculous, Candace,” Linda says with a roll of her eyes as her daughter gapes at her. “How would that even work?”
“But, but,” she sputters. “He admitted it!”
Linda clicks her tongue. “Oh, you kids and your imaginations,” she chuckles. “Now, come on. Help me serve the pie.”
Candace stares blankly, slumped over.
Isabella approaches and pats her on the shoulder. “There, there,” she consoles. “You’ll get them next time.”
Ok, that’s an overstatement. Baljeet measures ingredients for too long and Buford throws flour at Baljeet. They’ve finished maybe one cake and a couple batches of cookies, but it’s fun so they don’t really want to stop.
“Buford! We don’t have enough chocolate chips for you to keep pelting me!” Baljeet complains, dropping the bag of flour in his hands to turn and glare at Buford, who is entirely unaffected. Of course.
“Well, if someone would finish measuring out the flour, maybe I wouldn’t have to!” Buford snaps back, crossing his arms. He taps his foot against the ground in clear agitation, frowning slightly, as if to dare Baljeet to say something against him. He doesn’t.
“You- ugh! We have to be precise! Otherwise they’ll be ruined!” He says instead, throwing his hands in the air. Buford huffs.
“Yeah, sure, one milligram of extra sugar will ruin chocolate chips cookies. My bad. Didn’t realize we were making macaroons,” he gripes, grabbing another chocolate chip out of the bag, popping it in his mouth. Baljeet looks on in despair.
“If we don’t have enough chocolate chips for chocolate chip cookies-“
The bell rings. Which is a tragedy, considering the state of Baljeet’s overalls. He glares at Buford until he sighs and sets the bag down, walking over to the door and peering through the peephole. He looks over to Baljeet.
“It’s the guy that proves his namesake never had to promote hoaxes for a profit,” he says with a shrug. Baljeet stares at him.
“What does that even mean?” He demands. Buford frowns slightly.
“You know? The Fiji mermaid? General Tom Thumb?” Baljeet stares at him blankly. “Just- Phineas and Ferb are here.” Baljeet’s eyes widen as he hurries to the door, throwing it open.
“Hi! We were- okay, you’re covered in flour. Are you baking? We can leave if you’re baking. Though, we can-“
“Please distract the nerd. We aren’t getting anything done,” Buford cuts in before Phineas can ramble too much. Baljeet glares at him.
“Oh yeah? And who’s fault is that?” He demands. Buford looks at him blankly. Baljeet crosses his arms. “Alright, so I might’ve been taking an auspicious amount of time, but it’s imperative to our success!”
“How long was he taking?” Ferb asks suddenly.
“15 minutes just for the sugar. And he wasn’t done,” Buford answers neatly. Ferb glances at Baljeet.
“That’s hardly auspicious,” he says blankly. Phineas nods in agreement.
“More overindulgent!”
“Or imprudent.”
“Or immoderate!”
“Or-“
“Or way too long! Now, what do you nerds want?” Buford demands. Baljeet is sort of glad. That looked like it’d take a while.
“Oh! Yeah, Ferb and I discovered how to get water to its maximum hydrating abilities without any added electrolytes or anything! It’s not much, but we figured we could send it to the moon.” Baljeet stares at Phineas, waiting for him to continue. He doesn’t, just looks at Baljeet expectantly.
“He wants you to check the math, nerd,” Buford butts in, elbowing Baljeet, who glares at him before turning back to Phineas, who’s nodding his head way too enthusiastically. Ferb just stares at him.
“Hey, you guys! Whatcha doing?” Baljeet startles and turns to Isabella, who apparently just appeared from nowhere. Or maybe he got distracted trying to figure out how Phineas and Ferb managed to make Water+. Both are likely.
“Why is everyone at my house?” Buford complains. “Exactly one of you was invited!”
“And how did you know I was here anyway?” Baljeet demands. Phineas shrugs.
“You bake at Buford’s on Wednesdays.” Well. That is true. How Phineas knows, Baljeet has no idea, but he decided to stop questioning the brothers a long time ago.
“And Phineas was telling me about the hydration thing and I figured he’d come over here to check the math!” Isabella says, delighted. Okay, so all of Baljeet’s friends have encyclopedic knowledge on where he is at any time. That’s fine.
“How long have you known we bake?” Baljeet asks, turning to Isabella, pointedly not asking Phineas.
“Oh, Phineas told me about a month ago! He was trying to get a cake for that Fireside Girl party we held. Thankfully, I convinced him to go with someone else,” she says cheerfully. Baljeet sighs. That tracks. Though the word choice is a bit…
“Oi, what do you mean thankfully?” Buford asks, squaring his shoulders to look down on Isabella, who is entirely unfazed, instead choosing to straighten her back and face him head on.
“I mean you guys probably aren’t that great at baking! And that any one of the Fireside Girls can out-bake you at any point of any time!” She taunts. Baljeet buries his face in his hands. He can see where this is going.
“Oh yeah? Prove it!” Buford demands. And, as predicted, Phineas’s eyes spark with excitement.
“We can have a baking contest!” He says, elbowing Ferb enthusiastically as he does. Isabella’s face immediately turns from one that reminds Baljeet a little too much of a bull about to stampede to the sweetest smile he’s seen since the last time he’s seen Isabella smile at Phineas.
“Oh, that sounds like so much fun! At your house, right?” Baljeet looks on, forlorned, as Phineas and Isabella plan what will force him to take out the curtains of shame once again.
“Yup! We can get everything ready by tonight!” Phineas exclaims. Isabella shakes her head.
“No, remember, Ginger won’t be back from her aunt’s until tomorrow. We could use this competition as a way to get our speed baking badge, and I’d hate for her to be left out!” Phineas nods.
“Tomorrow it is, then!” He corrects before turning around. “Come on, Ferb!” Baljeet’s eyes widen. He has to stop this.
“Wait, you-”
“Oh, yeah, the math!” Phineas exclaims, turning around and shoving some papers into his hands. “Here. You can give it to us tomorrow!”
“But-”
“Or on another day. Whenever you have time, of course!”
“Okay, but-”
“See you later! Bye!”
“I don’t want to do the competition,” Baljeet says dejectedly as he watches Phineas and Ferb walk away. Both Isabella and Buford ignore him, too engrossed in their competitive spirits.
“Well, there you have it, little lady. We’re going to wipe the floor with you tomorrow!” Buford threatens. Isabella raises her eyebrows.
“‘Little lady’?”
“Yeah!” Buford cries. Isabella sighs.
“Pity to see you have to stoop to trash talk. You must be nervous. Oh, well. I gotta go home. Bye!” Buford narrows his eyes.
“You little-”
“See you tomorrow!” Isabella interrupts before turning to walk away. Baljeet watches her go mournfully.
