Sugar Cookies & Santa Hats
a/n: it’s been forever since I wrote for tumblr, so go easy on me! 😂 I will probably be less and less active in coming weeks, but I wanted to let you all know how much I love and appreciate you. happy holidays!!
summary: girl dad!Harry sets out to convince his crestfallen daughter that Santa is real.
“Who wants to make some cookies for Santa Claus?” Harry asked and his suggestion was greeted by a shrill shriek of excitement from two-, nearly three-year-old Penny, who was standing on her tiptoes to peer inside her stocking, which hung from a coat hook near the front door.
“Santa Claus!” she repeated, throwing her hands in the air and spinning around herself until she grew dizzy and came to an abrupt stop on the ground.
The family cat, Agnes, eyed her through the corners of her unamused eyes before turning back to the crackling fire to continue licking her jet-black paws.
Penny raced Harry to the kitchen, her bubbly giggles filling the room behind her as she ran. “I win!” she panted as she skidded to a stop before the refrigerator, followed by a triumphant, “I beat Daddy!”
Removing the family’s matching aprons from the pantry, you helped Penny into hers and handed her one to bestow upon Harry before donning your own.
Contrary to her younger sister’s enthusiasm, Ruby stayed on the stairs and somberly watched her family disappear into the kitchen.
“Come on, Rubes!” you called, hoisting Penny up to the sink to wash her tiny hands. “We need our master baker to show us how it’s done.”
Ruby let out a soft sigh, refusing to respond. After a moment, Harry poked his head out of the kitchen, making eye contact with his eldest daughter, his brow furrowed with concern. “What’s wrong?” he questioned, but his toddler’s joyous shrieks drowned out his voice. He placed Ruby’s folded apron into her hands, but she thrust it back at him.
“I don’t think I should make cookies for Santa,” she said after a moment, her green-gray eyes welling up with tears.
“Why not?” asked Harry incredulously. “I thought you loved to bake cookies!”
“I do,” Ruby began, shaking her head, “but I don’t think Santa…needs them.”
“Of course he does,” laughed Harry. “Cookies keep him awake so he can bring us presents, you know!”
Ruby shook her head once again, her ashamed eyes darting from her father to the Christmas tree and back. “Daddy,” she whispered earnestly, lowering her voice so Penny couldn’t overhear. “Santa Claus isn’t real.”
Shocked, Harry’s eyes dropped. He heard Penny in the kitchen, cheerfully singing, “Jingle bells! Jingle bells!” paired with the crackling of the fire. He felt his cheeks grow warm as he looked from his daughter’s tearful eyes to his fidgeting hands, and back.
“Who told you that, Ruby Doo?” he murmured softly as she began to cry.
“People in my class,” she sniffled, looking up at him with round, glassy eyes.
“Do you know what, bug?” Harry asked, lowering his eyes to a whisper. “When I was your age, kids at school told me the same. But do you know what happened?”
Ruby shook her head, wiping her nose on the back of her hand and listening intently.
“On Christmas Eve, I went to bed sad, but right at midnight, I heard jingle bells and hoofbeats on the roof.”
The six-year-old’s eyes lit up. “Reindeer?” she asked, and Harry nodded.
“When I poked my head out of my bedroom, I saw Santa arranging our presents under the tree.”
“Really?” Ruby asked, her eyes wide as saucers. “Did he see you?”
“He didn’t,” Harry replied, feeling the pit in his stomach disappear at his daughter’s budding excitement. “When I woke up in the morning, he had eaten all of the cookies and milk and fed the carrots to his reindeer. He even left me a special note in my stocking.”
“What did it say?” breathed Ruby and Harry gave her an impish smirk.
“That’s between me and Santa Claus. Now. I’m guessing it’s about time to cut out the cookies.”
Before he had time to rise to his feet, Ruby sprang off of the stairs and donned her apron as quickly as she could. She sprinted into the bathroom to wash her hands before meeting the remainder of her family in the kitchen.
“Just in time to help us roll out the dough!” you exclaimed, casting Harry a secretive smile as you pulled a step stool up to the counter for Ruby.
“We’re making cookies for Santa!” cheered Penny, bouncing on her toes in excitement.
Ruby held the handles of the rolling pin tightly and you placed yours over hers, guiding their movement over the dough. When the sheet sprawled across the counter, flat and smooth, you retrieved a bag of cookie cutters from the cupboard opposite where you were standing.
“I want to make Santas!” shouted Penny, reaching for the bag as you set it on the counter before her.
“I want to make trees and snowflakes and snowmen!” exclaimed Ruby, reaching for the bag. “I think Santa likes snowmen the best.”
“I want to make snowmen, too!” said Penny decisively.
While the girls distributed the cookie cutters, Harry pulled you aside. Wrapping his arm around your shoulder, he lowered his lips to your ear and whispered a secret plan into it before returning his attention to his girls.
“I’m making snowmen, Santas, bells, and reindeers!” Penny cried out joyfully as Ruby helped her press the cookie cutters into the sweet, malleable dough.
You and Harry helped them make the most out of the sheet of dough, resulting in two pans of warm sugar cookies less than an hour later. While Harry and the girls were infatuated by a rerun of the Polar Express, you placed the cookies on cooling racks and mixed food coloring into small tubs of frosting.
“Are you ready to decorate?” you called into the darkened living room and Penny squealed excitedly.
“We have a surprise for you, mama!” Harry called back. He, Ruby, and Penny appeared in the doorway, decked out in matching pajamas, aprons, light-up necklaces, and antler headbands.
Giving you a kiss on the cheek, he slipped a necklace on over your head and perched a Santa hat on your head. Whinnying, Penny galloped to your side, climbing onto the step stool and peering into the bowls of colored frosting.
“Red, white, green, pink, blue…” she named the colors, accidentally poking her finger into the blue. She licked the frosting from her fingertip and would have been successful in going back for more had you not stopped her.
“Now you’ve got to rewash your hands,” you chided, hoisting her up to clean her hands again.
Necklace flashing merrily, Ruby stepped onto the stool and reached for a cookie to begin icing.
Presently, Penny sidled up next to her and selected a snowflake. The girls contentedly smeared frosting onto their cookies until their arms grew tired and their bedtimes encroached.
They selected the cookies they saw most fit for Santa Claus and arranged them nicely on a plate with a handful of baby carrots and a glass of water (because milk would spoil if left out overnight.)
You and Harry perched on the edges of their beds--you on Penny’s and Harry on Ruby’s-- and read aloud as many stories as it took for them to drift off, dreaming excitedly of Christmas morning.
Once they were asleep, you and Harry slipped into your own bed to discuss your midnight plan.
“Ruby didn’t want to ruin Santa for me,” Harry smiled, just enough to make his dimple apparent. “So I told her about my experience with Santa when I was her age.”
Harry nodded, propping his head up on his elbow. “We should do the same. Be up by midnight?”
Harry roused you five minutes before midnight.
You awoke to a white, curly synthetic beard against your face. When you opened your eyes, you could distinctly make out the silhouette of your husband, decked out in a complete Santa suit, holding an armful of gifts and stocking stuffers.
With a charming smile, Harry extended a hand to you, helping you out of bed, but nearly losing a few boxes in the process.
You helped him steady his load before creeping silently downstairs to arrange the gifts beneath the elaborate tree.
Once the living room was finished, lit only by the tree, which was just bright enough to see the presents stacked beneath it and the empty plate beside it, you crept up the stairs and knocked lightly on your daughters’ bedroom door. Knowing Penny was a sound sleeper, you didn’t worry about awakening her.
Ruby, who was drifting in and out of a restless sleep, sat up immediately at the sound. Tiptoeing so as not to wake her younger sister, she let herself out of the bedroom and peered down the stairs. The sight her awestruck eyes beheld was one she would never forget. She clamped a hand over her mouth to prevent a delighted squeal from escaping, lest she blow her cover. Silently, she watched the man in the red suit distribute presents beneath the tree and slip some candy canes into the stockings.
After a few minutes of baffled silence on her part, the six-year-old began tiptoeing back to her room. She let herself in silently and slipped back into bed with a new kind of warmth and assurance brewing in her core. What a story she would have to tell her children one day.
~~~
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