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who: Ciel Phantomhive, Undertaker, Vincent Phantomhive, Beverly Crusher
what: Birthday doings! Also scar removal!
when: Dec 14 and 15
where: The Phantomhive household and the hospital
warnings: Cute. SO much cute.

They'd said little about it to each other, but it was harder and harder to avoid the elephant in the room as the days passed, bringing them nearer to this morning. Easily one of the worst days of their year and their best all at once, with so much joy and so much tragedy mixed all into twenty-four long-short hours.

Undertaker woke easily, curled on his side as per usual with one arm draped over the warm lump of blankets in front of him. It took a few moments for him to come around completely and he did so in stillness until the sleep cleared and he remembered. He smiled, the expression on him automatic now, and gave the lump a squeeze, but said nothing in case Ciel was awake and hiding, or perhaps still asleep. Neither would surprise him, not today.

He waited for just a moment before silently and carefully slipping from the covers and into the next room. There were things he meant to do today, starting with a greeting to Albert as he turned on the oven to warm and set the kettle to boil water for tea. He left his hair in its braid to keep out of his way as he set about gathering ingredients from cabinets and the fridge here and there and tied an apron about his waist where the mourning chain normally hung, humming pleasantly as he did. Even if terrible memories haunted this day for them, he intended not to let it bring the mood down.

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The water was very much appreciated and he lifted his head to reach out for it, taking a long drink. It helped wake him a bit, and he rubbed at his eyes again to wake himself a little more.

"'M still tired." Came the slow admission as he laid his head back down, more alert and watching him. And all the work he'd already done. Ciel could at least recognize it was going to be a cake, and there was the tiniest huff in response to that.

"You remembered that I like chocolate best..."

There was the cup, filled with nothing but water, and then there was... Oh. He grinned all the more and nudged a container of teabags closer to the drowsy Earl. "I can tell. Might taste a fair bit better with one of these in it, milord."

Poor boy. He had a bit to go before he was awake and at his best, but no one was pushing him, not today, not the least. Rather than settle himself in a chair next to Ciel, he went back to his bowl and the pans he'd set out to fill with batter. "It won't be done for some time, but today being what it is, I suppose I can let you off with a sneak peek. Not much room in this house for hiding anyway."

Oh. Yes, that would probably make it better. His ears burned a little in embarrassment. Water was still nice for waking up but he did reach out to take a teabag and set it in the cup, letting it sit there.

"Tanaka and the other servants wouldn't let us into the kitchens at all on our birthday." And Sebastian used his demon abilities to make most of the food when the servants weren't around, so the process was almost always missed. Not that he'd sought the butler out on his birthdays. Still, this was a nice change.

"One of the reasons I like it. Cozy." And finally, Ciel smiled a little. "Would have smelled it baking eventually anyway."

Poor boy, indeed. Silly thing. Still, it was a good and bad day for them both, and he was more than willing to cut him a little slack. The chocolate mix was given a few more whirls with his utensil before he tipped the bowl to pour a little at a time into one pan, then the other.

"Well, we'll not follow those traditions here. This is as much your house as it is mine and you're welcome to bear witness to whatever you'd like today within it." Making a cake? Oh, Ciel would more than have access to that if he wanted. He would insist on making it himself and let the boy eat what he wanted in the meantime, but later he could share his culinary secrets if Ciel so wished.

He did pause, however, to turn a grin back over his shoulder. "That'd be one of its qualities. It's not a good cake unless the whole house smells it."

That was nice, not making him be surprised or avoid parts of the house just because it was his birthday. After all, he was fifteen at that point, very different from when he and his brother had tried sneaking into the kitchens.

"And you're good at cooking at baking. So I know it'll be a good cake." He'd enjoyed enough food and treats Undertaker had made in the past, here and in England. It gave him good reason to trust in him now. Even if a cake was still different from the bone-shaped cookies.

He was still curious though, even if he was still waking up, about why he was doing all this.

"I haven't celebrated since that day, why now?"

He grinned and giggled, much as he would when his Earl complimented him - or anyone, really. "Why yes, I do try to be, milord. It's not the fancy food you're used to eating, I'm sure, but it will work for a goodie."

With that off his tongue, he turned back to the cakes, still batter in the pans, and put on a mitt to cover his pale hands as he opened the oven and put them both in to bake, one next to the other. He looked over the two, nodded as he saw them to be satisfactory to what matched the recipe in his mind, then closed the oven door and stood back to face the boy and sat himself at one of the seats at the table. The mitt was removed and set on the surface.

"Why now? Well, because I've never been with you in that time, my lord. And neither has your father, not since that day."

He still trusted that Undertaker would take care of him, for food and otherwise. It didn't have to be fancy, he was realizing that more and more so long as it was good and good for them all. He'd gotten to used to a nobles life and found he was plenty comfortable without.

He did miss Tanaka a bit though, at least.

"You might have though. Everyone else has been happy to invite themselves any other year." Those that knew his birthday anyway. It did make him wonder how Undertaker would have handled that day though.

"It's nice. Having you and father now, at least."

It would be good, at least, if not nutritious, but they weren't quite worried about that on such a day as it was. That was hardly at the forefront of his mind, and he didn't think the boy or his father would disapprove of one day of terrible eating to offset a year of decent food. If not, he could always ask forgiveness over a slice of chocolate ridiculousness later.

"Might have." He tilted his head. "But didn't. Who invites the family mortician to celebrate a day of life?" No one in polite society anyway. He was there to advise in matters of death and of disposing of things and people better left for dead. Even if Vincent wanted him there as a blood relative - if had even known! - why would he invite the funeral director along to ruin the day? The guests would talk, and rumor was a finicky thing as it was.

Still, he never minded. He'd long accepted his place as the mortician.

Ciel certainly didn't mind and he had a feeling Vincent wouldn't be doing any complaining either. Not after missing a few birthdays already and getting a second chance at life.

"When has my family ever given much of a care what anyone thinks? I have a former assassin for a maid, an ex-soldier for a chef, a boy who was experimented on for a gardener, and Snake is my footman. I'm not sure anyone would bat an eye at you over them." And, of course, the demon butler.

Besides, all the twins had ever cared about were the sweets and presents, all the decorations. He would have been frightened, but he'd always known Undertaker meant him no harm. He would have known then as well.

"I suppose we can make up for it now though."

He grinned widely, but shook his head and took his tea to sit himself in a chair at the table at last to wait. "I don't suppose they have, but I don't rightly claim to know who hired those servants since that one day. Wasn't my decision to make."

No one had been left behind. He knew it as well as anyone, but they'd also been under that assumption before the Earl had come back to them with a strange butler at his beck and call. Rather quickly, maybe too quickly, he looked up again and leaned over his cup on the table, grin wider than it should have been. "But enough of that. Make up for it all, we shall, starting with now. Besides cake, what would you like to do on your day, hm?"

Technically it had been a shared effort between Ciel and Sebastian, but Ciel had final word when it came to taking in any of the servants. Each one had a skill that would be beneficial to the young lord, keep his household secure. More secure, he always hoped, than it had been when his parents had been alive.

They agreed at least, on making up for everything, and that made him happy. That question though. Even if he was almost fully woken up by that point, he didn't quite process that.

"Ah... I don't know." He hadn't done anything but work the past few years. "We used to just play all day. Aunt Francis took me hunting when I turned thirteen." Actually, she had played on his competitive nature.

Here he'd been so far out of the loop these past several years, both with Vincent and now Ciel, he had no idea what it was that noble Phantomhive boys liked in their teenage years when the cycle went around again. Vincent had been away at school around that age and Ciel had had his own business to run. How young boys grew so fast.

He lifted a hand to rub at his chin, thinking on it, or pretending to do so, at least. The decision wasn't to be his but he could make like he was offering some sort of suggestion. "Mmm. That was back in good ol' London, I think. Not much hunting to be done in Riverview, unless you want to go after some of the monsters outside of the city."

It had certainly felt like a quick few years to Ciel, trying to establish himself as a businessman and as his fathers successor. It had taken a lot of focus and time had flown by before he realized it. And it had been enough that he hadn't really taken notice of anything he really enjoyed anymore.

Books were pleasant, and games. Board games, chess. In Riverview he'd discovered that he enjoyed movies, they'd sat down and fallen asleep to them enough times now that they both knew that.

"I'm not sure I could handle hunting anything out there." He didn't dare try and he didn't want Undertaker to have to play bodyguard for anything that might try eating the teen.

"What would you do?" Wait. "When is your birthday?"

They could certainly enjoy a movie or two, boring as that might be. They'd get more out of the close proximity and light conversation, as always, he thought. But it was Ciel's day, and whatever the boy wanted, he would have. Movies, games, books. Whatever he wanted.

It wasn't entirely a disappointment, though, when the Earl decided against a hunting trip. The things beyond the city weren't quite like foxes or deer that sporting events had been used to seeing chased and captured or killed. No, these creatures didn't run so much as they ran for a ways, realized how much smaller their hunters were, then tried turning the tables. The jungle out beyond the walls was all very different.

But the question made him think - honestly think - for a brief moment. "Nothing." That was the long and short of it. "I've done nothing to celebrate my own birthday in decades. Didn't seem important anymore, seeing as how I am and am not truly alive any longer."

When though. For when, he gave a little more of a pause. Should he or shouldn't he? Finally, he decided he might as well. "I thought to hide that from you, but here I know your own, so I guess it'd only be fair. I was born in March, on the twenty fifth."

As the day went on, he was sure he'd think of something. He was just happy to have his father and Undertaker, that made him happy enough. And going out anywhere brought on the risk of everyone else finding out about his birthday and making a spectacle of it. He wasn't sure he was ready for that.

Ciel did give a little frown at the answer though. Both at his comment about not truly being alive anymore and hiding his birthday from the young lord. He sat up a little straighter, blanket still wrapped around his shoulders and gave a huff.

"You're alive enough to me. You're warm and you breath and your heart beats." It helped him to sleep more times than he could count when just having the mortician close wasn't enough to calm his mind. "And why would you keep that from me? It wouldn't have told me much of anything."

Why he'd kept that information from the Earl, he couldn't say. It was nothing that he had thought to offer up before, to be sure, but neither had he been asked for it. Few cared enough to even know his name, let alone something as personal as a birth date.

He swirled his tea, then took another sip and held the cup between his hands. "Alive enough, as always. I'm not too far from what I was before I died, but we'll skip those unpleasantries for now." He giggled. "You never asked."

Oh, right. He'd had tea steeping, hadn't he? The sight of Undertaker's cup reminded him and he reached to pull his close again to finish fixing it. It gave him a chance to think while he did. And it occurred to him just how focused he had been on himself and his goals over the past few years. To the point that he hadn't noted or cared much for knowing anything about his contacts but for how to reach them or where to find them.

Ciel stared into to cup for a moment after then back at Undertaker. He didn't want the unpleasant details. Not just yet, anyway. Maybe someday, and not on his birthday. Or anyone elses.

"Sorry, I suppose I never thought about it." He would have before the attack, he'd been much kinder then. "I know now, at least. I promise, I won't let father cook that day, or you may find yourself in the hands of some other mortician."

The cup was set back on the table while fingers curled around it, leeching on the warmth to be found there though the oven did nicely to warm the kitchen around them. His in his little apartment above the funeral parlor did the same thing on cold winter nights, and he found himself more often than not in bitter nights when the wind seemed to blow right through the stone keeping the fire under the iron bars lit well until the morning hours.

It certainly wasn't missed.

His grin spread all the more at Ciel's apology. "Why would you? It was something you did. Nobles don't ask for opinions, they simply do." Not that it was his favorite part of society in their time, but it was something he'd found himself terribly amused with over the years, watching the tug and pull the upper caste had over the lower. "I never served as you know me under the delusion that I could sway your opinions one way or another, not on many things, and I haven't been wrong. At least you don't disappoint."

He took another sip of warm tea. "But we won't let your father cook then. I hadn't thought to treat it any differently than I do any other day in any case."

He couldn't imagine it was missed. Ciel had never lived like that before, the closest he had come was the cage the cult kept the children in but that had only been a month. One hellish month. Undertaker had lived there for as long as Ciel could remember.

"I should have cared though. Even if you didn't live on the estate. It's a lords duty to look after and care for the people." It applied to their domain, certainly, but as a small child, he'd thought it should apply to everyone. It was why he kept up more philanthropic efforts than he could remember his father doing.

Even if Undertaker hadn't been able to sway his opinions, he'd still looked out for Vincent's remaining son, so caught in a demons claws. What was it Blavat had called him? A collapsar? It seemed almost fitting now, though it had filled him with panic at the time. What would he say of Undertaker?

He could relate to Undertaker though, on how he spent his birthday. It brought a small smile to Ciel's lips and he shook his head.

"That's usually what I did. Treat it like any other day. Hard to do here."

Edited 2017-12-15 06:49 (UTC)

That? Now that managed to get a laugh from him, short lived though it was. He switched the cup to one hand while he tilted a cheek in against his palm. He really wasn't like his ancestors, this child.

Now no longer a child. He still had to keep reminding himself of that, even after four long years having known the boy portraying himself as a man in the world. Didn't help that Ciel still looked quite young for his years. "Ah, but I'm not your responsibility. All that time, I've been an accessory beyond your estate. You wouldn't have changed it if you'd known me better."

Did it bother him? Not in particular. On the contrary, he liked the distance. It allowed him more than a little freedom and relief from prying eyes. Or at least it had back home. But that was not here or there. "We still will, if you wish. All I insist is that I be allowed to make a cake." One long nail scratched at his chin. "Be allowed to finish it, rather. I've already started, but the oven is yours once I'm done, should you need it."

The laugh was unexpected, it made him give another little huff but it was short lived. He had a hard time being upset with the man anymore, at least for any extended period. Undertaker had done so much for him and gone out of his way to look after him, after all.

"No, but I still should have cared." If he'd been thinking of anything beyond his revenge, he knew he would have. Undertaker had been a friend of his family, closer than they'd known, he should have cared. He really should have, especially after he had returned.

The cake wouldn't be refused. Ciel still had his sweet tooth and Undertaker had gone through the trouble of making it.

"I'm so used to ignoring it, I really don't know what else we could do. Not anything different from what we usually do." And a pause. "I just don't want to go out and about."

He shook his head and took a sip from his tea and set the cup down again, turned the handle outward. "You wouldn't have. Don't let it ruin your day though, milord." To punctuate that, he leaned closer and pointed over Ciel's shoulder. "Do you really want me to bring Albert into this to back me up?"

It was a threat a tease to get the boy smiling again, but he'd make very good on it if he had to. He would! "We don't have to go anywhere you don't want us to, but it is your day. Until you start fussing about things you can do nothing about and I bring a Halloween prop into it."

That teasing threat worked, Ciel did crack a smile. He still felt a little guilty about not caring more before but he could at least make up for it now.

"You and Albert are always disagreeing. He might side with me just to spite you." He'd let Undertaker win this one for now though, funny as bringing Albert into it might be, he didn't want to spend his birthday arguing over something small. Even if he hadn't been keen on celebrating at the start.

"We could watch a few movies together, that would be nice."

He lifted a shoulder in a shrug, watching that quirk of those lips with a giggle. Success felt good. "I won't say he's always the instigator, but in this case I think I might agree with you. He does enjoy a good argument."

He reached for a small jar on the table and opened it, then picked out a cube of sugar with his nails and set it on his tongue. "Movies sound wonderful. What does milord have in mind for his viewing pleasure on this day?"

Really, he was kind of glad to hear the agreement, and it felt nice to smile and enjoy part of his birthday for once. He had to wonder what his birthday might have been like the past few years if Undertaker had shown up.

"Something funny? I like some of the comedies we've collected. And it feels like a good day for a few laughs." He was sure Undertaker wouldn't object too much to his choice.

That got his grin going. He looked back at the boy, still working over the sugar cube in his mouth. "I like where your mind's at. We can oblige, I guarantee." And he would. Who better to go to for humor than a grim reaper like himself, even if it was odd humor?

"We'll do as you like though. Your day and all. Let it be at your leisure." He swallowed the sugar and sat back in his chair, humming.

He knew Undertaker wouldn't object to his choice, and it makes him smile a little more warmly. And he definitely agreed about who best to go to for humor, Undertaker valued it enough in England.

"You won't mind spending the day watching movies with me?" He didn't want to bore Undertaker, not that he was terribly worried for that, or disrupt any plans he had.

There was an easy enough question. He turned his head to look over at the boy, leaning into the back of his chair. "Not at all. Why should I? I've enjoyed it well enough in the past." They might have been trying to bore each other to sleep by then, but he wouldn't mind it even still.

There was a little shrug. Honestly, he still sometimes expected the man the get bored of being around him, though he should know better after all this time.

"We do it a lot. I don't want to bore you, even more my birthday." Oh, that was absolutely something they both tried. With all the memories and experiences between them, they sometimes needed the help falling asleep, he was sure.

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