Ficlet: Anniversary Problems
Apr. 30th, 2026 06:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
badly_knittedTitle: Anniversary Problems
Author:
badly_knittedCharacters: Jack, Ianto.
Rating: PG
Word Count: 723
Spoilers: Nada.
Summary: Jack wants to get Ianto a gift for their second wedding anniversary, but he’s having trouble choosing something appropriate.
Written For: Weekend Challenge: Anniversaries at
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1_million_words.Disclaimer: I don’t own Torchwood, or the characters.
Jack was in a bit of a quandary; his and Ianto’s second wedding anniversary was coming up, and he wanted to get his husband an appropriate gift, but… Well, it should have been simple. He’d done all the necessary research into earth customs for anniversary gifts, because Boeshanian marriage customs mostly involved renewing the marriage contract every year, if all parties were still happy with their partners. No one on Boeshane ever had to divorce, they’d just let their contract expire instead of renewing it. There was no shame in leaving partners to be with someone, or several someones, who were more compatible.
Anyway, he’d spent hours researching, and their first anniversary had been simple. The traditional gift was paper, so he’d bought Ianto a new journal, an expensive one, with a leather cover, and high-quality paper edged with gold leaf. Ianto had loved it! Jack had received a book on origami, and several packs of coloured origami paper, and even now, a year on, if he was bored at work, he could get out his book and paper, and make something. It was fun!
Second anniversary was cotton, and the traditional colour was red, which was Ianto’s colour anyway; he looked so good in red, and Jack had thought the perfect gift would be some top-quality red cotton shirts, but then… Well, they’d been watching the original Star Trek series recently, because Tosh had bought Ianto the DVDs for Christmas, and it hadn’t taken long for Jack to realise that the characters wearing red shirts were the ones who usually died, and…
What kind of message would he be sending his husband if he brought him red shirts? Happy Anniversary, darling, now drop dead? It didn’t make any difference that Ianto was immortal now, and therefore wouldn’t STAY dead; it still felt rather like tempting fate, especially now that Jack knew from experience how it felt to watch someone he loved die, and then have to wait helplessly, wondering whether or not he’d come back. Ianto had been through that with him countless times, and had admitted to Jack that it never got any easier, so… As much as he loved how sexy Ianto looked in a red shirt, that idea was out.
Maybe he could get Ianto cotton shirts in a different colour, pink perhaps, but pink wasn’t the colour for two years of marriage, and Jack wanted to get this right. Traditions were important! A man should respect the culture he married into.
The gemstone for the second anniversary was Garnet, but Jack had bought his husband Garnet cufflinks as a wedding gift. As much as Ianto loved them, and still wore them whenever they were going somewhere nice, he only had two arms, so he didn’t need another pair.
Maybe he could get Ianto something other than a shirt in red cotton, pyjamas, or boxers, or bedsheets… But sheets would be for both of them, since they both slept in the same bed, although it was true that Ianto would look good spread out naked on red sheets. Most delectable, in fact, a visual treat.
Or perhaps he should skip the traditional year two gift and go with the modern alternative of china. He could get his husband a red coffee mug, or an entire dinner service in red… It was just that china didn’t seem personal enough, it was kitchenware, and that didn’t send a good message either: here are new plates, feed me! No, china was definitely out; there was nothing romantic about crockery.
Perhaps really luxurious fluffy red cotton towels might be good, to wrap Ianto in all snug and warm after a shower or a bath. But what if Ianto had the same idea? Well, fluffy towels never went to waste, so it wouldn’t be the end of the world.
Then again, perhaps Jack was reading too much into the whole red shirt thing and Ianto wouldn’t take it as Jack wishing death on him. Perhaps he should ask Tosh, see what she thought. She was Ianto’s best friend, so surely she’d be able to help. All he really wanted was to make his husband happy, show Ianto that he was appreciated and cherished. Why did that have to be so difficult?
Jack could only hope their third anniversary wouldn’t prove so fraught with complications.
The End
Anyway, he’d spent hours researching, and their first anniversary had been simple. The traditional gift was paper, so he’d bought Ianto a new journal, an expensive one, with a leather cover, and high-quality paper edged with gold leaf. Ianto had loved it! Jack had received a book on origami, and several packs of coloured origami paper, and even now, a year on, if he was bored at work, he could get out his book and paper, and make something. It was fun!
Second anniversary was cotton, and the traditional colour was red, which was Ianto’s colour anyway; he looked so good in red, and Jack had thought the perfect gift would be some top-quality red cotton shirts, but then… Well, they’d been watching the original Star Trek series recently, because Tosh had bought Ianto the DVDs for Christmas, and it hadn’t taken long for Jack to realise that the characters wearing red shirts were the ones who usually died, and…
What kind of message would he be sending his husband if he brought him red shirts? Happy Anniversary, darling, now drop dead? It didn’t make any difference that Ianto was immortal now, and therefore wouldn’t STAY dead; it still felt rather like tempting fate, especially now that Jack knew from experience how it felt to watch someone he loved die, and then have to wait helplessly, wondering whether or not he’d come back. Ianto had been through that with him countless times, and had admitted to Jack that it never got any easier, so… As much as he loved how sexy Ianto looked in a red shirt, that idea was out.
Maybe he could get Ianto cotton shirts in a different colour, pink perhaps, but pink wasn’t the colour for two years of marriage, and Jack wanted to get this right. Traditions were important! A man should respect the culture he married into.
The gemstone for the second anniversary was Garnet, but Jack had bought his husband Garnet cufflinks as a wedding gift. As much as Ianto loved them, and still wore them whenever they were going somewhere nice, he only had two arms, so he didn’t need another pair.
Maybe he could get Ianto something other than a shirt in red cotton, pyjamas, or boxers, or bedsheets… But sheets would be for both of them, since they both slept in the same bed, although it was true that Ianto would look good spread out naked on red sheets. Most delectable, in fact, a visual treat.
Or perhaps he should skip the traditional year two gift and go with the modern alternative of china. He could get his husband a red coffee mug, or an entire dinner service in red… It was just that china didn’t seem personal enough, it was kitchenware, and that didn’t send a good message either: here are new plates, feed me! No, china was definitely out; there was nothing romantic about crockery.
Perhaps really luxurious fluffy red cotton towels might be good, to wrap Ianto in all snug and warm after a shower or a bath. But what if Ianto had the same idea? Well, fluffy towels never went to waste, so it wouldn’t be the end of the world.
Then again, perhaps Jack was reading too much into the whole red shirt thing and Ianto wouldn’t take it as Jack wishing death on him. Perhaps he should ask Tosh, see what she thought. She was Ianto’s best friend, so surely she’d be able to help. All he really wanted was to make his husband happy, show Ianto that he was appreciated and cherished. Why did that have to be so difficult?
Jack could only hope their third anniversary wouldn’t prove so fraught with complications.
The End
