A/N: After thinking I was headed for a nasty bout of writer's block, JWood201 and I had a brainstorming session and came up with some festive plot bunnies, proving that two heads really are better than one, and that a problem shared is a problem halved.

So here goes with the Seasonal fic I thought I'd never write. Happy Holidays!

Ho Ho Mistletoe

Chapter One

It was December, and Christmas was fast approaching. On the island, it meant a change of temperature- it got hotter. But the humidity dropped, and as the castaways busied themselves with preparations, they were thankful for the cooler evening breezes.

This was to be their third Christmas shipwrecked. After the first, they hadn't expected to be on the island for another whole year, let alone two, so they had discarded all of the decorations they made, even though they had spent a lot of time and effort on them. After the second Christmas they did exactly the same, because by the Skipper's reckoning, keeping them was as good as admitting they were still going to be stranded in another twelve months time.

And yet, twelve months on, here they all were. Still stranded, and having to make brand new Christmas decorations all over again.

The girls, however, enjoyed it. It gave them something fun to do- something that wasn't a chore or a duty. They enjoyed playing with baubles and bows, making pretty things. They took a box full of odds and assortments into their hut and sat down at the table to start working.

"Do you know what I miss the most about Christmas?" Ginger tied a blue ribbon to a bauble made from a hollowed out parrot's egg hardened with nail polish. "The parties. You haven't been to a party until you've been to a Hollywood party!" She gave a wistful sigh and gazed dreamily at Mary Ann across the table.

Mary Ann smiled. "Then I guess I haven't been to a party," she replied, sorting through all the paraphernalia on the table, searching for a particular seashell she had spotted earlier.

"The beautiful gowns, the champagne, handsome hunks wherever you look!" Ginger threw her head back and let her flame red tresses bounce around her face. "And not forgetting the best bit. The gossip!"

Mary Ann laughed. "Back home, a party consists of a hog roast and square dancing, and by the end of the night you're lucky if there are three men still standing so they can carry the others home." She located her seashell and held it up for appraisal.

Ginger grinned. "Sounds like a party to me!"

"Oh, we had some parties, all right. Except most of the gossip was about pie tampering at the Bake Off, and what Old Man Jefferson was feeding his bulls to make them bigger than everybody else's."

Ginger wrinkled her nose. "Hmm. Give me Rock Hudson's private life any day!"

There was a knock at the door. It was such a familiar knock by now that the girls didn't even have to ask who it was. "Come in, Gilligan!" they chorused together, not even bothering to look up.

The door squeaked open and the first mate strolled in. "How did you know it was me?"

"Who else would it be?" Ginger teased.

Gilligan shrugged. "Anybody."

Ginger gave another wistful sigh. "Anybody? I'll take Gregory Peck."

"Sorry," said Gilligan. "I haven't seen him around these parts lately. But if I do, I'll tell him you were looking." He turned to Mary Ann. "Hi, Mary Ann. What'cha making?"

Mary Ann gestured at the pile of completed and half completed decorations and all the paraphernalia strewn across the table, coloured ribbons trailing over the edges. "What do you think we're making, Gilligan?"

"A big mess?"

"No! We're making Christmas decorations!" Mary Ann held up a starfish tied with a red ribbon. "See?"

Gilligan took the starfish and held it up, twirling it round and round in front of his face. "Oh, yeah," he said, almost breathlessly. "Neat!"

"Every year we make Christmas decorations, and every year he asks us what we're doing," said Ginger. Both girls watched as Gilligan continued to twirl the starfish around and around and around, his eyes going back and forth, back and forth, a silly grin spread across his face. "If he keeps on doing that, he'll end up hypnotizing himself."

"I think he already has," said Mary Ann, hiding a giggle behind her hand.

Gilligan blinked and put the starfish down. "That was fun," he said, staggering slightly.

"Oh, Gilligan! Only you could have fun making yourself dizzy," laughed Ginger.

Mary Ann rested her chin in her hand and gazed up at him fondly. "You do cheer us up, Gilligan. Especially at a time like Christmas, when we miss our family and friends back home."

"I love Christmas," the first mate replied, riffling through all the ribbons and bows. "Always have, always will. No matter where I am."

"That's such a lovely way to think!" Mary Ann said, wanting to hug him right there and then.

Gilligan shrugged. "There's no point in being unhappy," he reasoned. "It doesn't make anybody else feel better, and who wants to feel bad at Christmas? Nobody, that's who." He picked up an angel made out of scraps of fabric, its delicate, pale blue chiffon wings held out on strips of wire. He turned it around and studied it from all angles. "This is pretty," he said. "My sister would like this."

"We're going to put it on top of the tree," Mary Ann said, watching him intently. "As soon as we find a tree, that is."

Gilligan seemed mesmerised by the angel. It took him a couple of moments to realise that Mary Ann was still talking, so taken was he by the delicate little face made of silk and the wispy hair made out of cotton wool. The angel looked back at him through tiny eyes made from the very smallest black beads that Mary Ann could find in her sewing box. Gilligan noticed that the left eye was just a smidgen higher than the right eye, making the angel look a little unsure of itself. For some reason he couldn't explain, that just made him like it all the more.

"Gilligan?"

"Huh?" Gilligan snapped back to reality at last. He shook his head and looked down at Mary Ann with a faraway expression.

"You were miles away," Mary Ann smiled.

"He's always miles away," said Ginger.

"I was looking at this," Gilligan said, putting the angel down on the table as carefully as he could. "It's pretty. My sister sure would like it."

"Well," said Mary Ann, "we'll keep it when Christmas is over, and maybe one day your sister can have it."

Gilligan broke into a huge smile. "Really? Oh, boy, Mary Ann. That would be wonderful! I just know she'd like it. In fact, she'd love it. She used to love things made out of all beads and stuff." He touched the angel's fragile cotton wool hair. "I mean- I guess she still does, I don't know. It's been so long since I saw her."

"In that case, we'll make sure we keep it safe," said Ginger, moved by the fleeting sadness in Gilligan's eyes.

"Thanks, Ginger." Gilligan smiled, looking down at the little angel.

There was a sudden shout from across the clearing, which startled all of them. "Gilligaaaaaan!"

Gilligan froze like a deer in the headlights. His eyes went wide. "Uh-oh, there's the foghorn. I mean, the Skipper. I'm meant to be collecting firewood before it gets dark." He flustered for a bit until the Skipper yelled again, and then he made a hurried dash for the door. "'Bye, girls!" he called, even though he was already out of the hut and running, nothing left but a cloud of sand in his wake.

A moment's amused silence passed, and then Ginger noticed that Mary Ann was still gazing towards the door with her chin in her hand, a dreamy look on her face.

"Penny for your thoughts," the movie star teased, gently.

"Hmm?" Mary Ann looked over. "Oh, nothing!"

"Nothing?"

"Nothing. Really!"

"I'd say it was a nothing wearing a red shirt and a sailor hat, about five foot nine, with dark hair and blue eyes." Ginger grinned at the colour creeping into Mary Ann's cheeks. "Getting warm in here, Mary Ann?"

Mary Ann blushed deeper. "Don't tease me, Ginger. Not at Christmas."

Ginger smiled even wider, the kind of Hollywood smile that had flashbulbs popping all over town. "I know what you need, and I'm surprised we didn't think of it before."

"Oh, Ginger!" Mary Ann huffed. "Stop being all mysterious! 'What I need'? What, precisely do I need?"

Ginger leaned forward over the table, displaying her ample cleavage. Her nose crinkled in delight as she lowered her voice to a sultry whisper. "Mistletoe."