Desert me ahead of short ceremony (5)
I believe the answer is:
merit
'desert' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'me ahead of short ceremony' is the wordplay.
'ahead of' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other) (I've seen this in other clues).
'short ceremony' becomes 'rit'.
'me'+'rit'='MERIT'
(Other definitions for merit that I've seen before include "Worth; deserve" , "The M in OM" , "Deserve; excellence" , "Just deserts" , "Quality deserving reward" .)