Christy Miller Collection, Volume 1

by Robin Jones Gunn

  Christy looked around, avoiding the question. The truth was Rick could melt her with a single look. She was fine around him as long as they were teasing each other. But standing here, waiting for him like this, pushed her out of her comfort zone.

  The church gym began to echo with the thump, thump of basketballs and the loud hoots and calls of the athletes warming up for the usual Friday rec night. The only other girls Christy noticed were sitting in a clump on the bleachers.

  “Katie, I wish we hadn’t come.” Christy fingered her shoulder-length, nutmeg-brown hair. “I’m not into sports like you. I feel totally out of place here.”

  Katie’s face suddenly lit up. “Don’t turn around,” she muttered under her breath, “but there he is!”

  Christy’s heart felt as though it was thump-thumping as loudly as the basketballs that pounded the gym floor. “Did he see us? Is he coming over here?”

  Katie looked pleased. “The answer is yes and yes, and you’re on your own now. I’ll see you later.”

  “Katie!” Christy called out as her friend jogged across the court, scooped up a basketball, and filed into line with a bunch of free-throwers.

  “Hi,” came a deep voice from behind Christy.

  She turned slowly, letting her gaze melt into Rick’s chocolate brown eyes. His dark hair looked especially good tonight, all wavy on the sides.

  “Hi,” she answered, feeling petite at five-foot-seven in the shadow of his six-foot-four-inch frame.

  “Katie said you were coming tonight.”

  “And you came just to see me, right?” Christy switched from her nervousness to the lighthearted, flirty way she had been talking with Rick lately.

  He played right along. “I’ve been counting the seconds.”

  “Oh yeah? How many did you count?”

  “Billions.”

  “I didn’t know you could count that high,” Christy teased.

  Rick playfully grabbed her by the elbow. “Is that any way to talk to the only guy here who brought you a Christmas present?”

  “You did?” Christy felt her cheeks flush with surprise. Maybe what everyone had been telling her was true. Maybe Rick really did like her.

  “Maybe I brought you a present and maybe I didn’t.” Rick grinned. “All depends. Have you been a good girl this year?”

  “Oh, yes, Santa. I’ve been very good.”

  “In that case, you’d better come out to my sleigh and get your present. Especially since my elves tell me you’re leaving town tomorrow.”

  “My whole family is going to my aunt and uncle’s in Newport Beach. But we’ll be gone only a week.”

  “A week!” Rick clutched his chest as if he were having a heart attack. “Do you know how many billions of seconds are in a week?”

  Christy laughed. “No, how many?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I asked you. I can’t count that high, remember?”

  Christy playfully swatted Rick on the shoulder, then followed him out of the gym and into the parking lot. It was a mild southern California evening. Rick had on shorts and a gray sweatshirt. Christy felt overdressed in her best jeans and nice shoes. Christy thought her outfit looked good. She thought it might help her capture Rick’s attention. Apparently she didn’t need a particular outfit to do that.

  They batted jokes back and forth on their way to Rick’s cherry red Mustang. Ever since he had given her a ride home from church over two months ago, she had watched for his car everywhere—at school, at church. It was usually full of guys and girls, and Rick was so busy with his fan club that he never noticed Christy watching from afar.

  Then two weeks ago he talked to her at church, and for some reason they started this game of who could tease the other one the most. They had talked to each other every day since then, and people had started to ask Christy if they were going out.

  Now, standing at the far end of the parking lot in front of Rick’s car, it seemed unusually quiet after all the hubbub in the gym. Rick unlocked the front door, bent over, and grabbed a box wrapped with a huge red ribbon.

  “For you,” he said.

  “You shouldn’t have, Rick.”

  “I know. I know.”

  “Should I open it now?” She felt excited and full of anticipation—and relieved she had a present for him too.

  “Sure. Go ahead. Live dangerously,” Rick said, folding his arms across his chest. “To be honest, I didn’t know what to get you. My sister suggested a book. She said most girls like to read.”

  Christy opened the box, and, sure enough, it was a book. She held it up to read the title in the faint light: One Hundred-Twelve Uses for a Dead Hamster. Her emotions did a nosedive.

  What kind of present is this? Does Rick actually think I’d like a joke book for a Christmas present?

  Rick grinned. “I got one of the few copies left. It’s bound to be a best-seller this Christmas.”

  “Rick, you’re a sick person!” Christy felt like throwing his morbid book at him.

  “Check out number fifteen,” Rick said, turning the pages for her. “This is my favorite. See, you bend a coat hanger between two of them, and you’ve got ear muffs.”

  Christy didn’t look at the illustration. She glared up at Rick.

  Rick caught her look and held it a moment; then he thumped his forehead with the palm of his hand and said, “Oh, man! How could I have been so stupid? You already have this book, right?”

  Christy burst out laughing. “You are so strange, Rick Doyle! You have to be the strangest person on the face of this earth.”

  “That’s why I need someone like you. Someone who’s pretty and charming and whose manners might rub off on me.”

  Christy stopped laughing. She stood perfectly still, looking up at him, her blue-green eyes searching his in the dim light. How did he do that? Tease her mercilessly and then compliment her in the same breath.

  “You really are,” Rick said. “Charming, I mean.” He moved a little closer to Christy and in a hushed voice said, “Actually, what I really wanted to give you I couldn’t put in a box.”

  “Oh yeah?” Christy felt her stomach tighten. She wasn’t used to being serious with Rick. “What was that?”

  “This.” Rick grasped her by the shoulders, bent down, and kissed her. Then he stood up straight and looked around, as if to make sure no one had seen them.

  Christy swallowed and tried not to look as though the most shocking thing in the world had just happened to her. Why did he do that? Now what? What should I say? What should I do?

  Rick stood firm, waiting for Christy’s response.

  “I, um, I have a present for you too,” she said.

  “Oh yeah?” He smiled one of his half-face grins in which only the left side of his mouth curved upward.

  “Here.” Christy pulled the wrapped CD from her purse and handed it to him. “I hope you don’t already have this one.”

  The grin disappeared.

  Is he disappointed that I ignored his kiss? Should I have waited longer before giving him the gift? Christy felt awkward and not at all charming.

  Rick pulled the wrapping off and said with mild enthusiasm, “Oh, thanks. I don’t have this one.”

  The weird, confusing feelings that had overwhelmed her when Rick kissed her began to evaporate. She imagined they would walk back to the gym now, both acting as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. They would be just friends again and would go back to their flirty little games. It would be fun again instead of puzzling.

  “Thanks a lot, Christy. That was really nice of you,” Rick said, tossing the CD onto his front seat and locking the car door. He stuck the keys in his pocket and said in a low voice, “I was kind of hoping your present didn’t come in a box either.”

  Her heart began to pound. He wants me to kiss him! But do I want to kiss him? Did I even want him to kiss me the first time? Or is this part of our game, and now it’s my turn to make a move if I want to keep the game going? Before Christy could tie all
her thoughts together, Rick leaned over and kissed her. This time it was longer than the first kiss.

  Christy pulled away quickly. He was coming at her too fast. This was too confusing. What was he thinking? She lowered her head, and Rick let go. They stood there, silent, while Christy’s heart and mind raced with mixed messages.

  “Well,” Rick said, clearing his throat, “I guess we’d better get back in.” He nodded his head toward the gym. His expression showed that he was hurt. Or angry. Or both. Christy didn’t know what to say. They walked quickly, with a tight strain between them.

  The rest of the evening seemed to go on around Christy in slow motion as she kept replaying the scene in the parking lot. What had gone wrong? She liked Rick. All the girls liked him. She loved being around him and having people see them together. She loved teasing him and the way he joked with her. He had a personality like no other guy she had ever known. And he was so good-looking. He made her feel pretty when he looked at her.

  And, yes, she had dreamed about what it would be like to kiss him. But in her dreams it was nothing like the way it turned out tonight. In her dreams the kiss was sweet and innocent and romantic—like it had been last summer when Todd kissed her the day she left Newport Beach. She and Todd had stood in the middle of the street with the whole world watching, and she had felt all warm and glowy inside.

  With Rick she felt surprised and confused and as if they were hiding from the whole world in the dark parking lot. She wasn’t ready for what had just happened.

  Christy didn’t take her eyes off Rick all night as he played basketball. But he never once looked her way. Was he confused too? Or was he mad at her? Had she ruined everything by not responding in a way that would let him know she liked him?

  Determined to say something before she left, Christy positioned herself only a few feet from the exit and waited. Rick brushed past her, arguing with the guy next to him over who was supposed to be covering whom on the last play. Rick didn’t even look at her.

  The worst part was Katie’s prodding on the way home. “So, he gave you a stupid book and then what?”

  “I gave him the CD.” Christy wasn’t about to say any more, especially with Katie’s mom listening as she drove the car.

  “Well, did he like it?”

  “He said he did.”

  “Then what was the problem with you two tonight? He didn’t even say good-bye or anything when he left. And you were only standing a few feet away from him.”

  “It’s no big deal. We’re just friends,” Christy said defensively.

  “So …” Katie paused before switching subjects. “When do you leave for your aunt and uncle’s?”

  “Tomorrow. We’ll be back on New Year’s or the day after.”

  “Did Todd ever call? Are you going to see him next week?”

  “I don’t know, Katie. He hasn’t called yet.” The words stung as Christy said them, and Katie backed off again.

  The two girls had gotten into an argument just last week over Todd. Katie told Christy to forget him, since he hadn’t called or written in months, and she told Christy to go after Rick, since he was suddenly interested in her.

  Christy argued that her relationship with Todd was so solid that even if she didn’t see him for months, they could still pick up where they had left off last summer. Nothing would have changed between them.

  Now reality was about to hit. Tomorrow she had to get in the car with her mom, dad, and eight-year-old brother, David, and drive the hour and a half from Escondido to Uncle Bob and Aunt Marti’s house in Newport Beach. Todd would be there, living at his dad’s house.

  Then what would happen? Would Todd remember that he had called her in October and promised they would have breakfast together on the beach? Would everything still be the same between them? And what would happen with Rick while she was gone?

  When she got home, Christy retreated to her bedroom. There she lifted an old Folgers coffee can from her dresser and poured out a mound of dried carnations onto her yellow patchwork comforter. The faint scent of coffee came tumbling out with what was left of the bouquet of white carnations Todd had given her the day he kissed her.

  Twirling one of the withered petals between her thumb and forefinger, Christy whispered, “Lord, what’s going to happen with Todd? What should I do about Rick? Everything seemed fine until tonight. Does stuff like this even matter to You? Of course it does. What am I saying? It’s just that You don’t speak to me and tell me what I’m supposed to do. That would make it a whole lot easier, You know.”

  Christy paused and pressed the flower against her cheek. “I want a second chance with Rick. I want to start over and not let everything get all weird. And I want everything with Todd to be just like it was last summer. That’s all I want for Christmas, Lord. Oh, and one more thing. I want to make You happy. I mean, I don’t want to mess up and make You or anybody else disappointed with me.”

  Christy got ready for bed, wondering if she should have prayed the way she just did, giving God a wish list as if He were Santa Claus. At least I was honest, she thought. I don’t want to hide anything from God. Doesn’t He already know everything?

  Christy slipped between the cool sheets and curled up with the comforter tucked under her chin, clutching in her right hand a withered carnation.

  “You about ready, Christy?” Christy’s dad rapped on her bedroom door.

  “I’ll be right there.” Christy grabbed her purse and a bag with cosmetics and hurried out to the car.

  Christy’s mom, a short, round woman, stood by the front door, brushing back a strand of graying hair. “Norman,” she called to Christy’s dad, “you’d better take your Bible. I don’t know if Bob and Marti have one in their house.”

  “Maybe that’s what we should have gotten them instead of that box of international cheeses,” Dad called back in his deep voice.

  Christy could tell he was teasing. Her mom had tried so hard to come up with a nice gift for Bob and Marti, the couple who had everything. When Mom came home from the mall with a big gift-wrapped box of international cheeses, for some reason Dad thought it was hilarious and had teased her for days.

  “Christy,” Mom said, ignoring Dad’s joke, “will you put the rest of these things in the car and tell your brother to get ready to go?”

  Christy found David climbing a tree in the backyard and coaxed him down. A big kid with reddish-brown hair, he resembled their father. David had begun wearing glasses a few weeks earlier and had developed an annoying habit of scrunching up his nose to keep them from sliding off.

  Christy thought it looked disgusting and kept saying, “David, don’t do that!”

  He would only scrunch and squint more and say, “Don’t do what?” He did it about twenty times in the car during the drive up the coast to Bob and Marti’s.

  Finally Christy said, “You look like a hamster, David.”

  “I do not!” he spouted. “Mom, Christy called me a hamster!”

  “Please don’t start, you two. We’ll be there soon. Just look at the ocean. Isn’t it beautiful? Such a unique color today—almost like gray glass,” Mom said.

  “I miss the snow.” David stuck out his lower lip in a pout. “Doesn’t seem like Christmas without the snow.”

  “That’s because you never spent Christmas day shoveling the driveway for four hours,” his dad said. “I don’t miss it a bit.”

  Mom smiled. She reached over and squeezed her husband’s shoulder. Christy felt warm inside. She hadn’t seen her parents this content in years. Things had been awfully hard for them back on the farm in Wisconsin. Since they had moved to Escondido in September their family had gotten much closer. Christy noticed the biggest changes in her parents after they started going to church and joined a home Bible study group. They were settled and happy.

  “Can I go out on the beach as soon as we get there?” David asked.

  “We’ll see,” Mom said.

  Uncle Bob greeted them at the door of his beautiful hous
e in Newport Beach. “Welcome, welcome! Merry Christmas! Come on in!” He had on a red vest and a matching bow tie with white lights that blinked off and on.

  “Hey, cool!” David said, reaching up to touch the bow tie. “How does it do that?”

  Bob patted his right pants pocket, where he had a small box with batteries. Then he lifted his vest to reveal the wire leading up to the tie.

  “We special-effects guys never give away our secrets,” he said with a wink to David. “But we just might have another one of these gizmos lying around. You never know.”

  Marti rushed up behind Bob. “Why didn’t you tell me they were here, darling? Come in, come in.” She wore a festive sweater that was black with a Christmas tree woven into the front and trimmed in silver with a star on top. Her earrings were little presents that matched the ones under the tree on her sweater.

  Christy glanced at her family, all dressed in jeans and crumpled sweatshirts. Familiar feelings of inferiority and embarrassment spread over her. But her mom didn’t seem to be ruffled, so Christy decided to not let it bother her either.

  They all stepped into the living room and admired the elegant decorations. Everything was white, including a new leather couch and love seat. White and silver garlands hung across the huge window and fireplace mantle. And in front of the window stood a magnificent white-flocked tree, loaded with tiny silver balls and lamb ornaments. Dozens of gifts poured out from its base.

  “Christy, remember when we picked out all these lamb ornaments in San Francisco last summer? Didn’t it turn out adorable?”

  “It’s really pretty, Aunt Marti,” Christy said sweetly. Inwardly, she missed the smell of evergreen and the homemade strings of popcorn and cranberries that laced their small tree at home.

  “We brought our nativity scene,” Christy said. “Could we put it up on the coffee table?”

  “I suppose so,” Marti said slowly. “As long as it doesn’t scratch the glass, dear.”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  While Dad carried in the luggage and Mom busied herself in the kitchen, Christy set up the nativity scene. She kept glancing out the huge windows at the view of the beach. Her mind flooded with thoughts of Todd. Where was he now? When would he call? Would he stop by? Would they have breakfast on the beach as he promised? Escondido and Rick and Katie all seemed far, far away. Todd and all her summer beach friends were all that mattered right now.