by Lisa Jackson
Of course most of her restlessness was due to Chris.
It had been over two days since their date, and he hadn’t called her. And she wasn’t going to phone him. At least not right away. And, though she hated to admit it, her mother was right; the house did seem bigger and lonelier without Natalie. Megan didn’t even want to think about Adam. Of course, Megan hadn’t seen him since the wedding. Except for a quick e-mail from Natalie, no one in the family had heard from them. It was weird, really.
On Christmas morning Megan woke up feeling empty. Even the enticing scent of her mother’s baking couldn’t lure her down the stairs.
A lot of her ennui could be attributed to Chris, she supposed. She liked him; she liked him a lot. Not with the same deep feeling that she had felt for Adam, of course, but she did definitely think about Chris, which kind of pissed her off.
Then there was the other little irritation. Ken had called Leslie. He had even gone over to her house once since the sleigh ride. They seemed to be a couple already, and after less than a week Leslie was sure that she was falling in love with him.
As if! In love? After a single date? Leslie had always been a dreamer, but this time she had really gone off the deep end, and that pissed off Megan as well.
It was as if the whole world had conspired against her. And it had all started with Natalie’s wedding. Yeah, Megan was in a bad mood, a real bad mood.
On Christmas morning.
Terrific!
Finally, Megan forced herself to get up. She threw on a short skirt and a sweater, then brushed out her hair and attempted a bit of makeup. She stared at her reflection in the mirror critically. She was far from gorgeous like her sister, but she was okay—kind of. She played around with eye shadow and mascara and then gave up. She was a nerd, a “braniac” as Natalie had often referred to her. Despite her gray eyes and high cheek bones and thick hair, she was still “the girl most likely to run a major company by thirty.”
Ugh.
Aunt Janice came over and, though everyone in the family tried to keep up their spirits, everything seemed off. Even Mom’s Christmas turkey tasted bland.
Later, after dinner and when Aunt Janice had gone home, Megan was clearing the table when the telephone rang. “I’ll get it,” she shouted. Maybe it was Chris.
“Hello,” she said.
“Hi, Meg! It’s . . . so good . . . to hear your voice,” Natalie said at the other end of the line. She was actually blubbering, sobbing into the phone.
“Nat! Are you crying? What’s wrong? Is Adam all right?” Megan’s thoughts leapt instantly to pictures of instant disasters—boating, swimming, scuba-diving accidents. What could have happened?
“No . . . no . . . Adam, I mean we’re both fine. It’s just that it’s Christmas and I miss all of you so terribly.” Natalie sniffed loudly. “How—how are you? How was Christ—Christmas?”
Megan imagined her sister dabbing a finger under her eyelids to swipe at the mascara running down her cheeks. “It was okay, but, you know, different. Without you.”
“It’s Natalie?” Mom said, waterworks flowing from her eyes, too, as she waved frantically to get the phone. “It’s Nat,” she said to her husband. “Get on the extension.”
Another round of sobs from Natalie.
“I’ll talk to you soon,” Megan said, and handed the phone to her mother, who clutched the receiver in two hands.
“Merry Christmas, honey!” Carol Simmons said to her daughter who was, Megan knew, in the Bahamas. With Adam. And Natalie was crying? Homesick on her honeymoon? Well, it was Christmas, but Natalie had known that when they’d set their wedding date so close to the end of the year. Though Megan missed her, she didn’t feel sorry for her older sister in the Bahamas with Adam. Megan pictured the two of them laughing in the sun as they ran in the sand. Their bodies were tanned and sleek, foamy waves chasing them. Megan imagined Adam chasing her sister, catching her and kissing her as they fell into the sand, still embracing as the tide rolled around them.
No, Natalie with Adam in paradise should not have been crying.
When the doorbell pealed, Megan, the only member of the family not on the phone, answered the door.
Chris was standing on the porch, his hair a little wet from melting snowflakes, his face ruddy from the cold. Stupidly, her heart soared a bit.
“Hey,” he said, appearing uncomfortable.
“Hi,” Megan responded, and then added, without thinking, “What are you doing here?”
“I don’t really know,” he said. “It seemed like a good idea to show up and say, ‘Merry Christmas,’ but now I kinda feel like a dweeb.”
She laughed and stepped onto the porch, pulling the door shut behind her. “You’re definitely not a ‘dweeb.’ Merry Christmas.”
Relief washed over his features, and she noticed just how good-looking he was with his hair mussed and a bit of embarrassment still clinging to him.
“Come in,” she said, then, glancing up at the sprig of mistletoe her father had tacked over the porch, kissed his cheek. “Payback,” she said, pointing up.
His grin widened.
“Gotcha!” she said, realizing she was actually flirting with him as she led him into the house. In the kitchen her mother, a tissue pressed under her eyes, was just hanging up the phone. “Sorry, I . . . didn’t hear you come in,” she said. “I was just talking to Natalie and Adam.”
“Adam was on the phone, too?” Megan asked, and her heart dropped. She’d missed a chance to talk to him!
“Yes, Meg. Oh! He told me to give you his love.”
She felt as if a thunderbolt had struck her. His LOVE. Oh. God. Then she blinked and realized it was just an expression, a greeting from her new brother-in-law. Still . . .
“He also wished you good luck with the debating team. You know your father,” her mother said with a roll of her expressive eyes. “He brought it up again!”
Megan cringed. “I wish he wouldn’t. I’m not . . . I’m not sure that I’m even going to try out.” Now who sounded like a “dweeb”?
“Of course you are,” her father, hearing the tail end of the conversation, said. He nodded at Chris and placed a hand on Megan’s shoulder. “You’re the one who said you wanted to become a lawyer, right?”
Megan wanted to wither through the floor even though it was kinda cool that her father was so proud of her. Inwardly she wondered if he, a little disappointed that Natalie had decided to marry so young, had turned all of his own ambitions toward his youngest. Megan had heard it whispered that at one time he, too, had hoped to become an attorney. Until he’d gotten married in a rush as Natalie was on the way. No one had ever admitted it, of course, but Megan had done the math and didn’t buy the whole “premature” thing, as Natalie had been born at over seven pounds with a full head of hair.
Besides, it wasn’t that Megan had changed her dreams; it was just that she wasn’t sure she was ready to share all her deep, dark desires with Chris just yet. “Maybe a lawyer,” she admitted, and her father scowled.
“Never give up on your dreams, Meg. Never.”
Her parents exchanged glances that held stories Megan couldn’t hope to understand, and her mother reached for her pack of Virginia Slims sitting on the counter.
“No ‘maybe’ about college or law school!” her dad insisted. Then, a little more calmly, he added to Chris, “Megan here is the top of her class. Straight A’s all through high school. Colleges already interested.” He was actually beaming. Once more, Megan wanted to die. This attitude was beginning to be a habit, but her mother, shaking out a long cigarette, came to her rescue. “Jim, stop it.” Then, as she found her lighter, Carol Simmons added, “Don’t listen to your father’s blustering, Meg. You know how he is—every once in a while he gets up on his soapbox and gives all of us the benefit of his years of wisdom. You go out for the team if you want to, but don’t you feel that you’re pushed into it! And, as for you”—she scowled in her husband’s direction—“why don’t you go put som
e more logs on the fire in the study? Or . . . something?” With that she slipped on a thick sweater and stepped onto the patio, where she lit up.
Later, after a few hours of television and leftovers, her parents finally went upstairs to bed.
When her parents had left the room, and their soft footsteps echoed from upstairs, Chris turned to her and winked. “Alone at last!”
For the first time that day, Megan was a little nervous. She had never been alone with him really, and that wasn’t the only problem. Even at seventeen she’d rarely gone out on a date alone with a boy; she’d mainly hung out with a group of friends.
So now, on the couch, the television flickering and the fire dying, she felt a little awkward. When Chris leaned in to kiss her, she closed her eyes and felt his lips touch hers tentatively at first and then a little harder. A warmth spread through her blood, turning her bones liquid, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him back.
So this is how it feels, she thought as he held her close and she heard her own blood rushing in her ears. The world seemed to spin, to shine, and she wondered about letting go, touching him, feeling his body closer still.
A floorboard creaked overhead, and she nearly jumped out of her skin. She pushed him back and, breathing with a little difficulty, shook her head. “This . . . this isn’t smart.”
“Nothing happened,” he said, but his eyes had darkened, and she knew he’d felt that same adrenaline rush as she had. His own breathing was ragged, his lips swollen, and she swallowed hard just thinking of the feel of his mouth upon hers.
“I know, I know, but . . . you know, Mom and Dad are just upstairs.”
“We could go somewhere.”
“No.” She couldn’t leave; her parents would have a fit. She wanted to kiss him again, to let him touch her, to let that wild child within her rise up and experience all there was to life, to step across those unwritten lines, to reach out, to live a little and . . . oh, God, no! She slammed that door shut, put that wayward imp back into a dark corner of her mind. This was happening much too fast. Thinking of doing more than just kissing Chris was a mistake. It was just way too soon.
“It’s Adam, isn’t it?” he said suddenly, and her head snapped up.
“Adam?” Her gaze found his, and she saw a bit of pain in the blue depths of his eyes. “I mean, why would you think that—”
“Because you’re in love with him.”
The accusation seemed to hang in the air between them, a dark, nasty idea, but the raw, unaltered truth.
“No.” She shook her head, her tongue nearly tripping on the lie. “Adam? He’s . . . he’s Natalie’s husband.” Even now the word was hard to say and seemed to stick in her throat.
“Leslie said something to Ken.”
Megan closed her eyes and wanted to strangle her friend. “About Adam and me?”
“About your fantasizing about him.”
“I don’t . . .” She started to argue, but let the words die away.
“About your thinking you’re in love with him.” Chris sighed. “And I saw it at the wedding. There you were, this beautiful girl with a fake smile and sad eyes. You couldn’t give me, or anyone but Adam, the time of day. It pissed me off.”
She felt suddenly miserable. How many people had noticed? Her mom, Natalie, maybe even Adam himself! Just the thought of it made her uncomfortable.
“So,” he said, reaching for her hand and linking his fingers through hers, “I did something a little mean.”
“What?” she asked, intrigued, and she saw a muscle work in his jaw.
“I decided to teach you a lesson.”
“A lesson?” she repeated as she was beginning to understand. The kiss under the mistletoe. Oh, God, it had been some kind of backhanded joke?
“But, of course, it backfired. I kissed you and . . . Wow.” He actually blushed. “It was crazy-good. And there we were in front of everyone. It was stupid.”
She shook her head. “No, Chris. It was wonderful.”
“Yeah, well, I thought so, too, and so instead of teaching you a lesson, it taught me one.”
His self-deprecating smile was absolutely the sexiest thing she’d ever seen.
“So what about Adam?” he said.
“He’s my brother-in-law. And yeah, I did have this whole fantasy thing going with him. An older guy, I guess.”
“Is it over?”
Was it? She didn’t really know, but she wasn’t about to spoil this moment, so she lied, right then and there, staring into his worried eyes, touching his cheek with the tips of her fingers. “Of course it is, silly. Otherwise would I be here on this couch with you wondering how I could get you to kiss me again?”
“That’s the easy part,” he said, and kissed her just as she heard her father’s heavy tread on the stairs. He lifted his head and swung to his feet. “I’ll call you,” he promised, and left as suddenly as he’d shown up on her doorstep.
From the window she watched him drive away, her gaze following the taillights of his car as it disappeared through a curtain of snow, the cat winding herself between Megan’s ankles while Megan wondered if she could really ever give up dreaming of her sister’s husband. God, she was a fool. And Chris? She sighed inwardly and wished she could kiss him one more time. Maybe then she wouldn’t be lying when she said she wasn’t in love with Adam.
Chapter 9
As it turned out she wasn’t the only liar.
Chris didn’t call.
Megan told herself she wasn’t waiting for him though she jumped every time the phone rang. And things just got worse. She and Leslie braved the mall on the Monday after Christmas because Leslie wanted something new for her upcoming date with Ken. “I’ve got to get something cooler, you know, sexier,” Leslie confided as they walked into the third boutique. “I know it sounds dumb, but Ken and I aren’t going on this sledding thing alone. Guess who’s coming along?”
Oh. God. Chris. And another girl. Megan’s heart did a nosedive, and she realized how much the thought of Chris with someone else hurt.
“Claire and Brad,” Leslie said, and Megan didn’t know whether to be happy or disgusted. As Leslie picked up a sweater and set it back, she said, “I know, it’s kind of weird. Brad’s car is in the shop or something and he can’t get his dad’s, so anyway Ken’s driving up to Mohawk Mountain for New Year’s Eve.”
Megan continued to browse through the sale racks, pushing the hangers a little too quickly as Leslie rattled on about the proposed trip. Somehow, she felt betrayed that Leslie was going to be on a double date with Claire Wakefield. It wasn’t Leslie’s fault—or Ken’s for that matter—but still it was painful.
“Meg, have you been listening to what I’ve said?”
“Oh, yes, I’m just a little surprised, that’s all.”
“I thought that maybe you knew all about it,” Leslie apologized. “Didn’t Chris tell you?”
“I haven’t seen Chris for a while,” Megan admitted, and was surprised at how sad that made her. When had she become dependent on a boy to make her happy?
“Why not?”
“Well, thanks to you, Chris figured out that I thought I was in love with Adam.”
“Ouch,” Leslie said, then said, “ ‘Thought’ you were. As in no more? Come on!”
“I just don’t know.” That was the truth of it.
“Why didn’t you just lie?”
“I didn’t want to start out lying, you know. Seemed like a bad idea.”
“A bad idea was admitting that you had a thing for Adam.”
“Maybe.”
“You need to fix that.”
“I think it’s okay.”
“You’d better make sure. Or someone should.” Leslie sent her a disbelieving glare, and Megan caught her drift. She skirted the sale rack and saw a sales person eyeing her, as if she expected her to shoplift. Pulling Leslie out of the store, Megan said, “Don’t get any ideas. I’ll handle this.”
“Okay, okay,” Leslie said, pa
lms up, and they started shopping in earnest. By the time Megan got home, she was tired. The house was empty, her parents having gone out, no messages on the phone. “What did you expect?” she muttered, noticing that some of the Christmas decorations had begun to lose their luster; unlit red candles sat on the table with half-burned bits of blackened wick visible. Even the bright red holly berries on the mantel had started to wither and darken as if in anticipation of the season’s end.
And how about you, Megan Simmons? she asked herself as she waited for Madonna to shoot into her room before shutting the door. What will you do when vacation’s over and the sparkle of Christmas is gone? Will Chris ever call you again, or was your relationship with him just a holiday fantasy?
She flopped onto the bed and remembered when all of her unhappiness had begun, two years earlier when Adam had come into her life. No. That wasn’t quite right, she reminded herself. He had come into Natalie’s life.
Tired, Megan let her heavy lids drop over her eyes as she conjured up Adam’s handsome face: olive skin with a nobility and a slight arrogance; his dark green eyes were nearly liquid. How could he unwittingly have caused her so many heartaches? Then Adam’s image shifted, and she found herself looking into the blue eyes of Chris Johnson. He seemed amused, a dimple twitching in his cheek.
In her fantasy, they were beneath some sort of arbor, which was covered with mistletoe. Hundreds of people were watching them, and from the corner of her eye, she could see Natalie dancing with Adam. Natalie was wearing her wedding gown while Megan saw herself in faded jeans and an old sweatshirt with CENTRAL HIGH DEBATING TEAM on its front. Embarrassed and feeling out of place, she wanted to run and hide, or at least change into something more appropriate. She couldn’t! Chris refused to let her go, his bright eyes twinkling with mischief.