Of Smoke & Cinnamon: A Christmas Story

by Ace Gray

  Trigg catches me staring once or twice. Her eyebrows ask me what’s up but there’s no way to communicate that I’ve softened. Things look different because of her words, vanilla ice cream, even the dog I’d dropped at the shelter. They’d made me look at the past from a different angle. Like maybe I’d been upside down on a park bench for far too long.

  When we finally leave the bar, I’m tempted to pick a seat right next to her, I think about offering up my lap, but everyone is watching. Their thoughts are written plain for both of us to see. Each and every one of them is wondering how we could have gotten that close, that electric, over top of the bar. Hell, I’m wondering.

  But the way she looked back at me makes me think she might be reconsidering the past thirteen years too.

  If I did in fact break her heart, if I’ve been loathing myself rather than the one that got away, if this new version of the story were true, then the way she looked at me tonight erased everything. No, obliterated it.

  There was forgiveness, sweetness, sass, and moreover, want, but I couldn’t tell for what.

  God, I want to ask her. But I decide to keep my mouth shut for the moment, not wanting to pop this perfect bubble of a night.

  So I watch her, study the way her head tilts, the way her lips move, and the way her face brightens when she laughs. It’s so different and yet so completely the same. I can’t keep my eyes off her when she barrels out of the bar arm in arm with Trigg’s girlfriend. Trigg was terrified to introduce her to everyone, small towns equaling small minds so often, but Cam isn’t fazed. Even when Cass smacks her ass, she just laughs heartily and slides into Bobby’s truck.

  And her big, wide open heart makes me fall for Cam all over again as if I haven’t tumbled enough.

  Bobby and Darren’s trucks are time machines. Somehow sixteen of us pile into cabs, beds, laps, opening all the windows so we fit. It’s bigger, stronger, and sometimes beer bellied versions of the people that did this years ago. We pass around flasks, still ducking to take shots when we pass intersections notorious for cops. Though Officer Pritchers is on duty tonight and I’m pretty sure Tony will just laugh and maybe break long enough to join us.

  The college hill is a huge, steep hill built up to accommodate the division three stadium that sits behind it. It’s longer than the field itself so only half is bathed in streetlights until exactly midnight. Then the lights go out allowing magic and mayhem to really begin.

  We all scramble from the cars when we park, a group of obnoxious Fireball clowns more than anything, and laughter dances on the wind until White Christmas replaces it.

  The voice singing belongs to a siren, and not just one sent to doom me. Besides science, Cam was only ever really into choir. She had the voice of an angel, won most solos in show choir and would practice until her throat went raw so her nerves wouldn’t get the best of her. Those nights, the ones when she sang on the wind, were some of the most soothing ones of my life. She sang when my dad was diagnosed. I dreamt about it when he died.

  And now she’s singing her favorite Christmas carol for us all to hear, emboldened by cinnamon whiskey.

  I stutter step and try not to lose my footing. When she breaks free of Cass and Trigg and throws her hands out to the sides, whirling like the cool wind, my heart—among other things—swells.

  All too soon, Mike interrupts her, swooping in, scooping her up and throwing her over his shoulder, shouting something slightly coherent about her eating shit in the snow. He’s right, but I’m pissed she didn’t finish the song. And that I didn’t grab her first.

  Tasting the cherry of her bourbon on my lips, I make up my mind. I won’t let that opportunity slip by again. Judgement and pasts be damned.

  We toss sleds at the top of the hill, they bump and jostle around, smacking into each other. Inevitably one is hit hard enough that it starts sliding down the hill without a passenger. Jake runs part of the way down the hill to catch it, but whether booze or gravity, forces conspire against him and he topples head first then comes to a stop. Boisterous laughter and teasing all around echoes against the night sky.

  Mike sets down Cam but he’s staying close, preparing a toboggan so she can sit in front of him. The idea of her notched between his thighs makes a primal snarl vibrate my chest. Without hesitating, I grab a tube by the handle and stride purposefully toward her. I don’t ask, I don’t pause, I just throw the tube down, plop in and pull her into my lap in one swift movement.

  Cam squeals but she folds without complaint and nestles into my chest. I shove off before either of us has a chance to look around. The wind whips past us stinging cheeks and eyes but only enough to feel alive. Certainly nothing her heart beating against mine and giddy laughter can’t warm against.

  The tube flies far once we hit the flats of the practice field below the hill, rubber on the slick snow rocketing farther than the other sleds usually reach. We spin and spiral across far enough to see everyone rolling down behind us.

  “Oh, AJ…” Cam can barely get my name out between laughs and short breaths. “…I forgot what this was like.” She sounds surprised and relieved all at once.

  I let the tube peter itself out before wrapping my hands around her hips and pushing her to standing. She’s not even remotely unsteady but she cups her hand over mine as if to find her balance all the same.

  “Thank you.” She turns when she’s decided she’s stable and reaches out to me.

  Honestly, I’m concerned that she’ll topple if I grab her, but I can’t resist. She braces against my weight with a strength I didn’t think her slight frame had. She tugs hard enough that I’m pulled up, over and off balance. We’re going down and it’s all I can do to get an arm around her and brace for impact.

  We land nose to nose with me pressed firmly against her chest. I got my hand down fast enough to soften the blow and when the crunch of the snow beneath us silences, she’s laughing softly and making zero effort to move. Her hand comes to my chest but it doesn’t push, it caresses then curls into my jacket.

  “Cam’s natural grace is contagious apparently,” Mike says roughly from behind, or rather, above me. Her hand releases from my jacket.

  His voice has punctured the moment and it’s lost, forever gone. Everyone surrounds us and I push up and away. She pushes to her feet but does so gently. I snatch the tube from the snow and try not to stomp off toward the hill. Particularly because everyone else is laughing and telling jokes and stories and filling the air with the sound of youth. Sounds that ruin the quiet moment between Cam and I.

  “Hey, don’t walk so fast.” Cam’s voice is crystal clear even through the ruckus. It pulls me up short and she almost smacks into me.

  When I turn to look at her, she’s smiling shyly. I stare into her beautiful eyes and they seem illuminated from somewhere deep within. When I stare a little too long, she looks away, suddenly interested in the foot tracks we’ve crunched through the snow. I want to grab her chin and turn her toward me. I want to tell her that those little displays of emotion may well keep me alive for the next thirteen years. But everyone is closing in so I just start walking.

  Somehow Cam manages in the snow and her wedge boots. Selfishly I’m glad she’s wearing them. When I let her pass in front of me, the way they make her calves and ass flex should be illegal. I can’t help but imagine her bare legs balanced on top of scandalous stilettos.

  Cass and Trigg steal her next. Maria after that. Mike does in fact grab her, too. I can’t help but beam when she refuses to sit between his knees and instead opts for behind him, holding the toboggan reins.

  The city lights go out at midnight and the moon shines silver down on the snow. Everything looks like glitter, the magical kind. The shadows are blue and black where they fall across the landscape and my friends.

  I take a swig off one of the flasks that we’ve been passing around, then Derrick swipes it and shoots off down the hill. I laugh loudly—Fireball loud—and there is a matching peel of shimmering laughter from the other side
of where Derrick was.

  Cam.

  I look around and somehow, we’ve managed to become the only two people left standing on top of the hill. Everyone else is in varying stages of descent. When Cam notices, she crosses the small divide between us. For a split second, she looks so deeply into my eyes, she sees my heart, but then she turns to watch everyone tumbling down the hill.

  “I never got a chance to say sorry about your dad. I only found out the other night.” She leans her head on my shoulder.

  It’s the first time I haven’t been angry when someone said they’re sorry.

  “Is that why you looked like the world was ending at the hockey game?” I can’t help but wrap my arm around her, resting it at her hip.

  “Yeah.” She turns and contours her body to mine. I’ve gotten stronger, more muscled since high school, and she seems smaller, more delicate, but somehow, we still fit together. Even through bulky winter coats.

  “Despite everything, I wanted to call.”

  “Whatever’s happened between us, I would have come.” She nuzzles against me.

  And I can’t help myself. “What did happen between us?” I barely breathe the words that have been rolling through my head since yesterday morning.

  “What do you mean, what happened?” she asks as if I should know but she doesn’t pull her body from mine.

  “I thought I knew, but…”

  “You guys are no fun,” Mike yells as he bolts up the hill.

  And he’s angry, not just teasing. He’s been angling at Cam since he walked in the bar with her the other night. Now that he’s seen us back like us, he’s reacting like the prick he was in high school. He tosses the toboggan only meaning to release frustration but I see it for what it is.

  A Cam bomb.

  It’s heading for her knees. I try to get her out of the way but only manage to turn her so the sled can collide with the back of her legs. She’s teetering immediately, her hands clutching for me—for anything—but she’d been leaning against my body, not latched on.

  She tumbles. Onto the sled. Her hip hits first, and hard, then she twists trying to catch herself and hits her head.

  “Cam!” I bellow just as the damn sled starts down the hill with a battered little body on top.

  Everyone is skittering, tumbling, bolting down the hill after her. After a few yards, she rolls off and her hands move to cup her eye. I’ve never run so fast in my life, even folding my back leg and sliding to her like she’s home base.

  “Cam,” I cry out as I skid past her, then scramble back to collect her body in my arms. “Cam, are you okay?” I can feel her shoulders shaking with unshed tears.

  Feet and bodies and voices surround us but none of them register. I need the little form in my arms to say something. My world hinges on it.

  “Lamb…” Her nickname is a slip that everyone catches, and I don’t give a damn. “Lamb, are you, okay?”

  She rolls into my chest and wordlessly lets her hand drop from her eye.

  “Shit. Derrick, get the car.”

  Blood is streaming down her face from a deep gash above her eyebrow. I’ve seen Cam bleed enough to know two things. One, her body makes it abundantly clear when it needs stitches. Two, it will always terrify me.

  This time is no different.

  Effortlessly, I scoop her up and bolt behind Derrick to the car. Trigg, Cass, and Mike are closest behind. It takes everything in me not to tell them to fuck off as we speed the three blocks to the ER.

  “If I Could Turn Back Time” Cher

  There are only two situations that I have ever been able to tolerate being the center of attention. Otherwise my skin crawls, my shoulders shoot up and I want to burrow into my stomach and hide away for awhile.

  One is when I’m getting stitches. The doctor, nurses, my family, and AJ are always locked on me while they sew. I can sit there calmly, with relaxed shoulders, and tolerate any number of eyeballs. When I tripped and fell hiking the summer after junior year, I hit a tree branch. I got twenty-two tiny blue knots. AJ carried me all the way to the car and I didn’t flinch as everyone watched the needle punch in and out of my skin.

  The only other time I can manage is when I sing. These days it’s almost exclusively karaoke. I’m the queen of power ballads and it shocks people when I belt Whitney like Whitney.

  Both scenarios mesh in my mind as AJ watches me carefully. He’s so intent and intense, concern wrinkling his face, that my heart is spattering around a bit. Every time I look over, he’s watching me the way he did when we sat here as high schoolers. The way he did when we were in love and I was sure I’d grow old with him.

  Which is exactly why I’m thinking about karaoke. Cher more specifically. I can nail “If I Could Turn Back Time,” even add performance elements. I work the crowd, point fingers and stomp around in stilettos, keeping time with the music. Mouths usually drop open.

  And now the words are oddly appropriate.

  Why’d we do the things we did. I don’t know why we said the things we said.

  Ego.

  World’s shattered, we were torn apart. Like someone took a knife and drove it deep into my heart.

  Somedays I still think it’s still stuck. I want to whisper over to him, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I didn’t want to see you go.

  Maybe I’d even mention that, if I could reach the stars, I’d give them all to him.

  Then he’d love me, love me, like he used to do. A silent prayer…

  I’m singing the lyrics in tandem with the conversation I wish I could have with him. Either I’m in shock or my inner turmoil has gone and bubbled over.

  “Well good to know some things never change.” A familiar and kind voice comes from behind a clipboard. “AJ Jenkins sitting with Cam Collins, waiting for stitches.” Dr. Garcia tosses the clipboard on the foot of the bed.

  He’s gone completely white since the last time I saw him—the last time he stitched me up—and he has more laugh lines, but otherwise, he’s right, nothing has changed.

  “So what happened,” he asks as he gently cradles my chin and inspects my brow.

  I tell Dr. Garcia and while simple words come out of my mouth, the complex conversation AJ and I were having when I was hit by the sled rushes back.

  On second thought, everything has changed.

  Dr. Garcia gets me patched up and mercifully spares me the lecture about aftercare or being more cautious. He’s given it many times to both AJ and I. He opts instead for, “It’s good to see you Cam, but not in here.” He knocks me on my shoulder. “And you AJ, good to see you off duty as well.”

  We both smile and AJ collects my things then helps me off the bed. He keeps his hand firmly at my elbow like he’s expecting a rogue sled to attack me all over again. Like he’s always done as we walk out of here.

  “Are they all…?” I trail off worried that I’m going to have to face all fourteen people from the hill in the waiting room. That attention doesn’t suit me at all.

  “No.” AJ knows immediately what I’m asking. “I got Trigg to take them all back to the bar.”

  Why can’t we turn back time? Why didn’t I talk to him back then? Why did I let this man go?

  Because when it really mattered he picked a life without me.

  And there it is. Without thinking about it, Cher has reminded me words are weapons and they’re worse than the wound sometimes. And his words from thirteen years ago...

  I smile and nod as we weave through the hospital but I’m numb. And not from anesthesia. Everyone says hi to AJ, they tell him about people he’s brought into the ER, they throw the life he chose to build without me in my face.

  “Can I borrow your phone?” I ask as soon as we break into the fresh air.

  “Course.” His grip gets tighter on me as he digs.

  I both love and hate how he holds me.

  As soon as he hands me the phone, I dial my mom. I don’t know whether she’ll laugh or cry when she hears where I am.

  “I can take
you home,” AJ says quietly as soon as I hang up with a barely amused mother.

  “We’ve been drinking for hours, Jay. Pretty sure everyone in town knows it too. It’s not the best idea.”

  He nods aimlessly beside me. When we sit on a lone bench under the same silver moon and the tiny twinkle shards of stars that had been watching us sled, he finally lets go of my elbow. Opting instead to scoot close enough to press his whole side against me and throw his arm over my shoulder. I sag into the familiar crook that I’m convinced is still shaped like me. I want to stay there for eternity, in that little notch. But that would require turning back time.

  “You really don’t know?” I whisper into the night.

  “Know what, Lamb?”

  And in that moment, I’m sure he doesn’t. He thinks I’m the bad guy, the one tromping on hearts. He thinks I’ve been that way for thirteen years. AJ is twisting a knife he honestly doesn’t know exists, particularly with my nickname on his tongue.

  “Why my heart broke first?” I ask, determined to get this out now.

  He stiffens underneath me.

  “No. I’ve been busy worrying about my broken heart for thirteen years. That one threw me for a loop.”

  “Do you remember when your dad first got sick.” The words are sticky in my mouth.

  “Yeah.” He clears his throat but stumbles on the simple word.

  “Then that first appointment with the specialist in Denver?”

  “When they said it wasn’t a matter of if, but when?” His tone stabs at my insides.

  I nod into the crick of his shoulder.

  As clearly as yesterday, I can recall that appointment. AJ begged me to come if only so he could hold my hand. And I’d been so glad I said yes when they delivered that awful blow. Because bad news like that hits like a sucker punch you see coming. You brace for it, thinking that you can dodge the impact, protect yourself from it, but really it hurts so much worse because you were already tense.

  “When we got home, I offered to make your dad that horrible green drink he loved so you and your mom could have a moment, anything to make him comfortable and help heal you.”