“All right,” Gracie laughs. “I will put in your order.”
I shake my head as Gracie turns and walks away. “You are a pain in the ass, Ma, but we love you.”
She shrugs her shoulders. Most moms would probably be upset with their children for saying something like that, but not mine. She knows she is a pain in the ass. Leaning back, she cranes her neck in an attempt to hear what Aidan and the woman he is sitting with are talking about. Whatever it is, they are doing a good job keeping their voices low. I can’t hear a thing they are saying.
“Aidan, tell Blaire about the time I caught you and the Simmons girl kissing when you guys were about eight and ya’ll said -”
“Mother!” Aidan yells out.
Mom throws her head back, laughing loudly as Aidan apologizes profusely to his new friend.
“Oh, this is fun,” she says, wiping her eyes with her fingertips.
Gracie appears back at the table just then, setting my bowl of soup down in front of me and a garden salad doused heavily in ranch dressing in front of mom. Mom glances down at the salad, staring at it for a moment before her eyes roam slowly up Gracie’s body, locking in on her eyes with a hard stare. Gracie throws her hands up in front of her and takes a step back.
“I gave Nathanial your order… He said, and these are his exact words, if you want a strawberry salad, you are more than welcome to go back into the kitchen and make it yourself as he needs to tend to the paying customers.”
“Ohhh that boy.” Mom shakes her head as if she is really offended.
“If you go back into the kitchen and start prepping food, I need to put you on payroll. If I put you on payroll than I won’t have the money, or a position, to offer to Blaire, which I have to do since you told her I would find a position for her,” Aidan calls from his booth. “Think carefully about your next move. Am I hiring you or her? Do you really need that salad that badly?”
Mom snatches her fork, stabs it at her overly dressed salad and takes a big bite. “My, isn’t this delicious.”
Picking up my mug, I bring it to my lips and quickly down my soup, relishing in the warmth that rushes through my chest. Setting my mug down, I stand up and toss a couple of bucks down on the table. “It’s been fun, Ma, but I have to go.”
I lean in to kiss Gracie quickly on the cheek before turning to walk out with my mom yelling out at me to stop by for dinner. I leave my Jeep parked in front of the diner as I walk quickly down the street. That’s the one nice thing about this little town. Most things are within walking distance of each other. I walk down the street to a big brick building that I have spent more time in than I would have cared to in the last few years. I nod to a couple of people as I walk inside, straight up to the front of the room.
“My name is Travis. I am an addict and an alcoholic…”
Chapter Thirty
Gracie
For nearly three weeks I have been trying to get Travis to decorate for Christmas. Turns out, he is the true definition of a Grinch…who knew.
“Son of a…dammit!” Travis yells out.
I suck my lower lip in to keep from laughing out loud. He glares down at me from the ladder he is standing on as he strings Christmas lights around the trim of his house.
“Are you laughing at me?” he growls. “Because this is your doing. I never had any interest in decorating for Christmas and then you come along.”
Travis steps down from the ladder, grabs me by my hips and pulls my body against his. Dipping his head down, he grazes his teeth along my neck.
“Put up Christmas lights, Travis. Stop being a Scrooge, Travis. It’s the best time of the year, Travis. You’ll find yourself immersed in Christmas spirit, Travis,” he says, using a girly voice to do his best impression of me. “Bah fucking humbug.”
“Is now not a good time to remind you that we really needs to get a Christmas tree?” I ask as his hands round over my bottom and give it a squeeze.
Travis pulls back and gives me a dirty look. “More decorating?”
“We have to have a tree, Travis.” I whine.
“For what? We have no kids. I go to my parents’ Christmas morning and they will have a tree there. That is the only tree I need,” he says.
“Yeah, well I have no Christmas tree. I have no mother’s house to go to on Christmas morning.”
“You’re kidding me, right?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. “Have you forgotten who my mother is? She probably already has a little Christmas ball with your name on it to put on your spot at the table.”
“You’re right, she probably does, but I didn’t want to just assume I was going to be invited.”
“Gracie, as long as we are together, if there is a holiday or some other family obligation, assume you are invited. Even if we were to break up, I’m sure my mother would still invite you.”
“Wouldn’t that be awkward?” I laugh.
“Absolutely, but you and I are on Connie Foster’s ‘first comes love, then comes marriage’ radar. Once you get on that, you don’t get off. She’s already decided we are getting married so it doesn’t matter what we want. We could split up and you could move to France and she would still have it in her mind that we would find our way back to each other and get married someday.”
Travis turns back towards the house and puts his hands on his hips. He wasn’t particularly thrilled when I insisted that he hang Christmas lights up outside. He was even less thrilled when I found one of those gigantic inflatable kaleidoscope snowmen on clearance at the general store. Especially when a couple of his neighbors stopped by to bring him Christmas cookies and tell them how much they liked his decorations.
“Is this enough?” he asks.
“There are still some lights left, you could arrange them to look like giant snowflakes on the windows,” I say, giving him my best poker face. I’m not sure how good of a one it is since I am fighting the urge to erupt into a fit of giggles.
“Do you want a tree or snowflakes on the window?” he asks. “Cause you’re getting one or the other.”
My poker face drops then and I clap my lips together to suppress a laugh. “I’ll take the tree.”
Travis leans in close, his lips grazing along my ear. “Good choice. Let me grab my keys and we’ll go.”
~*~
“How’s this one?” Travis asks, pointing to the very first tree he sees. “It’s even got decorations on it already.”
“That tree is set up to advertise their lot.” I laugh.
“So? It’s a Christmas tree. We can ask them to take the decorations off if you don’t want them.”
“Travis! There are a hundred trees inside the lot! I’m not going to ask them to take the decorations off of this tree because you are too much of a Grinch to go inside and pick another one.”
Travis grumbles under his breath as he glances over at one of the lot attendants. For a moment I think he is going to call the guy over and ask him about the decorated tree, but he doesn’t. Instead, he turns towards the lot and begrudgingly heads towards the rest of the trees.
Thirty minutes later we are standing in my living room, staring at the Christmas tree we purchased. Which literally was the very first tree Travis grabbed inside of the lot.
“I think it looks nice,” he says. “A little bit lopsided maybe, but I think it gives the tree character or whatever…do you have decorations?”
I raise an eyebrow. He spent the last half hour doing nothing but complaining about the tree, and now he is asking about decorations?
“My grandmother’s are in a box in the attic,” I say.
Travis nods and disappears from the room, returning a few moments later with a cardboard box marked “Christmas Decorations”.
“Are you going to help me decorate it?” I ask.
He furrows his brow. “Of course, why wouldn’t I?”
“Uhhh, let’s see…I hate this fucking tree. Damn thing can stay bare for all I fucking care. Every other tree in this damn town is going to be decked out in
balls and lights and shit except for this fucking sap-infested thing,” I say, mimicking the very words he spewed out only moments before.
Travis responds by opening the box and pulling out a container of lights. He doesn’t say anything as he carries them over to the tree and begins to wind them through the branches. While he does that, I go into the kitchen and fill a watering can up with water for the tree.
“I never thought I would be doing this,” he says as I walk back into the living room with the watering can. I bend down, reaching under the tree to fill the tree stand up with water.
“What’s that?” I ask, sitting back on my heels, watching as he finishes putting the lights on and plugs them in.
“Decorating a Christmas tree with a girlfriend.” He glances back at me with a slight frown on his face. “You’re domesticating me.”
“Is that a bad thing?” I laugh.
“I haven’t decided yet,” he admits.
Travis walks over to the box of decorations, pulls out a container of green balls and hands it to me. He reaches back inside, pulls out a container of red ones, and walks over to the tree. We move around each other, hanging the balls in different spots around the tree.
“I like having someone to look after, someone to love, who loves me in return, but I was also fine with how my life was before.”
“You were fine with being an asshole?”
“I’m still an asshole,” Travis laughs. “Just not to you.”
Once the balls are on the tree, Travis takes the empty containers and sets them aside. I grab a box filled with random ornaments and set them down on the coffee table. Travis walks over and sifts through them, pulling one out that has a picture of me on it from when I was about five.
“Holy shit, I remember you!” Travis exclaims.
“What?” I ask, frowning as I take the ornament out of his hands and study it. The picture was taken during one of my summers here. My hair was up in pigtails and I was wearing a light blue and white plaid bubble romper.
Travis moves behind me, slipping one arm around my waist as he points to the picture with his free hand. “It isn’t anything big. I remember being at the lake and the ice cream man came. I was so excited because I had some birthday money and I was able to get a bubble play - one of those pink ice cream mitts with a big bubble gum baseball. I remember seeing this little girl standing off to the side and I felt bad for her because she wanted a push pop and her mom wouldn’t let her have one.”
“She never let me get anything from the ice cream man. She told me he…well, it doesn’t matter what she told me. She was crazy. I can’t believe you remember that.”
“I didn’t till I saw this picture. I almost gave you a bite of my ice cream but I was a selfish little shit and I wanted the whole thing for myself.”
I dip my head back and laugh out loud. “That’s okay. My mother probably would have had a fit if she saw me sharing your ice cream.”
“You never talk about her,” Travis says as we continue to decorate the tree.
“There isn’t much to say.” I shrug. “She was controlling and manipulative. I moved out the day I turned eighteen and I haven’t spoken to her since.”
“Do you ever miss her?”
I can feel Travis’s eyes on me, but I don’t turn to him. My mother isn’t particularly at the top of my list of things I enjoy discussing. The truth is, I haven’t missed her one time in the last six years. I didn’t shed a single tear when I left her home and I haven’t regretted it since. She obviously hasn’t either, since it was a cousin of hers that contacted me to let me know about my grandmother’s passing and the reading of the will. My mother didn’t even bother to show up for her own mother’s funeral. Truth be told, I thought she would show up to make the event all about her, like she always did. Instead, she went on a cruise to the Bahamas.
“No. I’m sure that makes me sound like a terrible person, but I don’t miss her. I haven’t since I left and I probably never will.”
We finish decorating the tree in silence. Me feeling slightly bitter at thoughts of my mother in my head, and Travis probably has no idea what to say at the moment. Tree decorating is one of those moments where nothing needs to be said, so we both act like we are in the Christmas spirit. Then we are done and I know we have to face the words that just came out of my mouth. Maybe there is a part of me that feels wrong for the way I feel about my mother, but I can’t help it. She hasn’t exactly done anything to make me feel differently about her.
Travis grabs a hold of my arm and pulls me backwards, causing us to fall onto the couch together. His arms wrap tightly around me, his lips graze the side of my head.
“That doesn’t make you a terrible person, Gracie, just an honest one.”
“The tree looks pretty good,” I say, ready to change the subject. “Even if it is slightly lopsided.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Travis
My mother squeals with delight as she opens the door and takes a step back to let me and Gracie in on Christmas morning. She immediately grabs Gracie’s arm and drags her down the hallway into the kitchen.
“I can’t tell you how excited I am that you are joining us. Travis has never brought a girl for Christmas,” she blabbers on.
I roll my eyes as I clench my hands around the handles of the bags containing everyone’s gifts. Although she is slightly annoying, I am glad for the distraction my mother provides. I had no idea what to get Gracie for Christmas. I never had a girlfriend to buy a Christmas present for that wasn’t drug or alcohol related. I feel like there is even more pressure for this Christmas to be memorable because it is our first one together. The last thing I want is to ruin it by getting her a crappy gift.
“Mom stayed up nearly all night long,” Liam tells me as I walk into the living room where everyone else is gathered. “She says she needed everything to be perfect for Gracie’s first Christmas with us.”
“Good, maybe she will take some pressure off of me then,” I mutter.
I set everyone’s gifts down underneath the tree and settle down into a spot on the floor in front of the fireplace. Gracie walks in a few moments later and sits down in front of me, cuddling close to my body. Mom walks in with a tray of hot cocoa and nearly drops it on the floor.
“You three bums get off of the couch right now!” she says to Remy, Nathanial and Liam. “You know you are to give up your seat for a lady! I taught you better than that!”
Every one erupts into laughter, with the exception of Gracie, whose face turns bright red. She holds out her hands as my brothers jump up at the same time. “Please, it’s fine. I am okay here on the floor with Travis, really.”
“Are you sure?” Mom asks her. “You don’t have to be shy here. If you want to sit on the couch, just tell one of them to move their asses.”
“I promise, I’m fine,” Gracie says.
She sounds so completely mortified that it makes me laugh again, earning me the Connie Foster death stare. I drop my head down into Gracie’s shoulder, pressing a couple of kisses along her skin in an attempt to stop myself from laughing. Her flowery perfume fills my nose, causing my laughing to cease and my pants to tighten. I wonder what the chances are I could convince her to sneak into the guest room with me to tussle under the mistletoe. Probably slim to none. I am about to open my mouth and ask her anyway, when my mom flicks on the TV and images of my brothers and I when we were younger fill the screen.
“What’s this?” Aidan asks.
“They opened up this new store in the mall. You take them your photos and they make a slide show. Cost a small fortune but I think it was worth it,” mom says.
“Now this, I have to see.” Gracie smiles back at me before turning to face the television. Just as she does, a picture of me and Remy dressed in ninja turtle costumes flashes on the screen.
“Oh my God!” Remy groans.
“Oh, you two were so cute,” mom gushes. “Practically twins growing up.”
I am beyond thank
ful when the slide show ends, but then it is time to exchange gifts. Mom opens hers first, then Dad, and then each of us boys in order by age - the same way we have done it for as long as I can remember. The only difference was that Gracie was with us, and she broke the rules by waiting to give me my gift until I gave her hers.
After everyone was done, she hands me a large square gift wrapped in red and white striped wrapping paper. I tear the paper off, balling it up and tossing it into the trash bag that my dad brought in before we started opening presents. Gracie twists her fingers nervously as I pull open the lid of the square box.
The air is knocked out of my lungs as I stare down at the handmade brown leather-bound sketchbook that is nestled softly in the white tissue paper. Setting down the box, my hands dive into her hair, and my lips crash hard against hers. I don’t care that my family is sitting here, everyone fades away as I kiss her with every ounce of passion I possess. Pulling back, I rest my forehead against hers. “That is the single most perfect gift that anyone has ever given me.”
“You really like it?” she asks, as if she had doubted the sheer perfection of her gift.
“I love it, seriously, I can’t wait to use it.”
Gracie bites her lower lip and smiles shyly. My heart rate speeds up as I pick up her gift and give it to her.
“This oughta be good. I don’t think he’s ever bought a chick a gift before,” Remy whispers to Liam, loud enough for everyone to hear. Everyone starts laughing.
“Shut up,” I hiss, causing everyone to laugh louder.
“Bet he Googled ‘Christmas gift ideas for girlfriends’ for ideas on what to get her,” Liam whispers back.
I grab a wad of crumbled up wrapping paper from the trash bag and hurl it at Liam. “I said shut the fuck up.”
Liam goes to throw the wrapping paper back at me, but Mom grabs it before he has a chance. In one swift movement, she turns towards me, winging the paper at me. It bounces off of my head and lands on the floor.
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