by Amy Spalding
“You really don’t have to do this,” I tell Kat while we’re standing in the seemingly miles-long line for cakes, even though we go to Porto’s together every Christmas Eve. “Don’t you want to go hang out with Quinn or something?”
“Duh, no, I always hang out with you on Christmas Eve, and you know it, dork. And Quinn had to go down to Orange County for some family thing anyway.”
“Yikes,” I say, which makes Kat laugh.
“I know. Part of her family is, like, super uptight and conservative, and they’re always like, you look like a boy! You’re never going to get a boyfriend like that! Like, uh, do you think she’s trying to get a boyfriend? It’s like they refuse to see her for who she is.”
“That sucks,” I say. “I like guys and I’d still be angry if someone said I had to dress differently to get one.”
“Right? And Quinn’s so freaking nice, she just sort of deals with it, I guess. I would boycott going or show up looking, like, as gay as possible.”
I really wouldn’t have imagined that someone as out as Quinn would have to deal with family members like that. “Is she OK?”
“Oh, yeah, she’s totally fine. Quinn handles everything, like, super amazingly, you know?”
Actually, what I know is that even math physically stresses Quinn out, but Kat seems to have some alternate Quinn she’s dating who isn’t afraid of anything.
“Why didn’t you preorder your cake?” Kat asks me.
“I forgot. Aren’t you having fun in this line?”
She giggles. “I like hanging out with you no matter what, you goober. So I feel like this is a trick question.”
I notice a ring shimmering on Kat’s index finger, right below her top knuckle. “Is that new?”
“Quinn got it for me for Christmas,” she says. “I think I mentioned once I wanted one of these midi rings, and she found, like, the best one. Plus a little stuffed otter, and she made us, like, a vat of tiramisu. My dad’s totally obsessed with her because of all the food she’s made us, or helped me make.”
“That’s good,” I say. “Considering he clearly hated Matty.”
“Sometimes I think he’s just way more comfortable with me dating a girl and not, like, having some boy steal me away, which I freaking hate,” she says. “You’re so lucky your dad’s not like that.”
I shrug. “I guess.”
“My dad asked my help so he could buy a present for . . .” Kat sighs. “His girlfriend, I guess, is what I have to call her? Diane. He was going to buy her this really fancy candle, which just seemed weird, right?”
“Well, how fancy?”
We both laugh and debate the merits of expensive candles until I finally reach the front of the counter and ask for a Tres Leches cake.
At Kat’s house, I get out my gift for her and she hands me a tiny gift bag overstuffed with sparkly tissue paper.
“Kat, if this is a fancy candle . . .”
She bursts into giggles. “OMG, I wish.”
Wrapped inside the sparkly tissue paper is a sleek pair of blue leather gloves.
“They’re ’cause it gets cold in Michigan,” she tells me. “And that’s one of the Michigan colors!”
“I might not get in,” I tell her. “But, thank you.”
I actually got her jewelry, too, but seeing the sleek little ring on her finger makes me hate my gift so much. It feels so young and in the past now.
“OMG,” Kat says, though, in an excited tone. “My emoji! Where did you find these?”
I shrug. “The internet. It’s amazing what people on Etsy will make.”
She immediately fastens the emoji earrings and takes a selfie for Instagram. It’s stupid to feel some sort of relief being tagged in her photo, but I do anyway.
Kat stays over until Dad’s home from the shop, then she heads home. We’ve promised to hang out first thing on the twenty-sixth as per tradition. Before we could drive, we’d force one of our parents to drive us to the Americana so we could spend our gift cards. Now the thought of the mall seems pretty horrible, but traditions are traditions.
“So I know that you don’t want me to say this, but . . .” Dad gives me a fairly serious look.
“But what?” I ask.
“Don’t you think it’s time that you headed over to your mom’s?”
“Oh.” I shrug. “I can feel that you’re about to make me.”
“Good guess.”
I take my time packing an overnight bag and remember to grab the Tres Leches cake on my way to the door. Dad hasn’t moved, and he gives me what I think he thinks is a genuine smile. But his eyes are sad, and it hits me that I’m saying good-bye to my own dad on Christmas Eve. I hug him as quickly as possible, and make it to my car, out the driveway, and then all the way down Riverside Drive before bursting into tears.
I get up early on Christmas Day, change into my running clothes, and take off from the house. Instinctively, I keep an eye out for Logan, who must be home on break. But of course I’m not dashing through the tiny streets of Magnolia Park, so there’s no chance I’ll run into him. Which is for the best. I think.
Mom (and technically Todd) gave me new running shoes for Christmas last night, and I have to admit they’re lighter on my feet, and I’m looking forward to training in them in the upcoming track season. It’ll be my first without Logan and—seriously, could I stop thinking about Logan for five minutes, even?
The house smells like cinnamon and coffee when I walk back in, exactly like a house should on Christmas morning. Mom’s alone in the kitchen, wearing her fuzzy blue robe that she’s had forever. I can almost pretend nothing’s changed.
“How are the shoes?” she asks.
“Really good. Thanks.” I pour myself a mug of coffee. “The season starts soon.”
“You must be excited.”
I shrug. “It’s always good to be out there again. I can’t really explain it.”
“You don’t have to,” she says. “I can see it on your face when you run.”
“Oh, god! My face gives me away!” I start to laugh, but it collapses in my mouth as Todd walks into the room. He’s not my family. He’s barely more than a stranger. And I’m definitely not home, no matter how this house smells.
“I should head out,” I say, and while I’m prepared for an argument, Mom just nods. Outside I gulp in the fresh air before speeding back, but when I walk inside and it’s only Dad and me, it hits me so hard I could literally fall over. This home is gone, too.
We do our best. Dad’s gone overboard with the fanciest tablet he could have bought—for college, he says—and a huge batch of his homemade cinnamon rolls that are reportedly so labor-intensive that we only have them for Christmas and my birthday. I’m pretty sure my gift pales in comparison—a selection of unusual or hard-to-find spices—but Dad promises he’ll use each of them to make me a special dinner in January.
“Doesn’t that actually make it a gift for me?” I ask. “Another gift?”
“You’ve had a rough year,” Dad says. “You deserve it.”
“You’ve had a rough year, too,” I say, and then we say nothing because what is there to say? We clean up discarded wrapping paper, put away our gifts, and are back in the living room with nothing else to do. I can’t fully blame the lull on Mom’s absence, though it’s not helping. The last couple of years, I’d send Logan a text as things were winding down for the three of us, and suddenly he’d show up in an ugly Christmas sweater, holding a foil-wrapped plate of food and a present his parents insisted he bring for mine. And eventually we’d figure out a way to sneak off and make out.
“We could go see a movie,” Dad suggests. “Isn’t there a new one with that Isaac guy you like so much?”
“Dad.” I have no idea how he latched on to the idea that I have a crush on Oscar Isaac, but it’s not something I feel we need to bond over. Can’t I just innocently find an actor attractive? Oscar Isaac is not going to be my rebound fling.
My phone buzzes, and I promise m
yself that if it’s Logan outside in an ugly sweater and holding a plateful of food that I won’t even glance out the window. But it’s Kat.
“Dad?”
“What’s up, kiddo?”
“Kat’s having a bad day and . . .” I shrug. “I told her she could come over. I’m sure she won’t be here for hours and hours. We can see the movie later, right?”
“Of course,” he says. “I’ll check the listings at all the AMCs.”
There are, inexplicably, three movie theaters within a few blocks of each other over by the mall. It’s like no one thought to ask anyone at their own company if they were building a movie theater in our town, much less where.
The doorbell rings only a few minutes later, and a jolt goes through me. Our house is so clearly lacking Mom. She might not have liked Kat much, but she was still always around. I don’t feel like having The Talk with Kat today, especially if it’s already a bad one for her. But maybe we could have this one horrible day together, and then it could all be past us? It might even feel like a relief.
“Hi.” Kat throws her arms around me before I even really see her. I try hugging back as hard as she is, but I have to force myself. It’s embarrassing enough when I cry when I’m alone; I can’t even imagine having so much emotion that it’s crashing against and then over my inner walls.
“Let’s go to my room.” I lead her down the hallway. “Do you want something? Water or cocoa or juice? God, sorry, why do I keep offering beverages?”
Kat snorts a big, snotty laugh. Her face is red and wet and streaked with mascara and her no-longer-perfect eyeliner. “I don’t need any beverages.”
“What happened?”
She flops down on my bed. “Maybe I will have cocoa, if you really don’t mind.”
I leave her in my room and find Dad in the kitchen. “Kat wants cocoa. I know you don’t approve of mixes, but do we have any?”
He gives me a look as if I suggested painting our house neon green. “I’ll make actual cocoa and bring it to your room. Don’t worry, I’ll knock on your door and leave it outside so you can keep talking privately with Kat.”
“Dad, you don’t have to go that far,” I say, but he waves me off, and I explain to Kat why I’m returning empty-handed.
“No, that’s good,” she says. “Now that I’ve had Quinn’s cocoa I probably can’t go back to a mix.”
I decide to let that go.
Kat shoves a little box in my direction. “My dad got me this.”
“Should I open it?” I ask.
“Duh, yes.”
I take off the lid to see a sparkling gold necklace, just like the one Kat wears every day. For a moment, I’m confused that her dad gifted her with something she already owns, but I realize that not only is Kat already wearing her necklace but that this one has different letters.
“Your initials,” I say.
“I think he wants me to stop wearing this one,” she says. “And it’s, like, all I have.”
I don’t know what to say because while it can’t actually be all that Kat has, it’s something big. Jennifer wore that necklace every time I saw her, including the last time, at her funeral. I missed almost the entire eulogy that Jennifer’s friend Stacey gave because I was concentrating so hard trying to remember the actual last time I saw Jennifer and what she was wearing. The truth was that I’d spent the night at Kat’s and left early to run, and Jennifer had waved good-bye while wearing pajama pants and a ragged promotional T-shirt from her company. It didn’t seem right that the last time you could say good-bye to someone they’d have on a shirt featuring a cartoon outline of a menopausal woman getting her groove back.
“Her stuff was all there,” Kat says. “And then it wasn’t. Like, at all. I don’t know where it went. Like, thank freaking god I already had the necklace or he would have gotten rid of that, too.”
“Maybe he just put it in storage,” I say, but I don’t know if that sounds any better.
“He’s erasing her.” Kat starts to cry more. “Because of freaking Diane. What kind of name even is Diane?”
I shrug because it’s so much better than Todd.
“It’s only been two years, and—Hang on.” Kat stops talking and glances down at her phone before tapping the green Accept button and holding it up to her ear.
“Hi,” she says into the phone. “Merry Christmas! Officially!”
The tears are instantly gone from her voice, and each word sounds dipped in sugar.
“Yeah, it was fine. Nothing exciting. I’m super glad you survived the OC.” She giggles. “Totally. So I’m at James’s right now but—oh my god, don’t even. I like hearing your cute voice, you dork. I’ll call you later.”
I try to look distracted by my own bedroom as Kat says good-bye to Quinn.
“Is everything OK?” I ask. “With Quinn and Orange County?”
“Oh, totally, I’m sure she’s fine or she would have said something,” Kat says.
Dad knocks on the door, and when I open it, he’s already disappeared and left only a tray containing mugs of cocoa topped with gourmet marshmallows.
“It feels like we have a butler,” Kat says as I bring in the tray.
“Remember Lana Schwartz’s party?” I ask, and Kat practically shrieks. In sixth grade, a girl who’s since moved away invited us all over for her twelfth birthday, where maids cleaned up behind us and a man we were pretty sure was a butler opened the door for every guest.
“That was, like, the first time I understood that there were rich people.” Kat sips her cocoa. “I’m not wearing that stupid necklace.”
“I don’t blame you,” I say, even though maybe Kat’s dad just wanted her to have her own initials on something beautiful. But after all these years, I don’t think I could guess what her dad would really want. He’s not like Jennifer was, and not like Kat.
I’m not sure which of my parents I’m not like. Obviously, my fingers are figuratively crossed for one outcome there, though.
“Kat—”
“I know,” she says, and I wonder if she does know. “My dad means super well, blah blah blah.”
Nope.
“That’s what mature people like you would think, James. Meanwhile I’m completely terrible for wishing nothing changed with him even if he wouldn’t be as happy.”
“I’m . . . I’m really not that mature.”
She makes a scoffing noise. “Please. You’re like the most freaking together person I know.”
“I’m genuinely sad to hear that.”
She laughs again, though it fades fast. “I guess I should go home. I just sort of took off.”
“I’ll walk you out.”
“Aw!” She hugs me again once we’re at the front door. “Thank you, thank you, thank you for everything. You’re the best friend seriously ever.”
I notice something out of the corner of my eye as I say good-bye to Kat. Once she’s walking away down the street, I lean over to see a carefully wrapped plate.
Merry Christmas, McCall reads the note taped to the Press’n Seal. Inside I peel back the wrap and inhale the fragrant scent of Mrs. Sidana’s samosas. They’re a big deal; apparently, they’re as labor-intensive as Dad’s cinnamon rolls, so Logan’s mom only makes them once a year, too. The first year that we were together, I was at the Sidanas’ while she was assembling them, and I heard her whisper to Logan, Are you sure it’s serious? I didn’t hear his answer, and so for hours I worried that he’d said anything but yes. Then a huge plate showed up later, and so I knew.
“Whoa,” Dad says as I walk inside. “I didn’t expect to see those this year.”
Me neither.
“You can have them,” I say, because suddenly the aroma isn’t delicious. It’s Logan’s snowflake sweater and the Sidanas’ kitchen, it’s kissing outside by the glow of Christmas lights and gearing up to count down to the new year. It’s my fifteen-year plan and just how on board he was. “Can we go to the movie now? Whatever movie?”
It isn’t unti
l we’re sitting in the dark (in the biggest of the AMC Theatres) watching Oscar Isaac and others on a very large screen that I realize Kat didn’t even notice that Mom and all her things were gone. Kat didn’t ask about my holiday at all.
There are at least three different New Year’s parties happening, but I’m relieved Kat also thinks Jose Vasquez’s annual My Parents Are at Big Bear Party is the right call. His house isn’t quite as centrally located as ours, but I’m actually happy for the long walk over in the crisp Los Angeles winter air.
Mariana waves as soon as I walk in, and I’m happy that neither she nor Sofia brings up the fact I’ve abandoned their lunch table and therefore haven’t seen much of them this year. I’m always prepared to say, “Well . . . Kat and Matty . . .” and leave it at that. But I think people understand breakups. You don’t have to fill in every blank space.
“Are you still planning on UCLA?” Sofia asks me.
I shake my head and pop open a Sanpellegrino blood orange soda. It’s always a relief when there’s anything nonalcoholic at parties besides tap water. “I need to get far away,” I find myself saying. It even sounds believable. “As far as possible, honestly. Probably Michigan, as long as I get in. I can run track and it’ll be fine for pre-med.”
“I can’t imagine going somewhere cold on purpose,” Mariana says. “You’re going to freeze. Our blood’s too thin for it.”
“I’m sure I can build up my blood.” I like the sound of it, becoming more powerful from deep inside. I’m starting to believe this lie, too, that Michigan is my dream now. I can picture myself on campus next fall. I’ve Googled it, and it’s easy to picture myself standing there among the changing leaves in the crisp autumn air. I can even picture me forgetting what was supposed to happen. Maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll forget even sooner.
More people crowd into our circle, and it feels like nothing has gone off course. It’s even fine that Kat’s not here yet, because something about her would ruin this grand illusion. Though I guess it’s weird that Kat isn’t here yet. We coordinated only what party to attend, not what time. And I’ve barely seen her this break anyway. For some reason, I want Kat’s absence to be something big and meaningful, but I have to remind myself that before Quinn was taking up all of Kat’s time, Logan was taking up plenty of mine and Matty hers. And Mom was still around, and my life felt . . . fuller.