by Tara Wylde
Lina wants to help out, as we’re there anyway. The two of us end up behind the counter. I show her how our registration and inventory systems work, how we decide who gets what. She seems genuinely impressed, and I can’t help but puff up a little: I designed both systems myself.
The stream of customers slows to a trickle around two. Mid-afternoon’s always a dead spot. In the window, the kids are putting the finishing touches on their masterpiece. I’ve got to admit it looks pretty good.
Lina turns to me in the quiet. “So... I have kind of a favor to ask.”
“You want me to go with you?” To the cop shop, I mean—she gave a statement last night, but they wanted to go over it again once she’d had a chance to rest.
“No, I... Mama’s meeting me there; that’ll be fine. It’s just, if it’s not too much bother... I think Joey’s a little scared. He doesn’t know why his daddy’s not around, and I think he thought the same thing was happening all over again. I don’t feel right leaving him with a babysitter so soon.”
“Oh, sure! Yeah. We’d love to have him. He have any food allergies, or anything he hates?”
“Just Brussels sprouts. Hates them, I mean. Not an allergy.”
“Think I can just about swing a sprout-free dinner.” This is an opportunity: I have a feeling Lina doesn’t want to go home, doesn’t feel safe there after what happened. If she has to come back to my place anyway, it shouldn’t be too hard to persuade her to stay. I don’t want to be away from her any more than Joe does. I fish for the right words. “Uh, I was thinking, it’ll probably be pretty late, by the time you come back for Joey. Why don’t you bring his pajamas? We can have a little sleepover.”
The relief that floods her face tells me I guessed right. “That’d be... That’d be amazing. I’m still pretty tired, and honestly, not knowing how you-know-who was getting in and out of my apartment, I’m still pretty creeped out.” She shudders. “I mean, his bail hearing hasn’t even been set yet, but part of me still thinks... Ugh.”
“You should stay for a while, then. At least till you can get bars put on the windows, new locks on the doors.” My heart’s pounding—maybe I’m pushing it a tad far. Don’t want her thinking I’m the stalker type.
“I... Well, I mean, I don’t want to put you out. And the commute would be kind of a bitch, but....” She tilts her head back, grinning. “Oh, God, yes please. I’ve been dreading...just, the whole idea of going back there.... My skin’s been crawling all day. And I—I don’t even have anywhere to sleep. He said he, uh...he—did something. In my bed.” She’s gone scarlet, red as a beet. I think I get the picture.
“Eugh. Well, I assure you, every sheet at my place is freshly laundered, and, uh, free of any scummy history.” Got to admit, I have done the thing she’s talking about, in my own bed, but not recently. Not since the sheets were changed. I look away so she can’t see me looking guilty and think...something weird.
Joey comes running up. “We’re putting all our handprints on the window! You guys wanna put yours?”
Lina and I exchange glances.
“Lead the way,” I say.
We add our prints to the end of the line, hers in bright red, mine neon green. Even with Cindy’s prints in the mix, it feels a lot like a family thing. Lina feels warm and alive, pressed against me in the cramped display. I plant an impulsive kiss on her cheek. Katie captures the moment on her phone. Think I’ll have her send me a copy of that: this is a moment I won’t want to forget.
158
Elina
There’s no feeling quite so luxurious as that slow swim to wakefulness, when there’s no alarm clock to bray in your ear, no four-year-old to use you as a trampoline, no honking rising up from the road below. I stretch and sigh—not yet. Not yet. Five minutes, and I’ll abandon my cocoon. But for now—
Someone’s tickling my foot. I jerk it up under the duvet. Clever fingers follow, clinging to my sole, even when I try to scrape them off with my other foot.
C’mon—five more minutes! Don’t fuck up my morning glow, I protest. At least, in my head I do. In the real world, it comes out more like “Mmph...off!”
It’s so nice in here, soft as a pile of kittens and just as cuddly. Even the faint sharpness of Nick’s aftershave on the pillow can’t spoil the effect. But this tickling—this is cruel and unusual punishment. Doesn’t he know there’s a chilly hardwood floor out there, and...and...fine. It’s actually not that bad. But still, can’t a girl—
Nick whips the covers off. I gasp. His bedroom’s not cold, but anything’d be a shock after the perfect comfort of the duvet.
“Oh, you suck!”
He grins down at me, unrepentant. “Y’know, for someone whose alarm wakes me up at five-thirty most mornings, you’re surprisingly lazy.” He tosses my dressing gown over me. As a blanket, it’s a pretty shoddy substitute.
“Mm... You only used to sleep till six.”
“That extra half hour, though, that’s when the magic happens. You know how I know?”
“How do you know?”
“’Cause I always wake up at the exact moment my dream gets to the best part.” He hops into bed and drapes himself over my back. “Therefore, six o’clock in the morning’s definitively, scientifically, the best time to wake up.”
I tilt my head. “Wait—if you’re waking up right as your dream gets to the best part, wouldn’t that make the best time to get up like, I don’t know, six-oh-five? So you can actually have the best moment?”
He shakes his head. His morning stubble scratches the back of my neck. “Nope. You never want to live the best moment. Or dream it. You always gotta keep the best moment of your life somewhere ahead of you. Something to look forward to.”
I smile. Nick has the best way of looking at life. Or the best excuses for lousing up my cozy nest.
I never did go home after what we’ve come to refer to as The Incident. Nick swung by and filled a couple of suitcases with Joey’s clothes and mine, and I’ve dropped Joey off a few times for playdates with Emin, but I haven’t crossed that threshold again. And with each passing day, I’m less sure I ever will. This place is cluttered, and too far from work, but it’s got Nick: a huge advantage in my book.
I lean back into his embrace. He’s sporting quite an impressive erection, and his hands are doing some magical things to my body. But I’ve already slept late. We don’t have time. “Mm... I’d better get up. Feed the kids.”
“Already fed. And bathed. And dressed.” He drags the edge of one fingernail along my inner thigh, just hard enough to leave a faint red line, and set my nerve endings alight.
“You’re not even shaved!”
“Mm, designer stubble’s making a comeback.” He buries his prickly face in the crook of my neck. His rough chin scrapes my skin as he peppers me with tiny nips and kisses. His breath’s warm and a little tickly; his lips soothe my beard-reddened skin. My will to resist is eroding.
“The car?”
“Cleaned it out last night.” He’s teasing me through my panties, firm enough to send tingling shocks of pleasure all the way to my toes, light enough to drive me crazy. Can’t concentrate with that going on.
“The...the, uh...the eggnog for tonight?”
Nick takes advantage of my open mouth to slip a couple of fingers into it. I lick at them instinctively, and feel his cock rise to full attention against my back. “Eggnog, nutmeg, parking, trees... All taken care of.” I feel his lips stretch into a grin. “Every...little...detail....” He flicks my nipple after every word. “So stop worrying.” Flick. “And relax.” Flick. “And....” He flips me onto my back, so suddenly my head spins. I can’t help but arch into it as he grinds his body against mine. He feels so good naked, all hard planes and lean muscle.
“You... You win!”
Nick looks down at me with a twinkle in his eye. “I should make you crawl to me on your knees for your lack of faith.” He yanks my nightie up over my head and twists it tight around my wrists.
; “And what would you have me do when I got to you?”
“First, I’d make merciless use of that sweet, tender mouth....” He pauses for a kiss, which deepens into another. Soon, my legs are wrapped around him, not an inch of space between us. When he draws back, he sounds as breathless as I feel. “Then I’d turn you to face the mirror, and I’d come up behind you, and take you apart with my lips and my fingers and my cock.”
“Mm, that sounds—“
He silences me with a finger to my lips. “I’m not finished.” The stern note in his voice, combined with the way he punctuates every sentence with a kiss, a caress, a pinch, has me melting in his arms. “I’d take my time. Hours and hours, if I had to. Make you watch every second of it.” He twists his fingers into my hair, eyes locked with mine. “Every time you closed your eyes, every time you looked away, I’d punish you with a slap.” His free hand claps down on my inner thigh, just where he knows I’m most sensitive. “Or a pinch.” That same hand snakes between my legs and pinches me just above the clit, sending a shock of pleasure through me, so intense it borders on pain. “Or a bite.” His teeth tug at my earlobe, worrying at my earring.
“Mmm....”
“I’d keep going till you could see yourself through my eyes—how beautiful you are like this. How hot you are when you give yourself over.” He tugs my panties down hard. “Mm—see? You’re blushing. That’s exactly what I’d train out of you. Any hint of shame, of embarrassment....”
Got to correct him on that one. “That’s... That’s what you might call a flush of arousal.”
“Oh yeah?” He leans over me to grab a condom. I take the opportunity to risk a naughty bite to his bicep. His answering growl stokes the fire in my belly.
“Yeah,” I tell him. It’s true: even when we test the limits together, I rarely feel so much as a flutter of self-consciousness any more. “I might still need that lesson, though. Just to be sure.”
“First time we’ve both got a free evening. Or morning. Or afternoon,” he promises. “Can’t wait to have you at my mercy...begging...trembling...calling me master.” He rolls the condom on in one practiced stroke. “Ready?”
“Starved for it.”
I bite my lip as he thrusts into me. No matter how many times we do this, I always see stars when he buries his cock in me. He’s thick, well-proportioned; those first few seconds ride that line between perfect excess and far too much. I hold my breath till he starts to ride me in earnest, feeling myself slowly adjust to his girth. That blinding sense of fullness gives way to a hot tide of lust. I clutch at thin air, sink my teeth into his shoulder, anything to keep quiet.
In the end, it’s no use. Nick has to stifle my scream with his hand when he brings me over the edge once, then twice, with barely time to catch my breath between. He’s hardly quiet himself, collapsing on top of me with a deep and heartfelt groan.
“Y’know,” he says, when he finally rolls off me, “the best way to tell you’ve got something special? Even the quickies are memorable.”
“Mm....” I wriggle free of my nightie and reach for the duvet, pulling it over us both. “Could use another nap, after that.”
“Oh, no! No, you don’t!” Nick’s up in an instant, wrestling the covers away. “I did that to get you going, not send you back into hibernation.” He grabs my nightie and starts snapping it at me like a towel. What does he think this is, a locker room? “C’mon! C’mon! Lots to do! I lied about cleaning the car!”
“You didn’t!” Fucking jerk! I snatch the nightie back and whip his chest with it.
“Nah, I didn’t. Car’s good to go. But we do need to shake a leg.”
He’s right. I can’t believe he actually went through with it, but he did—that Christmas banquet we talked about at the museum, it’s really happening. And it’s happening tonight. The response was far more enthusiastic than either of us could’ve anticipated. We’re expecting hundreds of old folks and families and kids, spread across six different parties. And we’ll be putting in an appearance at every single one.
Joey and Katie are loving it, of course: six parties means they each get to open six presents—and it’s a good thing the cops finally released his original gifts from evidence. Without those, and a couple of extras from Nick and Katie, I’d barely have had enough left for his actual Christmas.
Not, I suppose, that Nick would’ve let that happen. He’s great with Joey. Treats him like his own.
I pull Nick in for one last lingering kiss.
“What was that for?”
“Strength... We’re going to need it.”
“For you, I’m the Incredible Hulk.” He strikes a goofy flexing pose.
“Yeah—big, green, and angry. Just my type.” I flick him with my nightie one more time, then I’m up. The chill of the hardwood floor barely registers through my post-orgasm high. Still, I’m so sneaking a rug in here, one of these days.
The rest of the day goes by in a pleasant whirl. It’s funny: though we planned all six parties the same, each one’s got its own character. The first one’s sweet and mellow, a lot of caroling and eggnog by the fire. The next one seems to have caught disco fever: we get sucked into an over-sixties conga line the second we walk in the door. By the time we escape, we’re breathless and giggling, high on eggnog and endorphins.
It’s the last one that reminds me the most of our old neighborhood parties, probably because it’s getting late, and things are a little raucous. The younger kids are mostly crashed out on the various couches and beanbag chairs we brought in for the occasion. The older ones are playing with their presents, and the adults have gravitated into little knots and gaggles. The ebb and flow of animated conversation’s all around us. Every now and then, a wave of laughter sweeps the room. There’s even a couple of graybeards in the corner passing a flask back and forth, which I’m pretty sure doesn’t contain non-alcoholic eggnog. Yep. Just like the old days.
Nick pulls me into a huge beanbag with him. “This was a great idea,” he says.
I rest my head on his shoulder. “Can’t exactly take credit. I mean, it was going on in my neighborhood long before I was born.”
He squeezes my hand. “Still... You’re the one who brought it here.” He smiles. “Look at them.”
Katie and Joey are sitting under the tree with a few other kids, tossing a big red ball between them. Every time one of them gets the ball, he or she thinks for a moment, says something, and they all burst out laughing. I don’t remember that game. “Wonder what they’re playing?”
“Think it’s that one where whoever gets the ball has to tell a secret,” he says. “Or a joke. Don’t remember.”
Sounds about right.
“Y’know, I had a lot of shitty Christmases growing up.” Nick crowds a little closer, snuggling against my side. “Always wanted to do something like this for the kids. But this... I love this. There’s so much for kids, but we forget about the parents, the grandparents. I mean... When you’re a kid and Christmas sucks, you still have that hope the next one’ll be perfect, or the one after that. Feels like you’ve got infinite Christmases waiting. But at the other end of the line... Can you imagine waking up on Christmas morning alone, thinking your last truly magical Christmas is behind you?”
I don’t want to imagine that. “Let’s not let that happen to each other.”
“Never. We’ll have... We’ll be like ninety, all cute and gray, with our kids and grandkids around our feet, and a big bushy tree with a star on top.”
I find myself liking that thought—liking it a whole lot.
“And I’ll still have a full head of hair, and you’ll still have legs for miles: we’ll be the hot old folks. The silver foxes.”
I break out in helpless laughter. “You’re such a dweeb.”
‘Yeah, but I’m your dweeb.”
“No refunds, no exchanges?”
“Not a one.” His fingers twine with mine. “I’m a final sale.”
I decide not to ruin the moment by telling him
that probably means he was on the clearance rack.
He really wasn’t.
159
Nick
Christmas can best be described as happy chaos.
We wake up to Katie pushing Joey up and down the hall on his new red bike—his feet don’t quite reach the pedals, but I guess that’s not a problem when you’ve got a friend willing to help. I’ll put the kibosh on indoor bike-riding tomorrow, but for today, they should enjoy it.
Lina comes up behind me, still in her dressing gown. “Looks like they found the presents.”
“Sure did.” I poke her in the ribs. “So, d’you get me anything?”
“Don’t know—have you been a good boy?”
I can’t keep the wicked grin off my face. “You seemed to think so last night, when I was—“
She claps her hand over my mouth. “Sh—the kids!”
Katie spots us, and wheels Joey in our direction. “Sorry—it was kind of obvious what this was, from the shape of the wrapping paper.”
“You guys kept sleeping in,” adds Joey.
“That’s all right.” I pluck a scrap of wrapping paper out of his hair. “So, you guys tear into all the gifts, or just this one?”
“Just this one!”
“Good.” Lina eyes Joey’s pajamas, which are flecked with what looks like strawberry jam. “You guys had breakfast?”
Joey nods. “Just toast, like you said.”
She’s had us eating light since yesterday, in preparation for Christmas dinner with her folks. Having been over there for a few meals already, I’m fully on board with this strategy. I swear, last time we stayed for dinner, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to fit behind the wheel to drive us home. Still, I’m looking forward to this, especially seeing how excited the kids are.
I put on some coffee while Lina herds the kids into the living room. I can hear them messing around in there, making “tinsentacles”—that is, shuffling across the carpet in their socks to get some static going, then watching the tinsel reach out to them from the tree. We’re going to be finding tinsel around the place well into February.