It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Chick Lit

by S. E. Babin

  “Sorry. We just barged in.”

  He was stating the obvious, but okay. I shut the door behind him once he made it inside and stared at him as he sat the bag down in front of the tree and started unloading it.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Spending Christmas with you,” Jensen said. He didn’t miss a beat and kept putting presents out like he lived here.

  “What if I have family coming over?”

  Jensen stopped. “Do you?”

  I threw my hands up. “That isn’t the point!”

  Marie chose that point to kick off her shoes and make herself comfortable on my couch.

  I sighed. “You’re spending the night? That isn’t weird?” I gestured to Marie.

  Jensen shrugged. “Only if you make it that way. Every year when she’s with me, we sleep close to the tree.” He pointed. “And since you have one, there’s no reason for us to break tradition.”

  All the arguments died in my throat. He was here. It was Christmas. They were basically homeless, and I was acting like a heel.

  “Do you want some cocoa?” I asked instead of arguing.

  Jensen sent me a heartbreaking grin. “I thought you’d never ask.”

  Marie sent a whoop of delight up in the air and beamed at me.

  Hot chocolate it was then.

  * * *

  Marie tipped into dreamland about ten o’clock that night. Jensen and I were on opposite sides of the couch with her right between us. I gestured at all of the presents underneath the tree.

  “She doesn’t believe in Santa Claus?” I whispered.

  “Santa Claus is a marketing machine invented by retailers,” Jensen grumbled.

  I blinked. “Actually Santa Claus was based upon a European monk named St. Nicholas who gave his inherited wealth away to those in need. The stories say he once rescued three sisters from being sold into slavery by providing their father with a dowry allowing all of them to get married.”

  Jensen stared at me. “I’d forgotten how smart you are.”

  I pointed to myself. “Books. Books everywhere.”

  He shrugged one shoulder. “I never saw fit to tell her a lie. She knows the gifts she gets are from the people who love her. Not from a creepy guy in a suit at the mall with a revolving door lap.”

  I snorted quietly. “You are such a cynic.”

  “About some things. Not about us.”

  “There is no us,” I said.

  “Not yet,” Jensen said fiercely.

  9

  Christmas Day

  I awoke to enormous green eyes and a wide, dimpled grin in my face.

  “Ms. Jess, wake up! Presents!”

  I blinked, bewildered until I remembered last night and Jensen shoving his way into my home.

  I shut my eyes. “Five more minutes.”

  A deeper voice intruded and made a tsking noise. “Now, now. Is that any way to treat your guests on Christmas morning?”

  I pulled the covers tighter over my head. “Go away.”

  With a tug, the covers were ripped off of me, exposing my flannel reindeer pants and a pink tank top. Jensen’s gaze went hungry, but I glared at him.

  “If you wake me up, you must provide coffee.”

  Jensen hooked a finger behind him. “Full pot in the kitchen. Let’s go, lazy.”

  I reluctantly swung out of bed and followed Jensen out of my bedroom.

  Presents were everywhere, and Marie had patiently waited to open them. She was a great kid. I sat on the floor with them and watched as they passed present after present to each other, but I didn’t feel left out. It was kind of nice watching them together.

  Several minutes later, after there was a pile of wrapping paper five feet high next to us, Jensen passed me a small box.

  I took it under duress. “I didn’t expect company, and I didn’t get either of you a thing!”

  “Christmas isn’t about the gifts, Jess. It’s about the thought.”

  “I have food,” I said lamely.

  “I like that thought!” Marie exclaimed.

  We both chuckled as I pulled the ribbon off the gift and slid the lid off, my thoughts drifting back to the box I’d so unwittingly opened a couple of weeks ago. The box that had been quiet ever since the goddesses took it, and I booted Christopher out of my life and my home.

  I gasped as an aged, worn book slid into my lap.

  Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.

  It was from England because here in the United States the book was released as the Sorcerer’s Stone. My wide eyes met Jensen’s amused ones.

  “Open it,” he said.

  I cracked open the book, only to see the scrawl of J.K. Rowling. I slammed the book shut and handed it back to him. “I couldn’t possibly,” I breathed, even though I wanted it so badly I could barely stand it. “This is worth a fortune.”

  “I bought it years ago,” he admitted. “I knew I’d see you again.”

  Tears pricked the backs of my eyes. It was the most romantic revelation I’d ever heard and it made the book nerd in me sigh in delight.

  Jensen handed the book back to me, and I took it with reverent hands. “There’s something else in there.”

  I flipped through the pages until a single sheet of paper fell out. Jensen’s messy scrawl was evident on the paper.

  “Friends or something else,” it read, “doesn’t matter as long as I am with you.”

  “Thank you,” I whispered. He understood me.

  “You’re welcome.”

  I reached over and ruffled Marie’s messy hair. She beamed at me. “And thank you, too.”

  “It was hard to keep that secret,” she admitted.

  “You did a very good job,” I said with a grin.

  I stood up, my knees creaking in protest. “Coffee and breakfast. Everyone like cinnamon rolls?”

  Both voices yelled out “Yes!” I smiled as I walked back to the kitchen.

  Sometimes things don’t work out like we plan them to, but life is good at coming back full circle. I didn’t know what would happen with us, but I knew right now, we were going to be okay. Romantic or not, Jensen was a good person and I wanted to be around him. Yes, he’d hurt me, but that was life. The ones we love the most are capable of hurting us the worst. But life is also about amends and healing.

  I turned back. Jensen was staring at me, his eyes an intense green and his hair messy around his head. He winked at me and motioned me to hurry up with his coffee.

  Yep. Things were looking up.

  10

  Epilogue - Back at Aphrodite’s House

  A scream of alarm alerted Abby to something wrong. She ran down the stairs, clutching her heart wondering what could have possibly gone wrong this time. Throwing open the door she saw Clotho standing in the middle of the room holding a box.

  Pandora’s Box.

  “Good grief,” she said. “You scared the bejeezers out of me.”

  Clotho glared as she held the box with reverent hands. “I picked it up to put it somewhere safer and almost dropped it. It was sitting right here, disappeared for a few minutes, then just showed up again right out of thin air into my hands!”

  “Don’t drop it,” Abby said, then winced at the withering glare Clotho was directing her way.

  The lid was closed, but the jewels surrounding it gave off an inherent light.

  “Its job is done,” Clotho murmured and carefully walked the box over to her dresser where she set it down gently.

  “Poor Jess,” Abby murmured.

  Clotho’s eyes flashed silver for a moment before a wide grin spread over her face.

  “Poor Jess is doing just fine,” she said.

  “You shouldn’t look willy-nilly into people’s futures like that,” Abby admonished.

  “Normal people don’t use terms like willy-nilly,” Clotho fired back. “Besides, in about eighteen months we might find ourselves invited to a wedding.”

  Abby grinned with delight. “A wedding. After all
that.”

  Clotho nodded. “Pandora may be a savage mistress, but if you can stand together in all of her misfortunes not much can tear you apart.”

  “Good for them,” Abby mused, giving the box one last look before she left the room to finish making Christmas dinner.

  About the Author

  S.E. Babin is an award-winning author with a passion for writing books with a paranormal twist. Whether it's romance or mystery, she loves taking the norm and turning it into the extraordinary. Her love of reading turned into a curious exploration to see whether or not she could write her own novel. Beginning with discarded pages of angsty novels and a slightly popular reimagining of Beowulf's Grendel in her high school English class, Sheryl spent way too much time in the library, killing any chance of her becoming a cheerleader or anything even remotely cool.

  http://sebabin.com/goddess/

  @hungrybiblio

  SEBabin

  sebabin.com

  se@sebabin.com

  Mistletoe & Mayhem

  Susan Murphy

  1

  The further the car drove from the airport, the heavier Callie Ashton’s heart sank. In the side-view mirror she watched as the city lights slowly gave way to the darkness of the sleeping suburbs and then eventually to the familiar pitch black of the countryside that sprawled as far as the eye could see. As the lights faded, they took with them all of her hopes and dreams.

  ‘So,’ her brother Cam, who had been dutifully sent by her parents to drive the three hours to collect her, said. ‘Bombed out in the big city huh?’

  Callie groaned and shot him an unimpressed look. She was cross with herself when she realised how much he was enjoying her irritation.

  ‘Tell us what happened then,’ he pushed, hoping to rile her up as much as possible.

  Callie momentarily contemplated whether to retaliate by asking why he was still living at home at thirty-two and sponging off of their parents, but decided it was just delaying the inevitable. She could fire back and point out all of Cam’s shortcomings, which might have made her feel a bit better about her own imploding life for a moment, but there was no going home without facing the barrage of questions that would be sure to hit her the minute her toe even crossed the line into town. At least this was an opportunity to start practising her responses. Surely by the time she was cornered by the usual collective of nosey locals, she’d have perfected it and gotten the entire explanation down to only a few short and sharp sentences.

  ‘I didn’t ‘bomb out’ as you put it. For your information we had a big case, a tough case actually, and it’s not easy you know. Law is hard. There’s so many possible outcomes and it doesn’t always go your way, and…’ She could hear herself rambling and her brother’s smug grin was enough to alert her to the fact that he didn’t believe a word of it. He was, if nothing else, enjoying watching her squirm.

  ‘Still doesn’t explain why you came running back here. I mean, didn’t you say you were NEVER coming back?’

  Callie fell silent. She had no choice but to concede. She’d been awful and full of herself when she landed her dream job at a top law firm in Sydney and announced that she couldn’t wait to get out of Moonta Bay. But, reminding her of that right now, in her hour of humiliation, was plain mean, and totally Cam.

  ‘Shut up, Cam. Just shut up. Yes, I know I said that, but I was young and stupid and I hadn’t yet been completely stomped on by life and dumped onto the scrap heap as I have been now. Is that what you wanted to hear? Are you happy now?’

  There wasn’t a lot that Callie knew she could count on in life, and her recent descent into complete failure had definitely taught her that, but being kept grounded and reminded not to get a big head was something her family would always be there for and they weren’t shy about telling her so.

  ‘Sort of.’ The smirk had returned. ‘You realise it was only three years ago?’

  Callie could feel the burn that always seared across her milky cheeks when Cam was digging at her. From the earliest she could remember, he always knew exactly where to poke.

  ‘Fine, Cam. Fine. I screwed up a huge case, got pretty much demoted to dealing with parking fines, and then Zack announced that he was going off to save the world and I wasn’t invited. So, here I am, running home with my tail between my legs as a complete and utter failure and I’m sure that makes you soooooo happy.’

  A rogue tear that she had fought so hard to keep trapped behind her steely eyes, escaped and fell onto her cheek. She swiped at it fiercely and then turned to look out of the window at the nothingness of her approaching home town. She refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing her cry.

  Cam reached into the backseat and produced two cans of beer. He handed one, still cold from his battery operated cooler, to Callie. She eyed it, and him, and decided that given the apologetic look on his face, she would take it, even if it wasn’t a decent cab sav as she was used to these days. She took in a mouthful and let the liquid work its magic, tingling through her veins and out to her wired nerve endings. She was thankful for the alcohol, in whatever form it came.

  Just as the calm was finally setting in, Callie spotted the sign that sent her anxiety to a whole new level. ‘Welcome to Moonta Bay. Population 1,978.’

  In that moment she became aware of two things. Firstly, she wondered if Hamish O’Reilly was still in town and, given that he had vowed he would never leave, she suspected that he was. And secondly, that she was entering Moonta Bay, in a Ute with her brother, with a tinny of beer in her hand.

  She had officially hit rock bottom.

  * * *

  In the darkness Callie kicked off her shoes and stretched out her tired, cramped feet. They’d been jammed into high-heeled boots all day and had been screaming for relief for hours. She stared at them on the floor for a few minutes, remembering the shopping trip with her new work colleague, Jazz, which had led to the exorbitant purchase. She’d only just arrived in Sydney and started at the firm when Jazz, who was another fairly new lawyer, had convinced her she needed to ‘look the part’. It was the first time in her life she’d spent more on a pair of shoes than she’d earnt in a weeks pay, but it wasn’t the last.

  Something pulled at her from the inside. A longing perhaps, or just a sense that those days might now be long gone. But it was fleeting. There was no way that she would let Moonta Bay suck her back in. No matter what happened or how long she had to stay, she would not go back to dressing from the likes of Kmart and Target, or ‘Tarjeit’, as her mother liked to call it. She had to stand her ground and be the person she had worked so hard to become.

  Climbing into her old bed, she pulled at the fluffy pink bed cover her mother had turned down ready for her arrival. The feeling of the fake fur between her fingers reminded her of a much simpler time, a time when her dreams were still intact and there was an entire world out there to explore and look forward to. If she’d had even an ounce of energy left in her bones she’d have cried herself to sleep. Instead, she pulled the blanket up over her legs and silently thanked the Universe for the small blessing of a flight that had landed late enough to ensure that everyone would be sound asleep when she arrived.

  Squeezing her stinging eyes shut, Callie tried to remember what it felt like to be in Zack’s arms. That too it seemed was fading. He’d been gone over a month already and although, in hindsight, she knew their relationship had been doomed, she still missed him and his unwavering friendship terribly and hated him for leaving her so abruptly. At the time, she had still thought they would get married eventually and have a family, but once he had made his decision to leave, there was no going back, even if he had promised he would come back for her.

  She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath, not realising until her mother’s voice was audible from the kitchen, that she had fallen into a deep sleep and not moved an inch all night.

  Squinting against the sunlight that was teaming through the 1960s style venetian blinds that her mother thought were still the height
of taste, Callie spotted the Vision Board she had made when she was seventeen, hanging on the back of the bedroom door. A smile formed on her dry lips. It caused them to crack, but she couldn’t stifle the grin.

  The board was filled with the unbridled ambition and complete determination of her seventeen-year-old self. Pictures of a BMW sports car, a home that was likely owned by a celebrity and a cute brown Pug stared back at her. But that wasn’t the only pair of eyes staring. Next to the board, taped messily at the edges and slightly crooked, was a photo of her and Hamish, hand in hand and dressed for their High School graduation.

  Callie rolled onto her back, filled with thoughts about that night and how Hamish had picked her up in his Uncle’s car so that she wouldn’t have to ride in one of the Utes from his parent’s farm. He had treated her like a Princess, pulling out her chair and opening doors for her at every opportunity.

  The graduation had been one of the best nights of her life. Hamish was handsome, strong and genuinely a good guy and had, in the twelve months prior, only had eyes for Callie. Of all of the girls in Moonta Bay, including those who were much prettier and had their claws out for him, he had chosen her, again and again and she had loved every perfect minute of it.

  The only question now was, had he ever forgiven her for breaking his heart?

  2

  The low hum of voices in the kitchen had risen to a chatty level. They were still somewhat muffled, but Callie could definitely make out her mother, Marjorie’s voice, chastising Cam for something, and her dad butting in about his burnt toast and how there was a possibility it could kill him.

  Slowly getting her bearings, Callie was glad she had been too tired to even dream. What surprised her most was that she had fallen asleep so quickly. The usual time taken to reach that stage lately was around two to four hours. But, it wasn’t long before the painful sting of reality began to set back in with full force. She was back home. In Moonta Bay. In her old room. And in her old bed. It was as if the past three years of her hard earned life had never even happened.