A Christmas Cabin for Two

by KD Fisher

  “You don’t have to worry, because I’m not going to see him again.” The embarrassment surging through me only made my voice sound brittle. I was already tired of talking about this. All I wanted to do was finish making the panettone and switch off my overheated brain, maybe lose myself in a book or go for a long run on the treadmill in the basement. Anything to get Matt out of my head.

  “No?” Elena rested her hand on mine.

  “No,” I insisted. “I want to, but I’m not going to.” That made perfect sense, right?

  Now Luca had the dignity to look abashed. “Well, if you like him….”

  “I do.” I can’t fucking stop thinking about him. Keeping the second admission to myself, I turned back to the recipe card printed with Nonna’s spidery script, hoping neither of my siblings could see how hard I was blushing. My grandmother’s handwriting brought a wave of cool comfort, reminding me of letters filled with gentle, encouraging words and practical advice. “But there’s no point. If I see him again, I’ll just like him more. Then it’ll hurt worse when I go back to New York in January. Or when he decides he’s not into me after all. So, yeah. No point. Not going hiking with him.” I said this more to convince myself than my siblings.

  Luca’s face was a mask of exasperation, but Elena looked sympathetic and a little amused. “Yeah, okay, Mikah. That makes sense. You might like him, so you should avoid him. Super-reasonable.” She laughed.

  “It is!” I insisted. “I don’t even live here. The whole thing would be a waste of time.” My conviction was starting to fail, however.

  “In what world is a sexy holiday fling a waste of time? I’m not saying you have to fall in love or something, but it wouldn’t kill you to have a little fun. I would be all over that if the dude looked at me the way he was checking you out. And I don’t even like guys that much.” Elena’s voice lilted. She bit the inside of her cheek. “So, hiking? That sounds, um, wholesome.”

  “Ugh. I know. I don’t even have a warm enough coat.”

  Luca’s irritation seemed to multiply. “Jesus, Mikah.” Now he really sounded like our dad. “You lived in Boston. How do you not own a warm coat? It’s not like you can’t afford one.”

  Not wanting to admit I’d lost my heaviest coat, in addition to my dignity, at a bar after getting blackout drunk the night I received Josh’s stupid breakup letter, I shrugged.

  “Borrow my Canada Goose coat. And go on the damn date,” Luca insisted. Then he picked up his phone and stalked out of the kitchen to make a call.

  FOR the second time in as many days, I would be hanging out with Matt while looking like an extra in Oliver Twist. Like Matt, Luca towered over me and was significantly bulkier than I was. My brother tended to obsess over his body a little bit, spending tons of time at an expensive gym, working out with his personal trainer. So, naturally, his coat looked ridiculous on me.

  “Don’t say a word,” I growled at Matt as I trudged through knee-deep snow to where he leaned against the sign marking the trailhead. His eyes were locked on me, steady and warm, making my heart falter in my chest and blood rush to my cheeks. And he looked unfairly gorgeous with his close-cropped blond hair, perfect scruff, and brown work coat, like he’d sprung to life from the pages of some kind of rugged outdoor outfitters catalogue. Next to him, Moose snorted and pawed at the snow. I was thankful the dog didn’t go for an encore performance of his tackling routine. Instead he gave a happy bark and wagged his fluffy tail.

  “I brought an extra coat for you.” Matt patted the hiking pack on his back. “But it looks like you found something warm enough. Kinda big, though.” The damn smirk reappeared on his lips. I wanted to kiss it away.

  “It’s my brother’s coat. He’s a sasquatch like you, so….”

  Matt chuckled, and we started along the trail. Thankfully the snow was tamped down with footprints, and the path was well maintained. “How many siblings do you have?” he asked after a moment of walking in pleasant silence. I got the impression that he, like me, wasn’t big on idle chatting.

  “Only two. Elena and Luca, my older brother. He’s an attorney. A senior partner at the LA office of my dad’s firm. He can be… a lot, but he’s a good guy.”

  “I liked your sister. She said she’s an engineer?” Matt’s strides were so long, I had to hurry to match his pace. So naturally I slipped on a snow-covered root and bumped into him. I was making a great impression so far. Matt chuckled and ghosted his fingers over my cheek before continuing down the trail more slowly.

  “Uh-huh. She studied civil engineering at the Cooper Union. She’s wicked talented too. Super into sustainable design and always going on and on about infrastructure and stuff. Right after graduating she got hired at some eco-friendly start-up… to be honest I’m not really sure what she does. The hours are insane, but she works from home most of the time. I’m proud of her, though.”

  “That’s so cool.” Matt seemed to perk up. “Must have been nice for her to be able to stay close to home and work with such interesting faculty.”

  I was startled he’d even heard of Elena’s school. Then I felt like a pretentious jerk for being surprised. Just because Matt was a farmer from Idaho didn’t mean he was unaware of institutions of higher education. But the Cooper Union was fairly small and kind of niche.

  “Yeah,” I said slowly, trying to figure out a tactful way of asking why the hell he seemed to know so much about the school. But he supplied the answer before I could even ask the question.

  “I wanted to be a mechanical engineer when I was in high school. It was a total pipe dream obviously, but I thought about applying there because of the scholarship program and stuff.” He seemed a little embarrassed, as if he were admitting a dark secret rather than an adolescent career goal.

  “That’s awesome. What did you end up studying?” Immediately I loathed myself for asking the question. I sounded like a snob, subtly digging to find out where he went to school so I could slot him into a bullshit status hierarchy. Matt and I were walking side by side now, so in an attempt to distract him, I grabbed his hand and ran my fingers over his rough knuckles. His hand was warm and heavy in mine.

  “Nothing. Didn’t go to college. Kept on working the farm.” Coming to a sudden halt, he threaded our fingers together and then hauled me up against him, holding me in his big arms. Without thinking, I nuzzled into his chest. We had stopped in a small clearing, and the wind whistled through the trees. I let my eyes drift shut as I breathed in the woodsmoke smell of Matt’s coat.

  “Beautiful here, huh?” The words rumbled through his body.

  My eyes snapped open. I’d been so hung up on Matt, I’d failed to take in our surroundings. But the forest was, indeed, beautiful. A vast unencumbered view stretched below us: snow-tipped pines, rolling foothills, and swirling clouds promising snow. The cold quieted everything; even the gusts of wind and the occasional tap of a woodpecker searching the bark of a nearby tree seemed muted. If I could, I decided I would stay here forever: secure in Matt’s embrace, breathing him in, with nothing to disturb me but the occasional distant crack of a stick or the icy prickle of a snowflake working its way down the collar of my coat. I barely knew this man, but I already felt so safe in his arms. Comfortable. Like I could say anything and he would just reply with a soft smirk and a fast kiss.

  “It really is. Do you come hiking here a lot?” I was literally making the weakest small talk known to man.

  “Yup.”

  “I don’t exactly do a lot of outdoorsy stuff.” I was babbling. My voice had gone all weird and shaky because Matt’s fingers were brushing my skin, pushing my hair back from my face. I felt like an exposed live wire, sparking each time he touched me. “Like, some of my friends in grad school were big into camping and stuff, going up to Vermont or New Hampshire on the weekends, but it wasn’t my thing. I’ll bet you were a Boy Scout or something, though.”

  A tiny wrinkle appeared between Matt’s brows, and his lips pressed into a firm line. Then as quickly as the conce
rned expression appeared on his face, it lifted, like one of the clouds passing over the mountain peaks surrounding us. “Nah. Mostly did stuff around the farm. John and I went camping sometimes, though. Hiked a lot. Went fishing.”

  Moose raced ahead of us as we started back along the trail, Matt’s hand still engulfing mine. He was so much taller than me, I had to imagine it was almost awkward for him to walk this way, but if it bothered him, he kept it to himself. Besides, I liked being close to him. Probably too much.

  “So what kind of kid were you?” I asked, still apparently hell-bent on making dull small talk. I never did this. Throughout college and grad school I’d been nothing but irreverent in response to the boilerplate getting-to-know-you questions: where did you grow up, what do you do for fun, if you could have dinner with one person living or dead who would it be? But with Matt I wanted to know every single detail of his past and present. I actually wanted to know what his favorite book was. How he took his coffee. Did sleep find him easily, or did he toss and turn like I did.

  “Normal, I guess. Super into vo-tech. Kept to myself.” Matt shrugged his big shoulders, then glanced down at me, his lips quirking up. “I bet you were all goth, right? Real into poetry and music and stuff.”

  A laugh erupted from me. I hadn’t even been original enough to dress goth in high school. My school had required us to wear uniforms, tidy red-trimmed navy blazers and starched white shirts. Unlike other kids who pushed the limits of the dress code, I went along with it, not caring enough to make waves. My weekend clothes had been designer samples my mom handpicked for me: cashmere sweaters, tailored jeans, artfully distressed T-shirts that cost far more than any swath of cotton ever should. I just put on the stuff I liked and left the rest in the fancy shopping bags in my closet for her to take back to the office.

  “No, I was kinda weird. Quiet, gay as hell, worried all the time, obsessed with doing well in school. I didn’t have a ton of friends to be honest. I was big into reading, though. English was always my best subject. I was even the editor of my school’s literary magazine. Very cool stuff.” I glanced up at Matt, at his solid frame and long limbs. “To be honest I’m kinda surprised to hear you weren’t some star athlete. Like a linebacker or… okay, I don’t know anything about sports.”

  Matt had gone tense again, and I was starting to get that maybe he didn’t particularly like talking about his childhood. “I did play football. Stopped my junior year, though.”

  We’d turned off the main trail and were now descending a narrower path through dense forest. Moose bounded forward, the sound of his paws crushing over frozen snow a steady rhythm. Matt hadn’t once stopped to look at the trail maps, and I realized I’d been following him blindly. He seemed so sure of where we were going, I didn’t even think to question it. But the sky was already darkening a bit, and my skin prickled with a tiny flash of worry.

  “Is it getting dark already?” My voice totally betrayed my anxiety.

  Matt glanced up at the sky, now a deeper gray as the snow had started to fall in earnest. “Yup. Sun sets before five this time of year. But we’ll be back to the trailhead soon. This path loops us back around to where we started.”

  I followed him and Moose through the silent woods, calm firmly back in place since Matt did actually seem to know the trails. I couldn’t keep my eyes off him, and when he looked down and saw me staring, he just grinned. He seemed so solid and comfortable in his own skin, moving through the snow like he never second-guessed a single step.

  Moose bounded alongside us, occasionally darting into the underbrush to sniff or dig, but otherwise sticking close. Every ten minutes or so, Matt would stop and kick at the snow with the tip of his boot. I had no earthly idea what he was doing. Marking the trail? Checking for tracks? But when he came to a dead halt and crouched down to brush powdery snow away from a clump of loose rocks, I finally had to ask what he was up to. In response he lifted a snow-damp brown and ochre rock, smooth and striated with blueish gray.

  “Sandstone.” Matt held the rock up, seeming to address it directly. “My niece, Abby, has a huge rock collection. Right now she’s on a sandstone kick. This one’s pretty nice, huh?” He slipped the rock into his coat pocket, patting it once as if ensuring it was tucked away safely. Something about the gesture was so tender and sweet. It was like Matt had been designed specifically to appeal to every one of my innermost desires. Big and burly? Check. Ruggedly handsome? Check. Surprisingly thoughtful and adorable? Double fucking check.

  I was usually terrible at initiating physical affection, vacillating between bumbling conversation and getting tangled up in my own thoughts, but the desire to be close to Matt overwhelmed my usual self-consciousness. I leaned into his broad frame, pressing myself up and pulling him down to claim his mouth with mine. Matt’s lips fell open with a soft moan, the kind of satisfied sound I imagined he might make upon biting into a perfectly ripe piece of fruit. My pulse raced, and I tugged him closer, slipping my tongue against his. I was surprised by my own desperation for contact, his skin, his mouth, his hands. Matt gripped my shoulders, firm and strong. My pulse quickened. But instead of hauling me against him, he gently pried me away. I whimpered, still thrumming with need.

  “I like you.” He grinned, and his voice warmed me straight through, like sinking into a hot bath.

  All my words left me, and I stared at the path while my heart soared up to fly among the swirling snowflakes.

  “You want to maybe get some dinner? No worries if you can’t. I know you might have plans with your family. But it’s getting pretty cold, and I’m starving. We’re only about a ten-minute walk from where we parked. If you want, you can follow me into town. This place, Café Ines, is really good, and it’s dog friendly.” He scratched the top of Moose’s head, not meeting my eye. It was probably the most Matt had spoken since we met.

  “Yes,” I said quickly. Now that I’d forced myself to go on this date, I was dreading us parting. Dreading the moment that Matt, like Josh, might decide I wasn’t worth it. I didn’t know if I could handle more heartbreak, more unanswered texts, more letting myself be vulnerable, only to feel like a complete fool. Already I knew I liked Matt too much. One more afternoon with him, and I’d let my fantasies shift from making out to waking up together.

  My face burned despite the cold wind. I shivered at the thought of spending the night with Matt, laying my head on that broad chest, his heartbeat lulling me to sleep, soothing and steady like a metronome.

  Chapter Four

  Matt

  “WHAT can I get you boys?” The waitress glanced between me and Mikah, eyebrows arching toward her blonde hairline.

  Mikah’s cheeks, already pink from the cold wind, flushed red. “Uh, sorry. I’ll need a second.” He scanned the menu while I placed my order for a Teton Amber Ale and fried chicken. Seeming distracted from the moment he followed Moose and me into the warm, softly lit restaurant, Mikah hadn’t even looked at the menu. Since we sat down, he’d alternated between taking giant gulps of water, shredding his napkin, and glancing down at Moose where he lay under the table. I couldn’t tell if the guy was nervous or just really wasn’t into the date anymore. Maybe he’d been hoping for a fast hookup instead of dinner?

  “And for you?”

  “I’ll do the gnocchi and the IPA, please.” Mikah gave the waitress a polite smile and handed over his menu.

  Her pen paused on her notepad, and her heavily lined eyes swept over Mikah’s thin frame, clad in a slightly ratty gray sweater. “Can I get a real quick look at your ID?” She looked half-apologetic, half-suspicious as Mikah fumbled for his wallet and handed her a Massachusetts driver’s license.

  The moment she walked away, I couldn’t resist the urge to tease Mikah. “You still get carded, huh? Hey, enjoy it while you can. I never get asked.”

  Mikah shook his head and sifted his fingers through his hair, pushing the tousled curls back from his face. With some effort I focused on our conversation instead of my very sudden, very strong
desire to touch him. “Ugh. It happens all the fucking time. There’s no way I look under twenty-one either.” When I only shrugged in response, Mikah narrowed his eyes at me. “Wait, how old are you, anyway, Mr. I Never Get Carded?”

  I barked out a laugh. “Twenty-nine. But even when I used to try and underage drink, I usually got away with it. Guess I always looked old or somethin’.”

  “Ooh, underage drinking, huh? You were definitely edgier than me. The only time I ever drank underage was when my mom bought some super-rare wine she wanted us to try for ‘educational purposes.’” He made air quotes around the words. “That and a few times with my weirdo boyfriend.”

  I knew if I looked at Mikah, my feelings would be too plain on my face, so I fixed my attention on our surroundings. I definitely didn’t want him to see how stupidly, irrationally possessive I got at the mention of this boyfriend. I wanted to rub Mikah’s hunched shoulders and smooth the little wrinkle of concern between his eyebrows. Instead, I let my gaze travel from the twinkling white string lights stretched above the small bar to the sprigs of holly tucked among the bottles of wine and come to rest on the tiny fake Christmas tree shoved into a corner. It never failed to amuse me how quickly the town of Jackson transformed itself into a winter wonderland in the days after Thanksgiving. Christmas lights twined around the elk antler arches in the town square. Cheerfully decorated Christmas trees in the lobby in every hotel. Twangy versions of holiday music spilling out from every tourist store…. But who was this boyfriend, anyway? Okay, clearly trying to distract myself didn’t work.