A Very Bossy Christmas

by Kayley Loring

  I can hear her sniffling, which is awesome.

  “Ma. Don’t cry.”

  Well, this is a fucking delightful unexpected treat.

  “Aw, Decky, I’m sorry. I’m sorry you felt so bad about everything that you had to go and fake a girlfriend.”

  “It’s no one’s fault, Ma. Well, maybe it’s my fault.”

  “I like her, Dec. I like Maddie. I like her with you. Even Nonna likes her.”

  “I know. I do too.”

  “I just don’t know where I went wrong with you. You were such a good boy. Always my little angel—I don’t know why you can’t get it right with a girl.”

  “I wish I knew. I thought I was doing pretty good, too… You think I should go back to New York real quick to fix this?”

  “Declan Sullivan Cannavale, don’t you dare! You can’t leave your brother with those animals—Aiden and Eddie can’t handle them.”

  “Those animals from your side of the family, you mean?”

  “You should be Brady’s best man—we don’t talk about it, but you know it.”

  “Yeah. I know.”

  “Least you could do is be there for him for the next few days.”

  “Yes. Least I could do after providing him with a bride.”

  “All right, that’s enough about that.”

  There’s banging on the door.

  “Eh! Room service! Somebody in there order a wicked awesome steamin’ pile of trouble?!”

  “Shut your feckin’ gob, O’Sullivan—this here’s a fine establishment.”

  “Shit,” I whisper into the phone. “They’re here. I gotta go.”

  “Me too. I gotta pick your granny and grandad up at the airport.”

  “Oh good. His foot’s better?”

  “Enh. Good enough. Love you, Dec. Don’t screw up your life. But don’t let those boys screw up Brady’s wedding for him either. And I don’t want all you boys showing up for the rehearsal all banjaxed and unshowered!”

  “On it. I’ll take care of all of it. Love you too. Bye.”

  I check the text that I had started writing to Maddie and delete it without sending. I’ll try again when we’re in the party limo. I roll my eyes and gird my loins, because what the fuck are a bunch of grown men doing getting into a party limo at one in the afternoon anyway?

  More banging on the door. “You in there, Dec?” It’s Brady, and he sounds mildly frightened.

  “Yeah. Coming.” I grab my coat, slide my phone into an inside pocket.

  As soon as I unlock the door, Billy O’Sullivan comes bursting through it. He gets me in a headlock and shouts out, “Eh, Manhattan! Look at this ugly mug. I missed this mug so hard all these years.” Billy has burst through every door he’s ever walked through, and he shouts in his sleep. I’m already exhausted. He looks around at the suite and lets go of me. “Whoa. Check out this wicked fuckin’ pissa hotel room!”

  “Should we get going?” I ask as he bounds over to the windows.

  My Irish cousin Nolan squeezes my shoulder and hands me a can of Guinness in a brown paper bag as he passes by while unzipping his jeans. “Drink up, cousin. I need to hit the jacks.”

  I do appreciate that the can is unopened, because the last time I drank from an open container that he presented to me, here is what I’ve pieced together about how the next 48 hours played out: Nolan shaved the front part of my legs. We all ended up on stage at a Steve Miller Band concert singing "The Joker." We took over the drive-thru window at a Taco Bell. I sang that Chumbawamba song into the mic and bought tacos for everyone who came through—with my new credit card. The next morning, I tried to adopt all of the dogs at an animal shelter in Toledo and cried for half an hour when they wouldn't let me. No one really knows how we ended up in Michigan.

  I pull my brother in for a hug. “Having fun yet?”

  “I can’t wait to never go out without my wife again. Or just to never go out again.”

  “Sounds good.” Sounds really good. I am not going to cry.

  “Sorry, is it weird for you when I call your ex-girlfriend my wife?” he asks with a smirk.

  “Naw. Is it weird for you when she screams my name out during sex?”

  “Oooh, touché.”

  Touché. Brady is the only person in my entire family who would ever use that word, and I love him for it.

  I catch Billy pulling snacks out of the minibar. “Hey. Don’t touch those.”

  “Aww, come on. I’m starvin’!”

  “There’s supposed to be food in the party bus—I Venmo’d Aiden money for it.”

  “Naw, we spent it on lickah instead. Tell you what—you finish that can of Guinness before we leave this room, and I won’t touch your mini bar.”

  “Fuck off. You can pick one snack.” I hold up a finger for emphasis, like I’m talking to a child. “One.”

  Brady lowers his voice and says, “So, Casey just texted me that Maddie isn’t coming, and she was just pretending to be your girlfriend? What’s going on? Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m okay. Don’t even worry about me—this is your day to relax and have fun.”

  “You sure? If you want to talk about it…”

  I’m actually dying to talk about it. It is literally the only thing I want to talk about all of a sudden, because it’s all I want to think about. But my brother looks so concerned, and it’s his bachelor party day, and I’m not that self-absorbed and miserable. Yet.

  I crack open the can of Guinness. “I’m sure.” I raise the can to him. “May the best day of your past be the worst day of your future.”

  After guzzling about half of it, I let him take it from me so he can toast me with: “May your heart be light and happy, may your smile be big and wide. May we survive this feckin’ shit so that I can claim my bride.”

  After both of my cousins have finally finished polluting my luxury bathroom, I’m a little buzzed and stepping inside the luxury party bus that is basically a cheesy bachelor pad on wheels. It is in no way as funny to me as the cheesy stretch limo that Maddie got for us, because my older brother did not order it ironically.

  Around the navy blue leather perimeter seating are my oldest brother Aiden, youngest brother Eddie, Casey’s husband, Billy’s married brother Mark, and the married Irish cousins, Sean and Fergal. Everyone else is dressed more casually than I am, as usual. I greet everyone, and Nolan places another unopened can of Guinness in all of our hands.

  “To the brewery and then the casino!” Billy yells out after chatting with the driver.

  “I thought we’re going to Dave & Buster’s first,” I say, looking at Aiden and Brady.

  Aiden stares down at the floor meekly and takes a sip of beer.

  “Nawww! Fuck that kiddie shit—what are we, twelve? Change of plans. We’re havin’ some actual fun instead. Drink up, Manhattan.”

  This is bullshit.

  I nudge Brady, who’s sitting beside me and texting Hannah. “You okay with this?”

  He shrugs. “Doesn’t really matter where we go. We’re all going to end up hammered and facedown in the gutter by about five o’clock at this rate. Maybe if we pass out early, we’ll wake up tomorrow sooner.”

  I muss up his hair. “Such an optimist.” I pull out my phone and open up the text app.

  Eddie plops down beside me. “Hey. I hear Maddie was just a fake girlfriend. Can I have her number?”

  “I will actually murder you if you try anything,” I mutter without even looking at him.

  “I’m kidding—obviously. I have a girlfriend.”

  “Yeah. You meet her in person yet?”

  “No, she goes to St. Bart’s for New Year’s every year with her friends. That’s why she couldn’t make it to the wedding.”

  “Uh-huh. And was your friend Birdie also not available to be your date?”

  He laughs. “She would never go as my date to anything in a billion years. That’s hilarious.”

  “Sucks to be you, huh?”

  I finally type out the text
to Maddie, impressed with how concise and eloquent I am, even after about fourteen ounces of dry stout. I hit Send as soon as I feel Nolan’s Black Irish eyes on me from the back of the bus and put the phone back in my pocket.

  I’m not scared of that fucker, but ever since I was a kid, I’ve felt the need to impress that guy. And every Irish guy, for that matter. I would laugh in Colin Firth’s face if I ever meet him, but if I cross paths with Colin Farrell, I’d probably burst into tears, start quoting In Bruges, and try to make out with him or something.

  Billy switches the Top 40 radio music to a hip hop station and cranks up the volume before shaking up a bottle of champagne and popping the cork, spraying bubbly everywhere like an asshole.

  I don’t even finish the whole can of Guinness before Nolan silently exchanges it for another full one. I know this trick. It’s harder to keep track of how much I’ve had this way. Not falling for it. Not this time.

  I type out another text to Maddie because I remember something really important that I wanted to tell her, and then hit Send before Billy comes over to hassle all four of us brothers for texting our women when we should be partying.

  “Whatta yiz doin’ ovah heah? This a bachelah pawty or a fuckin’ pussy convention?”

  I send Maddie one more impassioned text before slipping my phone back into my coat pocket as Nolan sits down between me and Brady, flicking at his scruffy face and staring me down like an Irish gangster.

  “You’re here to have fun, are you not?” he calmly asks.

  “To a degree,” I say. Holding my ground. “We’re gonna pace ourselves. I promised my ma and my sister I’d keep my brothers out of trouble. You wouldn’t want to upset my ma and my sister now, would you?”

  He grins and pulls a flask out of the pocket of his leather jacket. “You wouldn’t want to disappoint your Irish ancestors, now would you?”

  Some sober voice in my head starts reciting every single thing I should be saying on the phone to Maddie right now, but I can’t quite hear it over the din of my drunk Irish ancestors taunting me.

  “Forgive me, Cooper,” I whisper into the flask as I slowly bring it to my lips.

  Thirty-Four

  Maddie

  SHOULD OLD ASSISTANTS BE FORGOT

  Well, I gotta hand it to Declan—no one has ever given me a more useful Christmas present in my life. I only allowed myself one glass of wine at my sister’s place yesterday because I didn’t want to risk getting all maudlin and drunk-texting him after so emphatically telling him not to text me when I left the office. But instead of waking up with a hangover this morning, I have bruised fists.

  Worth it. I got out a lot of aggression with that punching bag. But I had to remove the picture of him that I’d taped to it, because it just made me sad, and I didn’t even want to pretend to mess up that annoyingly handsome face.

  First he’s got me overworking my erotic massage tool, and now I’m abusing the punching bag.

  Okay, I may have also abused the erotic massage tool last night. And again this morning. Because not having a job is stressful. I emailed a headhunter shortly after I got up, to let her know that I’m looking for a new position, and she called me back immediately to discuss my options. She didn’t even ask why I was leaving my current position—I suppose because she has already found jobs for numerous other former executive assistants who have had the misfortune of working for Declan Cannavale.

  I went out to run some errands when I knew Mrs. Pavlovsky would be in her apartment eating lunch, because I didn’t want to risk seeing her disappointed face. Declan had come by the building yesterday, and I wouldn’t let him in. She came by my door to ask if she could let him in. When I asked her not to, she was only slightly less dramatic than the heroine of every film I’ve ever seen that’s based on a Russian novel. Now that I’ve returned and put the groceries away, I casually check my phone to see if the recruiter or anyone else has contacted me.

  There are a bunch of texts from Declan and a couple of voice mail messages, and I am so mad at my stupid heart for racing as soon as I see the notifications. I’m so furious with my idiot stomach butterflies for taking flight as I open up the texts.

  DECLAN: Hi. I know you said not to bother texting you, and even though you are the boss of me, I have never been good at letting someone else have the last word. There is one thing and one thing only that I should have said to you yesterday, Maddie… I

  That’s it. He just wrote “I.” Like that’s what he should have said to me yesterday. As if every single thing he said wasn’t about him.

  DECLAN: Also, what you said about me and hands was right. I don’t want to be like that anymore. You deserve better.

  I mean. I think he may have meant “me and Hannah,” but it’s the “You deserve better” part that concerns me, since that has historically been code for “I’ve met someone else, so let’s take a break and start seeing other people.” The time stamp for the next text is about half an hour later.

  DECLAN: Cooper. I miss you all. I done know if I deserve forgive but please give me another change. I’ll do anyway.

  I want to laugh because he’s obviously drunk, but I also wouldn’t put it past him to ask me to change for him. Or maybe he wants me to loan him some quarters.

  Then I listen to the voice mails. The first one is just Declan singing the first half of “My Heart Will Go On” into the phone before getting cut off. I can hear a bunch of grown men yelling the words to a Beastie Boys song in the background. It’s an aural fustercluck.

  The next message is probably a pocket dial. At least I hope it is. I can hear a bunch of guys singing the Meatloaf song “I’d Do Anything for Love,” and Declan is singing the girl’s part.

  After listening to those messages again, I find another text notification.

  DECLAN: Copppperrrrr. Please done be Maddie at me. I never fell like thish around anyone before. I ducked up. I wished yo were here. I ned young. Brb

  Before I can even try to decipher what the hell he meant by this message, I receive another one.

  DECLAN: Right. Howya, gorgeous. Time for Dec to put the phone away and join his family now. Happy New Year to ya.

  So that’s that. Not that I would have responded. Because what am I supposed to say to any of that? I just hope that dumbass remembered to eat before he started drinking, because he sounded hungry to me.

  I listen to the voice mails one more time before putting my phone in my purse and leaving for Sentinel with a storage box. At least I know I won’t run into Declan when I collect my things from my desk. I do, however, run into Mrs. Pavlovsky when I’m walking out to my car.

  She looks exactly as heartbroken as I had feared she would when she sees me. It’s freezing out, but at least she’s wearing a brand-new wool coat while sweeping the very clean sidewalk in front of our building.

  “Oh, you got a new coat!”

  She tears up as she strokes the collar. “Yes. Beautiful kind man bring me yesterday.”

  “Declan gave you a coat?”

  She nods and sighs. “He seem very upset. But you also seem upset, so I did not let him in. But I vanted to, Magdalena. Ohhh, I vanted to. It was very hard.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.” I rub her arm. “Thank you for respecting my wishes. And don’t forget to work on your w sounds.”

  She pouts and then licks her lips and says, “I wish you will be happy with him.”

  Cindy is singing “Don’t Stop Believin’” into her karaoke machine at the reception desk when I arrive at Sentinal. She pauses the music as soon as she sees me, but it’s not because she’s embarrassed to be caught singing. She’s staring at my storage box and looking very concerned.

  “Hi,” she says. “Are you leaving us?”

  “Yeah. Don’t stop singing, though. You sounded great.”

  She completely disregards my compliment. “Oh no—Maddie. Why?”

  “Oh, you know. This job just isn’t a good fit f
or me.”

  “Did he fire you?”

  “No. It was my idea.”

  “Oh. Did things get…complicated?”

  I look around to see if anyone is within earshot.

  “No one else is here,” she assures me. “Otherwise I wouldn’t be singing… Did things get weird after McSorley’s?”

  “No, not at all!” I did not mean to yell that. “It’s just time for me to move on.”

  She twists her lips to one side. “After two months?”

  I look away because there isn’t much else that I can say.

  “Well, I won’t keep you, but I’ll miss you. Stay in touch, okay?”

  “I will, definitely.”

  As I’m walking away, she says, “You know, he went through seven other assistants here before he hired you.”

  “I’m well aware of that, yeah. He’s pretty demanding.”

  “Yeah, but I mean…you’re the only one he actually made stay late with him.”

  “I am?”

  “He’d always send the others home early because it was easier for him to do everything himself, he said.”

  “Oh.” I stare down at the empty box in my hands. “I didn’t know that.”

  Fuck you, nose tingles.

  “I didn’t even know the poor guy could smile until two months ago.”

  Not now, tear ducts!

  “Yeah, well…hopefully his next assistant will be even better for him,” I manage to say through the lump in my throat. “Oh, and Cindy… Don’t tell him I told you this, but Declan was your Secret Santa.”

  Her eyes widen, her lower lip quivers, and now there are three women in Manhattan that I know of who are all teary-eyed over that asshole.

  When I’m almost done packing up my personal items, I get a call on my cell phone. It’s my former boss, Artie. Maybe he’s finally going to do me a solid and come out of retirement so I can work for him again. “Hello? Artie?”