by Meg Easton
Aaron laughed a big hearty laugh that made Macie chuckle. “Do you think she would add my name to that headline?”
“People in town are trying to set you up, too?”
He shook his head and licked the side of his cone. “I live in Mountain Springs. But I teach at Nestled Hollow High, and my students have made it their goal to get me married off by the end of the school year. And they’re a pretty relentless bunch.”
“No. They didn’t.” Macie laughed. She knew most of the high school students at NHH, and just imagining them being matchmakers to their teacher was the funniest thing she’d heard all day. She didn’t mean to keep laughing, but she couldn’t help it. “And I thought things were bad with my family and all the townspeople.”
Aaron laughed, too. “You know, when one of my students said that hashtag NHH Finds a Wife For Mr Hall was trending, I didn’t think it was so funny, but it really is.”
Macie laughed even harder. The ten-year-olds were all getting their ice creams one by one and filling in the tables behind her. She pointed her spoon at the man. “See, what you need is a fake relationship. Get someone who will pretend to be your girlfriend, and then the students will feel like their job is done and back off.”
Aaron froze, and then a grin spread across his face. “Not only are you the best amateur Ice Cream Motivation Analyst I’ve ever met, but you’re also a brilliant genius. That would fix everything.” He met her gaze, his eyes practically sparkling. “So are you up for the job?”
“Wait,” Macie said. “Me? I wasn’t meaning me.” She paused, blinking a few times. “You want me to be your fake girlfriend?”
“Sure! Why not? We’re both in the same boat, so it’s a win win. I could get my students off my back and you could get your family and everyone else in town off your back. We could go on a couple of strategic fake dates, and then in a few months we could break up. Our broken hearts would buy us at least three more months of people backing off. Then bam, you’ve got your six months, and I’ll have made it to the end of the school year.”
“Wow, I really am kind of brilliant.” She paused, searching his face. “But I don’t know. That’s just... I don’t know.”
“You want to get married and I never want to, so obviously the two of us would never work out as a couple. That’s what makes this so perfect. No romantic feelings will get in the way— we’ll just be two teammates working together for a common goal.”
The more she thought about it, the more excited she became. This could be the answer she needed that she hadn’t even known she was looking for. “Do you think it would really work?”
The basketball team was all around the three other tables in the shop, all talking over one another and comparing ice cream flavors, raising the noise level and the excitement level in the room. The excitement started to bleed from them to her.
“Why not? How old are you?”
“Twenty-seven. You?”
“Twenty-nine. So pretty close. Plus we’d make an attractive couple.”
Macie glanced at her sister and bit her lip. Could she keep a secret like this from her?
Aaron tipped his head Joselyn’s direction. “Who is that you’re worried won’t believe you?”
Macie chuckled that her face had been so easy to read. “My sister Joselyn. She knows we just met today.”
“She’s seen us having engaging conversation. That usually precedes a date.”
“True.” Macie would have to keep it a secret from everyone else in her family, too. Could she do that? She was the one who obeyed the rules. She didn’t lie. But the more she thought about it, the more sense it made. She could already feel the weight of the hope and disappointment that came along with dating lifting from her shoulders, and with that, she felt a smile lifting her face.
Macie pushed her ice cream off to the side, pulled the notebook from her stack of papers, opened it in front of her, and picked up her pen. “We need to figure out the details before we can enter into a contract.”
“You aren’t going to make me sign in blood, are you?”
“No, but we will need to head over to City Hall and have Gloria notarize it.” She enjoyed the look of surprise on his face before she let him know she was kidding. But really, a part of her did want something more official than scribbles in her notepad.
“Okay, details,” Aaron said. “We should probably each choose an event to show up together at that’s really going to give us the biggest bang for our buck. Oh! I’ve got it. Can I borrow your pen?”
Macie handed it to him, and he pulled a couple of napkins out of the holder that sat on their table and wrote something on it, hiding what he was writing. Then he folded it up in a fancy way that made it look like an envelope, completely surprising her that he knew how. He slid it across the table, a look of fabricated shyness on his face.
Macie picked it up, opened the “envelope,” and read what he’d written out loud. “Will you go to Winter Formal with me? Ice cream if you’d say yes.” The note took her right back to her high school days and she laughed. “Winter formal, huh?”
“I’m chaperoning. If we went together, all of my students would see. We’d be dressed fancy, which will make them go crazy for it. We could dance a few dances, and in their mind, the deal would be sealed. What do you think?”
When was the last time she had dressed up fancy? It might be fun to do it again. “When is Winter Formal?”
Aaron winced. “This Saturday. Is five days enough notice to get a dress?”
“Maybe.” She took her pen back, pulled out her own napkin, wrote down her answer, folded it into a different envelope shape that she’d learned back in elementary school, and handed it to him.
After opening it, he read out loud, “‘That sounds sweet. I won’t leave you out in the cold— we were mint to go together.’ Aww. My students would be so proud of this exchange here. I might have to tell the story in class. Okay, why would they not eat their cones?” he asked as he gestured with both hands toward the tables behind Macie. “The cone is practically the best part!” He took a big bite of his.
Macie turned to see what Aaron was looking at. All of the basketball kids had eaten the ice cream out of their cones, and were putting them pointed side up on a tray, balancing more on top like a house of cards trying to be a castle. The noise level in the shop rose with each cone that they managed to put on top without falling.
Macie laughed at how much enjoyment the kids were getting from it, then turned and wrote Aaron’s strategic date: Winter Formal on her paper, then tapped her pen on her lips, trying to decide what would be her best strategic date. “Really, my most strategic date would involve my family. How willing are you to go to a family thing with me? It might be the only way to convince them, since if I really had a boyfriend, I’d bring him, no questions. My family has two parties— one on Christmas Eve that goes into Christmas Day, of course, but we also have a Christmas Kickoff get-together the weekend closest to when the twelve days of Christmas starts. It’s the Saturday after the Winter Formal.”
“That could be fun. Sure, why not?”
“I’m the youngest of seven kids.”
Aaron’s eyes grew wider.
“And they’ll all be there.”
She paused to let that sink in.
“And they’re all married.”
She waited, giving him a moment.
“And they all have kids.”
Really, it was comical how wide his eyes were getting. She ducked her head in apology. “Change your mind about this agreement? We haven’t gone to Gloria to make it official, so it’s not too late to back out.”
Aaron swallowed hard and looked at his ice cream cone like it had betrayed him. Then he got up and threw it in the garbage can, then made his way back very slowly. She bit her lip, watching him, trying to guess exactly how awful that would be for him.
He sat back down, eyes on her, and said, “How many people are we talking?”
Macie looked up at the ce
iling, doing the calculations in her head. “Thirty-three. Plus us.”
“You’ve seriously got thirty-four people in your family, just with you, your parents, and siblings on down? Without counting aunts or uncles or cousins?”
She nodded. “Why? How many do you have?”
“Four, including me. Unless you count the woman my dad married, then five.” His eyes shifted to the chaos that the ten-year-olds were making as two of them were now trying to see who could smash their cones into bits the fastest. “So you’re saying that a get-together at your house is kind of like that.”
Macie winced.
“It’s worse?”
“Well, that’s like what? A dozen kids? We’ve got nineteen. Not that nineteen is much more than twelve, though,” she added, hoping that it softened it a bit.
He sat up straighter in his chair. “Do you know what? I have one class with thirty-three students. I can do this. Write it down.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m asking you get a dress on extremely short notice. It’s the least I can do.”
She wrote down Macie’s strategic date: Family Christmas Kickoff party. “We might need a couple more dates just to make sure it’s believable. Should we just say that we’ll keep the number even between yours and mine?”
Aaron nodded.
“Sorry to interrupt.”
Macie jumped at her sister’s comment. She hadn’t noticed her coming.
“The night crew just got here,” Joselyn said, “so we thought we’d head over to Snowdrift Springs Park and see if they need any help with decorating the city tree before the lighting. Do you want to join us?” Her eyes cut to Aaron. “You could bring your friend.”
Macie’s and Aaron’s eyes met, and he raised an eyebrow, asking if she wanted to go. “It might make Saturday go more smoothly if we’ve already been somewhere together.”
“True,” Macie said, even though it would make the fake relationship thing go from theoretically a good plan to real life scary and committed, even though she hadn’t had nearly enough time to consider all the angles enough to commit yet. She didn’t take leaps like this. But, she told herself, this wasn’t a leap. This was taking the safe way around in order to avoid leaps. She studied him for a moment, and then turned to her sister. “Emily is closing up Paws and Relax and taking care of the animals, so I’m good there, but I’ll still need to stop by after to get Lola and Reese. But we’d love to.”
“What’s Saturday?” Joselyn asked.
This was the moment. She’d have to commit to it fully if she was going to convince Joselyn. “We,” Macie said, smiling at Aaron, “have a date.”
Chapter Four
Aaron had been teaching at Nestled Hollow High for more than three months, but he realized that all of his time spent in Nestled Hollow had been at the high school, or, on the very rare occasion, grabbing a quick bite to eat. He’d quickly fallen in love with the students there and he had the time, so he’d volunteered for nearly every after school assignment the school offered. But all of that— every swim meet, school dance, football game, band competition, drama production, tennis match, and soccer game—had been on campus. He’d spent almost no time at all in the town itself.
Come to think of it, he hadn’t spent much time at town functions in Mountain Springs either. Or in Colorado Springs before that. So the tree decorating caught him a little off guard. Apparently the lighting itself wasn’t until six, and that’s when everyone showed up, but there was still at least three dozen people there, helping to decorate the giant tree smack dab in the middle of the park. It stood several feet taller than all the others, and looked like it had probably been there since before Nestled Hollow was even a town.
Macie seemed excited by the event, and she was trying to get him excited, too. True, he spent most of his time with high school students and adults, but families came to NHH sporting events, so it wasn’t like he wasn’t used to crowds like this. Maybe it was just because as a kid, his life had revolved around swimming, school, and his sister’s dance competitions. Going to town events just wasn’t in his family’s DNA.
“We should help them decorate,” Macie said.
Several high ladders were evenly spaced around the tree, and the city had one of their cranes with the basket at the end to hold a person that was extended to the top of the tree. There were several people to each ladder, standing at different heights, and people were passing ornaments up, assembly-line style.
“I’m not sure we’re supposed to,” Aaron said. “Besides, it looks like they’ve got it under control.”
She gave him a smile that clearly said she thought that was a flimsy excuse, and pulled him toward the totes of ornaments along with Joselyn, Joselyn’s husband, and their baby. The people in charge must have been okay with everyone helping, because nobody stopped them. And it was actually a lot of fun— he was glad that Macie had made him participate.
The darker it got, the more families arrived. Not too many teens had been at the decorating part, but more and more of them were coming in anticipation of the lighting. At 5:45, they took down the ladders and set up a microphone and a small platform. People started finding spots in front of the tree.
“It’s getting pretty cold. I think I’ll go grab my bike from in front of the ice cream shop and head home.”
“You can’t leave,” Macie said. “They haven’t lit the tree yet.”
He glanced up at it. “This isn’t really my thing. I’ve seen a couple of students already, and the rumor mill will probably take it from here.”
“Have you never seen a big tree lighting before?” When he shook his head, Macie said, “It’s incredible. It’s nothing like a tree in your living room. It took Sam three full days to get this many lights wound onto the tree. Stay. It’ll change your life.”
He raised an eyebrow in challenge.
“Think I’m wrong? The only way to prove it is to stay.”
“Perceptive and persistent.” He took a deep breath, looked up at the tree, and then glanced at the crowds pulling up in the parking lot or walking toward the park, all bundled up in their winter clothes. Some of them were certainly his students. And after helping to decorate the tree, he actually found himself wanting to see how it would look lit up. “Okay, I’ll stay.”
She led him to an area in front of the tree near the microphone, on the side that people coming from the parking lot would reach first, and they both rubbed their hands together to keep warm. Not two minutes passed, and he could already see a handful of more students. Morgan and LeeAnn headed straight for them.
Macie slipped her hand into his. He turned to her and smiled. “Nice touch.” She grinned back at him.
“Hi Coach Hall! Hi, Macie!” Morgan said as the two girls from his AP class neared. He caught the moment that both girls’ eyes flicked to their hands and then back up to their faces.
Aaron looked from Morgan to Macie. “You two know each other?”
“Well, duh,” Morgan said. “We do live in the same town. And she gives me puppy therapy. I swear I wouldn’t have made it through finals at the end of last year if it wasn’t for her.”
LeeAnn nodded her agreement. “And without her, I never would’ve been able to handle breaking up with Peter.”
“Basically, if it weren’t for Macie opening Paws and Relax, we’d both be blubbering piles of Morgan and LeeAnn-colored goo on the ground.”
“It’s true,” LeeAnn said. “She, like, literally saves lives.”
“Wow. A life-saver and an all-but-pro Ice Cream Motivation Analyst. You are one talented woman.” How had they decided to commit to a fake relationship, and he hadn’t once even thought to ask what she did for a living? That was the kind of thing a boyfriend would know. He needed a crash course in Macie Zimmerman.
“Don’t forget perceptive and persistent,” Macie said.
He smiled. “I’m pretty sure I couldn’t forget that if I tried.”
“So you two are dating?” Morgan
asked. “When did this happen?”
Well,” Aaron said, “we first met this morning, actually. It was a pretty explosive meeting, like a bolt came out of nowhere and knocked me right off my feet. With such a memorable meeting, I couldn’t stop thinking about her all day long. One thing led to another, so we met at With a Cherry on Top—”
“Where he knocked me off my feet just as quickly—”
“And we had an amazing conversation and just really hit it off.”
Macie looked up at him and smiled. “By the time we finished a Is the Doctor Pepper In? and a Maple, Please Bring Home the Bacon, we had decided that life would be perfect if we started dating.”
LeeAnn put both of her hands over her heart. “Oh my goodness, that is the sweetest story I’ve heard in my life!”
Macie reached out and placed her fingers on his biceps. “It doesn’t stop there, girls. He even asked me to Winter Formal.”
Both girls squealed in delight.
Morgan glanced at the choir. “Oh! We’ve got to get up there quickly.” She grabbed LeeAnn’s wrist, and started backing toward the choir while calling out, “But we want to hear all about this in class on Thursday!”
This was working even more perfectly than he could have possibly hoped. Macie was pulling it off beautifully. As the chatting from the crowd grew, he leaned in and whispered in her ear, “You are amazing, teammate. That went beyond what I had hoped for. And pulling it off in front of those two was especially perfect.”
Macie turned and put her lips right next to his ear and said, “And I’m pretty sure that you leaning in to whisper in my ear like that just set the rest of the town abuzz. Nice work, teammate.”
He stole a quick glance behind them and sure enough, everyone was watching them, even Macie’s sister and her family. Smiling, he turned back as Macie pressed her side into his, blocking the fist she raised from everyone’s view behind them. He bumped his fist into hers as they grinned at each other. “We’ve got this.”