Snow on the Roof

by Sean Ashcroft

  Grant didn’t get a lot of affection. He was allowed to cling to it when he did. That was natural.

  “Thanks,” Grant said.

  He couldn’t keep leaning on Sunny like this, even if he wasn’t complaining. Julia had moved on with her life. It was probably time Grant started to think about looking for someone.

  He’d never really been in a relationship, aside from his marriage. He’d never been with someone he loved in all possible ways. The longer he left it, the less time he’d have with that someone.

  It just seemed like a huge risk to put himself out there, and he wasn’t sure he’d ever be brave enough to take it.

  But maybe he was lonely enough now.

  “I’ll let you go to lunch,” he said belatedly. “I just wanted you to know how grateful I am.”

  Sunny smiled at him.

  His parents couldn’t possibly have known how pretty his smile was going to be, but they’d picked his name well. He really was like a ray of sunshine.

  “I’m glad I’m helping,” Sunny said, standing and pushing the chair back under the desk. “You want me to bring you back a coffee?”

  “I’d love that,” Grant said. “You’re spoiling me.”

  “Sounds like you could use a little spoiling,” Sunny responded. “I’ll be back soon.”

  Grant nodded, then thought of a tiny way he could start to repay Sunny for his kindness. “Take an extra half hour. Go… sit in a park for a while or something. Enjoy being young.”

  “Now who’s spoiling who?” Sunny raised an eyebrow. “I’ll see you in an hour and a half. Text me if you need anything.”

  “I will,” Grant agreed, though he didn’t intend to disturb Sunny. He’d asked enough of him, and he wasn’t going to ask any more, even if he knew Sunny would jump to help him.

  This explained his glowing references. They’d all talked about how he was a self-starter and quick to go above and beyond, but Grant hadn’t realized it’d be like this.

  Three days in, he could barely remember how he coped without Sunny. That meant it was important to keep him happy enough to want to keep working this job.

  There was no way Grant could go back to living without him.

  6

  Sunny only lasted fifteen minutes out of the office after his talk with Grant before he couldn’t bring himself to be away any longer. Grant had opened up to him, and he clearly wasn’t the kind of man who did that a lot.

  That made Sunny special, and Sunny liked feeling that way. He wanted more of it. He wanted to sit and bask in Grant’s presence.

  That was… probably not good, but it didn’t stop him buying coffee and donuts and heading back into the building, tapping his foot on the floor of the elevator as he waited for the numbers to light up to eleven.

  He liked Grant. Making Grant happy made him feel good about himself.

  Sunny hadn’t said his thank-yous yet, and now that Grant had, it felt like time to do that. He was grateful, too. Grateful for the opportunity, grateful to have a job he felt good at.

  Grant looked up at him as he walked back into the office, raising an eyebrow.

  “It’s cold out,” Sunny explained. “And you need to take a break, too,” he added. “I have donuts.”

  Grant smiled at him, which Sunny loved. The crow’s feet around Grant’s eyes made his smiles seem so kind, so genuine.

  “Hard to say no to donuts.” Grant sat up, gesturing at the chair opposite him. “Make yourself at home.”

  Sunny handed Grant’s coffee across the desk to him, putting the box of donuts down between them and then settling into the surprisingly comfortable chair. Most people would have picked one that made it hard for visitors to their office to overstay their welcome, but Grant hadn’t.

  Maybe Grant hadn’t picked this one at all, but the taste shown in his office furniture matched what his apartment looked like, so it didn’t feel like a leap to assume he had.

  “I wanted to thank you, as well. For trusting me, and for giving me a shot. I’d be living off the charity of my roommate right now if I didn’t have this job.”

  “With your resume?” Grant raised an eyebrow. “I’m lucky you’d bother with me at all.”

  Sunny squirmed in his chair, sipping his peppermint latte happily. He was thrilled that the nearest coffee shop had already made the switch from pumpkin spice to peppermint. Not that there was anything wrong with pumpkin spice, just that peppermint felt more like Christmas.

  Sunny loved Christmas. He even didn’t hate Christmas carols playing in every store he went into. It was the most wonderful time of the year.

  “Maybe I like you.” He shrugged.

  He did like Grant. He liked Grant a lot.

  Maybe he had a tiny crush on him. Just a harmless little one.

  It was Christmas. He was allowed to love everyone at Christmas.

  “Does that mean you won’t hate me if I ask you to do the impossible?” Grant asked, playing with his coffee cup.

  “Depends on what you mean by impossible,” Sunny sat back in his chair. “I’d be willing to work a miracle or two.”

  Grant chuckled. “Good, because that’s what I need to ask you to do.” He paused to sip his coffee. “I promised my daughter snow for Christmas.”

  Sunny blinked at him. “I can’t control the weather,” he said, though he didn’t think Grant was really asking him to do that.

  “Right, no, I know.” Grant sipped his coffee, then set it down and leaned forward across the desk, resting his elbows on it. “I mean, I do think you’re slightly magic, but I get that you can’t do that. But I figure it’ll snow somewhere and my ex is willing to come up for the holidays, but I need… well, I need a three-bedroom cabin someplace where it’ll snow. And it’s three weeks before Christmas, so…”

  “Impossible,” Sunny finished for him. Could he do that?

  Maybe. He’d definitely give it a shot.

  “Yeah. And I won’t be mad if you can’t do it, but I’ve tried everything I can think of. I figure you might have some better ideas than me. You have had so far.”

  Sunny blushed at the compliment. He was glad Grant thought this highly of him.

  Hopefully, he wasn’t about to disappoint him.

  “I’ll do my best,” Sunny agreed.

  “Your best has been amazing so far,” Grant said. “Can I also put you in charge of getting Christmas decorations? Since, y’know…”

  “I know,” Sunny said. That, he could definitely do. Looking at Christmas decorations and imagining how he could decorate an apartment of his own was one of his favorite hobbies. “I’ll actually enjoy that. How many do you want? And what kind?”

  Grant shrugged. “Go nuts, and I just want Hope to like it. I promised her a great Christmas this year, with a real tree and everything. If that has to happen in my apartment, fine, but I want it to be as perfect as humanly possible. So I need your help.”

  Sunny’s heart melted. Grant’s love for his daughter shone through every time he talked about her. It was so sweet it almost made his teeth hurt.

  “She’s twelve, yeah? I think I can appeal to the twelve-year-old crowd. I bet she loves glitter almost as much as I do.”

  Grant smiled at that. “She does love glitter.”

  Sunny nodded, reaching forward to grab a donut. He could do this. If he had to build a cabin himself, he’d find a way.

  He wanted Grant to be happy. This would be his Christmas good deed for the year.

  “Hey, uh, while we’re making impossible requests of each other, can I ask you something?”

  Grant looked up at Sunny as he reached out for a donut of his own. “I’m all ears.”

  “I was thinking,” Sunny began, his heart in his throat. He knew Grant was gay, but he was also older, and he seemed a little reserved. This might be too much for him, and Sunny wasn’t sure he wanted to find that out.

  Right now, Grant was perfect. Scratching the surface and risking the discovery that he wasn’t perfect all the way throug
h was scary.

  “Just for the holiday season, I was wondering if… maybe… it’d be okay if I painted my nails? I can keep it subtle.”

  Grant frowned at him, and Sunny’s stomach sank. It was too much.

  And now he had to live with that knowledge. The knowledge that his gorgeous, perfect, sexy boss wasn’t perfect after all.

  Not that he had to be. Sunny was still grateful for the job. He’d just hoped that maybe he’d finally be able to be himself at work. He spent a full third of his life here, so it would have been amazing.

  “Wear it all the time if you want. Hell, come to work with a full face of makeup and heels, if you want.” Grant shrugged. “I’ll defend you if anyone gives you crap. You’re my employee, so I get to make the rules for you.”

  Sunny stared at him, his donut halfway to his mouth.

  Tears pricked at his eyes. Grant was perfect, after all.

  Or at least, as perfect as Sunny needed him to be.

  “Thank you,” he said after a moment, his throat still tight, but for completely different reasons now. “That, uh. That means a lot.”

  Grant smiled the warmest, kindest smile at him that Sunny could ever remember being on the receiving end of. “Hey, we gotta stick together, right? I’m not into nail polish or heels or anything like that, but I’d like to think someone else would have my back if I was.”

  Sunny nodded, forcing back happy tears. He didn’t want to cry in front of his boss, but he did want to cry right now.

  Thankfully, Grant didn’t look as though he was about to say anything. He probably understood. He’d probably had a lot of moments like this, moments where he was thrilled to feel accepted.

  It would have been so much harder for him when he was Sunny’s age. Sometimes, Sunny forgot that things hadn’t always been like they were now.

  “You’re a good boss,” Sunny said once he was confident that he had himself under control. “Thank you.”

  “Well, you’re a great PA, so no need to thank me. I honestly don’t care if you show up in your pajamas, as long as you keep doing what you’re doing.”

  Sunny chuckled at that. “I actually like wearing a suit, so…”

  “Yeah, me too,” Grant said. “It’s not as comfortable, but it makes me feel… I dunno. Halfway competent?”

  “I know what you mean, yeah.” Sunny nodded, still floating from the relief of discovering that Grant was one of the good guys, after all. “When did you want those Christmas decorations by?”

  “Uh, any time before the 24th? I won’t have time to put them up before then, so there’s no rush.”

  “Okay. I’ll work on the cabin first, and we can go from there.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” Grant sat back, wiping powdered sugar off his nose. “Thanks for making me take a break, by the way. And the donuts.”

  “You’re welcome. That’s what I’m here for,” Sunny said.

  All he needed to do now was pull an available three-bedroom holiday cabin out of thin air.

  7

  “I’d like the record to show that I’m a miracle worker,” Sunny said as he walked into Grant’s office, brandishing the tablet that he’d confessed he preferred to work on.

  Grant sincerely didn’t care how Sunny worked as long as he kept doing what he was doing. He was glad to see that Sunny was wearing nail polish today, though. Grant had been afraid that maybe he’d lose the courage he’d found in asking overnight and decide against it.

  Grant had spent enough of his life feeling like he had to hide who he was that there was no way he’d do that to anyone. Especially Sunny, who’d pulled him back from the brink of a nervous breakdown.

  “You found somewhere?” Grant asked after a moment, realizing what Sunny was talking about. He was already a miracle worker, he just kept getting better and better.

  “I had to go through a few local connections, but yeah, I did.” Sunny grinned at him. “I have pictures for you to look at before I confirm anything.”

  Grant sprung up from his desk and crossed the room to stand behind Sunny, eager to see what he’d found.

  The first picture made him gasp. A cute little chocolate-box cabin sitting in a field of snow. It was exactly what he’d been picturing when he’d had the idea.

  Sunny chuckled. “It also has lake views, though I guess the lake’ll be mostly frozen,” he said. “Inside there’s a really beautiful hearth, three bedrooms, like you asked, a recently updated kitchen…”

  Grant watched over Sunny’s shoulder as he scrolled through the pictures, resting a hand on Sunny’s shoulder for balance.

  “It’s perfect,” Grant said. “Better than perfect.”

  Sunny turned to grin at him, his eyes lighting up. He reacted so well to praise that it was hard not to tell him everything he did was amazing.

  Grant hadn’t realized how close they were until Sunny turned his head. Just a few inches between them, and Grant’s hand was still on his shoulder, warmth seeping into his palm through Sunny’s shirt.

  His stomach bottomed out as he realized that he’d only have to lean in a little way to kiss him.

  He wanted to. In this one moment, when Sunny had given him everything he asked for and then some, he wanted to kiss him. He could feel the air between them crackling with electricity.

  Sunny’s lips were so soft, and his smile was so pretty, and the satisfied little sigh he made over his first sip of coffee in the morning was etched into Grant’s brain. He wanted to make Sunny make that sound.

  Actually, now that he was thinking about it, he wanted to do a whole lot more than kiss.

  He’d known Sunny was pretty from the moment they’d met, but he’d been trying not to think about it up until now. This had caught him off-guard, too thrilled that Sunny had come through for him to tone down his joy.

  Joy at knowing Christmas was saved, but also at just being near Sunny.

  That was getting harder and harder to ignore. Sunny had come to Grant’s rescue at a time when he’d needed him most, and now Grant was attached.

  More than attached. There was something a lot bigger than that going on here.

  He could feel it happening, and he knew that would be a disaster for them, but he couldn’t make it stop. He’d known he had a connection with Sunny from day one, and maybe it was only the Friday of their first week, but he couldn’t help how he felt.

  Panicked by that train of thought, Grant took a step away from Sunny, putting some more distance between them.

  It was one thing to have incredibly inconvenient feelings, but it would have been another thing entirely to act on them. Grant was an idiot, but he wasn’t quite that stupid.

  “So… book it?” Sunny asked.

  Grant nodded, his heart pounding in his chest.

  The last thirty seconds had been an emotional rollercoaster, and he needed a few moments to recover.

  “Yeah, book it. From, uh… maybe from the twenty-third? I was thinking about having people arrive on the afternoon of the twenty-fourth, but that means I have to go ahead to set up. Where is it?”

  Sunny chuckled the same fond chuckle he always did when Grant got ahead of himself.

  “It’s not too far out, actually. Maybe an hour and a half’s drive, once you get out of the city. Only an hour away from where my parents live, too. I didn’t know there were places like this so nearby when I was growing up.”

  That explained why Sunny had mentioned local connections. This cabin probably belonged to a family friend, or something.

  Grant didn’t want to pry, but it meant a lot that Sunny was willing to go to lengths like that for him. Sunny always went above and beyond.

  “Heading up on the twenty-third is fine, but you have to leave on the twenty-sixth, if that’s okay?”

  Grant nodded. “That’s okay.”

  He would have liked a few more days, but he accepted that he’d left it too late now. As long as he got to spend Christmas with the people he loved, he was happy.

  “Okay.” Sun
ny tapped on his tablet a few times. “Booked. Merry Christmas.” He smiled warmly.

  “Thanks. Seriously, thank you,” Grant said.

  Maybe what he thought were feelings for Sunny was actually just excitement and relief at having someone around who could make his life this easy.

  That made more sense.

  He’d just been caught up in the moment earlier.

  “Now would be a great time to ask me for anything you want,” Grant said. Sunny deserved a reward for this. It had been impossible, and he’d known that when he asked. The fact that Sunny had somehow accomplished it was amazing.

  “I’d like Christmas day off so I can spend it with my family,” Sunny said.

  “You were already getting it off.” Grant smiled at him. “But I think you’d figured that out.”

  “I was starting to get the impression, yeah.” Sunny nodded. “That’s really all I want. This is my job. You don’t need to reward me for doing it. You pay me.”

  “Not enough,” Grant said. “Remind me to do something about that in the new year, okay? I mean that. I just don’t think I could get anyone in accounts to cooperate between now and Christmas.”

  He’d give Sunny a cash bonus out of his own pocket for Christmas. Sunny had more than earned it.

  Sunny opened his mouth, closed it, and then took a breath to start again. “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll remind you.”

  He’d clearly been about to object, but Grant was glad he hadn’t. Sunny was worth his weight in gold. He deserved to get paid at least a fraction of that.

  “Take an early lunch,” Grant said. “I gotta call Julia and make plans.”

  “I can also do that for you,” Sunny offered.

  Grant shook his head. “You’ve done enough. Seriously. Besides, Julia I can handle.”

  “Okay.” Sunny agreed, taking a step toward the door. “But I’m only a text away if you change your mind.”

  “I know,” Grant said. Sunny was the most reliable person in his life right now.

  Which totally explained how he felt, too. Sunny just made him feel good because he was there, and he kept doing all the things that Grant hated to do without a word of complaint.