by Lucy Smoke
I just held up his churro and caramel dipping sauce in silence with a smile. He grinned back at me and took them, popping the top on the plastic container so that it flipped open and then dunking the churro in, before biting off the soggy goodness in what looked like one of the most practiced moves I had ever seen.
“I take it you have done this before?” I queried with a raised eyebrow.
“I told you, I am addicted. Here you need to try this, these ones are excellent. Not burnt, but still crispy, and so much cinnamon.” He dunked his churro back in the sauce and offered it to me.
Without even thinking, I leaned forward and bit off the caramel covered bit. Oohh, that was good.
“That’s really good,” I said as I continued to chew behind my hand.
“Told you, now you will be addicted for life too!” He smirked at me.
I sucked in a breath and placed my hand on my chest, eyes wide. “You’re my enabler!”
To that he leaned in and whispered in my ear, “I want to enable you in so many more ways.” To which I blushed as red as the ribbon James had cut to tie around the tree. I quickly looked up at Vinnie, who stared back at me with hooded eyes. I got caught in that look, imagining all of the naughty ways he could…
“Okay Scoop, ready to pick a tree?” Vinnie asked me.
I blinked. Did I imagine that whole thing? “One second,” I said as I held up a hand and turned back to James. I pushed the other churro and sauce towards James. “These are for you.”
“Thanks, Chief. Go pick a tree,” he said with a wink. Did I see that right?
I turned back to Vinnie. “Okay, ready!”
Vinnie reached out and grabbed my hand, dragging me along, “Well actually, you don’t get to pick. I kind of already set aside one for you.”
“Oh, really? But how will I know you picked the best one?” I asked him back with a flirty tone.
“Oh I did. As soon as I saw it, I knew it was the one for you,” he replied confidently.
He dragged me to the furthest corner on the right, where there was a mini tree hiding amongst the normal sized trees.
“Vinnie,” I hissed. “Did you steal this tree and hide it so no one else would find it?”
“Maybe,” he said as he threw a cute, little, guilty smile over his shoulder, which I am sure worked on his momma whenever he got into trouble. It sure was working on me. “I just wanted you to have the best tree.”
Vinnie bent over, giving me a very nice view of his charcoal jean covered ass. Hockey players had really nice butts, must be all that training. Before I was ready, he stood up and pulled out the cutest tree I had ever seen.
It was about three feet tall, with thick, spindly branches that had tight curled bristles coming off of it in thick clusters. It was on the smaller side, but it had character. I was already decorating it in aqua and purple decorations in my mind.
“She’s beautiful,” I whispered as I reached to touch one of her bristles.
“She instantly reminded me of you, so I saved her. I did good right?” Vinnie asked.
“You did good, Vinnie,” I said with a smile.
“Great, let’s take her back to James so he can put a ribbon on her for you.”
He carried the tree hanging from one hand and held on to mine with the other. This was another moment I wanted to remember forever. I tugged on Vinnie’s hand. “Selfie?”
“Ahh, I love selfies. Here, I’ll get the tree in there too.” He lifted her up higher.
I quickly unlocked my phone, made sure the camera was facing us, used my new-found skills at camera button pressing, and clicked for two selfies. One smiling, the other with a silly face.
I showed Vinnie the pictures, while he looked over my shoulder. “Oh I like that one, make sure you send it to me.”
I quickly snapped a few pictures of the miniature trees, being sure to get as many red bows in the pic as possible. My phone started to vibrate in my hand, and before the notification could pop up on the screen, I quickly locked it and popped it back into my pocket, heart pounding loudly in my chest.
“Sure, I’ll send it to you tonight, after I check that I don’t look hideous first.” I smirked at him.
“You could never look hideous, Scoop,” he replied offhandedly as he picked the tree back up and pulled me closer to him. He threw his arm around my shoulder as we continued our walked back. Usually, I found that position really uncomfortable, like I was being squashed by an arm, or the guy was a little bit too short. But not with Vinnie, it was like he was made the perfect height for me to fit snugly against him.
When we reached James, he was smiling at us. “Ah so she did love it.”
“Yep, it’s perfect,” I said back.
“Great, now all you need to do is decorate it,” James said as he started to cut the ribbon to tie onto my tree.
“Yeah, I might take a quick trip down the craft alley before I hit the next stall and grab a few things. I haven’t had a tree to decorate for a few years,” I mused.
“Well, so that you don’t double up on anything, I got you something on my way in,” Vinnie said as he reached into his pocket.
When he opened his hand, there was a red wicker love heart. Exactly the same as the one already in my messenger bag. I kind of just stared at it for a second, until James let out a cough, I quickly reached out to grab it.
“Vinnie, you didn’t have to do that. I wasn’t expecting a gift.” I stared up at him with a bit of shock.
“I know, and that’s why I got it. I like making you smile,” he responded with a sweet whisper.
I ducked my head, but looked up and smiled at him. My phone then took that moment to vibrate several times.
“I guess you probably need to keep moving around the festival, right?” he asked with a sigh.
“Yeah, I need to keep going, but I have a few more minutes,” I replied, not really wanting this to be over just yet.
“Okay, well I’ll walk you to the edge if you like?” he offered.
“That would be great.”
Vinnie took my hand again, but instead of dragging me along, we strolled like a couple enjoying the miniature tree farm. Vinnie rubbed his thumb over my knuckles as we walked, giving me the warm and fuzzies on the inside.
When we made it to the edge of his designated area we stopped.
“Well this is it, this is as far as I can go; otherwise, the organizer of this festival will kick my butt,” he said jokingly.
“I heard she is a hard task master,” I replied with as much seriousness as I could inject into my tone when my heart was pounding a million miles a minute. If tonight didn’t put me into cardiac arrest, I didn’t know what would.
Vinnie reached up and tucked some hair behind my ear as he smiled down at me.
I bit my lip as the warmth from his hand filled my cheek, and I looked up at him through my lashes.
“I’m going to kiss you now Scoop,” he said as he started to lean in.
I was nodding my head as his lips touched mine. Vinnie’s kiss was sure and strong. He held my head with one hand and pulled me in closer with the other, tucking me into him. I felt tiny and dainty, and like someone should be filming this moment to use in a rom com. He bit my bottom lip enough to make me gasp and used my reaction to sweep into my mouth. Just as I was beginning to catch up to him, he started to pull away, making me hold onto his jacket to keep him there; my fingers clutched his heart and leather at the same time.
He chuckled as he reached for my hands. “Scoop, I can feel your phone vibrating; you need to go check on how things are going.”
I sighed, knowing he was right. My forehead dropped onto his chest. I didn’t want this to end.
Vinnie wrapped his arms around me and gave me a quick squeeze. “I’ll message you later to find out how everything went. Okay?”
I nodded my head and muttered, “Okay.” I lifted my head and took a step back.
“Okay then. By the way, this is number three,” he said with a sly smil
e.
“Three what?” I asked with confusion.
“Three dates. The Sports Bar on Sunday. Coffee on Thursday. And tonight.”
Oh. “Right,” I replied. This was my chance, the opening I needed. I was doing this; I was going to intentionally get my name written up on the Puck Board. That’s what investigative journalists did right? They followed the story the whole way in? They jeopardized everything for the article? Right? Right.
I looked up at Vinnie through my lashes. “So are you going to invite me to your place?”
He stared down at me, a serious expression on his face; his eyes roved all over my face. “Scoop, I would love to take you back to my place tonight, but I’m not going to. When you come back with me to my apartment, it’s going to be when we know for sure that we have something. I’m not going to risk what we have. You mean more to me than that. I want you to meet my roommates, to sleepover, to come to all my games. This, you and me, this isn’t a game to me. I want this.” Vinnie smiled down at me as the hand cupping my head adjusted a little so that his thumb could rub across my bottom lip.
Releasing me, Vinnie grabbed me by the shoulders, turned me to face in the opposite direction, gave me a light tap on the butt, and said, “Now, go be amazing.”
And with that, he sent me on my way.
And I left. I just walked off. My brain absolutely befuddled at what had just happened. Did he just, turn me down? Did he just turn sex, with me, down? Seriously? Wait, he just said this wasn’t a game – did that mean he wasn’t using me as a part of the Puck Games? Why not? And meet his roommates, oh my God. Even if he did want anything to do with me after all of this was over, the other two - how could I bare to face them?
My phone vibrated in my pocket again, but I just ignored it. Okay, so Christian, I hadn’t exactly asked him to take me home, but that kiss had been heart-stoppingly amazing. And then Vinnie with that amazing speech. I felt like I was wandering around in the twilight zone. Or an alternate universe where vampires were real, Cinderella got to keep her shoe, and players like Vinnie turned me down! Me! I did not get turned down.
My phone vibrated again, causing me to huff and stamp my foot as I yanked it out of my pocket and put Vinnie’s heart in there for safe keeping. Juvenile I know, but I couldn’t exactly express myself the way I wanted with so many small humans running around. There were a bunch of texts from stalls and one from Elizabeth, as well as Steph and Justin.
Elizabeth: Media Image.
Steph: So how’d it go with Vinnie?
Justin: He is going on a vacation to Florida in January. He bought some of those ‘little red bikini things.’ He wants to get a tan before he dies.
Justin: As well as Moon and Snow, he has three cows, Daisy, Bullwinkle, and Daffodil, two dogs, Milo and Otis, and a rooster named Pete. Who names a rooster Pete?
Justin: He has a suspicious mole in his underarm, right next to where the hair starts. He just asked me if I thought he should shave before he went to the doctors about it.
Justin: H, you owe me double big. I can’t get the image of a misshapen mole growing with hair out of my mind. It’s permanently burned in.
My stress evaporated at Justin’s silliness; a smile stretched my cheeks so widely they hurt. Poor Justin. I quickly opened Elizabeth’s first. It was a gif of Ryan Gosling clapping his hands. I sent her back the pictures of the trees, hopefully she liked those too. I dealt with the stall texts next, mostly just requests for more supplies. I then opened Steph’s message.
Me: No luck. I point blank asked him to take me back to his place, and he said no, after he kissed me. Will talk to you about it tomorrow.
I then flicked back to Justin.
Me: Sounds like you are having a great time! I was going to swing by in about twenty minutes after I checked on Santa, but you seem to be doing good, so I’ll skip you and move onto the make-your-own-candied-apple.
Pocketing my phone, I headed in the direction of the big red guy. I had barely taken ten steps when it vibrated again.
Justin: That’s cruel H, you have to come see me. Besides, I have a surprise for you.
Surprise? I liked surprises.
Me: Well, I guess I will have to come see you then :p Want me to bring you anything?
Justin: Nope, I got it all sorted.
Of course he did.
Still smiling, I approached the marquee that was set up to take photos of the kids with Santa. We had chosen to put Santa’s big chair by the clock stairs and hired a sleigh to put up on the hill in the background with a few fake reindeer. I peeked over the shoulder of the girl manning the computer and printer.
“Oh, those look so cute! Look at how excited they are to see Santa.” I smiled as I watched the images appearing.
“Yeah, the older kids have been great. We had a few screaming toddlers earlier, but he handled them like a pro, giving them a sucker and getting a few to laugh. Had some funny shots with a few adult groups. Here let me find you one.” The girl replied as she quickly flicked through the folder, double clicking on one to enlarge it.
A group of guys had run up to the sleigh in the background and were sitting in it like they were on a rollercoaster, hands up in the air, while Santa played on his phone. I burst out laughing. It was ingenious.
“Yeah that’s what we all thought as we set it up. Want me to send you this one? The guys all signed our media release, so you can use it in the paper if you’d like?” she offered.
“Oh, that would be great. And then I can send it on to Elizabeth. She would love it.” Which reminded me.
I stepped out of the marquee and snapped a few pictures, turning in a three-sixty to get everything around me. I had another idea and quickly ran halfway up the stairs, turning back and setting my camera to panorama. I followed the little arrow across the screen until I had the whole shot. Which looked amazing, if I do say so myself.
I opened my message to Elizabeth and sent her those pictures too.
I headed back down to the Santa stall to double check everything, when I saw that the line was empty. I checked with the photographer first and when she said it was okay, I approached Santa.
“Hi,” I said, suddenly a bit nervous about my request. Could this be considered sexual harassment?
“Hi there young lady, how can I help you?” he asked me with a jolly smile. When I got close I could see that his white beard and glasses were real. The white fluffy hair falling out from under his hat looked suspiciously real as well. And the belly. The suit looked loved but new. Holy crap, was this guy actually Santa?
“Uh, I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind taking a selfie with me? I want to send it to a friend,” I replied, a little nervously.
He chuckled. “Of course, I’m here to take photos. Doesn’t bother me if it’s a selfie. What did you have in mind?”
I coughed a little, my cheeks going red. “I, uh, wanted to give you a kiss on the cheek while you were all ‘ooohh.’” I answered with a shocked facial expression while waving my hands in the air. Yeah, I was cringing too, it’s okay.
This time he really let loose with his laughter, and I had to give it to him, what with him throwing in a few “Ho, ho, ho’s” in there.
“I like it, come and sit next to me and we’ll get this done.” He patted the empty space by his side.
I hurried over running my fingers through my hair as I went. Sitting down I set my camera to selfie mode, turned to face Santa, closed my eyes, pressed my lips to his cheek, and pressed capture a few times.
When I opened my eyes, I saw that the photographer had actually taken a few photos herself. “Would you mind if I took a couple without your phone in the shot? These came out pretty cute,” she called out to me.
Why not?
“Sure, want anything different?” I called back.
“Could you sit on his lap? You look like you are reaching a little.”
I looked up at Santa with a raised eyebrow, he gave me a simple nod.
I quickly perched on on
e of his knees, my phone hidden away, and took up the same position. I could feel Santa doing different facial expressions, but could only hold my position for about ten seconds before I started laughing.
I gave Santa a real kiss on the cheek. “Thanks for being a good sport, Santa,” I said with a smile as I got up.
“Anytime, it’s not like I get kissed by pretty young ladies every day. I usually need mistletoe for that sort of thing.” He winked back at me.
I hurried back to the marquee to see the pictures. They were hilarious. Santa was shocked, smiling, and covering his face.
I pointed to the computer. “Could you send me these too?”
The girl nodded and started doing her thing. I patted her on the shoulder and left the stall to go find out what Justin’s surprise was.
On my way, I opened up the selfies with Santa. The first one was a bit blurry, but the next one was priceless. The angle was a bit tilted. I had really pressed my lips to his cheek, and he was hilariously shocked with his mouth open and eyes wide. Perfect! I quickly opened each of the guys’ message threads and sent them the picture.
Rounding the bend, I saw the line for the horse and carriage rides had about ten couples waiting in line. It was going on nine o’clock, which meant the festival only had about an hour to go, with each stall shutting down one at time to slowly send people back to their cars. When that happened, each stall had to pack their things up into the tubs available and close down their marquee. I had arranged with campus security to use their shuttles to have everything picked up and housed in their garage for the night until we could get everything sorted out tomorrow.
This also had the added benefit of having the guys leave at different times.
Justin had his back to me, and a sense of deja vu came over me. I tapped him on the shoulder but quickly took a step back. He turned around suddenly, but since he was already standing the looming effect didn’t hit me so strong. His scowl changed into a smile when he saw my cheekily grinning face.
“H, finally! How’s the festival going?” he asked as he reached for my arm and pulled me closer to the gas heater he was standing near. The warmth instantly washed over me. I wasn’t sure if it was the actual heat from the heater or from the feeling of protectiveness Justin showered me with.