Exmas

by Winter Renshaw

  I’m not sure how that could be. Her life experience is akin to a spoiled toy poodle and the only boyfriends she’s had was some guy from high school, a washed-up former boyband singer, and some sugar daddy she met on a dating app.

  “Maybe some other time,” I say, inserting my ear buds.

  I browse through my downloaded podcasts before settling on The Tim Ferriss Show, but before I hit play, I turn to Bij and ask her one question.

  “Do you ever want more for yourself?”

  She looks up from the Us Weekly in her lap, her lips bent to the side like she’s pondering my query.

  Our childhood was one of luxury and privilege, and both of us are well aware of the fact that we’re set for life. The only difference there is that I work by choice and she chooses not to work at all.

  The world is in the palm of our hands.

  Anything we want is ours.

  But is that enough?

  A man can’t fuel his soul on worldly possessions alone.

  “What, you mean like kids or something?” Bijou wrinkles her nose, as if the mere concept of future children disgusts her.

  She’s never been a big fan of anything that’s noisy, smelly, or excessively needy. And when she was a kid, she never played with babies. Only Barbies. And none of the Barbies ever went on to have babies. They were too busy with their personal drama to start families of their own.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I just keep asking myself … if the rest of my life was just like this, would that be okay?”

  “Um, yes. That would be awesome. What kind of question is that?” Bijou scoffs.

  “Why, are you unhappy or something?” she asks.

  “I’m not unhappy. I just feel like something’s missing.”

  Bijou flips a page in her magazine.

  “It’s that Joy girl,” she says without hesitation.

  “Joa,” I correct her.

  “She's what’s missing. Or maybe you just need to get your rocks off. You were a lot happier when you were hooking up with her on the regular.”

  Bijou is the wrong person to get philosophical with. This is where Joa would come in handy. She was never afraid to talk about the bigger picture. In fact, I remember shutting down a lot of those conversations because she wasn’t afraid to ask the big questions, the questions to which the truth was potentially terrifying.

  Looking back, label or no label, we were in a relationship the entire time.

  I was hers.

  She was mine.

  Even if we were both too stubborn and pigheaded to admit it.

  As soon as this plane lands, I’m calling her.

  This isn’t over.

  It never was.

  Past

  Reed

  Joa grips her sandwich with both hands, her legs crossed as she sits on a bench outside our office on her lunch break.

  “Why are you eating your lunch out here?” I ask as a city bus makes his presence known and leaves us in a cloud of exhaust.

  I wasn’t looking for her, I just happened to notice her sitting here as I walked back from a client meeting a few blocks away.

  “I almost always eat lunch out here. You didn’t know that?” she asks.

  Obviously not. She’s worked here a hot minute. I don’t know a damn thing about her other than the fact that when I’m not tearing her clothes off and claiming that pout of hers, I’m thinking about tearing her clothes off and claiming that pout of hers.

  “Why?”

  “All right. You caught me. I’m a closet people watcher,” she says. “It’s not as creepy as it sounds. I just find people interesting. That’s all.”

  “So you sit here, eat your lunch, and stare at people.”

  “Basically.” She takes a nibble of her sandwich. “Want to try?”

  I smirk, taking a seat beside her.

  “See that couple over there? Waiting for the bus? They break up every Monday. By Wednesday they’re always back together. Tuesdays it’s just her and she talks on the phone while she waits, so I usually get caught up on the drama then.” She rolls her eyes. “So. Much. Drama.”

  “I don’t understand the appeal of the whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing anymore,” I say, watching the young couple scream at each other, arms flailing wildly and the girl looking like she’s two seconds from snatching his phone from his hands and stomping it into bits. “I mean, unless you’re looking for a one-way ticket to marriage and kids, there’s really no point in dating. It’s an outdated concept. Someday it’ll be practically obsolete.”

  “Doubtful.” She lifts a brow. “Love is a universal language. It brings people together. I’d hate to see what this world would look like without it.”

  “You think those two are in love?”

  She chews her bite. “No. But I think they’re too young and too busy fighting to realize it. They just think they are. But that? That’s not love. That’s entertainment.”

  We watch them a few minutes more, and then the city bus stops and they disappear inside.

  “Have you ever been in love, Reed?” Joa asks, folding her sandwich wrapper in her lap.

  “Random,” I say. “But no, Joa. I haven’t.”

  “Do you ever think you’ll want that? For yourself? Someday?”

  I lean forward, elbows resting on my knees and hands folded.

  “I don’t think about that kind of stuff,” I say.

  “Never?”

  “Never.” Turning to her, I say. “I don’t need a girlfriend or love, Joa. I’ve got you.”

  “So basically I’m enabling your emotionally dysfunctional tendencies.” Her words are dry. I can’t tell if she’s teasing or annoyed with me.

  “Are you complaining? Pretty sure your end of the bargain isn’t too shabby either.”

  Crumpling the wrapper, she gets up and tosses it in a nearby trashcan.

  “Not complaining,” she says as she eyes the main entrance to the building. “I just think it's kind of sad. Everyone should get to experience at least one great love in their life.”

  I stand, shoving my hands in my pockets and chuckling when she looks at me with pity in her eyes.

  “Who knows,” I say, “I’ve still got a lot of life ahead of me. Maybe it’ll hit me when I least expect it. In the meantime, I’m not looking for it, and I’m sure as hell not sitting around feeling sorry for myself when I’m shacking up with you in tropical casitas.”

  “Fair enough.”

  I follow her inside and we wait for an elevator.

  “What about you?” I ask. “Have you ever …?”

  Her pink lips dance a little. “Yes. I had a boyfriend in high school. We dated for three years until he went off to college. He was a year older than me. But he was my first love, and it was intense and magical and I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world.”

  Her hands clasp in front of her hips and her head tilts as she stares up at the ceiling with this dreamy, school-girl look on her face.

  Heat flashes through me and my throat tenses.

  Is that …?

  Did I …?

  Am I jealous?

  I refuse to believe it, and by the time we get to our floor and go our separate ways, I don’t give it another thought.

  There’s no way I’m jealous of her teenage ex-boyfriend.

  Right?

  27

  Joa

  I change into jeans, grab a cardboard box, and gather my purse and keys. I’m heading into the office to clear out the rest of my belongings.

  Lucy texted me a couple hours ago, said the FBI had raided the place, taking mostly files and computers. I have a few picture frames and smaller items I’d like to grab while I still have the chance.

  I’m backing out of my driveway when my next-door neighbor waves for me to stop and makes her way across her side of the driveway to my passenger door.

  “Hi, Agatha,” I say, rolling the window down and lowering the volume on the radio. “What’s going on?”

  Her s
ilvery hair is tucked into a stocking cap, and she wears a parka that makes her tiny frame look as though it doubled in size.

  “I just wanted to see if that nice boy might be coming around again anytime soon,” she says, rosy cheeked and sparkle-eyed.

  “Oh. Um. I’m not sure. Why do you ask?”

  “I baked some thumbprint cookies. I wanted to give him a few as a thank you for the other day,” she says. “My son and his family left last weekend. Went back home to Wisconsin Wednesday morning, I couldn’t get my car to start. I knocked on your door to see if you were home and he answered. Long story short, he jumped my car with yours and shoveled both of our driveways.”

  “He did?”

  “Sure did,” she says, breath turning to clouds. “He’s a keeper, that one. Reminds me so much of my Richard. God rest his soul.”

  She makes the sign of the cross before glancing up at the cloudless winter sky.

  “If you see him again, tell him thank you for me,” she says. “I simply cannot thank him enough.”

  “Of course.” I nod and she trudges away in her snow gear, disappearing inside her garage.

  I make my way to the train station, driving all the way in a foggy mental haze. Nothing about the past week and a half feels real, and the last four days are all but erased from my memory.

  But it’s the strangest thing.

  I’m not even upset.

  In fact, I’ve never felt more at peace.

  The office is a war zone.

  Pam dabs at teary eyes from behind her desk. From the looks of it, she hasn’t moved for a while. She’s just sitting there, staring at a stack of Post-Its and an unplugged phone.

  Passing by the first set of offices, I lose count of how many open and emptied file cabinets I find.

  Did they think we’re all in on this scam? What else are they looking for? I suppose they have to do a full and thorough investigation to make sure none of the innocent ones are roped into this and none of the guilty ones get out of this unscathed.

  But still.

  I get to my office and walk behind my desk. My computer tower is gone. Nothing but a gaping dark space and a bunch of lifeless cords.

  Starting with my smaller drawers, I fish out all of my personal belongings. Chapsticks. Hand lotions. Travel-sized rollers of perfume. They’ve rifled through everything, but I manage to pluck out the things I need.

  I move to the next drawer, then the next, but it’s when I get to the fourth drawer that I gasp.

  The little box with the silver wrapping paper and blue bow, the one Reed gave me that Christmas, is sitting in my bottom desk drawer, half covered with shuffled papers. A shiny contrast against a sea of white.

  I threw this away.

  I know I did.

  He had to have fished it out of my waste paper basket after I left that day. Why didn’t he say anything? When was he planning to give this to me?

  “Oh, hey, you’re here now.” Lucy stands in my doorway. “What’s that? Is that left over from the Secret Santa party?”

  “No.” I say, tugging at the bow until it unravels and falls onto the top of my desk. “It’s from Reed.”

  Lucy comes closer, examining the small package in my hand.

  “It’s probably jewelry,” she says. “That looks like a necklace box or something.”

  I carefully tear the paper and place it aside, revealing an unmarked, white cardboard box—the kind you might see at an arts and crafts fair.

  “I bet it's a necklace. Or a bracelet,” Lucy says.

  The package feels heavier than a piece of jewelry would, and besides, we’ve never gifted each other anything. And at the time, we weren't dating. There’d have been no reason for him to buy me jewelry.

  I slid the lid off the top and place it under the box.

  It’s a key.

  Attached to a “Cabo is for Lovers” keychain he must have bought when we were in Cabo San Lucas together once. We had to have been hooking up for around six months by that point. I didn’t even know he bought this.

  I lift the keychain out of the box and notice a folded piece of paper beneath it. Unfolding the note, I hold my breath.

  Joa,

  What are we doing?

  I’m crazy about you, and I know you feel the same.

  Who are we trying to fool?

  Reed

  Lucy reads the note over my shoulder. “I don’t get it.”

  “It’s a key to his apartment.” The cool metal rests in my palm and I read the lettering again. Cabo is for lovers. It’s cheesy and I’m sure it cost him all of five dollars, but it’s perfect. “We had this thing ... back when we were hooking up. Our apartments were off-limits to each other, no exceptions. This key … this key means that I was more to him than just some hookup.”

  My eyes mist and dampen, but I blink it away.

  I wish he was here right now.

  “This is major, Lucy,” I say. “You have no idea.”

  “So ... what now? Are you going to call him?”

  Dangling the keys between us, I say, “No. I’m going to go see him."

  Past

  Joa

  If he doesn’t hurry the hell up, I’m literally going to pee my pants.

  My foot bounces as I wait in the passenger side of Reed’s Range Rover. He picked me up for our weekend road trip, but we had to turn around because he forgot something.

  The threat of sweat collects along my hairline, and I find myself scanning the perimeter to check out the bush situation.

  And screw the no-visiting-each-other’s-apartment rule. I’m making an executive decision and throwing it out the window right now.

  But his building is massive, and while I know his apartment number, I don’t think I could afford a wrong hallway.

  I need a direct route, no wrong turns.

  The pressure intensifies and my bladder throbs. According to the clock on the dash, he’s been inside seven minutes now.

  Grabbing my phone, I shoot him a text with three question marks, only to hear his phone vibrate in the console.

  He left it behind.

  Fanning myself, I squeeze my eyes and pray to God I don’t burst right here in these beautiful, buttery leather seats.

  The driver door opens a minute later, and Reed climbs in, tugging a baseball cap over his head. “Sorry about that.”

  We came back for a hat?

  “You okay?” Worry lines sprout across his forehead, though I can hardly see them with his precious Dodgers cap in the way.

  “Yeah, just … can we stop at the 7-11 on the corner?” I ask.

  He nods, backing out of the guest parking lot of his apartment complex and pulling onto the nearest street.

  I can see the gas station from here. Green. Orange. Taunting.

  Red light.

  Reed slows to a stop and I take a deep breath.

  “Seriously, Joa, are you all right?” he asks. “You look like you’re uncomfortable or something.”

  The light turns green.

  “Just go,” I say, regretting those two giant bottles of water I drank this morning. I was trying to pre-hydrate myself for the weekend since I knew we’d be getting extra sun, but I wasn’t planning for it to hit me all at once. “Unless you want me to wet myself.”

  Reed laughs, flooring the pedal and gunning us through the intersection—which makes things ten times worse for a hot second.

  I don’t wait for him to stop before I unfasten my seatbelt and open the passenger door. I’m sure I look like a lunatic sprinting for the door like this, but I don’t have a choice.

  When I get back, I feel halfway sane and all the way human again, and I hand him a package of Skittles I picked up on my way out.

  “I would’ve let you use mine,” he says.

  “Just drive.”

  28

  Reed

  It’s been a full twenty-four hours since I left Chicago. More than double that since I last saw Joa. I tried to call her as soon as I landed at LAX last ni
ght, but she didn’t answer.

  I thought about sending her a text, but desperate doesn’t look good on anyone. Plus, she’ll see the missed call. She’ll know I was trying to reach out.

  I just hope she doesn’t think I had anything to do with the GenCoin scandal. So far, my name has been kept out of the media coverage. They’ve blasted Grosvenor’s name and picture everywhere. Every news channel and media outlet and Internet site. Even though Coffey and Iaconelli were in on it, it’s Grosvenor who’s getting all the attention since he founded GenCoin and the pump-and-dump scheme was mostly his idea.

  The asshole absolutely tried to pin it on me—forging emails and documents with my name on them and using my credentials to log into the different systems, but since I was working with the SEC, they assured me my name would be left out of everything and I’d be hailed as a hero when it was all said and done.

  I heard from someone at the LA office that Grosvenor was escorted out by two men with federal badges on Friday.

  God, I’d have loved to see that cocky bastard go down like that.

  I merge onto the 405, heading home from a morning of running errands and finished with a little gym time and a hot shower.

  My phone buzzes in my cupholder as I change lanes. I steal a quick glance the moment traffic comes to a standstill and read the message.

  BIJOU: Mom and Dad want to do a family dinner tonight. Martina is cooking!! She just got back from Paris!!

  A half hour later, I pull into the garage beneath my condo and head into the building, my gym bag slung over my shoulders as I text Bijou to let her know I’ll be there.

  Family dinners have never been my thing—at least not York family dinners—but I know it’d mean the world to my sister.

  Plus Martina’s cooking.

  She was one of our full-time chefs growing up. Her husband got sick when I was about seventeen and she took some time off. Now she only cooks for us on special occasions or as requested.

  I ride the elevator to the fifth floor and hop out, digging in my bag for my key.