Page 274 of Accidentally Under Your Tree

"I didn't debauch you enough last night?" she purred.

"I'll never get enough of you."

Pink rose up her neck and filled her cheeks. Her lips pursed, struggling against a smile. She had a way of pulling at the strings of my heart, made it swell too big for my chest. It thudded against my ribs. I rubbed the heel of my hand into its persistent beat, but it wouldn't calm.

I jerked my chin toward the silent radio. "What were you listening to?"

She chewed her bottom lip. "Miley Cyrus."

"Why'd you turn it off?"

Wrinkles creased her forehead. "Um…I guess because my ex hated my music. So, I turned it off on reflex."

"I don't mind.Party in the USAis one of my go-to karaoke songs."

She snorted. "Of course."

"What? I listen to Miley?"

"Karaoke. Nightmare."

"To sing or just be there at all?"

"All the above."

"Would you just go and hangout with me?"

"Do you really like it?"

I shrugged. "I have a lot of fun."

She chewed her full lower lip. "I'd go. But only if you promise not to dedicate a song to me."

"I promise not totellother people that I'm dedicating a song to you. But you'll know."

The smile she'd been fighting won out. "Fine."

It felt like more than a compromise about something pithy. It felt like common ground. It felt like there was space where I could be outgoing and ridiculous, and she could be prickly and quiet. There was room for both of us.

"We got all the way here, and I still don't know where to begin." Lizzy's voice echoed a bit in the mall's interior hallway, over the Christmas music.

"Gift shopping is like that, isn't it?" Jerking my head toward a bookstore, I grabbed her hand. "Let's just look around."

She trailed behind me through the open doors. The smell of coffee and baking cookies wafted in the air from the cafe to our right. Bookshelves covered the bulk of the floor space, but the music and game department were decent.

Lizzy paused to flip through a planner decorated in pastel colors and soft lines.

"Need a new planner?" I asked.

She shook her head. "No, I keep everything electronically. It's just pretty."

"Do you want it?"

"There's no point." She closed the cover and ran her hand over it. "I'd just own it to own it. I don't actually have a use for it."

I tilted my head, trying to get a better look at her face, to make sure I wasn't imagining the wistfulness in her voice. "Does everything have to have a purpose?"

"No, but planners should, I guess." She looked over her shoulder at the stacks of books. "Does she read much anymore?"

---