Page 14 of Merrily You

I think we should talk before your party tonight. Mom wants me to go to the grocery store for five million things. I can pick you up and then we can have some privacy. Does that sound okay?

It would be nice to get out of the house, even though I’d barely been here for a day. Being in the car with just Danny would be nice.

Sounds good. Let me have some breakfast and get dressed. Come over whenever.

I yawned and stumbled to the shower and then to the kitchen where my dad was making eggs and bacon and had a cup of coffee mixed with hot chocolate for me. There was nothing more decadent and if I wasn’t careful, I was going to have too much and then be bouncing off the walls until it was out of my system.

I could hear Danny’s voice in my head telling me not to overdo it. She was always my voice of restraint and reason. Without her I would have gotten into a lot more situations.

“Thanks, Dad,” I said when he slid a plate of breakfast in front of me. Mom joined us, still in her robe. She was an elegant woman, but I liked seeing her like this. No makeup. Her hair still in rollers. When I was little, I’d loved watching her put on her makeup and do her hair. It seemed magical to me. How she’d used so many powders and potions to make herself look even more gorgeous. It was amazing to see her with my dad, who was handsome in a bookish way. He had glasses and thick dark hair that was always tousled. I’d gotten more of his looks than hers,but I had gotten her hair, which was nice. If only she’d leave me alone about my bangs.

We ate breakfast while Dad read the paper and Mom gazed out the window. The snow had stopped, and the weather had warmed up enough that what fell last night had melted. There was more precipitation in the weather forecast, so my hopes for a white Christmas were still on track. I wasn’t giving up hope.

Breakfast was quiet, but my ears perked up when there was a knock at the door.

Danny.

“Come in,” I called. She knew she didn’t have to knock. I never did at her house.

Danny came in and gave me a tight smile. Great. The weird vibes were still there from last night. That damn kiss. We shouldn’t have done it. Should have saved it for the mistletoe and then we could forget about it.

“Daniella, come sit down and have something to eat,” Mom said. She didn’t care if Danny saw her with her rollers in. Danny was almost another daughter.

“No, thank you. I’ve already eaten.” No doubt her mom had fed her until she’d begged her to stop. Carol didn’t listen to phrases like “no thanks, I’m full.”

“At least have a cup of hot chocolate and coffee,” I said. It was rich and indulgent.

Danny looked at me and sighed. “Fine.”

She sat down at the table with us and Dad made her a cup. She asked him what was new in town and he read some of the headlines in the paper, along with the letters to the editor. Some of them had us laughing as Danny finished her cup and I went to get dressed.

When I came out, I found my dad deep in discussion about financial stuff with Danny. If I didn’t interrupt, we were nevergetting out of here. Dad loved to pump Danny for investment tips.

“Love you, bye!” I called to my parents as I bundled Danny out the door and toward her car.

Once it was just the two of us and she was driving in the direction of the grocery store, silence fell between us and it made me twitchy. I hated this kind of silence.

Just before Danny pulled into the grocery store, I blurted out, “Am I a bad kisser?”

Chapter Eight

Danny

What? Where did that come from? I had no idea what she was talking about. I stared at her for a second before someone honked and I made the turn into the grocery store parking lot.

It was chaos trying to find a spot, and I focused on that instead of what Holiday had said.

I turned off the car and faced her. “What are you talking about?”

She pulled at a thread hanging from one of her gloves.

“I just…things have been weird since last night. Since the kissing thing and I wondered if it’s because I was bad at it. You can tell me, you know. If it was bad. I mean. You can.”

She wouldn’t look at me.

It took me a moment to follow her logic. She’d thought that I’d pulled away because the kiss had been bad.

“No. It wasn’t bad, H. I told you it was fine.”

---