Page 19 of The Best You've Ever Had

I nudge his elbow. “You’re not missing much. Christmas is the worst.”

“I’ve actually always liked Christmas. But now I think it will just haunt me with memories of losing Mick.”

The Grinch in me wants to cheer him on and agree that, yes, holidays are indeed the worst. They can be tied to terrible memories; I know that better than anyone. My reason for hatingthis time of year, however, is due to a lying, cheating father, not the heartbreaking loss of someone who loved you like their own. Both are losses in profoundly different ways.

I nod, scrambling for the right words to say. Unless you need a swift kick in the ass, I’m not the person to turn to when things get tough. This situation doesn’t warrant tough love. It needs someone gentle and understanding, someone who knows the right combination of words to ease the grief, even by a fraction. Not an emotionally stunted, pessimistic pain in the ass like me. All I know is that this sucks. And that even though we’re all pretending to smile through these final moments with Mick, there’s an underlying sadness for everyone involved. The ending is inevitable, no matter how much he’s loved, how much we cry, or how much we savor and squeeze every ounce of love in these moments with him.

Ben drives down the road toward my mom’s home, the cold wind whipping at the branches and jostling the car as we travel down the deserted road. We sit in comfortable silence, both of us lost in our thoughts.

Pulling into the driveway, he shifts the car into park and raises his chin toward the front door. “Better knock first in case Paul popped a Viagra and they’re still going at it.”

I throw him a disgusted look and move to smack his shoulder, but he’s faster than I expect. He turns his upper body toward me, catching my hand in midair and holding my wrist suspended above the center console.

“Didn’t your mom tell you that hitting isn’t nice?” he asks, looking me dead in the eyes. His grasp is gentle yet firm, and for a moment, we stay locked in the unexpected closeness.

My stomach does a strange flip flop. “You know we don’t play nice.”

“So how do we play then?” His thumb strokes the smooth skin of my wrist, and it takes everything in me not to moan out loud.

“You tell me,” I breathe.

A moment of silence lingers between us, heavy with unspoken acknowledgment—a mutual understanding that a newfound fire has been ignited, illuminating a path toward uncharted territory. The last time I saw him, I wanted nothing more than to tell him to kick rocks barefoot. Which is why it surprises me that now I’d like to kick rockswithhim. In a bedroom. Or a car. Or a filthy alleyway. Or anywhere really, so long as we could channel our heated energy into something more productive—like doggystyle.

His voice comes out as a deep rumble, “Layla, I?—”

A loud knock on the passenger window startles me, making me jump and nearly hit my head on the roof of his bougie sports car. He immediately drops my arm as I snatch it back, both of us acting as if we’ve been caught red-handed committing a horrific crime.

“Layla! Ben! Hi, kids.” Mom stands right outside the car, waving like the happy little maniac she is. “Come on in, it’s freezing out here.”

I open the car door and fly out, a tight smile plastered on my face with an unnatural laugh to match. “He was just on his way out.”

She makes a disappointed sound as I start to carefully power walk up the slick pathway. Much to my dismay, I hear the window roll down behind me and his deep voice call out to my mother, “On my way to the grocery store to pick up some things for tonight. I’m sure you already talked to my mom, but she wanted to know if everyone could come by tonight.”

I don’t even hear my mother’s reply, because I am out of there faster than an Olympic sprinter. In fact, the Olympicsshould recruit me because not only am I fast, but I’m agile under pressure—sprinting on near-frozen cement after almost jumping my childhood nemesis as if he were free Taylor Swift concert tickets

All I know is that we were two seconds away from fucking in the very small backseat of his car.

And I’m not too mad at the idea of that.

Chapter Eight

Ben

“A little to the right.Wait, no to the left,” Mick instructs from his place on the couch. I’m adjusting the shimmering star atop the giant ten foot fir tree. My family are Christmas-holics, and terminal diagnosis or not, there’s no stopping their obsession. At this point, I’d go door-to-door caroling as freaking Santa Claus if I knew it would make everyone happy.

“Is it good?” I ask, from the top of the ladder.

“It’s perfect.” With a watery smile, my grandpa stares at the decked out tree. “You did good, grandson.”

Every year, everyone in my family comes together to decorate the tree. My grandparents and parents made it an annual event that takes place sometime after Thanksgiving. Even after I moved out, we made sure to make a day of it, with Christmas music blasting and spiced cider.

Fast forward to this year, and Mick can barely stand for more than a minute, which is why my parents and I took on the responsibility of hanging every ornament while he directed us from the couch on the exact placement. He seemed like he was having fun telling us what to do, messing with us by having us move it a dozen different times—just because he knows he can and we’ll do it.

A knock at the door sends a jolt through me, my head snapping in its direction. My body thrums with anticipation, aware that I’ll be in close proximity to Layla again soon.

After the situation in the car, egging her on, and on the edge of losing control, I feel conflicted. She’s my fake girlfriend, and the last thing I should want is toactuallyfeel the inclination to kiss her. But I do. Of course, I do. Who wouldn’t want to kiss her? The beautiful, intimidating, mini-typhoon.

Layla and Gina walk in, total opposites of one another. Gina embodies a whimsical hippy, with a swaying bohemian skirt and dozens of beaded bracelets jingling on her wrists. Layla, on the other hand, is all confidence and business in a tight sweater dress. As she walks in, her eyes scan every detail in the room like the Terminator. She catches me looking and doesn’t break eye contact. Instead, she raises an eyebrow, signaling that she knows I’ve been caught staring at her curves in that distractingly tight dress. It feels like a cruel joke—after everything I wanted to do to her in my car earlier. It’s as if she’s teasing me, daring my willpower to snap.

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