Page 51 of Artfully Wild
“My brother lives for this shit, but I just think the other Hallmark Christmas stuff is far too unrealistic,” I say matter-of-factly.
He lets out a resigned sigh. “We have this argument every year. Of course it’s unrealistic. That’s the point!”
I roll my eyes as he continues. Jacob has been ranting about this for years. He’s all about the holidays. The impractical paper snowflakes hanging around town, the winter festival with all the typical red-cheeked kids with snot running down their noses, hot chocolates in hand and scheming on where their next snowball fight will be. Honestly, I don’t get the popularity of it, but Jacob is not so secretly a little kid on Christmas morning, the twinkle lights reflected in his naive child eyes.
“It’s all about the magic of it all. The stories are there to give you something to believe in.”
My hands shuffle in my lap. “Bah humbug is all I have to say.”
A short laugh. “That’s a lie and we both know it.”
Frustrated that he’s right, I sigh and continue. “It’s just so…” I throw my hands up in the air. “When have you ever seen an actual flash mob proposal in real life or someone standing on the doorstep of theirmarriedfriend’s house professing his love for the guy’s wife? I mean, what kind of magic is that? It’s not. It’s a complete betrayal. And it’s not cute or hopeful. It’s horrible and sets the precedent that it’s okay to tell your friend’s wife that you’re in love with her, therefore, putting the pressure on her to reciprocate in some way.”
I turn to see a familiar smile playing tug of war with his lips.
“Whyare you making that face?”
“I just find it endearing how in denial you are about holiday magic.”
“I’m not in denial, I just don’t think it exists.”
“You used to.”
We both know he’s right. But once Sarah moved back and eventually passed, Christmas never felt the same anymore. It felt…empty. The chair we used to find her in all the time was empty and every time we were all together, the room wasn’t as bright. I was tired of pretending it wasn’t. I was the first one to do anything about it, which was discontinuing my appearance at Sunday brunch until Hudson finally convinced me to start going again. I only agreed because I wanted to see him squirm with Avery there, who he denied he had feelings for even though we all knew that was a lie.
While I’m happy he finally stopped lying to himself, seeing my brother and his fiancé find each other this year, the feeling went from empty to an abyss. Deep, dark and so lonely that when I let myself fall into it, I don’t try to crawl out. I’ve seen how far down it is, I know there’s no chance of making it back to the top, so what’s the point of trying? Thinking about the therapist I haven’t seen in a year, I imagine what she would say if I had voiced my current thoughts to her in our last session.
Her deep, smooth voice instantly calms me and I think about her green eyes, outlined with freckles just on top of her cheek bones and the small crinkles she would get at the edge of her lips when she smiled. “When your thoughts take this kind of direction, where do you think they are coming from?” Camilla would ask.
I’d argue and give her a classic sarcastic response about how they obviously come from my brain and that her question doesn’t make any sense to me. Then she’d tell me my thoughts are coming from a place I haven’t resolved yet. She’d say there’s something in my past that tells me I am not good enough. That Iwill never be good enough for myself, therefore, in my eyes, I won’t be good enough for anyone else either. And then I’d see that her words have some kind of merit. Not that they wouldn’t, seeing as she’s the one with the framed degrees and qualifications hanging on her wall right next to the large pothos plant that was only a baby when I started therapy with her three years ago. I’d then realize again that recent events have brought up a lot of things from my past I haven’t really worked through, stuff I’ve shoved down over the years while plastering a sunny, sarcastic disposition over top to make it seem like I’m a whole and complete person even though the inside of me is exactly the opposite. Shattered and lost.
“Yeah, I used to,” I admit. I try to dismiss the thoughts from my head and focus on Jacob. They came, I acknowledged them, and now I’m pushing them back down into my own dark abyss where they belong. Shoving them into the back of the bottom drawer where they’ll stay until I decide it’s time to clean it out again.
Fingers graze mine as he lifts my hand to his lips, taking his time to nip at each finger tip followed by a kiss to soothe the sting. He gets a look on his face that I know all too well. It’s the one I’ve seen cross his features too many times to count. The one he gets when he’s about to propose something ridiculous he knows I’m not going to want to agree to. He had the same look in high school when he convinced me to sneak out at 3 a.m. in the middle of winter to skate on the lake that Hudson built his house nearby.
He was in loose-fitting black basketball shorts and a light sports jacket. He climbed the tree outside, perched on the part of the roof that led to my window and tapped incessantly until I woke up.
“C’mon, get dressed sleeping beauty,” he says in a hushed, excited tone—the kind kids get when they try to sneak downstairs on Christmas morning to see their present without waking their parents. Hudson, Sarah and me every year. Our own Christmas tradition outside of the family’s.
“Jacob, what the hell. It’s like 2 a.m. and it’s freezing.”
He checks his watch, his breath coming out in huffs, a cloud forming in the charged air between us before quickly disappearing only to be replaced with another.
“Put on some pants and let’s go.” It seems like he is trying not to let his gaze linger on my bare legs and instead focus on the oversized T-shirt I wore to bed.
The one I have on is a faded black from use, a skull with multi-colored daisies sprouting from the top of its head, cracked in places from years of washing.
I run my hands through my hair exasperated. “Jacob, it’s like 2?. I’m not coming outside.”
“Where’s your nerve?” he challenges. He knows exactly how I will respond to that because of all the years we’ve been friends. Because he knows me and he knows I’ll never back down from a challenge. What can I say, though…I like to win and I like to prove myself, which I am sure is some kind of deeply ingrained insecurity of some sort, but I want to ignore that and take him on.
I grab the nearest pair of sweatpants—black with deep pockets, which is how I know they are from the men’s section–and I throw on a sweatshirt under a thick jacket. My winter coat is downstairs and I amnot going to risk waking up my parents to go grab it. The stairs will give me away immediately. I love our old house, but she has creaky bones that make sneaking around next to impossible. That, and Isabelle has the ears and eyes of a hawk. Somehow, she knows every move I make, usually before I ever make it or think about making it.
We somehow make it off the roof and down the tree without breaking anything, including the branches, and manage to not wake anyone up.
Jacob grabs my hand and bends down to pick up something near the base of the tree then tugs me forward. He takes a few steps before I realize what he is holding.
“Why are you carrying ice skates?” I ask, skeptically.
