Page 4 of Christmas Agreement
Rugar:Pick you up at quarter to?
Katie:You don’t want to meet there?
Rugar:No.
Even if Kyle would kick my ass just as quickly as he would any other guy on campus, I wouldn’t make Katie my dirty secret. I had more respect for her than that, and when the time came, I sure as hell would man up about it. I wanted everyone to know. That meant picking her up for our breakfast not-a-date.
There was a long pause where I watched the dots dancing on my screen. Then disappearing. Then reappearing.
Katie:OK.
I grinned and tossed my phone onto the blanket beside me. I had a date with Katie Johnson. Her brother would probably kill me. Eventually. When he found out. But that was a problem for a different day.
I snatched up my phone again.
Rugar:Sleep well, Katie-Kat. I’ll see you in the morning.
Katie:Don’t call me that.
Rugar:You love it.
Those dancing dots again… And again, they disappeared then reappeared a few times.
Katie:Night.
She’d signed it with a winky-face emoji, and I grinned. Shedidlike my nickname for her.
Rugar:Night.
Leaning back, I laced my arms behind me and stared at the ceiling. Today felt like years of waiting coming to an end. An endinganda beginning. I’d never really had a solid plan for how I’d get Katie in my life. I’d just always known that there wouldn’t be any girl for me other than her. However it was that I worked that out.
Tomorrow, the real campaign would begin.
Time for rubber to the ice.
Time to take it to the net.
I just had to hope when I took my shot, I scored. Otherwise, this could be sudden death elimination.
I had to do this right or else.
Puck me…
Agitated, I leapt back to my feet and headed out of my apartment. Thankfully, it hadn’t snowed too much today and that had been in the morning, so the little precipitation we’d gotten had all been cleared. In minutes, I was in my Jeep and driving toward the beach on the north side of Lake Majestic Falls. I rolled along Lake Main Street, a path similar to the one that Katie and I had walked earlier.
Everything was dark, save for occasional Christmas lights and the beams from the posts at regular intervals along the edges of the sidewalks. The street was deserted, since the caroling had finished awhile ago. Not a creature was stirring, not even a moose.
I snorted a laugh through my nose. A moose… My eyes were peeled for Clarence, Majestic Falls’ proverbial mascot and good luck charm for couples. He was nowhere to be seen, either. Hopefully, that wasn’t a portent of Katie and I being unsuccessful together.
“Come on, Clarence. Do me a solid,” I said then laughed at myself. A moose wasn’t deciding whether I’d be with the girl of my dreams. That was totally up to Katie and me.
Still, I drove around for over an hour before I was settled enough to head back to my place and fall into bed.
Three
Katie
I stood in front of my closet with my wet hair, body wrapped in a towel, trying to decide what to wear. This wasn’t a date. It wasn’t a date. Itabsolutely wasn’t under any circumstancesa date.
