Page 46 of Fa-La-La-La Faking It
Chapter Fifteen
The ice storm pelted Bluebonnet with bouts of sleet and freezing drizzle for three straight days, coating the streets with a wintry mix that, for all practical purposes, shut down the entire town. Schools issued snow-day notices. Businesses either announced delayed start times or closed altogether. Life in the Hill Country came to a screeching halt.
Since Adaline’s apartment was located directly above Cherry on Top, her bakery remained open. The pipes hadn’t frozen and the electricity kept chugging along, so she made specialty “snowball cupcakes” topped with white buttercream frosting she shaped into a perfect ball with an ice cream scooper. Teenagers and families with small children flocked to the town square to try sledding across the park on makeshift sleds.
On any other winter day, Adaline would’ve loved watching the kids, all bundled up in mittens, brightly colored puffer coats and pom-pom hats. But the square didn’t seem the same without the Christmas tree lot. Icicles dripped from the dogwood trees that flanked the gazebo, so she knew Jace’s lovely fir trees wouldn’t have stood a chance. Still, she missed them.
She missedhim.
Gus’s farm was located on the outskirts of town at the bottom of a steep hill that made the drive far too treacherous while the roads were still iced over. Adaline was lucky she’d gotten out of there after the pizza party. If she stayed with Jace in the barn much longer, she might not have made it home. By the time she’d collected Fuzzy from Belle and gotten back to her apartment, sleet had been coming down hard. Ice pellets dotted the entire town square.
Now three days had passed, and she hadn’t seen or spoken to Jace since. Tomorrow morning called for warmer temperatures, which meant life could return to normal in Bluebonnet. The only trouble was that Adaline didn’t quite know what normal looked like anymore.
She’d tried to think of the past three days as a cleanse, like when people went cold turkey and stopped eating sugar. Although, did anyone really stick to those things? A total sugar blackout sounded completely miserable. A baker wouldnever.
In any case, as she’d explained to Fuzzy in great detail numerous times over the past seventy-two hours, this forced break from Jace was a good thing. She’d started to feel way too cozy with him. Tooclose—not just physically, but emotionally too. Adaline was already in flagrant violation of half the fake dating rules she herself had insisted upon. Even worse, she’d begun to think she might have genuine feelings for her fake boyfriend.
“Not going to happen,” she told Fuzzy as she climbed into bed and pulled up the pink-and-red crocheted blanket Gram had given her for her sweet sixteen birthday to her chin.
The Cavalier yawned from atop the pillow beside her. Great. Even her dog didn’t believe her. He’d been on the receiving end of enough talk about Jace lately to recognize this particular lie when he heard it.
“I’m serious,” she said as she burrowed further under the covers.
She got nothing in response but a snort followed by the sound of Fuzzy’s deep, rhythmic breathing as he drifted off to sleep.
Adaline wished she could fall asleep half that easily. Every time she closed her eyes, her mind spun with all the things she wasn’t getting done duringFrosty the Snowstorm, as the local weatherman had dubbed it, despite the notable lack of actual snow.
She hadn’t managed to get any new information on the retail space for lease next door to Jenna’s dance school because the property company had shut down during the storm. Nor had she been able to do any research on Gram’s wedding announcement because the library had been closed as well. Also, since the Christmas tree lot had been dismantled for the past four nights, Comfort Paws hadn’t brought in a dime of hot chocolate money. While the world had been hibernating, so had each and every one of Adaline’s plans.
Even her visions of Santa Claus pictures as part of her grand plans for the Comfort Paws fundraiser had gone up in flames. Tomorrow afternoon, Bluebonnet Chapel was hosting a Santa photo event and had invited the Comfort Paws dogs to provide support. The therapy dogs would help calm children who were nervous or scared about meeting Santa Claus. Adaline was really looking forward to it, but she couldn’t help thinking about what could have been.
“Everything is going to be okay. Tomorrow is another day,” she whispered to her sleeping dog.
In the stillness of Adaline’s quiet apartment, all was calm. All was bright. And even though she never would’ve admitted as much to anyone else, her last thought as she closed her eyes was that Gram just might be right.
I’m lonely.
It was a terrible thing to realize, made worse by the knowledge that she’d been just fine before Jace came along. Their pretend romance had uncovered some very real truths, and she wasn’t sure she was ready to face whatever else this nutty holiday season had in store for her.
It’s only until Christmas Eve. Just a few more days.
A tear slipped down her cheek, and Fuzzy blinked his little eyes open and shimmied close to lick it away. But the tears kept falling, one right after another. And for the life of her, she didn’t know whether she was crying because the end was barreling toward her at warp speed, or because she wished she could rewind the clock before it struck midnight.
A knock sounded on Jace’s door the morning after the ice storm ended, and the sound was so unfamiliar that he almost didn’t recognize it.
He stood in Gus’s kitchen with a cereal bowl in hand, spoon paused halfway to his mouth. For a second, he’d thought he might’ve been hearing things. Then it happened again—three sharp knocks on the front door.
Jace set the bowl and spoon on the counter and made his way to the log cabin’s entryway. His heart gave a rebellious twinge of hope before he could shut down any runaway thoughts that Adaline might be stopping by. He’d thought about her countless times while he’d been trapped out here during the storm. Part of him wished he’d asked her to stay that night in the barn. If he could live that evening all over again, he probably would have. She could’ve picked up Fuzzy from Belle’s house and come right back. A thousand images had invaded his mind over the course of the past three days—Adaline snuggled beside him on Gus’s patchwork sofa, warming her hands on a mug of hot tea. Fuzzy zipping around the barn in a little red sweater, weaving among the Christmas trees. Adaline in his kitchen, baking one of her mouthwatering pies that they’d eat for dinner straight from the pan with two forks, picnic-style, on a blanket in front of the fire.
Not that Jace had a single ingredient suitable for baking pies or anything else that might be on the menu. But if he was going to fantasize, he may as well fully commit.
As tempting as those thoughts had been, he knew the time apart was probably for the best. Their charade was proving to be far more complicated than he’d anticipated. Or, as Adaline had so accurately predicted...confusing.She was the first person Jace thought about when he woke up in the morning, and her lovely, heart-shaped face was the last thing he pictured in his mind’s eye when he drifted off to sleep at night. He couldn’t count the number of times he’d nearly picked up the phone the past few days, just so he could her voice, tell her a silly joke and make her laugh.
But he wasn’t supposed to do that, and he knew it. Their relationship wasn’t real. Jace didn’t know why he had such a hard time remembering that.
This entire episode had been his idea. He’d practically had to talk her into it, and she’d given him no real reason to believe anything had changed.
Then why does it feel likeeverythinghas?
