Page 9 of The Mistletoe Bluff
A thick, heavy silence settled, and I looked over my shoulder to find Elsie wringing her hands in her lap.
“Have you heard from your mom at all?” she finally asked.
At the mere mention of my mom, my muscles twisted into knots.
“You know I don’t talk to her. It’s been years.”
“Maybe—”
“No, Els. We’re not going there. She made her choice. It’s just how it is.”
Elsie was quiet after that, knowing better than to push me where my mother was concerned.
I managed to find a half-empty bag of chocolate chips hiding in the back of my pantry. We left the sad topics behind us while we devoured them, and talked about how things were going with her book deal—her first romantic comedy was set to release in the spring—before we settled in for a night of Hallmark Christmas movies, though we only made it through one before Elsie yawned and pried herself from my couch.
“We’re not as young as we used to be,” she said through another yawn as she got up and gave me a hug before slipping into her coat and boots. Before Elsie left, she gave me a stern look and said, “Don’t forget to enter the contest, Maya,” then wished me goodnight.
Once she was gone, I tiptoed back to the couch, eyeing the competition flyer as if the paper would grow giant teeth and eat me. My fingers trembled as I picked it up and scanned it for the tenth time. At the bottom was the deadline to enter in big red letters. December thirty-first—the end of the month.
Was Elsie right? Was this my second chance? Maybe Oliver had ruined the first one at Meridel Community College, but did I dare put my heart, not to mention my future, on the line again? If I was smart, I would leave my camera in a bag buried in my closet and never look back, finding something else to fill my bank account.
But…making smart decisions had never been my strong suit. I was too impulsive. That was one reason I was in debt to begin with.
I blew out a long breath, set down the flyer, grabbed the remote, and turned on another Christmas movie. I hated this time of year, but there was something about these cheesy romances that set my aching heart at ease.
For tonight, I would lose myself in someone else’s love life, and worry about the photography competition tomorrow.
Oliver
If I thought the racing heart from the coffee was unpleasant, it had nothing on the prickling feeling that was threatening to burst from my skin as I sat in my Jeep outside the auto body shop, preparing to face Maya for the first time in months, praying she wouldn’t punch me in the face for all the trouble I had caused.
Whenever I angered her, there was a distinct flash of her blue eyes that gave away that she wanted to punch me. It was either that or she wanted to kiss me, but that might have been wishful thinking on my part.
She probably meant for those looks to scare me away, but I found them strangely endearing.
Should I be concerned that I inspired the girl I liked to violence? Probably.
One time in class she had been fidgeting with a tripod, trying to get the legs to extend. I walked over and tried to take it from her to help her, but instead she got angry, gripped the thing tighter, and yanked it from my hands, simultaneously hitting me in the stomach with the end of it.
She had been far too happy at my grunt of pain, and then barked, “I’ve got it,” and stalked to another table, away from me, and proceeded to ignore me.
Somehow the whole interaction made me like her even more.
Maya was feisty.
I loved it.
My fingers twitched against the button to unbuckle the seat belt, but I couldn’t bring myself to push it as I stared at the building in front of me.
The place desperately needed a facelift. What used to be white stucco was now a discolored brownish white, the front door creaked something awful whenever it opened, and the lit sign above the door no longer had every letter of Meridel Auto shining through the snow. Instead, it read “Meri Ato,” which was kind of ironic since there was nothing “merry” about the look of the shop.
Being the only auto shop around, I would have expected the owner to put in more work to make the place visually appealing, but then again, in a small town, maybe he just didn’t care all that much.
I brought my attention back to the door, still fidgeting with the seatbelt. Why was I so nervous to see Maya again? Why was her potential reaction to seeing me so frightening?
She already hated me. It couldn’t get worse than that.
My phone buzzed in the cupholder, and I flinched. I half expected it to be Maya, letting me know she was here, even though she went inside a few minutes ago. Like the coward I was, I had slumped down in my seat to hide from her as she passed by. It was a moment I was not proud of.
