Page 145 of The Holiday Fakers
“I think it’s an awesome idea. You can link to it from your socials, and I’ll link to your socials and your site from my accounts to help drive traffic to it.”
“You’d do that?”
“Of course! I love you and want to show the world how amazing you are.”
She blushes. “Thank you. And now it doesn’t matter about hiding all the pictures I’ve drawn of you because there’s a backlog to post.”
“And I can always pose for more …”
“I’d like that.”
I kiss her again, and she sighs as our lips meet, then she breaks away.
“Come on. We need to choose a present for you.”
“I don’t need one. You’ve already given me you, and that’s everything I’ve ever wanted. Plus, you’ve drawn me looking way hotter than I actually am.”
“There’s no one hotter than you, Brody King.”
She pulls me toward a stall festooned with Christmas tree decorations, all laser-cut from wood and depicting different scenes of Hideaway Harbor.
“Look at these,” Piper says in a hushed tone. “They’re beautiful!”
“If there’s a view of Hideaway you want and don’t see, I can always create it,” the woman inside the hut tells us.
“Thank you,” I reply as Piper’s eyes flit from ornament to ornament.
“Look! There’s the wishing bridge over the spring! The harbor, Larry the Lobstah, Skippy the dog, the museum, the town square.” She faces me. “Would you like one of these for Christmas? Would they work on your tree back in New York?”
I tense, as if I’ve just been punched in the gut. “Yeah, that’d be nice,” I reply. “Perfect.”
Piper’s excited expression falters. “You sure?”
“Absolutely.” I force a smile. “I’ll turn my back, so it’s a surprise.”
I don’t wait for a reply, facing the street as memories of Christmas past come back to haunt me.
A minute later, Piper threads her arm through mine, and we set off again.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
No, I don’t, but this is Piper, and she deserves the truth from me, no matter how hard it is to talk about.
“I don’t have a tree. Never have.”
“That’s okay. I only have a tiny artificial one in Brooklyn.”
“I don’t decorate at all.”
“Nothing wrong with that.”
“Maybe. But I don’t celebrate Christmas at all.”
She stops in her tracks. “What do you mean? Surely you go somewhere on Christmas Day?”
I shrug, allowing myself to feel the sadness and emptiness of my life.
“If I could have worked over the holiday season, I would have. But even Hollywood shuts down for a couple of days. So, I either took myself on vacation and got wasted, or went to some celebrity party and got trashed with people like me. Lonely folks getting drunk and pretending they’re happy not having to deal with families.”
