Page 5 of Jingle Bell Flock
I pictured Jeremy standing across from me earlier in the field of Douglas firs, his hands braced on his hips and his feet planted wide, his nostrils flaring with annoyance. “If you can call him yelling at me about, and I quote, ‘your fucking goats’talking, then yes. We talked.”
“Yelling is progress, though. Better than his grunts,” Bristol tried to assure me.
“That’s one way to look at it.”
I rolled out another section of dough and reached for the Santa-shaped gingerbread man cookie cutter. The kitchen smelled like cinnamon and molasses and butter, scents that usually calmed me down but weren’t doing much for my mood currently.
“Though I guess I’ll be getting yelled at a whole lot more this week, whether I like it or not.”
“Oh? Do tell.”
“Jemma came up with an idea for me, Winterberry Farm, and Stella McKinley over at Mistletoe Brewing to partner on a big holiday event next weekend. Petting zoo, beer and cheese tastings, her and Charlie donning their Santa and Mrs. Claus costumes again. The whole nine yards.”
“That’s perfect! It’ll force you guys to spend time together, and maybe you can finally hash everything out.”
“Spending time with me is thelastthing Jeremy wants. That man would sooner murder me than have an honest-to-god conversation about our past.”
Our past.
As if those two words could sum up seventeen years of guilt and regret. We’d been best friends since we were in elementary school, then teammates in junior high and high school … and then more.
Until I screwed everything up.
I’d been too scared to come out, too worried about what my family would think, so I’d hidden what we had. What Jeremy was to me. Dated girls while meeting him in secret in the rows of trees behind his house. And when prom came around and I’d taken Sarah Mitchell instead of being brave enough to go alone—or god forbid, askhim—Jeremy had looked at me like I’d stabbed him in the back.
He’d stopped talking to me after that. Stopped looking at me at all except with that particular brand of hurt that had eventually hardened into anger.
I’d left for Harvard that autumn, thinking time and distance would make it easier.
Spoiler alert: it hadn’t.
And now here we were, nearly two decades later, and he was still looking at me the exact same way.
“Personally, I’ve always thought hate ismuchbetter than indifference,” Bristol continued, her voice pitched low and thoughtful. She was probably thinking about her … situation with Rhett Jennings, a local handyman. I was pretty confident Bristol wouldn’t mind if he gothandsywith her.
“If you say so.”
I pressed the cutter into the dough, my mind replaying the moment when Jeremy and I had crashed into each other chasing after Comet. The way his heart had pounded under my palm. The way he’d looked at me—just for a second—before shoving me away like I’d burned him.
In some ways, his reaction felt worse than indifference. At least indifference would have meant he was over it, over me, over everything that had happened between us all those years ago. But the way he’d pushed me away—like he couldn’t stand to have me that close for even a second—meant he still cared. Still hurt.
And knowing I was the one who’d caused that hurt? That I wasstillcausing it just by existing in his orbit?
That was worse than anything.
“Speaking of hate.” Bristol’s voice shifted from thoughtful to irritated. “Did I tell you what that good-for-nothing wastrel Rhett Jennings did now?”
I pressed out another row of gingerbread men, grateful for the change of topic. “I’m almost afraid to ask.”
“He—”
Over the soft crooning of Bing Crosby singing about a white Christmas coming from the speaker on the shelf in my dining nook, I heard a loud banging sound that didn’t belong.
“Hang on,” I said, interrupting her mid-sentence and wiping my hands on a dish towel. “I think someone’s at the door.”
I tossed the towel over my shoulder and headed through the dining room to the living room. Through the window, fat snowflakes spun under the porch light. Jeremy stood in the glowing circle, his hat pulled low on his head, his hair curling out from underneath the folded brim. His lips were set in a hard, determined line, and his cheeks were flushed from the cold. Or anger. Honestly, it was hard to tell with him sometimes.
My pulse tripped, then took off.
