Page 68 of Dreaming About Forever

Jordan grabbed the bag of light-blue icing and cut a small hole in the tip like his mom advised. Alicia did the same with another bag of green and leaned over the cookies.

There were some slip-ups with the initial outlining process while he figured out exactly how far the line needed to be from the edge of the cookie, but soon he had four cookies outlined and filled in.

“What do you need while I wait for these to dry?” Jordan asked.

Alicia pointed to a cookie with a strip of icing draped over the edge. “Can you scrape the icing off that one so I can start over?”

Next, he outlined some of the cookies that would make up the center of the tree. Every once in a while, he checked on Alicia and pointed out how good her cookies were looking.

“Shoot,” Alicia said. “The colors aren’t blending.”

Jordan picked up the cookie and started scraping the icing. “I’ve got this one.”

Alicia sighed but moved on to another. They worked in silence for a few minutes, and Jordan went back to the cookies that needed snowflakes. He took extra time making sure the lines were perfectly straight and that each design was different. He might not be able to draw a sunset or a mountain scene, but he could draw a straight line with the best of them.

“Those look amazing,” Alicia said. “They’re so pretty.”

“I was going for beautiful, but I’ll accept pretty as a win.”

Alicia tilted her head, resting it against his shoulder. “Thank you for this. I’m having a lot of fun, even if we don’t win.”

“We’re going to win.”

“I don’t know. Levi and Ruby have reindeer heads on each cookie.”

“I’m not worried about their reindeer. Those are trash,” Jordan said as he finished up the last snowflake.

“I think the only thing we have left to do is put the decorations on the tree,” Alicia said.

“You’re really intent on beating these old ladies,” Jordan said.

“I don’t care how old they are. I want to win.”

Jordan grinned as he moved the snowflakes to the side and picked up a bag of white icing. “I’ll do the lights. You do the ornaments.”

Every bit of his focus went into creating draping lines that flowed from one cookie to the next, then spacing the little light bulbs evenly across the lines. He swapped sides with Alicia more times than he could count, but their masterpiece was coming together.

“Ten-minute warning!” his mom shouted.

Jordan looked up to check on Alicia just as her icing bag fell onto the cookies.

“No!” Alicia shouted.

Jordan picked up the icing bag. “It’s only three. We can fix them.”

“Ten minutes,” Alicia whispered, but she didn't hesitate. She picked up the bag she needed and started piping. When one part was finished, she passed the cookie to Jordan and started working on the next one.

His mom started the ten-second countdown just as Jordan was finishing up a cookie. “Almost finished.”

“Drop your weapons!” his mom shouted.

Alicia tossed her almost empty bag onto the table and brushed her hands over her hair. “Done.”

“We did it?” Jordan asked. Honestly, he hadn’t expected them to make it.

“I think so.” She let out a quick exhale through a smile. “I think we did it.”

Alicia launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck. Jordan dropped the icing bag and held her. It was the second time they’d been this close, and it kicked him in the chest just as hard as the first time.

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