Chapter 2

Chapter Two

Danny

Time never passed the way you hoped it would. When you wanted it to slow down, it always moved faster. Before I knew it, I was cleaning out the fridge at work so nothing went rotten while everyone was gone for the holidays.

We’d had a little party, but it was mostly an excuse to hire a caterer and buy everyone lottery tickets. You wouldn’t think that a company full of finance experts would be into lottery tickets, but every year I got a bouquet of them.

At least I’d have Holiday with me. We’d made a pact when we went to college together that we would always go with each other to our family Christmas events. Hers put more of an emphasis on Christmas Eve, and mine was all about Christmas Day, so it worked out perfectly. That way, when we were ready to tear our hair out, there was someone who could be a refuge. The two of us had saved each other more times than I could count.

It was worth it, even when people assumed we were together and asked a million questions about why we weren’t together. Holiday and I had it mostly down to a science by now, but this year the pressure was even worse.

My sister, Raquel, had recently gotten married, which left me as both the youngest, and the only one still single. Michael, my oldest brother, had married his husband four years ago and they’d had my little nephew last year. This would be the first Christmas that baby Nicholas might actually be aware of and I was looking forward to sharing the magic with him.

After saying goodbye to my coworkers, I drove back to my apartment with dread in my stomach. Holiday and I were driving together back to our hometown first thing tomorrow morning. It seemed silly to take two cars, but we always did, just in case.

As usual, I already had everything packed and in the trunk. If I knew Holiday, and I did, she would be throwing things into the backseat tomorrow morning and no doubt I’d get a panicked call ten minutes into the trip that she’d forgotten something and had to go back and she’d meet me at the breakfast place we always hit. Every year was the same, and I didn’t hate it.

There was a consistency to Holiday’s chaos that I’d adjusted to after so many years of knowing and living with her.

Holiday was trying to cook dinner and pack when I walked in, and I had to tell her to focus on dinner and I’d grab what she needed. I was better at getting everything into her suitcase in an organized fashion anyway.

Holiday yelled at me to grab what she wanted to bring, and I folded everything and made a quick trip to pull some things out of the dryer.

“You should wear that new velvet dress you got,” I called to her.

“You think? It’s not too much?” she yelled back.

“No, it brings out your eyes.” Holiday had eyes that were the prettiest shade of blue that looked like an ocean right before a storm. The dress was a darker blue, but it was gorgeous on her and made her eyes glow underneath her bangs.

“I like that. Give me more compliments,” she yelled back, and I laughed.

“I give you plenty of compliments,” I said as I gently folded the dress and added it to her suitcase.

“You can never have too many compliments.” Her voice made me jump. I’d been so busy putting the dress away that I hadn’t heard her come up behind me.

“Jesus, Holiday. You almost gave me a heart attack.” I shoved her gently as she frowned.

“That’s not a compliment. I was asking about compliments.”

I glared at her.

“Don’t scare me and I might consider it.”

She huffed and rolled her eyes. “You’re really not getting this compliment thing at all.”

I glanced back into the suitcase, wondering what I was forgetting.

“Why am I the one who has to give compliments? Shouldn’t there be some sort of give and take?”

“But we were talking about me,” she said with a pout. I knew that face. She was determined and I wasn’t getting out of this without giving her what she wanted.

“You are an excellent cook, an incredible best friend, and your eyebrows are perfect without even trying.” She’d heard me say all those things before. Well, maybe not the eyebrow thing. That was something I’d always thought but had never voiced. My own eyebrows required far too much maintenance and upkeep so they didn’t look like overgrown caterpillars on my face.

Holiday’s smile was brilliant. “You think I have perfect eyebrows?”

“Yes, H. You have perfect eyebrows.” Now I was never going to hear the end of it.

“What’s that? Oh, sorry, I can’t hear you over the sound of my eyebrows being perfect.”

I sighed. “I’ve created a monster.”

Holiday winked. “A monster with amazing eyebrows.”

“Did I say amazing? I did not say amazing.”

She opened her mouth to throw a retort at me, but then her eyes went wide. “Shit, the chicken!”

Holiday dashed to the kitchen to save our dinner and I finished packing up her suitcase, zipping it with way too much satisfaction.

That night we had our own Christmas tradition of watching all of our favorite heartwarming romantic holiday movies. If we didn’t have to go home to see our families, my idea of a perfect Christmas would be spent inside with Holiday on the couch eating too much food and watching as many movies as we could before we completely passed out in a food coma. We’d go outside at some point and drive around the suburbs and look at all the decorations on the houses before going back home and convincing Holiday to make three different kinds of cookies that I would then devour.

We could do all of those things at another time, but the idea of a quiet Christmas really appealed to me. It would be so…peaceful.

In between the movies, we each fielded messages from our family group chats asking us when we were leaving (early in the morning), reminding us what to bring (Holiday had made enough peppermint double chocolate chip cookies for both of us, and the wine my mom liked was already packed), and having the same arguments we had every year.

“We should just put them on silent,” Holiday said.

“Then they’ll call.” We’d tried that before. One thing we’d always had in common was relentless families who were not content unless they knew every single ounce of our business. In addition to wanting to know everything, they also were constantly begging us to move closer. Because forty-five minutes was “too far away.”

My mom had gone so far as to start sending me crime statistics in cities. I had stopped trying to remind her that I didn’t live in any of those cities. It didn’t matter. She was almost as bad as Holiday’s mom that way. At least she didn’t demand that I listen to gruesome episodes of true crime podcasts like Holiday’s mom did. I’d have to do an intervention if that ever happened.

The two of us fell asleep on the couch together, which was another tradition. I woke to the alarm on my phone blaring as a familiar voice cursed in my ear.

“It’s too fucking early.”

I blinked my eyes open and looked down to find Holiday with her head on my chest, her hair absolutely everywhere. Part of her bangs stuck straight up in the air, making her look like she’d been electrocuted.

She looked cute and grumpy as hell.

“You say that every year,” I rasped, my voice rough and scratchy.

“It’s true every year,” she said, sitting up and yawning, her jaw cracking.

“Come on. Let’s get going.”

“Coffee,” Holiday said, trying to run her hand through her hair and just tangling it further.

“Yes, yes. I know you need caffeine.” So did I, but one of us had to take charge and it was usually me. I wiggled out from under her and stood up, stretching my back and hearing it pop far too many times. We really needed to get a better couch. Maybe one with a bed inside so neither of us ended up needing back surgery before we were thirty.

“Coffee,” Holiday moaned, tilting over and crashing back onto the blankets.

“It’s coming,” I said, making my way to the kitchen and getting things started for her. I’d set my alarm so we had plenty of time for Holiday to wake up, for us to pack everything else we needed into our cars, and for us to have enough time to stop and get our favorite breakfast.

After so many years, I had this part down to a science and we were right on schedule.

Holiday had passed out again but woke up when I waved a cup of coffee under her nose. I’d added just enough peppermint creamer the way she liked.

“Coffee,” she said, which was one of the only words she could say upon waking.

“Finish your coffee. I’m going to get dressed.” I’d already set out her outfit last night on her dresser, so I grabbed it for her and set it next to her on the couch before going to my room and changing for the day.

When I arrived back in the living room after putting my hair up and brushing my teeth, Holiday had finished her coffee, but she was staring out the window with a glazed look on her face. Caffeine hadn’t kicked in yet.

“Come on, let’s go,” I said, heaving her to her feet as she whined. I set the clothes in her arms and shoved her toward the bathroom.

“Go get ready. I’ll take the rest of our stuff to the cars.”

In spite of needing my own caffeine fix, I had work to do to make sure this journey went smoothly.

One good thing about combining Holiday and caffeine was that once it hit, she was unstoppable.

I came back upstairs to find her bustling around, throwing things from the pantry into a bag.

“What are you doing?” I asked slowly. She spun around, her blue eyes a little wide.

“Just packing snacks. I hate it when I don’t have snacks when I’m driving.”

“H. The trip is less than an hour. And we’re stopping at the diner. We don’t need snacks.” She turned around and ignored me.

“Why don’t you come and help me get the rest of our stuff to the car? Don’t forget the cookies and the wine.” I’d put notes on both of them last night so we didn’t forget.

A few minutes later we had everything in the car and were ready to go. I’d badgered Holiday into having a full tank of gas and made sure her car started and there were no dangerous lights coming on before I told her she was okay to go.

“You’re worse than my mom,” she muttered under her breath.

“Yeah, and what happens when I don’t tell you to check your car before you go somewhere?”

“That was one time!”

“Yeah, because of me, it was only one time.”

Holiday’s eyes narrowed. “Fine. Me and my perfect eyebrows will see you at the diner.”

I was about to head to my own car when she honked the horn.

“Seriously?”

Holiday grinned at me. “Thanks for helping me keep my shit together. I don’t know what I’d do without you. Oh, and your hair looks great today. And that sweater is a perfect color on you.”

Oh, she was giving me compliments now. I was surprised to feel my cheeks getting pink and it wasn’t just because of a sudden burst of cold air.

“See you at the diner, H,” I said. She gave me one more smile before cranking her music and driving onto the street in front of our apartment complex.

I followed after her, but quickly lost her when a light turned red. I’d see her soon.