Three

Calvin

I can't believe I'm even considering talking to Harlow about this. Maybe I'm more desperate than I thought. But I know Harlow. He's always been kind of wild, but he's also good. And I need to do this with someone I trust at least a little. Harlow's always been brutally honest. If anyone can help me, it's him.

I don't get a chance to talk to him about it because the line of kids waiting to talk to Santa is long, and I don't want to rush any of them. They're all so cute, and some of them look like they rarely ask for anything.

Most of the parents look tired but happy to see their kids so delighted. There are a handful of others who are clearly irritated at having to be here. A part of me wants to take longer talking to their kids, but something tells me that would piss Jacklyn off.

They close the line at five, but we see every kid that made it in before then, so we're not done until around seven. By the time I'm finally able to peel off that red suit and get back into my normal clothes, it's properly dark outside, and it's freaking cold. After being on the west coast for four years, I'd forgotten how fucking cold it could get in Idaho.

I pull my jacket tighter around me and stuff my hands in the pockets for warmth. That suit kept me mostly protected from the weather, but now it's like I can feel every bite of the wind down to my bones.

I hurry out of the back room I changed in and start for the parking lot. I'm heading for my car when I see Harlow at the same pick-up truck he had in high school, the driver door open.

I have to do it before I lose my nerve.

"Harlow."

He glances up when I call his name. "St. Nick. What can I do for you?"

"I, um, I…" What little bit of confidence I may have once had shrivels up and dies. What am I supposed to actually say?

Harlow's eyebrows lift. "Look, I'm about to meet someone so…"

"I want to have sex with you." The words fly out of my mouth at an embarrassingly high volume, but I don't look around to see if anyone else is around. I'm mortified enough as it is.

Harlow's quiet for a second, his face a mask of shock under the glow of the streetlight. Then he asks, "I'm sorry, what?"

"Don't make me say it again." I can feel the heat climbing up my neck, spreading to my cheeks. To my horror, tears of embarrassment are stinging my eyes. What the hell was I thinking?

"I'm sorry," I say suddenly. "I don't…I just…I'm sorry. Please forget I said anything."

I start to turn away, but Harlow grabs my hand. His are gloved, and the warmth around my fingers is instantaneous.

"Wait," he says. "Come get in my truck for a minute. We'll talk."

"It's fine." I try to pull my hand free, but he holds on tightly. "Harlow, I shouldn't have said anything."

"Well, you did. So come on."

I really don't want to prolong this, but I guess I owe it to him after what I blurted out. So I round his truck and climb into the passenger seat.

He gets in beside me and starts the engine to fill the cab with heat. "Out west four years and you already forgot to dress for the weather?" he asks, leaning over me to open his glove box, where he pulls out a pair of black gloves that he hands me.

I take them gratefully, hoping he thinks the shaking in my hands is from the cold and not nerves.

"All right." Harlow settles back against his seat but turns to face me. "Tell me what the hell that was about."

My throat is tight as I pull the gloves on, taking longer than necessary so I can have a minute to think. But even that's a bad idea because I don't really want to think about what I said outside his truck.

"Cal," he prompts when I've been silent too long. "You can't just say something like that and then not give an explanation."

"Okay, okay. Could you just…not look at me while I say it?" It's such a childish question to ask, but I'm so far out of my element right now. I need to take back some semblance of control before I freak out.

"Okay," Harlow says, no judgement in his tone. "I'm not looking at you."

I swallow hard and stare out the window at the twinkling lights of the Christmas tree farm. "I was hoping you would help me with this…problem. The last guy I slept with, he broke up with me because he said I wasn't…great in bed. And if you laugh at me, I swear to God—"

"I'm not laughing at you," Harlow interrupts, his voice serious. "I think that guy sounds like a complete prick."

"I thought that too at first. But maybe I'm wrong."

"What about the other guys you slept with?" Harlow asks. "If they didn't say anything similar, then you should just forget about what your ex said."

"Yeah…he was my first." I mumble the last part. It's not that I'm ashamed of waiting until I was out of high school, it's just that Harlow was always so cool about stuff like this. I think he'd had sex before we even started high school. Even now, I envy the confidence he has about himself.

"Seriously?" Harlow asks, surprised. "You waited and then gave it up to a jackass like that?"

"He might not be a jackass," I protest. "He could be right. And I want to have another relationship in grad school, but if I don't know if Jesse was telling the truth or not, it's going to hang over me whenever I talk to another guy. So…"

"So you want me to have sex with you and tell you what I think?"

"Yes?" It comes out sounding like way more of a question than a confirmation, but I'm too fucking nervous right now.

"Why me? Because I've slept with half the town?"

I'm dying a little to ask if it really is half the town. I mean, it is a small town. But I don't push it.

"No," I say instead. "It's because you're honest, and I'm comfortable around you. Even when we were at odds back in school, I was comfortable around you. If you don't want to, I get it. I shouldn't have even said anything."

He's quiet for a long minute, and my anxiety skyrockets.

"Please don't tell anyone." I say it in a whisper, but the silence is already so thick that it sounds more like a shout.

"I'm not going to tell anyone," Harlow says. "I'm just thinking."

As much as it kills me to sit in the silence, I do. Even though it's fucking awkward.

I keep my gaze trained on the twinkling lights in the distance and calm my nerves by counting my breaths. How long does it take someone to decide if they want to have sex or not? I'm no expert, but it's not that hard of a decision, right?

"Okay," Harlow says when I feel as though I can't stand the silence anymore. "I'll help you."

"Really?"

"Yeah. But I want to talk about some ground rules. Give me your phone. I'll put my number in and text you my address. Come over before work tomorrow and we'll talk."

I give him my phone, the shaking in my hands still visible even with the gloves on.

"Why're you so nervous?" Harlow asks, entering his number into my phone. "It's just me."

He says it like this is the most normal situation in the world. Like maybe he meets people every day who blurt out that they want to have sex with him. Maybe he does.

"I don't know. It's kind of a weird thing to ask someone."

He shrugs. "Not really. If you think about it, we kind of ask that question in a way whenever we start dating someone. You were just more…direct about it."

Again, I envy his confidence. The smooth way he talks. It makes the whole situation feel less awkward. Makes me feel less pathetic for bringing it up in the first place.

"Okay." Harlow hands me my phone back. "I'll text you my address later tonight, and you can come by in the morning."

I nod. "Got it. And…thank you."

He flashes me a quick grin. "Don't thank me yet. You're going to earn my review, and I'm not going to make it easy on you."

Four

Harlow

I'm still a little in shock about Calvin's request the next morning. He was always shy when we were kids, and we were definitely never close enough to have the kind of conversation we had last night in my truck. Though, maybe that made it easier on him.

I feel a little unsettled as I make breakfast, but I don't even know why. It's not like I've never slept with anyone before. And the chance of having sex with Calvin Simms is something sixteen-year-old me only ever fantasized about. Even though I saw him a lot around since the town and school are small, I never let myself get close to him. He was like Jacklyn; he had his sights set on getting out of this place. I did, too, but it didn't work out for me. When I was eighteen, I blamed it on what happened with Jackie keeping me back, but I knew most colleges wouldn't get to see the fact that I'd been disciplined for cheating in the past.

It was because I didn't want to start my life after high school still shackled to my parents. No one was willing to sign a loan with me without one of my parents co-signing. I knew if I did that, my parents would hold it over me for the rest of my life. So I got a full-time job instead and moved out. I took two years of community college and just got accepted in UCLA for the spring semester. Even though I'm going to miss everyone—especially the kids and families I've gotten to know through Santa's village—I'm so excited to get the hell out of here.

A knock sounds outside my door, and I move to open it and find Calvin fidgeting nervously on the other side.

"Come in," I say, stepping back to let him into my apartment.

"It smells great in here," he says, his voice soft.

"I don't have table, so take a seat at the bar." I move around him and grab the plates I set off to the side. When I place them on the bar, I go back and grab two mugs of coffee.

Calvin looks grateful to have something to do besides talk about what he came here to discuss, so I don't bring it up yet. Instead, I make small talk with him, find out what he's been doing the last four years and where he's been.

He relaxes the more we talk, and I wait until then to bring up the subject.

But to my surprise, when I start, he interrupts me with a hand on my arm.

"I thought a lot about this last night," he says, his voice taking on that shyness it had when he showed up this morning. "And before we get into anything, I wanted to say I'm sorry if it came across like I was…insinuating something about your sex life."

The innocence of his apology makes me smile, but I hide it because I don't want him to think I'm laughing at him. "I didn't think that. I heard what you said last night. You're comfortable around me." Even as I repeat his own words back to him, I have trouble believing them. I guess I know a lot of people who are comfortable around me, but I never pictured Calvin Simms being one of those people. We've just been at odds for so long.

"Okay." Calvin pulls his hand back from my arm. "Then we can keep going."

"Great. Okay, so first, we need to have safe words."

His eyebrows lift. "Um…I just want to have…regular sex. Not, like, the kind that maybe needs a safe word."

"Okay, bullet point under the first topic: all consensual sex is normal, Cal. But I hear what you're saying. I'm not planning on doing anything wild, but we're also not in a relationship. We knew each other in high school, but we don't really know each other now. I want to make sure you're comfortable with whatever we do. I don't want you worrying about doing something you don't want to do because you're looking at this as a lesson or practice or whatever."

"Oh." He nibbles on his lower lip. "Of course. Sorry."

"You don't need to apologize." Contrary to what most people in town probably believe, my sex life isn't exactly BDSM, but Cal had said Jesse was his first. And from what Cal told me about him, Jesse probably isn't much of a prize. I want Cal to learn what he likes in bed, including the ability to stop something he doesn't want to do.

I take a sip of coffee before continuing. "Second ground rule: I want this to stay between us. You know how people in this town can be about couples. And I don't want it to affect work at the village. I did that once."

"Turned out bad?"

"The worst. He was constantly pressuring me to have sex in the sugar palace—you know, the place in the village for toddlers? He said it was the only place he could get turned on."

Cal's nose wrinkles. "Ew."

"Yeah. To no one's surprise, he's currently serving out a ten-year sentence for indecent exposure and stalking." I know that's pretty out of the norm for workplace romances, but it was definitely scarring. And on top of that, I don't want anything I do with Cal to get back to Jackie. Maybe if we had a normal relationship, I wouldn't care if she knew who I was seeing. But we haven't been normal in a really long time, and her showing up out of the blue after four years of dodging her phone calls really threw me.

"Jeez," Cal says. "So you lost all good taste after high school?"

"It's called a moment of weakness," I reply. "Now, third rule: this ends after New Year's Day. I'm heading to school in January, and I'm not looking for a relationship right now."

His cheeks redden. "I never thought you were."

"I know. I just want to make sure we're clear."

He looks like he wants to say more, but instead he asks, "Where are you going to school at?"

"UCLA." I wait for him to ask why I waited so late, or if the cheating issue in freshman year had anything to do with it.

Cal doesn't ask anything like that. His eyes light up, and a grin breaks out across his face. "I live thirty minutes outside of LA."

"You do?"

"Yeah, I'm going to grad school there." He clears his throat suddenly. "Not that I'm suggesting we be friends or anything. But it would be nice to know someone there. My best friend Min is going to school in Arizona when I start at UCLA."

I frown. "The ground rules never stated that we couldn't be friends."

As the words leave my mouth, I know I should take them back. Because I know that despite my best intentions and all my rules, I'm going to find it hard to walk away from Calvin. In high school, he was the one guy I wanted but couldn't have. And now that there's the promise of being with him, I don't know if I can let go of that.

Except…I'll have to. Cal isn't looking for anything serious either. Not with me anyway. He said he felt comfortable around me, and that's what he wants. Someone to help him recover from what happened with that prick he was seeing. Once he's done that, he'll move on from me just like everyone else does.