And then an idea hit. “Something outside—I saw a giant pine tree two houses up. I bet there are pine cones under it still. Maybe we could get some for decorations or...Oh. Maybe if we get five"—he grabbed the markers and laid them out on the table like he was making a big asterisk—"we could put them like this and glue the inside right here to make a star.”
“That’s genius!” Noelle said, grabbing his arm and making him feel pretty proud of himself for thinking of it.
“Now we just need something sparkly or shiny and some kind of garland. What goes with stars? We can’t just have the entire tree be stars. Planets? No. Moons? No.” She shook her hands out. “I can’t think of anything that goes with stars. What else is in the sky?”
As soon as she said that, all he could think of was helping Aiden to hang all the snowflakes he’d made from the ceiling of their family room. “How about ‘Snow under the Stars’ for the theme? Maybe we can cut out snowflakes.”
“Ooo,” she said. “I like that. Okay, we need something sparkly or shiny. I know that the craft store has sheets of paper that are a shiny silver. Maybe we can make the snowflakes out of that. It’s thicker paper, so we won’t be able to be too intricate with them, but I think we can make it work.”
“That’s two things from the craft store, though.”
“Sixty seconds!” Noelle’s mom called out from somewhere else in the house.
“Eek! You’re right. We’ve got to move fast. Um... Oh! The woman who lives on the corner makes handmade cards. She’s bound to have ribbon—let’s ask her. What are we going to do for a garland?”
“Maybe something with the snow theme? Like tissues or something?” It sounded stupid, but it was the only idea he had.
“Oh! Tissue paper. We could get white—it’s everywhere and super cheap. There’s an antique store next to the craft store, and they use it to wrap up breakable trinkets. We could try there. We could cut the sheets like big snowflakes and then, I don’t know, tape them together into a long garland and then bunch it with ribbon.”
A loud horn sounded.
“Huddle time is up!” Noelle’s mom called out. “You have sixty minutes from right now to be back here to present what your team has come up with!”
Noelle grinned at him, her eyes lit with excitement. It was coming so strongly off her that he was feeling it himself. “Are you ready?”
He nodded and grinned back. They both slipped on their coats, then she grabbed his hand and pulled him outside. They raced to the neighbor with the pine tree first, knocked on the door, got permission to take “as many pinecones as you’d like—feel free to take them all!” and grabbed seven, just in case. Then they ran just as quickly to the house on the corner.
A woman who was probably in her seventies answered the door, and when Noelle explained what they were doing, she said, “Of course, dear! Come into my craft room. No, don’t take off your shoes—you’ve got a race to win!”
In less than two minutes, they had a roll of ice blue ribbon in their hands, and they were racing back to where his car was parked. He dumped the pine cones onto the floor behind his seat, then they got into the car, and he headed toward the convenience store.
Luckily, they had the pretzels in stock. Noelle picked up two big bags of them and put them on the counter.
Jack’s eyebrows drew together. “Why two?”
“Because Aiden is going to wake up tomorrow morning and realize he slept right through this activity, and he’s going to feel bad. I figured I could take a bag over to him tomorrow and hang out with him for a bit so he won’t feel like he missed so much.”
Jack just stared at Noelle. They were in the middle of a race against the clock, trying to win a prize that seemed really important to her, and she was stopping to think of someone who was vastly important to him? It touched him in a way that left him speechless.
She put her credit card back in her pocket, grabbed the bag from the cashier, and said, “Come on!” and they both raced out of the store.
When they were in the car and driving toward the craft store, he asked, “So who would you be on a team with if Aiden and I weren’t coming this year?” He came so close to not attending this once he found out that Aiden wasn’t.
She was quiet for a long moment before she answered. Then she cleared her throat and said, “I don’t know. But it kind of requires six teams. This event has evolved over the years—before everyone started getting married and having kids, we used to do it with cousins, aunts, and uncles. Their families have grown, too, so they do their own versions of it now. For as long as I can remember, Gran-gran had always been my teammate. We didn’t do it last year since we were planning a funeral, so this was the first year without her.”
He felt an acute pain from what had almost happened. What if he’d just stayed at Rachel’s and helped out around her house and not come at all? He felt sick just thinking of how it would be for her to face this first event without her gran-gran and have to do it without a teammate.
He could feel the emotions coming from her as she, too, likely thought about what the night would’ve been like if he hadn’t come. Maybe if he and Aiden had never planned to come,she would’ve asked one of her cousins or a friend to join her. He was glad it was him here, though.
“What was your favorite time when you pulledDecorationsfrom Santa’s hat?”
She chuckled at whatever had just come to her mind, and he was glad it was a happy memory. “One year, Gran-gran and I decided to do a ‘snow globe’ theme. We got these little balloons that were see-through and poured some glitter inside, and then pushed in little random objects we found outside before blowing them up. We had thought it was the most genius idea ever until we put them on the tree and a good half of the balloons popped when they made contact with the pine needles. We were both laughing so hard, I don’t think we even finished decorating it before the horn sounded.”
Her story made him smile. Their lives growing up were so different from each other. He was glad she had memories like that.
“I’m worried that we aren’t going to finish everything,” Noelle said. “It’s going to take a while to cut out all the snowflakes and glue ribbons to all the ornaments, so we need to get back as quickly as we can. I know where the paper is at The Crafty One. Do you want to run into Trove of Oldies and ask for the tissue paper at the same time?”
He said yes just as he turned into a parking spot, coming to a stop way too quickly, and they both jumped out of his car and ran into their stores. There must not have been too many people in line at The Crafty One because she actually beat him back out to the car. The woman at the Trove of Oldies register had wanted to hear all about the scavenger hunt, but still, it hadn’t taken too long.
