Then they drove back to Noelle’s parents’ house. The whole time they were in the car, he tried to think back to the last time when he’d done anything as fun as this and was coming upblank. Surely a race to gather supplies wasn’t the highlight of his life.
He glanced over to where Noelle sat with such an intense look of determination on her face. Maybe it was less about what he was doing and more about who he was doing it with.
They parked, grabbed the supplies, and headed into the house. After they dumped all the supplies on the craft table, Noelle pulled out her phone. “Thirty-two minutes! I think we just set a record!”
It was a good thing they had twenty-eight minutes left on the timer instead of fifteen because his hands weren’t used to doing stuff like this. They started with the pinecone and made the star for the top of the tree before realizing that they didn’t have a way to make it stay up there. Noelle gasped, then ran out of the room. Moments later, she returned with a triumphant smile on her face, holding an empty toilet paper roll. “We’ll just hot glue it to this, and then we can just slide it down over the top branch.”
Surprisingly, it worked. They cut snowflakes out of the big tissue paper next, which wasn’t easy. Then, side by side, they laid out the snowflakes on the floor, corners overlapping, and taped them together, and started bunching them and tying the bunched part with ribbons. They were working so closely that their shoulders were nearly constantly touching, their hands brushing each other with every ribbon they tied. And every time they did, it sent a new feeling of euphoria through him.
The same thing happened as they cut ribbons, glued them to the back of the star pretzels, and then cut little snowflakes from the shiny silver paper. It was too thick to fold and cut like Aiden had, so they quickly used the square and round hole punches to make it look as close as possible to snowflakes.
Then they went to work putting all their decorations on the tree. As they hung the garland, they pushed some of the lights through the holes in the thin paper, making it look likemoonlight spilling over fresh snow. It amazed him how well they worked together, seeming to anticipate each other’s moves, working so much more quickly than he could’ve guessed.
They got the final pretzel stars and silver snowflakes hung on the tree just as Noelle’s mom called out, “Five-minute warning!”
Noelle turned to him, her breaths coming fast, a look of wonder on her face. “We finished with five minutes to spare! Can you believe it? And look how amazing our tree is!” She gave him a hug, and he gave her a tight squeeze back.
They both turned to admire their handiwork. He had to admit he was impressed that they could decorate the tree in the amount of time they had and make it look awesome. He felt taller just looking at it.
“We’ve got time,” Noelle said. “Maybe we can get a few more lights to show through the garland.”
They both leaned in, hands working together as they moved around the tree, this time without the sense of urgency that had driven them for the past hour. This time, he just reveled in being so close to Noelle, being so in sync with her.
On one particularly tough part, where the tape made the garland bunch up weird, they were both leaned in close, both of their hands bumping each other as they worked, and Noelle turned her face from the tree to his. He looked over, too, their faces barely a couple of inches apart. He could feel her quiet breath, smell her shampoo, which smelled remarkably like gingerbread, and see the longing in her eyes.
She was so beautiful. He’d known it for a long time. But now he understood how much of her beauty came from the person she was on the inside, shining through for all to see.
She bit her bottom lip, and his eyes were immediately drawn to those lips. Those lips that he’d imagined kissing a million times over, stopping himself each time. Then he saw her eyes shift to his lips, too.
Then, after a quick breath, Noelle’s hands flew to his face, her palms resting against the sides of his face, her fingertips in his hair, and her lips were on his. He let out a slight groan, and they both straightened to standing as he put an arm around her waist, pulling her closer.
Her lips moved against his with the same sense of urgency they had felt while decorating the tree. A need to hurry before time ran out.
There’s time, he thought.We have time.
And, just like they’d been in sync all evening, she seemed to be in sync with his thoughts, too. The sense of urgency seemed to flee, and she relaxed into the kiss, her fingers slowly skimming along his cheeks, down his neck, across his collarbone, her hands coming to rest on his shoulders.
A tiny voice said that he shouldn’t be kissing her. But a much louder voice, one that only spoke in emotions, told him that this was perfect. She was perfect. Kissing her was perfect. That part of him exploded with hope, adoration, happiness, peace. A dream a year and a half in the making coming to life.
He was here with Noelle. And if he wasn’t mistaking the emotions she seemed to be pouring into this kiss, she felt about him the same as he felt about her. Heat radiated through him, a lightness in his limbs, a tension-free calm spreading out from his chest.
“Time’s up!” Noelle’s mom called from the kitchen.
Noelle pulled away ever so slightly, and he traced kisses along her jaw, then paused with his lips just brushing her ear and whispered, “I think that means we should stop.”
She sighed and sank into him, her body pressed against his, a hand resting on his chest, filling him full of light and heat. “There should be a trophy forthatbecause I’m pretty sure we just won.”
He chuckled softly. “I think we did.”
As he heard the footsteps of walking adults and racing kids heading back to the central kitchen and family room area from all the places in the house they’d scattered to, that quiet voice inside him whispered just barely loud enough to be heard,But you’re her boss.
He ignored it as, hand-in-hand, they headed into the family room with everyone else.
eleven
NOELLE
Noelle gotinto her car Monday morning to go to work and blasted theChristmas All Daystation, singing along to it. Christmas music just didn’t sound the same in the rental car she’d been driving. She patted Elfie’s dash. It was so good to have her back.
