Nick hung back by the tree, busying himself with the last of the ornaments. Holly was also Ryan’s little sister and it’d been his idea to have Nick be her block party date. Was it not a problem because they were friends and Ryan trusted him? Or was it because Ryan knew he’d had to essentially bribe Nick to come and Nick wasn’t into her?
A fact that was starting to sit heavier in his stomach.
Nick twisted a little reindeer so it faced the front, trying not to watch Holly out of the corner of his eye as she jumped into the conversation with Ryan and Kat, debating whether Ryan was being too overprotective. Christmas-crazy or not, Holly didn’t deserve to be misled by him or her brother. But Nick couldn’t tell her without causing an issue between her and Ryan—yet another secret tucked under the tree.
Guess it was pretty obvious what everyone was getting for Christmas this year.
“Over the river and through the woods, to grandmother’s house we go.” I skipped across the patchy frozen ground, singing at the top of my lungs as birds chirped in protest. Hooking my arm through Nick’s elbow with my gloved hand, I began to swing in time to the tune. “The horse knows the way…take it, Nick!”
He didn’t take it.
Instead, he shrugged out of my grip with a pained expression, reaching up to flip his jacket collar over his neck as a flimsy excuse to be released. Wimp. The wind wasn’tthatbad. “I don’t know the words.”
“No one does.” I adjusted my hat, nose burning from the cold. Okay, maybe it was a bit chilly. I attempted the next line. “Something, something…the sleigh…”
I’d ditched the elf ears after they’d given me a headache—I’m blaming the headache on them and not on Lydia getting chummy with my mom earlier—and now my black beanie fit snugly over my curls as my family trudged through the forest.
Dad led the way, toting an ax and flocked on each side by Janie and Mason, who peppered him with questions he couldn’tanswer, like why did trees grow so tall and why was the sky gray today instead of blue? “Because God said so,” he finally declared. They accepted that answer and then launched immediately into questions about the North Pole, promptly stumping their grandfather once again.
Olivia, Kat, and Mom walked as a threesome, arms linked. Chloe and Axel filed behind, holding hands, while Ryan and Lydia followed them, Ryan’s face shooting periodic scowls at Axel’s back and then softening as he looked down to respond to Lydia.
I brought up the end of the parade with Nick, partly because that was the way it’d worked out when we’d started this hike to the back of my parents’ property, and partly because I didn’t want to actthisChristmas-obsessed in front of my family. Granted, they’d already witnessed the other steps of Operation: Naughty List without saying much—except for Olivia. Thankfully, she was too distracted by her worries over Mom to grillme.
I was equally glad she’d not caught that conversation Nick and I had while crouched over my siblings’ childhood ornaments. That’d been a close one. Good thing Axel had barged into the kitchen when he did and set off Ryan’s brother radar, or else I might have actually bonded with Nick.
Might have actually started to see him as a real man with a real heart and real memories and real reasons for his own aversion to Christmas.
I swallowed. Close call, indeed.
“Through the white and drifted sno-ooow!” Axel walked backward, arms spread wide as he bellowed the next line into the forest.
Janie and Mason stopped asking questions long enough to clap. Kat shook her head, while Chloe laughed, grabbing at Axel’s red scarf and rewarding his courageous solo with a kisson the cheek. Ryan eyed them and squatted to make a snowball, eyes narrowed to slits.
Which gave me a great idea. What was more annoying than listening to me sing off-key Christmas songs and meandering through a frozen forest while picking out a Christmas tree?
Listening to me sing off-key Christmas songs and meandering through a frozen forest while picking out a Christmas tree with wet snow in your jacket, that’s what.
While my siblings and Lydia rushed to prevent Ryan’s evil plan against Chloe and Axel, who were now wrapped in a hug, I concocted one of my own. “Janie, Mason—what’s that?” I pointed to the top of a tall pine off the side of the path and let my mouth drop open.
Their little heads immediately swiveled to look, along with my parents’, Nick’s, and Chloe’s, who managed to untangle herself from Axel and frown up toward the sky.
While they all squinted at nothing, I scooped up snow and turned sideways, hiding the evidence as I worked to pack it into a tight ball. It was harder than it looked, since it was more ice than slush, but that was okay. Just meant it would take longer to melt in Nick’s coat.
Chloe shaded her eyes with her hand as she peered upward, hip cocked. Her light brown hair cascaded over her shiny jacket. “I don’t see anything.” Behind them, almost comically silent, Kat and Olivia wrestled a snowball from Ryan’s grip as Lydia clung to his arm, wearing her most stern teacher expression.
“Yeah, Aunt Holly.” Janie jumped up and down on the crunchy forest floor, as if the motion could get her close to the branches twenty feet above her head. She pushed her bangs out of her eyes. “I don’t see it!”
“That’s because you’re a shrimp.” Mason, who was barely taller than Janie, gave her a little shove.
She glanced at her mom, who was still busy talking Ryan down, then to her grandparents, who were also looking up into the branches, and frowned. Then she sat down on the ground with a hard thump and released a piercing wail that sent a flock of birds abandoning their treetop post.
Oh brother. It must run in the family, because if that wasn’t a move straight out of Kat’s childhood playbook…
It worked in my favor because, at Janie’s cry, everyone abandoned the futile search and crowded around her, murmuring various admonitions (Olivia) or comforts (Mom). I finished forming my weapon of destruction, my palms cold through my gloves, and felt a grin sliding across my face thathadto rival Ursula’s after Ariel signed her golden contract.
“Hush. You’re not a shrimp, Janie. You just haven’t hit your next growth spurt.” Olivia picked her up and swiped snow off her behind. “Mason, quit being mean. You’re not exactly ready to try out for the NBA. Have you seen how tall your father is?”
I hid the snowball behind my back, weaving casually around my family to find the perfect vantage point.
