Filed to story: The One That Got Away
“Wait a minute, I’m a part of this council too,” Louis objects, “and you guys just turned down my fruitcake cookies without a second thought.”
“You said to forget the fruitcake cookies, like, five seconds ago!” I say.
“Well, now I want them back under consideration,” he says.
“I’m sorry, but you don’t have the votes,” I tell him. “Kitty and I both vote no, so that’s two against one.”
My dad pops his head into the living room. “Put me down as a yes vote for the fruitcake cookies.” His head disappears back into the kitchen.
“Thank you, Dr Rupert,” Louis crows. He drags me closer to him. “See, I knew your dad was on my side.”
I laugh. “You’re such a suck-up!”
And then I look over at Josh, and he is staring at us with a funny, left-out look on his face. It makes me feel bad, that look. I scoot away from Louis and start flipping through my books again. I tell him, “The list is still a work in progress. The cookie council will strongly consider your white-chocolate cranberry cookies.”
“Greatly appreciated,” Josh says. “Christmas isn’t Christmas without your white-chocolate cranberry cookies.”
Kitty pipes up, “Hey, Josh, you’re a suck-up too.” Josh grabs her and tickles her until she’s laughing so hard she has tears in her eyes.
After Josh leaves and Kitty goes upstairs to watch TV, I’m tidying up the living room and Louis’s sprawled out on the couch watching me. I keep thinking he’s about to leave, but then he keeps lingering.
Out of nowhere he says, “Remember back at Halloween how you were Cho Chang and Sanderson was Harry Potter? I bet you that wasn’t a coincidence. I bet you a million bucks he got Kitty to find out what your costume was and then he ran out and bought a Harry Potter costume. The kid is into you.”
I freeze. “No, he isn’t. He loves my sister. He always has and he always will.”
Louis waves this off. “Just you wait. As soon as you and I are done, he’s gonna pull some cheesy-ass move and, like, profess his love for you with a boom box. I’m telling you, I know how guys think.”
I yank away the pillow he’s got cushioning his back and put it on the recliner. “My sister will be home for winter break soon. I bet you a million dollars they get back together.”
Louis holds his hand out for me to shake on it, and when I take it, he pulls me on to the couch next to him. Our legs touch. He has a mischievous glint in his eye, and I think maybe he’s going to kiss me, and I’m scared, but I’m excited too. But then I hear Kitty’s footsteps coming down the stairs, and the moment’s over.
“Can we put up the tree this weekend?” Kitty asks at breakfast.
My dad looks up from his bowl of oatmeal. Oatmeal, ugh. “I don’t see why not.”
Half-heartedly I say, “Alice might be mad if we do it without her.” Truth be told, I want to put up the tree too. It’s so cozy to do Christmas Cookie Bonanza and have the lights twinkling on the tree and Christmas music and the whole house smelling like sugar and butter.
“Brielle’s family put their tree up the day after Thanksgiving,” Kitty says.
“Let’s just do it then,” I say. “Can we, Daddy?”
“Well, if Brielle’s family is doing it,” Daddy says.
We drive out to the Christmas tree farm an hour away, because that’s where the really nice ones are. Kitty insists on seeing each and every tree to make sure ours is the best one. I vote for a plump balsam fir because it smells the best, but Kitty doesn’t think it’s tall enough. We go for a Douglas fir instead, and the whole drive home the air smells like Christmas morning.
Josh runs out of his house when he sees us struggling to get the tree inside. He and my dad heft it up and take it inside the house. He holds the tree up straight as my dad screws the Christmas-tree stand around it tight. I have a feeling like he’s going to want to stay and help decorate the tree. I can’t stop thinking about what Louis said. How Josh could maybe like me.
“A little to the left,” Kitty directs. “It’s not straight enough.”
I bring down the box with the twinkle lights and the ornaments and start sorting through them. My favourite is the painted blue star I made in kindergarten out of dough. It’s my favourite because there’s a bite taken out of it – I told Kitty it was a cookie and she chomped right into it like the Cookie Monster. And then she cried, and I got in trouble, but it was worth it. “Should we do coloured lights or white lights this year?” I ask.
“White,” Kitty says. “It’s classier.”
“But coloured lights are whimsical,” Josh argues. “I mean, they’re nostalgic.”
I roll my eyes. “Whimsical, Josh?” And then Josh proceeds to make a case for coloured lights, and he and I argue back and forth until Daddy intercedes and says we should just do half and half. This is when things finally feel really and truly normal between us, now that we are bickering again like old times. Louis was wrong about Josh.
The tree is so tall it nearly touches the ceiling. We run out of lights, so Daddy goes to buy more at the store. Josh puts Kitty on his shoulders so she can put the star on the tippy top.
“I’m glad we got a big tree this year,” I say with a happy sigh, falling back on to the sofa and looking up at the top. There’s nothing cozier than a Christmas tree all lit up.
A little later, Daddy has to go in to the hospital, and Kitty goes over to our neighbour’s house because they’re making s’mores in the fireplace, so it’s just Josh and me cleaning up. I’m putting ornament hooks back into their different ziplock bags and Josh is loading up a cardboard box with the ornaments we didn’t have room for. He hoists the box in his arms and bumps into a branch on the tree, and a glass ornament slips off and breaks.
Josh groans.
“Jo-osh,” I say. “I made that in home ec.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s OK. It wasn’t my best work anyway. I put in too many feathers.” It’s a clear glass ball with white feathers and white sequins inside.
I go get a broom, and when I come back, he says, “You act different around Kavinsky. Did you know that?”
I look up from sweeping the broken ornament. “No I don’t.”
“You don’t act like you. You act like … like how all girls act around him. That’s not you, Bella.”
Annoyed, I say, “I act the same as I always do. What would you know about it, Josh? You’ve barely ever even been around us.” I crouch down and pick up a shard of glass.
“Be careful,” Josh says. “Here, I’ll do it.” He stoops down next to me and reaches for another shard. “Ow!”
“You be careful!” I lean close to him and try to get a closer look at his finger. “Are you bleeding?”