Something cold and slimy slithered in my gut. “I was just asking aquestion.”
“Right. Sorry. My bad. I didn’t realize this was question time.” Julian folded his arms across his chest, angrier than I’d ever seen him. “How about we discussyourfirst car, Daniel. Or where you lived when you got it. Or how you got the money for it. Or who you were dating when you did. They’re justquestions,right?”
I stared at him, stunned. “You know I don’t like to…” I closed my eyes and rubbed my forehead as the irony of what I was about to saystruck.
“Sorry,” I said softly. “I didn’t realize this was something off-limits. That’s all you had tosay.”
He huffed out a breath and cocked one hip to the side, his posture relaxed just slightly. “No,I’msorry. It’s not off-limits, I’m just not used to having to explain it. It’s about my dad, and…” He shook his head. “It’s hard. So another time,okay?”
I nodded. “Sure.”
Julian managed to smile. “Okay. Let’s do this, then.” He beckoned me closer, and when I reached him, I held out a hand for his, wanting to ground myself in him. Julian threaded our fingers together and tugged me gently down thealley.
We emerged at the church parking lot, where it looked like Times Square had exploded and the shards had landed in O’Leary. There were dozens and dozens of small wooden booths, all painted blue, green, and white, and each strung with an insane number of fairy lights. There were tinsel Christmas ornaments, a huge inflatable dreidel, and a dance area in one corner that was covered in fake snow where a DJ was setting up abooth.
“This is…” I began, then paused, unsure how tofinish.
“Extra?” Julian suggested. “Garish? Kitschy?Cute?”
“All of those things,” I agreed. But there were pink-cheeked kids chasing each other up and down the street, the air smelled of chocolate and pine, and people werelaughing,genuinely enjoying this time with their neighbors as they set up these little displays, so really, it was mostlycute.
Julian led me to the back, where his mom was setting up a gorgeous display beneath a white and gold Ross Landscapingbanner.
“Oh, I’m so glad you boys are here,” she greeted us. She pulled Julian into a fierce hug, then stood on tiptoe to press a warm, maternal kiss to my cheek. “I need somehelp.”
Julian had said his mother was determined to apologize to me for her behavior at Thanksgiving, but as far as I was concerned, that kiss balanced the scales. I couldn’t help but contrast it to my own mother’s chilly perfection. It seemed like Jules and I both had parents who liked to get their own way, but where his mom was over-protectively involved in his life, my parents had all but written me off when I didn’t meet theirexpectations.
Though maybe that wasn’t entirely fair. My father had called me twice in the last two weeks, leaving messages each time to confirm that I was expected home for Christmas. He’d somehow even gotten Sabrina in on his act, getting my former agent to text me repeatedly, making all kinds of threats about coming to get me if I didn’t come home. I didn’t actually think anything would be fundamentally different if I went home—I imagined the same crown roast, the same cocktails, the same professionally decorated Christmas tree, the same expressions of disapproval on my parents’ faces—so I had no plans to leave the cabin, but I’d give them points fortrying.
“What’s going on?” Julian asked hismom.
“Theo and Sam were supposed to be here to help me set up all of these centerpieces.” She gestured at a huge flat of greenery. “There’s a bunch more in the truck.” She jerked a thumb over her shoulder at the area where the vendors had parked. “Margo Martin can’t get her overhead lights to work, and she swears up and down it’s an issue with the power and not her lights, which I seriously doubt. And apparently I’m the only one around who can go and troubleshoot it forher.”
“Where’s Theo?” Julian asked, shooing his mother to one side as he jumped in to fix up herdisplay.
“I have no idea! Sam needed to move some things.” She sighed impatiently. “I couldn’t tell you why she needed to move them today, or where she was moving them to or from. All I can tell you is that neither of them are here, and now I’m four handsshort.”
“And here Jules and I are, with four hands between us,” I said. “What can Ido?”
She smiled, wide and genuine. “You picked a good one,” she told Julian, nudging him in the ribs. “If you and Julian can just finish setting up this display, I’m going to go see what Margo’s talking about. Then maybe you two can help me get some of the pre-decorated miniature trees out of thetruck?”
I glanced and Julian and both of usnodded.
“No problem,” Isaid.
She winked at me and squeezed Julian’s shoulder and she ranoff.
“Okay, you’ve clearly got an artistic vision here,” I said, watching Julian work. “How about I hand you the centerpieces, and you arrangethem.”
“My artistic vision is basically not to crowd things on top of each other,” Julian said, rearranging a basket filled with pinecones and greenery. He smiled at me. “Also known asdon’t make it lookshitty.”
I grinned, handing him a long piece of greenery interspersed with berries. “Exactly my style aswell.”
“Yeah, I kinda…” Jules paused and clapped a hand to his front pocket, which was buzzing slightly. “Shit. That might be a text from Theo.” We swapped places and he yanked the phoneout.
He blinked for a second, swallowed, and slipped the phone back in his pocket withoutreplying.
“What’d he say?” I demanded. “Everything okay? Do they need aride?”
