The relief was immediate and overwhelming. She felt the tension leave her body. This wasn’t a nightmare. This was just an emotional Christmas.
She’d been embarrassed by the quilt and she was overreacting to a simple misunderstanding.
The necklace would have been wonderful—but this? His words, his feelings, something from his heart that he'd sat down and crafted just for her?
This was better than jewelry. This was Tom choosing to be vulnerable, to pour his feelings onto paper, to tell her in his own words how much she meant to him. This was the kind of romantic gesture you kept forever, saved between the pages of a book, read again and again until the paper wore soft.
"Oh, Tom," she breathed, taking the envelope with trembling fingers. She could feel her eyes fill with tears—happy tears, grateful tears.
She looked up at him, her smile radiant despite the earlier hurt. "This is perfect."
She carefully opened the envelope, wanting to savor the moment. His family was watching, Mia's hand at her throat, touching her new necklace, everyone waiting to see what romantic words Tom had penned.
Lauren pulled out the paper inside.
A check.
For five hundred dollars.
The memo line read: “Xmas - buy yourself something nice."
Her smile was still on her face. She could feel it there—stretched and frozen, a grotesque mask she couldn't seem to remove.
Lauren stared at the slip of paper in her hand. At Tom's writing. Her name. Yesterday’s date. Everything correct and proper.
Her mouth felt too dry. The Christmas tree across the room was blurring into a smear of color and light.
Not words. Not feelings.
Just money.
“This way you can get exactly what you want," Tom said into the silence.
A check.
Like an employee receiving a Christmas bonus. A stranger he owed money to.
"That's very practical," Judith said, and there was approval in her voice.
"Smart thinking," Richard added.
Lauren felt suspended outside of this conversation, watching herself from a distance as her world collapsed in real time.
She'd given him her heart, had held it out for him to take care of.
He'd given her money. Five hundred dollars. Buy yourself something nice.
Lauren felt the eyes on her, felt the weight of everyone's attention. She forced her face into something resembling a smile. Her cheeks ached with the effort. Her hands felt clammy. She couldn't tell if she was sweating or freezing.
"Thank you," she whispered, the words scraping her throat raw. "That's... that's very thoughtful."
She carefully folded the check and tucked it back into the envelope.
Her pulse pounded behind her eyes. Her limbs tingled, distant and unreal, like she was floating an inch outside of her own body.
Lauren stood abruptly. "I should check on the pie."
She walked to the kitchen, the envelope still clutched in her hand. Through the window, snow was beginning to fall, covering everything in pristine white.
