Or maybe I do what I’ve done the last few years. Just stay put, volunteer at the Christmas Market, and work.
I square my shoulders, scan the site one more time, and listen to the wind thread through the studs with a low whistle. The mountains have vanished into white and I want to get home before the snow makes its way any closer.
I climb into my truck and sit for a second, watching the sky close in. The snow has started to fall. I feel the guilt of skipping another Christmas clutch at me, the disappointed tone in Maddie’s voice when she asked if I was coming home.
I tell myself to focus on what’s in front of me. The weekend. Seeing my sister. Helping her and her best friend haul boxes. Christmas can stay where it always does, on the other side of the line I drew five years ago. I don’t need lights or casseroles or carols to remind me of what’s missing. I’ve got enough ghosts this time of year.
I start the truck, crank the heat, and tap the steering wheel until the defrost kicks in. This week, I’ll keep my head down. Finish the job. Help Maddie. Help Hailey.
Then, if I’m lucky, I’ll make it through another December without letting Christmas find me.
CHAPTER 2
Hailey
Asingle peppermint candle and endless cardboard boxes. That’s our holiday aesthetic this year.
Mariah Carey belts high notes from Maddie’s Bluetooth speaker while I tape another box shut. It’s like I’m wrapping up my life, one box at a time. Packing paper crackles under my knees.
“I can’t believe we’re packing up our apartment this Christmas instead of putting up a tree,” Maddie says, twirling a roll of bubble wrap like a baton. She’s wearing red flannel pajama pants and a glittery headband that says MERRY in crooked glitter letters.
“Remember the tree from freshman year?” I grin. “Technically a fern with a single string of lights.”
“And an angel cut out of a cereal box.” She snorts. “DePaul’s finest dorm décor.”
I glance around our living room, now empty. Naked nails where our gallery wall used to be, a wrapped couch with its throw pillows stuffed in a trash bag, the coffee table buried under a mountain of my labeled boxes. H: KITCHEN (FRAGILE). H: BOOKS (HEAVY). H: CANDLES (TOO MANY). The last one earns me a side-eye from Maddie.
“You have a candle problem,” she says.
“I have a coping mechanism,” I correct, sniffing the peppermint like it can steady me. “It’s a proven fact that your olfactory senses are the best for memories anyway. Every time I smell this now”—I smile at her—“I’ll think of you, in this moment, yelling at me about having too many candles.”
She laughs, plopping cross-legged beside me, and starts wrapping mugs, narrating each like an auctioneer. “Lot one: the snowman who lost an eye in the dishwasher. Lot two: the mug that got me through the Great Burnt Pumpkin Incident.”
“Never forget,” I deadpan, both of us bursting into laughter remembering that crazy incident.
We fall into our usual cadence of laughter, randomly singing along with the radio and talking endlessly about the memories we’ve made living together. Just like we’ve been doing since the tiny studio we rented right after graduation. That place had a galley kitchen so narrow you had to choose between opening the fridge or breathing. We ate ramen off the cardboard box we used as a table and watched the El rattle by like it was our personal soundtrack.
“Two apartments, three jobs, nine IKEA meltdowns,” Maddie says, winding bubble wrap around the snowman mug like a scarf. “All with my ride or die.”
My throat tightens. “Don’t start now,” I scold her, not ready for the waterfall of tears I know I won’t be able to stop once they start.
She nudges my shoulder. “You’re allowed to be excited and sad at the same time. It’s called being a complex, layered woman.”
“I feel like I’m more of an ‘emotional train wreck,’ but sure.” I sit back on my heels, taking in the scuffed baseboards, the walls in a sage-green paint we spent weeks picking out, andthe window seat where I sat on my computer, applying for this dream job in Denver that I’ve recently landed.
Two years here together. That’s what Maddie and I had. But before that, it was years of dorms and then the two starter apartments, but this place made us feel like adults. Like we had finally made it. We had real furniture we bought with money from our real jobs. Late nights, fueled by wine, dancing in our socks, bad dates recapped like post-game analysis, Sunday pancake rituals, my first coding contract accepted at this kitchen counter. It’s wild how much life fits into a small space when you’re not paying attention.
Maddie’s smile turns soft. “Your new place is going to be perfect. Denver’s going to lose its mind over you, I can tell you that. Those mountain men aren’t gonna know what hit them when you pull into town.”
“Bold of you to assume Denver is ready for my candle budget.” I force a breathy laugh. “You, meanwhile, will be living your best Chicago life in an apartment that doesn’t have a haunted dishwasher that randomly decides to dump ten gallons of water onto the floor in the middle of the night.”
“RIP to the ghost of plates past,” she says solemnly, then brightens. “Also, my new building has a gym and a rooftop. So be prepared when I come to visit next summer and I’m ripped and hot. I’m going to become intolerable.”
“You already are.”
We bump shoulders, smiling. The song changes to “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” and something in my chest tilts. We both go quiet, listening to the song we’ve heard a million times before.
“I’m proud of you,” she says, barely above the music.
