I put him back down on the step, making sure his head was on the side, so he wouldn’t choke on his own sick if it came to that, then I kept on making my way up.
My floor was like the rest of the building—old, dirty, loud as fuck. I could hear two babies screaming, music blasting from several stereos, a couple having a screaming match, and two dogs barking their heads off.
I could afford to move. I’d been making enough money to change apartments for a couple of years already. Something just kept holding me back.
Was it the fear of losing it all?
Or that I didn’t deserve more than the shithole I was raised in?
Who the fuck knew?
All I knew was it was familiar. Home, in a way. Even if all I usually did was sleep and shower in it. I’d always rather be working than twiddling my thumbs at my apartment.
The proof of it slapped you in the face as soon as you flicked on the light.
Small, dingy, no carpet, no curtains, no nothing except the black recliner sitting facing the TV that was set on two TV dinner stands.
It wasn’t even a nice TV. Nothing worth stealing.
Sure, everyone in my building knew who I was connected with now and not to fuck with me. What can I say? Old habits died hard. I once got my fucking bike stolen six times over one summer. I had to track it down and beat the shit out of whoever stole it over and over.
Walking over to the fridge, I reached inside to grab a beer before dropping into my chair and flicking on the TV.
Damn near every channel was playing some classic Christmas movie full of low-stakes family drama or relationships that were starting to form against a backdrop of glittering lights.
With a sigh, I found something a lot more realistic—a movie about a gang turf war, and drifted off to sleep, wondering how the fuck I was going to fake holiday cheer that I’d never felt before.
And I only had a few hours to figure it out.
CHAPTER TWO
Stephanie
“At what point does this go from ‘charmingly festive’ to ‘fire hazard’?” I asked, stepping back from my Christmas tree that featured at least twenty strands of steady and twinkling colorful lights.
About four plastic containers full of tissue-paper-wrapped ornaments were just waiting for their turn to adorn the plastic branches.
“About five strands ago,” my best friend, Andy, said. She was petite and redheaded with a youthful round face and big honey-brown eyes. She was draped over my couch in a sweater she’d knitted herself that featured a French Bulldog in a Santa hat. The inspiration for said sweater was curled up near her candy-cane-printed fuzzy socks. He was tan and tubby with an adorably smushed face. He was snoozing away but no longer snored since he had surgery to fix his nasal passages.
“I want it to feel alive,” I said, stepping back and squinting to look for blank spots. I had another two totes full of lights I’d inherited from my mother—a woman who was practically Mother Christmas. This was only my second year trying to fillher shoes. I was afraid of failing, of losing the magic. Especially after a good chunk of it felt buried with her.
“It’s going to be very alive when it is a blazing inferno.”
“They’re LED.”
“Why is it so hard for them to make LEDs that don’t feel too bright and too cold?” Andy grumbled. An incandescent purist, she scoured every estate sale and secondhand store to try to find those precious strands for her own tree. You couldn’t even blame her, since she did white lights and white LEDs were especially harsh on the eyes.
“I know. Your electric bill is going to give me palpitations, and I don’t even need to pay it.”
“Right? January is going to be rough. My credit card was smoking at the toy store yesterday.”
“That happens when you have seven nieces and nephews to buy for.”
“You’d think my brothers and sisters would have taken my budget into consideration when they decided to keep reproducing,” she said, lips twitching. Expensive or not, she adored all of her niblings. “Did I tell you Carly is pregnant again? Due in April.”
“That’s four, right?” I asked, scooping all the Christmas blankets and towels off the chair so I could drop down on it.
“Yeah. They’re talking about moving to Jersey to get more room. Speaking of kids, how have the plans been going for the charity?”
