But none of it is real. Not to her.
I know, because she told me once, on a Christmas that smelled like bleach and canned green beans instead of cinnamon and pine. We were kids in a hallway with peeling wallpaper, not a chandelier in sight.
“I hate Christmas,” she whispered, voice fierce and low, like she was confessing a crime. “It’s fake. It’s just another day where people pretend they give a shit.”
She was thirteen then, all sharp cheekbones and sharper anger. I was twelve, sullen and quiet. The first time she said it, something in my chest sat up and listened.
I already hated Christmas too—but for different reasons. For me, it was the day my mother packed a suitcase and left. Merry Christmas, kiddo. She said she “needed some air,” that I’d be “better off” with someone else. Then the door slammed, and it stayed slammed. The snow outside kept falling like nothing had happened, like the world hadn’t just gone hollow.
The state came next. And eventually, so did Meredith.
Tough. Angry. Smarter than everyone. She didn’t cry when bullies snapped her pencil in half. She didn’t whine when dinner was thin soup and stale bread. She never begged anyone for anything. She was all spine and stubbornness and bite, and I loved her the second I realized she saw through the same bullshit I did.
She was my anchor in that storm, whether she knew it or not.
Now she’s all grown up and lethal, gliding through the world she carved out for herself. My chest tightens at the sight of her in those sleek heels and that don’t-fuck-with-me coat.
She doesn’t recognize me. Her gaze slides right over the man in the red suit without a flicker of interest. To her, I’m just cheap velvet and bells. Nothing.
The boy who used to sleep on her floor flinches inside my ribs at being overlooked. My gloved hands curl into fists on my lap, leather creaking softly. I hate that she doesn’t see me. That she’s forgotten me. But ignorance is temporary. I’ve come too far and waited too long to remain unseen. I swallow back the bitterness and allow myself a small, secret smile.
I’ll remind you, Meredith.
My lips shape the words soundlessly as I watch her: I’ll make you remember why Christmas is so special.
In my head, it’s Christmas Eve in that house again. The hallway reeks of bleach and overcooked vegetables, and the linoleum is so cold it burns through my socks. Meredith crouches in front of me in the half-dark, knees popping, a chipped paper plate balanced on one hand. “I’m not hungry,” I mutter, stomach growling loud enough to make the lie pathetic. She just snorts and slides her second cookie onto my plate anyway, fingers brushing mine like she’s daring me to push it back. Later, when the yelling downstairs spikes high and sharp, I’m on the thin mattress beside her bed, staring at the brown water stain on the ceiling while her hand dangles over the edge, palm open. I take it, and the noise dulls, like someone shut a door between us and the rest of the world.
She was the only good thing in that place. In years of gray, she was the one thing that didn’t feel rotten. She’ll probably never know the full extent of what she did for me—how just knowing someone else out there hated the world the way I did made it bearable. In a system that treated us like paperwork, she made me feel like I wasn’t a mistake.
Meredith saved me.
In some ways, she saved herself too—that hardness, that ability to numb out, it kept her alive. But I saw the fissures then, even if she never shed a tear. And I see them now, beneath the power suits and perfectly controlled tone. She’s lonely, even ifshe’d rather die than admit it. I see it in the way her shoulders drop the second she thinks no one’s looking, like she’s shrugging out of a coat that doesn’t fit.
A flash of red velvet in my peripheral vision yanks me back to the present. A little girl in a dress that matches the bows on the mall wreaths stands a few feet away, clutching her mother’s hand and eyeing me like I might bite.
Show time.
I paste on a warm Santa smile and beckon her closer. She clambers into my lap, patent shoes digging into my knee, sticky fingers gripping a handwritten list that’s longer than her arm. She smells like sugar cookies and the artificial pine from the giant tree behind us.
“Have you been a good girl this year?” I boom, voice deep and jolly.
She nods so hard her hair bow wobbles. “Mostly,” she whispers. “Sometimes I make Daddy mad.”
The words nick something raw inside me. My smile doesn’t falter.
“I’m sure you’re doing just fine,” I tell her, and for a moment it’s not Santa talking at all. Then I clear my throat and slide the mask back on. “Santa’s very proud. I’ll see what I can do about this list, okay?”
She giggles and scrambles down, her mother snapping a photo and thanking me. I barely register it. As the kid runs off, my eyes are already searching for a sharp black coat.
Meredith is only a few yards away now, standing in front of a malfunctioning animatronic reindeer that’s refusing to light up. She gestures at it with the tip of her pen, giving instructions to one of her assistants. Clipboard in one hand, phone in the other—multitasking like the world will stop spinning if she doesn’t hold it up herself. The assistant scribbles frantically, noddingat every word. Meredith doesn’t spare a single glance in my direction.
She doesn’t see the man in the red suit.
She will. Soon.
My fingers slide into my coat pocket, brushing over the crumpled brown paper there—the leftover scrap from last night. I spent hours wrapping that gift, hands shaking. Not from nerves. From anticipation.
Anyone else would call it what it is. Stalking. Obsession.
