“That’s a lot of money.”
“Not compared to how much I owe.”
“Baby steps,” Olivia said, using powder blue icing to decorate a snowflake with a loopy intricate pattern. As an architect, she had a very even and precise hand and worked through the array of cookies quickly.
“I don’t have time for baby steps,” I reminded her. “Christmas is coming! It’s almost here. I have to be sold out by then. I’m not anywhere close.” I spooned icing on a Rudolf cookie and ate it, cheeks bulging.
“I’m not going to make it.” I scrolled through the TradeMe app, hoping someone had posted a job offer since the last time I had checked twenty minutes ago.
“It’s still early,” Olivia reminded me.
I sank into frosting cookies. It was a methodical activity that put me in a Zen state and helped me calm down. There was something especially relaxing about frosting with royal icing. Trace the outline then fill in and watch the color form in a glossy pool.
Olivia snapped her fingers in front of my face.
“I’m not sleeping with him.”
My friend giggled.
“I don’t even like Matt.”
“Hate sex is great sex. If he’s offering, you shouldn’t say no.”
“But he hasn’t been offering,” I said. Not like Brody offered. That offer had beenveryobvious. But I didn’t want obvious. I wanted the romance. I wanted the first kiss on Christmas Eve.
Really? We have to wait that long? At that pace, you’re not going to see his dick for eighteen months.
“He needs a little encouragement,” Olivia said conversationally as, machine-like, she traced the outline of dozens of Santas.
“Next time you see Matt, you should just bend over and tell him to get in the Christmas spirit and lick your Christmas cookies.”
The thought of himthere…
“Cookies are better than sex,” I chanted to myself.
Olivia laughed and started adding carrot noses on the snowmen. “Or you could have both at once.”
“We are making cookies and having a wholesome afternoon,” I stated.
Olivia didn’t let up. “How big do you think it is?” she asked, pouring black icing into a baggie and snipping the tip off.
“I’m not even going to think about it.”
But it was all I could think about as Olivia and I finished icing the cookies—how I wanted him…in his kitchen, under a Christmas tree, in his office…
“These are almost as pretty as the Christmas tree ornaments.” Olivia held up one of the cellophane baggies with a large snowman, tied a red ribbon around the top, and hung it on the tree.
“Sure made a lot of cookies,” I said, arranging them in boxes on the counter. “I hope I actually have customers to eat them.”
My phone chimed as I was throwing away the paper icing bowls.
“I have a job!” I squealed, jumping up and down. “And it’s at a Christmas tree lot.”
“Score! You have to wear a cute outfit!”
I was feeling veryChristmas chic when Olivia dropped me off at the Christmas tree lot on her way to a meeting with a client in Manhattan.
I had left the shop open again with the cookies arranged on trays for people to take.
