They also both wanted Grant to be happy, so that was probably enough for them to be friends.
“I like your nails,” Hope said between mouthfuls of juice. She obviously wasn’t in a hurry to get back to her family.
Sunny was a novelty. That was probably even more interesting than Christmas.
He wasn’t sure. He’d been a shy kid, but he was aware that some of them were more outgoing. It made sense that Hope would be, considering her parents.
“Thank you,” Sunny said. “I need to repaint them, I chipped them a lot tying the tree to the car.”
“I could repaint them for you,” Hope offered.
“I… would love that,” Sunny said, genuinely surprised. Hope seemed to like him. He hadn’t been sure until now whether or not he’d be likeable to a kid her age, so it was nice to know that she wasn’t about to start avoiding him or anything.
“Cool. Come with me,” she said, finishing her juice in one long draught and then heading for the living room.
Sunny’s stomach turned over at the thought of facing Grant, and his ex-wife, and another total stranger, but he finished the last mouthful of his juice and followed Hope into the living room.
“Mom says I’m old enough to paint my nails now,” she said excitedly. “Look at all these colors,” she added, picking up a box full of bright, bold nail polish bottles that she’d obviously been given for Christmas.
Sunny grinned at her enthusiasm. He remembered buying himself a similar box when he’d been a teenager, hiding them away in his room, being scared of what would happen when his parents noticed, but determined to stand his ground over it.
They’d been cool about it, in their usual, generally apathetic way. Not enthusiastic, but it had barely gotten a mention. His mom had said she liked the color.
He’d picked up another bottle of it and given it to her, relieved that he wasn’t going to have to argue over it. Most things had been like that with his parents. They were supportive, in their own, quiet way.
They just also hated to rock the boat, so Sunny was on his own if anyone else took issue with his nail polish, or his choice of clothes, or the one year he’d mentioned a boyfriend.
He’d learned pretty quickly not to do that in front of his uncle.
“What color do you want?” Hope asked.
“You pick for me,” Sunny said, sitting down next to her on the couch.
“What if we do red, green, yellow, and blue, and white, like the Christmas lights?” Hope asked.
As hideous as he knew that would be, Sunny didn’t hate the idea at all. It was Christmas. He was allowed to have hideously bright nails. Besides, if it made Hope happy, he wasn’t going to argue. “Works for me. We’ve gotta get the glitter off first, though. Do you have remover?”
“And cotton rounds,” Hope said, grabbing both items out of a Christmas gift bag with a puppy in a Santa hat on it.
Sunny liked Hope already.
“I watched a lot of YouTube videos about this,” Hope explained.
“That’s how your dad learned how to start a fire,” Sunny said. He could see that she was definitely Grant’s daughter. “Do you know the easy way to get glitter off?”
Hope shook her head.
“Okay, well, this is an ancient secret, passed down generation to generation,” Sunny said.
He’d actually also learned it from YouTube, but what was the point in making friends with a kid if he couldn’t pretend to be unfathomably wise?
“You take a cotton round and split it in half, like this,” Sunny said, peeling the two sides away from each other. “And then in half again,” he added, demonstrating by pulling on each side of the round until it split into two half-circles.
Hope watched him intently, which made Sunny feel like a genius.
Maybe this was why people had kids.
Probably not the only reason, but it was kind of cool to feel smarter than usual.
