“Excuse me?”
“You plugged the lights in before they were up. You’re supposed to plug them in after you’ve covered the entire tree, then stand back, and say, ‘Okay, ready!’ Then someone plugs them in, so you get that real ta-da moment.”
Anne rolled her eyes. “That’s not something people do.”
“It absolutely is.” That grin pulled at his lips again.
She shook her head. “No one would waste that amount of time decorating a tree without checking to see if the lights worked first.”
“It’s part of the drama,” he said. “The ‘will they/won’t they’ effect.”
She laughed. It felt like a release, like she had been holding it in for eight years, just waiting for this moment, so she didn’t try to temper the sound. She let it bubble out of her until there were tears in the corners of her eyes. Freddie watched her, smiling, too.
A few minutes later, they were done. The room was darker now that the sun had set, and the warm glow of the tree made the room feel smaller, like a cocoon around them.
“We did it,” she said, almost embarrassed by the sense of pride swelling in her chest.
“We did,” he said with a nod.
A moment passed before she turned to him. “Can I ask you a question?”
He was still staring at the tree as he answered. “Sure.”
“Why did you help me?”
His brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, why did you offer to bring this up here? Why did you stay to help with the lights?”
He stared at her for a minute, as if he was just considering the fact as well.
“I guess I don’t know how to be strangers with you, either,” he said. “So maybe we could try friends.”
Friends. She had made the same offer to him eight years ago: It was all she’d asked of him after their breakup. His only answer then had been to block her number. Now, here they were again. She had felt so angry, so hurt back then, and she expected those same feelings to rise up now. But they didn’t. Instead an old kernel of hope returned to her chest.
“I could be friends with you,” she replied.
He stared down at her in the dim light, and smiled. In that moment, it almost felt like those eight years hadn’t passed at all. That maybe…
WHAM.
“Finally!” James cried out, throwing the front door of Cricket’s apartment wide open while balancing a big heavy box and pivoting into the kitchen, “I never thought Ellis would leave. Honestly, how many ways can you say ‘get out’ without just saying ‘get the fuck out so I can make a birthday cake for you!’? I tried ‘you should go to the gym, bring your new weighted vest,’ and ‘there’s a secret sale at ABC Carpet, hurry!’ I even made up a building HVAC emergency. The man is oblivious! I finally had to call Cricket to have her pretend she lost the keys to their office. Oh, did you get the powdered sugar?” He dropped the box on the kitchen counter and had already removed the flour and baking soda when he looked up. “Oh, Freddie! I didn’t even see you there. Oh, and look! Cricket got a tree!”
“Actually, I got the tree,” Anne said, pushing a few loose strands of hair away from her forehead. God, she didn’t even want to imagine what her ponytail looked like right now. “Freddie was…”
“The muscle,” Freddie added.
Anne swallowed down another laugh.
“Hmm,sohelpful,” James’s eyes narrowed as his mouth quirked up playfully. “Who is Freddie Wentworth? Entrepreneur. Tree mover. I have so many more questions. For instance, do you know how to bake?”
Freddie chuckled. “Unfortunately, no.”
James frowned. “That’s too bad.”
Anne turned back to Freddie. “It’s Ellis’s birthday on Friday, so we’re baking him a cake.”
“Throwing him a party, too,” James replied as he unloaded thehand mixer and measuring cups on the kitchen counter. Then he paused, eyes wide like he had an idea. “Oh! You should come! Friday night, are you free? It’s just upstairs on the roof deck.”
