“Well, I got stuck driving back from the lodge and then Isaac—this is Isaac, by the way. Isaac, this is Blitzen.”
Blitzen glanced over her shoulder. “My real name is Eugenia, but I prefer my stage name.”
He nodded. “Noted.”
“Anyway, I uh...” I wasn’t willing to fess up to my absolutely childish decision to blindly walk into the wilderness. “We got lost and you found us! The end!”
Isaac’s gaze narrowed on me. “Something like that...”
Blitzen’s cabin was an adorable little A-frame with light pink trim and a red door, and as we stepped over the threshold, we all took turns stomping our feet on her welcome mat that read:cum inside.
“Can I steal this doormat?” I asked.
She giggled. “It was my gift from the work white elephant exchange.”
“I really missed my calling as a stripper at the North Pole.”
We took off our boots and lined them up at the door as she said, “You would fit right in, Sunny. Besides, Vixen is out on maternity leave.”
“If I didn’t have a screenplay to finish and I hadn’t just agreed to help run a diaper empire, I might take you up on that.”
Blitzen looked at me like I was the most delightfully curious thing she’d ever seen, and Isaac buffered for a minute. I’m sure he had plenty of diaper-related questions, but that was the kind of information Isaac Kelly was no longer privy to.
We sat on the red velvet couch near the hearth while Blitzen relit the fire. “The tow company is going to be slammed tonight, but you should have enough service here to call them. You can also just use my Wi-Fi and put in a service request online.The Wi-Fi name is Lord of the Pings and the password istheprecious. All one word. No caps.”
“A Lord of the Rings fan?” I asked. “So hot.”
“I did a Sauron striptease for Halloween last year.”
Isaac cleared his throat. “So were you just like a fiery eyeball or...?”
Both Blitzen and I turned to glare at the peasant among us.
“Is this eyeball-shaming? In my own house?” Blitzen demanded of Isaac. “And I’ll have you know that Sauron does have a corporeal form in the Third Age, according to Gollum’s account of—”
“Sauron was super hot before he served Morgoth,” I added over her. “Andafter that too—at least when he wanted to be. Sometimes he could be a wolf too!”
“You’re being a real Sackville-Baggins right now,” Blitzen told Isaac. Then she took off her coat and began to remove her snow bib. “Okay, so I have to go to work.”
“In this weather?” Isaac asked.
“The North Pole closes for no one or no thing. Not even Mother Nature herself, and especially not on Christmas Eve. Plus, I have a Ford F-150. It scoffs at the snow. Scoffs!” She stepped out of her winter gear to reveal a white floor-length flowy negligee and straightened her halo.
Isaac and I watched, jaws slack, as she put on a fur coat and grabbed a pair of gold heels and a pair of gauzy glitter-coated wings from her coat rack.
Blitzen shrugged. “We’re doing a nativity theme tonight, and I’m the angel.”
“Well,” I told her, “I am very sad to be missing that.”
“You should come out on President’s Day. Last time, I was William Henry Harrison. Because I wasn’t wearing enough clothes, get it? Anyway,” Blitzen said as she took a refrigerated lunch bag out of her little teal vintage refrigerator. “Just putthe fire out before you go. There’s a key under the mat. Make yourself cozy until the tow truck gets here. There’s some extra blankets in the hall closet. Merry Christmas!”
“Thank you so much!” I called to her as she let herself out the front door.
Beside me, Isaac shook his head. “Saved by an angel on Christmas Eve.”
I couldn’t help but smile. It truly felt like some sort of miracle.
Chapter Thirty-Two
