Page 40 of Not Home Alone

“Excuse me. He was a bad boy, but I was cool in my own way. I was very popular at school and in the town. Being the daughter of the owner of The Christmas Barn makes you kind of famous when you’re a kid.”

She yawns again.

I persevere. “Okay, so I was Clara. Grant was cast as the Nutcracker Prince. We spent a week together rehearsing. It was kind of like the Summer Lovin’ backstory in Grease, between Sandy and Danny Zuko. Minus the beach. And it was Christmas, not summer. And we weren’t singing all the time, and I didn’t have bangs.”

“So, nothing like Grease. Got it.”

“’Twas the night before Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve is always the night of the performance. We’d been circling and eyeing each other for a couple of weeks. You know. Furtive glances from across a crowded room and all that…” There are butterflies in my stomach as I remember it. It’s bizarre how easily I can tap into those remembered feelings when I allow myself to. Even when I don’t want to.

Glancing at April, I can see that I’m about to lose her, so I get to the good stuff. “But on this night, Grant and I were alone together, on the stage at Holly Grove High, rehearsing. He claimed to be having a hard time remembering his lines all of a sudden, but he knew them the day before. He just wanted me to keep running lines with him, and it was so obvious. It was cute. And anyway, there’s this part in the play where Clara and the Nutcracker Prince kiss. That’s all it says in the script. If there’s an age difference between the actors, or if it’s little kids playing the parts, they just hug. But the director wanted us to kiss. Every time we ran through it with the cast and crew we’d just go, ‘and they kiss.’ And we said we’d figure out the staging later. Well…”

April leans forward, feigning anticipation.

“Finally, it was later. We rehearsed the kiss that night. A lot. Soooo many different ways.”

“On stage?”

“Yes. Just the two of us in the auditorium on stage. With the stage lights on. We weren’t in costume, but we’d hit our marks, and he’d be like, ‘How about I kiss you like this?’ and he’d put his hands on my face and kiss me on the mouth. And I’d be like, ‘But the back of the house won’t be able to see, so how about this?’ And I’d grab his shirt and he’d put his hands on my hips. And we just… kept kissing. For an hour. Every possible way you could imagine two people kissing when they still had their clothes on and weren’t doing anything else—we tried it. We finally decided on a particular kiss. On the lips. His hands on my waist. My arms around his neck. Not passionate for the performance, but a real kiss on the mouth. Touching each other…”

April lets out a tiny sigh, despite herself.

“And then it got late, and he walked me home instead of giving me a ride on his motorcycle.”

“Because you were scared to get on his bike?”

“Because he didn’t want to get there fast. So we took the long way. He asked me all these first date type questions. It was so cute. He asked me what my favorite beverage was and what kind of music I liked.”

“Christmas songs?”

“Yes, but also Led Zeppelin. Which, it turned out, he also loved. We had the same favorite song. And we just strolled around, holding hands when we were in the dark on a side street.”

“Because he was embarrassed to be seen with you?”

“Because he… well… I guess so, yeah. He was the rich bad boy, and I was, everyone thought, the goody-two-shoes daughter of the guy who owns The Christmas Barn. But he wanted me to show him my favorite parts of the town. The Moody mansion is on the edge of town, and his dad had an office park built on the edge of town too, so his family didn’t spend a lot of time around Main Street. I showed him a different side of Holly Grove, and he showed me a totally different side of him. It seemed real. We walked past the Home Alone House—this house. And I told him about how much I loved this house and dreamed of living here someday.”

“Why? Do you love the movie that much?”

“I mean. I love it a lot. But it was the family that lived here back then, mostly. They always looked so happy and healthy. They ironed their T-shirts and had cookouts and played touch football on the lawn and they probably never got cavities and the parents looked like…”

“Like they never fought and they’d stay married forever,” April suggests. Another child of divorce who knows exactly what I mean.

“Exactly.” We’re both quiet for a beat, and I give the silence between us some space. I know that April’s parents divorced three years ago, and Connie told my dad they used to fight a lot. I’m sure April knows how lucky she is to have Joe Tucker as a stepdad, but her father lives in Chicago with his new girlfriend, so it’s not easy. “Anyway. It started to snow. And he kissed me. In a dark part of the street by my—your—house. Not as part of the play. No pretense. He kissed me. For real.”

My new stepsister doesn’t need to know about the tongues. About the way Grant smelled—the leather and fancy soap scent that I later learned was sandalwood. Now is not the time for me to think about the way he stood with his feet planted on the ground, leaning into me, so steady and possessive, but I could feel how much energy he was holding back. Before that night, I had only ever kissed boys at parties and there was always a spinning bottle involved, or a dare and a closet.

I never told anyone about the deep desire I had to give myself to him. To let him do all the things he wanted to do to my body, and I didn’t even know half the things he could do, I just wanted him to do it. I wanted him to be the one to show me what it meant to be a young woman who had the power to drive a young man wild. I didn’t want it all to happen that night, but I knew I wanted it. My body trusted him, and I wanted him to know it. He asked with his fingertips, and my hands answered. I felt how much he wanted me through his jeans. I didn’t know what to do with it, but I would have let him show me. Someday.

With a sigh, I continue. “It was by far the most romantic, best night of my life. We didn’t talk about what it meant, of course. I thought it was because we didn’t have to. It was impossible to ignore how lit up we were by each other. But then…”

“You boned him and he ghosted you?”

“No, April. We did not bone. However. He showed up backstage right at the last minute on Christmas Eve, night of the show, acting like the night before had never happened.”

April groans, a genuine, heartfelt groan. “Men.”

“Yeah.” I take a deep breath before delivering the big finish to this story. “And when it came to the moment in the play when we were supposed to kiss… I leaned in and reached for his neck, like we had decided the night before. But instead of kissing me, he turned his cheek and stepped away from me.”

April looks genuinely aghast. “On stage?”