CHAPTER 7
Emma
I can’t believe it’s Christmas Eve already , I think as I sprint the last several metres home, not stopping even when my vibrating watch tells me I’ve hit the 5km mark.
My laboured breathing confirms I’ve completed my morning run at a rapid pace and I know it’s because I’m so eager to get home and see what the elf next door has in store for me.
Yesterday, from my spot perched in front of my living room window, I’d watched him sit in his car staring daggers at my house, giggling to myself as I turned the music on and the volume up every time he attempted to leave. He’d sat there for so long I’d wondered if he was planning to stay the night in his car. Or just driving off. Either would have ruined the next surprise.
It was quite the challenge to find the Love Actually soundtrack on CD. Buying it and arranging the same-day delivery was even more difficult. And expensive. But I had felt the need to drive the needle into him just that bit more. The Spotify playlist on repeat was good and all, but it felt too transient. By leaving him a physical copy of the songs that will no doubt haunt him for many, many months to come, I’d taken the war to the next level.
And now I was waiting for his next move.
When I’d left for my run earlier, I’d been disappointed to find my doorstep empty. It was anticlimactic to know I’d put in the effort to drop a bottle of wine and the CD off for him, only to wake to find nothing in return. A part of me wondered if I’d taken it too far, but then my eyes tripped over the 5kg bag of kitty litter, still sitting next to the front door mocking me, and I thought I hadn’t taken it far enough. The elf next door is a menace, a hot one, but definitely one deserving of my wrath.
“Oh, there it is.”
I stop a few steps from my front door and admire the parcel, wrapped in Christmas paper, waiting for me. Relief fills me, and I ignore the thrill of knowing he’s still invested in this war of wills. That he’s still invested in me .
Unable to wait any longer, I skip up to my front door, bending over to retrieve a shoe box-shaped parcel, along with a smaller box that my salivary glands now identify as the ‘cookie box’.
“Chocolate chip cookies,” I breathe as I take them in. Today he’s left me a full dozen and they’re still warm.
I glance towards his house, realising he is possibly making the cookies fresh. And if this is the case, maybe, just maybe, I need to be nicer to him. Befriend him, even. The cookies are that good.
With the parcel tucked under one arm and a cookie stuffed in my mouth, I open the door and let myself in, pumping the air conditioning up to the maximum. The temperature outside is already scorching, so I need to get ahead of it if I’m to not boil to death today.
“What’s he got in store for me in here?” I shake the box lightly and when I can stand the suspense no longer, I open it, my mouth dropping open at what I find inside.
“Facetime Carly mobile,” I command my phone, shoving another cookie in my mouth and flopping into my favourite overstuffed armchair. Which just so happens to have a perfect view out of my living room window.
“Hey, Ems.”
The pretty, flushed face of my bestie fills my screen and I lean back with a sigh, comforted by just the sight of her.
“You won’t believe what he left me today.”
Carly knows who the ‘he’ I’m referring to is. After I dropped off the ear plugs that escalated our war, I’d called her and vented about the whole thing. As a loyal friend, she’d been completely on my side and ever since she’s been demanding hourly updates on what’s going on over here. She also can’t believe after all our shenanigans (her word, not mine) that I don’t even know his name yet and secretly, I agree. After almost a week of hostile interactions, it seems weird to know him only as the ‘elf’.
And for him to know me as the ‘Grinch’.
“Show me!” Carly’s eyes are shining and her grin is wide. Being ‘a thousand pounds with pregnancy weight’ (again, her words, not mine), she’s finding it hard to move off the couch. Apparently, my neighbourly war is the most entertaining thing happening in her life right now.
That’s just sad.
“Well, first, he left more cookies!” I hold up the box, light blue this time, currently filled with nine scrumptious chocolate chip cookies. “And they’re the best ones yet. I think he makes them because these are warm and gooey on the inside.”
She groans, licking her lips. “Oh my gosh, that sounds amazing. I could eat a bucketload right now.” Her pregnancy cravings have included all things chocolate, so this must be torture for her. “Save me one?”
I look between her face and the box in my lap, indecision swimming through me. I’ve been best friends with Carly for almost twenty years…but these cookies are next-level yummy. I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to resist eating every single one of them.
“We’ll see,” I mumble non-committed. “But that’s not all he left.”
The cookie-induced pout leaves her face, and she leans in closer to her phone camera. “Show me!”
So, I do. I lift each one out of the box and hold it in front of my phone camera, absorbing her laughter getting louder with every revelation.
“Oh my gosh, he’s so funny.”
A bubble of laughter tickles my throat as I watch her. She’s right. He’s mean and funny. But probably more funny than mean.
“It would have taken him a while to pull this collection together.”
The collection Carly is referring to is a pile of DVDs meant to…insult me? To continue the ‘you’re a sad, single, crazy cat lady’ theme, he’s bought a bunch of DVDs, starting with The Break Up and moving through the following:
The Runaway Bride
The First Wives Club
How to be Single
How Stella Got Her Groove Back
He’s Just Not That Into You
And ending with Kill Bill: Volume 1 .
“I mean, he got you DVDs. Who does that?” Carly asks through her tears. Her tears of mirth, to be exact. “And they’re so…pointed. He’s Just Not That Into You ? That’s brutal.”
But also, a good movie.
“The guy is an evil genius,” I tell her through another mouthful of cookie, lamenting the fact I’m now down to only eight left. There’s now zero chance I’m saving her one. “This is such a subtle burn; on the surface, he’s just leaving me a bunch of classic movies to watch. But the theme is clear as day. I’m like the sad single lady in every one of these movies.”
“What’s the Kill Bill movie about?” Carly frowns, blowing her newly cut bangs from her eyes. She cut them in a fit of boredom last week and has regretted it ever since. I think they look fabulous on her.
I read the back of the DVD with a frown, not sure why it’s been included in this bunch. “Let me google it.”
Minimising Carly’s face in a small corner on the top of my screen, I type in a quick google search, barking out a laugh at what I find.
“So, apparently, it’s about a woman hell-bent on seeking revenge on her former boss and lover for trying to kill her on her wedding day. It’s a cathartic classic that is the perfect movie to add to your post-breakup watchlist.”
Carly giggles and I smile along with her. The elf has put together quite the extensive list here. Even finding one as obscure as this.
“What are you going to do next?” she asks when our laughter has died down.
I look at the DVDs scattered around me and then at the cookie box, which is now down to seven cookies.
“I’m not sure,” I admit, biting my lip. “What can top this? I’ve tortured him with Love Actually until I thought he might move out on the spot. And it didn’t deter him. In fact, it spurred him on. I’m not sure I can compete.”
“Don’t give up yet,” my best friend encourages. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t want this brand of her entertainment to end just yet. “You’ll come up with something.”
My gaze travels over my bright and festive Christmas tree and the sole, sad stocking hanging next to it. It’s supposed to be the season for goodwill to all. How have I found myself in a petty battle with the hottie next door?
“I think I’ll wait until after Christmas,” I tell her with a firm nod. Even the fiercest battles in history took a day off to celebrate the birth of Jesus. “And then catch him off guard just when he thinks it’s all over.”
She grins at me with an admiring whistle. “Girl, you’re cold. And diabolical.”
I like the sound of that. I’ll give him one day to celebrate with some Christmas cheer, lulling him into a false sense of security, and then I’ll hit him with something when he least expects it. What that something is, I’m not sure yet, but as I hang up with my bestie, promising to maybe save her a cookie (not going to happen), and rummage through my trusty ‘just in case’ cupboard for my old DVD player, I’m determined to make it something amazing.
The elf next door gets a day off to enjoy his minor victory, not knowing that I’m plotting to win the whole, entire war.