7
I groan as synth pop and George Michael’s voice hit my ears.
The bittersweet lyrics of “Last Christmas” are the last thing I want to hear after the day I had.
I recall the whole episode: yelling at my family, the broken cookie jar, bolting out the door.
It’s going to be so awkward explaining myself.
Instead, I keep my eyes closed, half listening to the song, appreciating the soft pillow beneath my head. An improvement compared to the hard, icy-cold ground I recall as my last memory after I ran out of Mom’s house.
The comforter over my body is deliciously toasty and practically molded to my body as I twist sideways.
How long have I been out? Did poor Manny have to carry me back to my she-shed to rest?
Of course, I’m not a medical professional, but with multiple nurses in the house I don’t think they’d let me sleep if I had a concussion?
I crack an eye open. Rays of sunlight filter through a pair of unfamiliar black curtains, illuminating an equally unfamiliar stack of records on the floor.
Those alt metal rock albums definitely aren’t mine.
Nor do I remember seeing them in the she-shed.
I jerk back and bump something—no, someone—next to me.
WTF.
“Babe, ugh, turn that shit off, please,” a raspy voice says.
Babe? My nerves race faster than the Trans-Siberian Orchestra as I roll over and come face-to-face with some white dude’s heavily tattooed back.
I cover my mouth to muffle my shock. Who is the hell is he? And where am I?
The world shifts unsteadily, and I shut my eyes and groan. Low point, Marygrace. What the hell happened last night? Seriously, tell me I didn’t go home with a stranger and pass out in his bed? And what about the fight with my family and the Butt Crack Santa jar? Did I just dream all of that?
I hug myself trying to make sense of the situation.
The thin ray of sunlight coming through the window is just enough light to see that I’m wearing a large black T-shirt and—I pull the collar and wince as I confirm that yes, I’m wearing only a T-shirt.
Where the hell are my panties? Or even my reindeer onesie?
I bite down on a rising scream. Wherever I am, I need to get out of here faster than tickets sell for a Beyoncé concert.
I sit up and search the room for any clues that could possibly tell me who I stumbled home with. There are clothes strewn on the floor. Mismatched furniture that’s seen better days.
The rando grumbles and pulls the blanket toward him.
“Babe, seriously, turn it off,” he groans again, his back still to me as he removes one of the pillows he’s sleeping on and puts it over his head to cover his ears.
I agree, I’ll be able to think better without Wham! as the soundtrack to this surreal morning. I follow George Michael’s voice to my phone, located on a ratty nightstand next to the bed, and hit the side button to silence my alarm.
“Thanks,” he mumbles.
Now in the sudden silence, my brain resumes spinning like the rainbow wheel on my Mac when it’s loading.
How did I go from arguing with my family, face-planting on the way out the back door, to hooking up with a rando and crashing at his place?
The order of events just aren’t coming together.
I brush my hands through my hair. My family was desperate for me to bring someone home for Noche Buena.
Then it hits me. Leo. Did I somehow go home with him?
I check out the guy’s back again. I don’t remember seeing any tattoos on Leo last night—not that he couldn’t have had any.
He was wearing long sleeves, but something in me doubts that beneath his ironed dress shirt Leo the dentist was hiding so much ink.
Plus, wasn’t his hair brown? I shake my head. How could Leo be so… forgettable?
I study the stranger again, spotting the guitar tattoo on his back, and his full sleeve of roses, music notes, and wait—is that my college mascot?
The little cartoon chestnut stares soulfully at me.
My eyes narrow. This guy’s curly dirty blond hair streaked with strands of blue dye looks familiar now, too.
“Babe, what are you doing?” He rolls over.
I open my mouth to respond, but his face stops my racing heart.
Oh. No.
When I slipped on that ice, I must’ve somehow fallen into some alternate dimension, because this absolutely cannot be happening.
I squeeze my eyes shut as tight as I can, but when I open them again he is still there.
Not Leo.
“Dale?” I exclaim.
Dale’s brows flick up. “Like what you see?”
I freeze like he’s a real-life error message on my phone. How am I in Dale Quigley’s bed?
Dale Quigley, my high school boyfriend. My ex–high school boyfriend.
His bright blue eyes flick up and down me, and a lazy smile forms on his thin lips. Lips I used to think were the sexiest when he sang. Lips I thought I’d never see again since we broke up freshman year of college.
How is this possible? Dale moved to Nashville after graduation, from what I recall. Nowhere near Hopewell Crossing.
“Babe,” he murmurs and lazily lifts the blankets invitingly, exposing the rest of his body, barely covered by flame-red boxers. “Come on. I’ve got an early Christmas present for you right here.”
My jaw drops again, and it takes me longer than I’d like to admit to stop gawking at his body. He’s filled out a bit since college, but is still in very bangable shape.
Finally, his words sink in. I sputter, “Did you say Christmas? Is it Christmas Day?”
He laughs. “I said early Christmas present. But it can be Christmas morning every morning if you like.” He puckers his lips.
I shake my head. “So it’s not Christmas Day?”
He makes a face. “Um, I believe December twenty-fourth is still considered Christmas Eve.”
Christmas Eve? I was with my family the morning of Christmas Eve. But now I’m with Dale? None of this makes sense.
I grab my phone to check the date, half expecting to see some snarky messages from Wit Wit at least, maybe a check-in from Juliet. I do a double take when my home screen isn’t the Christmas picture of my cute nephews and nieces I’d set it to earlier this month and is instead some weird snake logo.
“Babe, what’s up?” Dale asks, propping himself up on an elbow.
“N-nothing,” I stutter. “Just checking to see if I got any texts from my family.”
“Hmm.” He sounds unimpressed as he rolls the blanket back around himself. “Your loss.”
I mean, it’s not like his body isn’t totally appealing, but I’m a little distracted right now.
I jab at the calendar app to make sure my eyes aren’t playing tricks on me and…
wait, it says today is Friday. But that can’t be right.
Olivia’s wedding is on Saturday, which is December 26, the day after Christmas.
Today should be Thursday. I close and open the calendar app to confirm.
The air in my chest deflates as the calendar reopens and the day doesn’t change. But the year is…
No. This can’t be right. The whole room spins, and I have to take three deep breaths to stop myself from passing out. Because if this is right, then it’s Christmas Eve, but it’s Christmas Eve one year in the future.
“Dale?” My voice wobbles. “Did you mess with my phone somehow? The year is wrong.”
“No…” he mumbles. “It must be your old phone. That’s why I offered to buy you a new one with the Reytown money, but you declined.”
“Reytown?” I echo.
“My record label?” he says, rolling back to face me, blue eyes sharper now. “What’s going on with you this morning?”
His record label? Dale started his hard rock band Cobra Strike when we were still in high school, and last I remember they were being named Best Local Band in the region while we were in college.
No small thanks to me. I wince as I remember deciding to switch my major to marketing so I could help him promote his band.
I landed him gigs in local bars, got him on radio stations, filmed and edited his music videos, not to mention wrote a bunch of his songs.
All of which I deeply regretted the morning he dumped me over text message while I was eating my Special K and cramming for my Consumer Behavior final.
“Nothing is going on with me,” I say defensively—although something is very much going on with me, I just can’t figure out what.
He watches me for a moment, blue eyes skeptical.
“Wait.” He frowns. “This isn’t about the New Year’s gig again, is it? We’ve got to do this show. The label is amped to get me onstage—it’s Times Square.”
I blink rapidly at him. “Times Square,” I repeat. He’s playing New Year’s Eve in Times Square?
Sure, Cobra Strike was fire back then, but a college-band kind of hot. Not record-label hot. “I know.” He laughs and leans over to rub my knee. “All thanks to you.”
Thanks to me? How did I help him get the Times Square gig?
“And I’m sorry we couldn’t get comp tickets for your whole family,” he continues. “Maybe next year, right?”
Dale rolls back over, tugging the sheets back up to his hairline, leaving nothing but dyed blue tufts sticking out.
“I’m getting up,” I announce, hoping my shaky legs will carry me. I need to figure out what’s going on.
“If you’re getting up, can you start breakfast? I’m going to snooze for a little bit longer. It’s going to be a long day today.”
“It’s Christmas Eve,” I say as I snag a pair of mesh shorts from a nearby chair. I slip them on, praying that they were washed at least in the last month. “I wouldn’t call seeing my family a ‘long day.’”
“What?” He pops his head out of his covers again. “We’re not seeing your family. Cobra Strike has a gig, don’t you remember?”
No, I don’t remember. My chest is too tight. Between my missing memories, the date on my phone telling me we are a year in the future, and waking up next to my college ex-boyfriend, I have exactly zero idea what is going on. I need to get out of here. I need to find somewhere to clear my head.
I grab the door.
“Tonight at six,” he says. “I can’t wait for the Spotify people to meet my fiancée.”
I make some kind of sputtering sound that doesn’t really constitute words as I push my way out of the bedroom and lock myself in the bathroom, bracing my hands against the sink.
Did he say Spotify? Wait, did he say fiancée?
Before I can truly process the words, my gaze falls on a small heart-shaped bowl sitting by the edge of the sink, with an unfamiliar metal band cupped inside.
I stare at the strange object. A small black band with a large yellow gemstone like a cobra’s eye makes my legs wobble. Is that what I think it is?
On instinct, I reach for it and slip it on my left ring finger. It fits perfectly.
We’re engaged?
And this snake-inspired thing is my engagement ring?
I stare at myself in the mirrored medicine cabinet.
“What is happening?” I ask my reflection. She blinks back at me. Familiar dark eyes and long dark hair. But there’s something different.
Something on my arm that makes the color drain from my face.
A tattoo wraps around my bicep. I twist to get a better view in the reflection and freeze.
I strike while it’s hot and heavy. It’s a song lyric.
And not just any song lyric. It’s the very first song Dale wrote when we were back in high school.
And it wasn’t even that great of a song until Robbie and I helped him with his lyrics and music arrangements.
So what is it doing permanently on my arm?
I take a deep breath, attempting to get my bearings. So it’s one year in the future and I’m spending Christmas Eve with my fiancé Dale Quigley.
You will be with the love of your life a year next Christmas.
Madam Lunas’s words hit me like a freight train.
It’s one year later. I have a fiancé.
You’ve already met this person. You already have history.
But why Dale? I couldn’t even listen to a love song for months after we broke up. And now I’m going to marry him?
Madam Lunas, what have you done?