Chapter 7 Kit
William looked peaceful as he slept. I felt something stir in me as I watched him. William was handsome, objectively. He obviously knew that, and over the last few weeks, I had decided that even though he was handsome, he was a little too self-assured. I found that irritating.
But last night William was different, because for a brief moment he was honest and maybe even vulnerable.
It was unexpected, and frankly, it was hot.
What was even more unexpected was that when he opened up to me, it unlocked my own honest emotional response.
I hadn’t been prepared for that. I knew this could be trouble.
I thought about leaving William sleeping on the other end of the sofa and disappearing into my apartment for the rest of the day, but it was Christmas. It seemed wrong for either of us to spend the day alone if we could avoid it. I decided I needed to stop being silly.
I nudged William with my foot. William stirred but didn’t wake. I nudged him again. He grumbled and made a smacking noise with his mouth as he slowly woke up
“Hey, Merry Christmas,” I said softly as I nudged him again to make sure he was awake.
William sat up. “Merry Christmas,” he said as he stretched. I gave him a minute to get his bearings.
“What do you usually do on Christmas?” I asked him.
“Well, normally, I’m just getting home from a work trip, and I usually meet my friends Meredith and Addison in Chinatown for some Chinese food,” he said. “What about you?”
I shrugged. “The last three or four years have all been different because of my mom’s cancer, but for the most part we’ve just been home, watching Christmas movies.”
“Let’s do that,” William said decidedly. He seemed to agree that the two of us would be hanging out on Christmas Day. I liked the fact that I wasn’t going to have to ask him.
We made our way into the kitchen and put together a decent breakfast of pancakes, eggs, and bacon.
We made huge cups of coffee, and I bullied William into letting me add gingerbread cookie-flavored coffee creamer into his coffee.
We made our way back into the front room and settled in for more Christmas movies.
As we watched, William and I both drafted and sent Christmas text messages to friends and family. Sometime during the second movie of the day, William’s phone rang.
“Oh, this is my mom. I should answer this,” William said. He swiped his phone to take the call. “Hi, Mom. Merry Christmas.”
“Anak! Merry Christmas! Maligayang Pasko!” A voice loudly called from his phone.
I tried to nonchalantly look over William's shoulder. I could see a small Filipina woman’s face filling the screen.
Her glasses sitting on the edge of her nose.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call last night. We were celebrating. ”
“It’s okay, Mom,” William said.
“Say hello to your cousins, Carmen and Junior,” William’s mom said forcefully. She pulled two younger cousins into the screen. They awkwardly waved. “Merry Christmas, po.”
William was polite. “Merry Christmas.”
Carmen said, “You have a nice Christmas tree.” Willam looked over his shoulder at the tree in the corner of the front room. “Oh, thanks,” he said.
When he turned to look at the tree, he moved just slightly so that his camera was focused on me instead of him, and his cousin Carmen asked, “Is that your girlfriend? She’s pretty.”
William turned on the sofa so I wasn’t behind him anymore, and I was off screen. He looked up at me, and I mouthed sorry.
We heard the rustling of William’s mom snatching the phone back from Carmen and her face filled the screen. “Are you with a girlfriend?”
William had a momentary look of panic, but he said calmly. “No, mom. It’s just my housemate at my new place in Georgia.”
“Oh, can I see her? Let me say Merry Christmas to your…housemate,” William’s mom said in a sing-songy voice. William looked up at me. I nodded and shrugged.
“Okay, Mom.” William turned so that I was in the background of the video call. I waved politely and said, “Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas to you, too!” I could see his mom’s face light up. Her eyebrows raised in the same way that William’s did when he was amused.
“Mom, we have to go. Merry Christmas.”
“Okay, Anak. Love you.”
“Thanks for doing that,” William said, tossing his phone on the sofa between us. “My mom is very persistent.”
“No problem. Hopefully, she couldn’t tell I hadn’t showered in two days.” I laughed.
“You look great,” William said as he set his phone back on the coffee table. He raised an eyebrow as he looked over at me. “But I could have sworn you were wearing a retainer at some point last night.”
I scoffed and hoped desperately that my face wasn’t turning tomato red. “For your information, I was wearing my retainer, but I took it off when we went into the kitchen to make pizza bagels.”
William laughed. “You might be the only adult I’ve ever met who still wears their retainer.”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I asked with a bit of a laugh, and I shrugged. “I guess I’m a bit of a rule follower. Your mom called you a name, anak? Is that a nickname?”
“Oh, ha. Yeah, it’s a term of endearment for your child in Tagalog, my mom’s language,” William said.
“You look like your mom,” I said pointing at his phone on the table.
“Yeah?” William said with an amused look. “You’re really the only person who has ever said that. My mom is a five-foot-tall Filipina lady. I’m over six feet tall and a spitting image of my dad when he was my age…from what I can tell from pictures.”
“Maybe it’s more the expressions you two make,” I said thoughtfully. “In that way, you favor each other.”
He was quiet for a minute. Then he turned to me and said, “You look just like your mom. I mean, based on the photos I’ve seen around here.”
I blew air from my nose and shook my head. “I wish. My mom, she was this free-spirited, artistic, effervescent person that everyone loved to be around.” The corners of my mouth pushed down in a doubtful frown. “I might resemble her, but I’ve never been like that.”
William sat back and shrugged. “I don’t know, Kit. She’s stunning. You look just like her.”
I felt my cheeks burn red. I tried not to read much into what he had said.
I looked out the window. “It’s going to be a quiet week.”
“Yeah? What do you mean?” William asked.
“Well, everything closes here in town until after New Year’s Day.” I saw the blank expression on his face, so I explained further. “Like everything is closed. Library, schools, stores, banks. The only thing open is the regional hospital.”
“Even chain restaurants?”
“We don’t have any national chain restaurants or grocery stores in Creekstone. You’d have to drive to the next town for that.” I saw the realization cross his face.
“Oh, wow. So, everyone just shuts down till January second? That’s some real small-town shit.”
“Pretty much.” I smiled and tried not to be defensive. “It’s one of the great things about living in Creekstone. Slow pace of life, but if you aren’t prepared for it…”
“Huh,” William sighed. “I had a lot of work I needed to get done, but I guess it’s going to have to wait till next week.”
I was curious about William’s work. Even though I was against it in principle, I was also a realist and knew that even if we didn’t sell our land to Braithway & Randall, other townspeople would.
I wondered what William’s company intended to do with the land.
But I decided against asking about it. I had lost that bet, so I had to try and not to be mean about William’s relocation and work in Creekstone.
Even though I usually had no problem keeping my cool, something about this topic triggered me.
Every time it was brought up, I ended up biting William’s head off.
It’s like when I was with William, I just lost my filter.
I wanted to be nice, though, and Creekstone was completely shut down until after the new year, so I said, “Tomorrow morning I’m going to go for a run by the river if you want to go with me. You know, get out of the house a little.”
William’s eyes lit up. “Yeah, that would be great.”
I smiled and tried to play it cool. “Awesome. Hopefully you can keep up.”
We had just started the movie again when my phone rang.
I saw Aunt Rita’s face pop up on my screen.
I had already sent the requisite Merry Christmas text message to her, so I knew she was calling because she must have talked to my dad.
If I told Aunt Rita I hadn’t gone to D.C.
and that I was back in Creekstone, she would change her travel plans to be home with me for Christmas.
I didn’t want that. I watched the phone ring in my hand, and I let the call go to voicemail.
Almost immediately after that I received a text from Veronica.
Are you home alone? I can come up there.
Aunt Rita called back immediately. I was looking at my phone trying to decide if I wanted to answer it or not when William said, “MountainMan2000 must really want to talk to you.”
I let a laugh out. “No, it’s Aunt Rita. She must have just figured out I am home alone on Christmas.”
“I’m offended!” William said, pressing his fingertips against his chest in an exaggerated gesture of shock. His sly smile spread across his face. “Just answer it. You’re not alone.” William casually popped a few of the leftover chocolate-covered pecans into his mouth.
William was right. I slid my finger across my phone to answer it. Aunt Rita’s face appeared immediately. She looked tan...and pissed. “Kit, why didn’t you tell me your dad’s flight got canceled? I could have come home.”
“I’m not alone,” I said into the phone. “I am…”
Before I could answer, Veronica started calling me. I sighed. “Aunt Rita, hold on. Veronica is calling me too. Let me merge the call.”