Chapter 1
Chapter One
MELLIE
PRESENT DAY
Ronin was asking about you.
Bree’s words have been bouncing around my head since her trip here last month.
She offhandedly mentioned seeing my former best friend when she came here for Thanksgiving.
Was that before or after she told me she wanted to see other people?
I can’t remember. That weekend had held more than one revelation.
Seeing him wasn’t odd—not when you live in a town as tiny as our hometown. But mentioning it to me? That was new. As an unspoken rule, we don’t talk about Ronin. Not anymore.
Now, almost a month later, I’m still pondering its meaning as I move around my bedroom, ducking into my tiny closet to toss another few shirts onto my bed. My stomach is in knots. wondering why he’s had a change of heart after years of silence. We haven’t spoken since I moved to LA four years ago.
When I ran away and he didn’t try to follow.
I’d give anything to have Ronin back in my life, to hear his deep laugh, feel his strong arms wrap me in a warm bear hug. It’s the longest I’ve gone without talking to him, and I miss him.
Bree, Ronin, and I had been inseparable as teens, known around our small town as the Three Troublemakers.
Bree and I became even closer in the last year.
One of her visits to my apartment and a drunken game of Never Have I Ever ended with us in bed together.
That era ended last month after Thanksgiving when Bree came clean about meeting someone back home, confirming every fear I’ve had about starting a relationship with one of my closest friends.
I should have trusted my gut, which had screamed at me that it was a terrible idea.
Damn her and that stupid, sexy pink hair, and that cute ass.
It always sucks to be dumped, but in the end, I didn’t place the blame solely on Bree.
Long distance was hard, and it never felt like either of us had our whole heart in the relationship.
Our break-up was as amicable as one could get—minus the glitter bomb I briefly considered setting off in her rental car.
At the end of the day, I think we are both aware that we make better friends than lovers.
Ronin, on the other hand… With Ronin missing from my life, it feels like there’s a giant man-sized hole in my heart, an empty vacuum in my day to day.
He wanted things from me back then—things I could not give to him.
After what happened with Bree, I’m more sure than ever that I made the right call.
After months of him ignoring my text messages and phone calls, I took the hint and assumed the years of friendship we’d built didn’t mean the same to him as they did to me.
I move across my small room without thinking, stopping at my dresser to pick up the small, bejeweled picture frame sitting atop the dusty surface.
I run my fingers across the blue and green gems, wiping the dust off the clear plastic covering the photo.
Ronin’s arm is slung around my shoulders, his brown hair grown-out and floppy across his forehead.
The grins that are stretched across our faces bring a wistful smile to mine now as I take in the teenagers staring back at me.
We weren’t more than fourteen or fifteen in this photo.
I think back to when Ronin and I met, when I felt like I was drowning and he was the life preserver that pulled me to the surface.
It was our shared love of manga and games that brought us together.
Countless afternoons spent sprawled out in the oversized chairs scattered throughout The Reading Nook, playing Magic the Gathering or swapping volumes of whatever series we were reading.
He invited me into his friend group, introduced me to the wonderfully immersive world of role-playing games like Dungeons and Dragons, igniting my passion for storytelling and writing.
Ronin accepted me for who I was in a time when being weird or being different wasn’t always considered cool or trendy. Not like today’s world.
When Ronin and I were in high school, Ambrosia “Bree” Greco moved to Blue Fields with her family, and our duo became a trio.
The rest was, as they say, history…until I had the crazy idea to leave town, full of dreams of becoming a writer for television or movies.
Chasing that Hollywood career like countless people before me.
Four years have gone by and I don’t have all that much to show for it besides an overly expensive apartment, a trail of shitty jobs, and a brand new ex-girlfriend.
Now, I’m hours away from the small-town certainty of seeing him, and I hate every piece of clothing I own.
Trying to pack for my trip home for Christmas has turned into an evaluation of every shirt and dress I pull out.
Holding up another top to the mirror, I groan in frustration and throw it aside into the quickly growing discard pile.
Why do I care what I wear? I’ve never put this much thought into my wardrobe before now.
Giving up, I pull on my favorite worn-in T-shirt, an oversized Die Hard black tee that has the TV-edited line “Yippee Ki Yay Mister Falcon” scrawled across the front in blocky red letters.
A lump forms in my throat and I press my lips together tightly, remembering the day Ronin gifted it to me on my birthday the year before I left.
“So you’re finally admitting Die Hard is a Christmas movie, is that what’s happening right now?” I tease, holding up the shirt Ronin carefully wrapped in colorful wrapping paper.
“I wouldn’t go that far.” A pleased smile lifts on his mouth as he watches me pull on the new shirt over my tank top. “If you’re going to be delusional about what Christmas movies actually are, I can only embrace the crazy, not fight it.”
“It is a Christmas movie! I will die on this hill.”
“And that’s why we all adore you, Mel.”
My heart strains as the nickname echoes through my memory. Shaking it off, I tug my black leggings back on and turn toward the mess currently all over my bed.
“Okay, Mellie, let’s narrow this down,” I whisper to myself.
I need to be on the road in the next two hours if I want to make my flight, and like usual, I left packing to the last possible minute.
It will be my first Christmas spent at home in the last four years.
Ordinarily, I would stay in LA for the holidays, and perhaps my parents would fly down to ring in the New Year like they did last year.
But now, something is pulling me back home.
Maybe it’s the years I’ve been gone. Maybe it’s the thought of being together with Evan and our parents, and finally meeting Evan’s girlfriend, Catalina, who he seems pretty serious about.
Maybe it’s the thought that Ronin is thinking about me.
Whatever the cause, I bought myself a round-trip ticket to Washington, my return flight set for after the new year—and I have nothing to fucking wear.
I blow out a breath, my strawberry-blonde hair blowing away from my face, and bend down to pick up a pair of jeans from the messy floor. Brushing them off and rolling them up, I stuff them into my carry-on bag that lays sprawled open across my bed.
My phone pings from my nightstand and I pick it up, swiping to read the message from my mom checking my flight. Again. I smile as I type back my response:
Landing at 2! Can’t wait to see you
Mom is thrilled with my plans to come home, and I truly am excited to see her. It’s been too long since I’ve had one of her cozy mom-hugs and her famous Blue Fields Double Dipped Chicken. It’s my favorite thing to eat in the entire world.
I set my phone back down on my nightstand and survey the wreckage of my closet.
Pulling out a few of my favorite comfy T-shirts, a couple more pairs of jeans and leggings, I toss them on top of my bag.
My mother hasn’t disclosed all of her holiday plans for us, but I figure it will be smart to bring a few nicer outfits as well.
Reaching into the corner of my minuscule closet, I retrieve one of my favorite dresses and lay it delicately across my bed.
I have one more outfit in mind, and soon enough a sharp, black blazer and black slacks join the dress as I root around for a couple of nicer tops to wear with the jacket.
I love the duality of fashion, being able to show off my feminine side or embrace androgyny.
To me, it’s one of the best parts of being queer, something I realized about myself in my teenage years.
By some Christmas miracle, I manage to finish packing on time, hitting the road toward the airport with my favorite BTS album blasting through the speakers. My stomach is still a mess of nerves, flipping between excitement and apprehension. Ready or not, Blue Fields, here I come.
“Amelia? Mellie!” My mom’s excited voice rings out across the airport lobby.
“Mom!” I squeal as we run the last few feet to meet each other. Her arms wrap around my torso and squeeze tight. I breathe in her familiar scent; perfume she’s worn since I was a child mixed with a faint sweet, powdery smell. Mom smells like home.
“Oh, honey, I’m so happy you’re here!” Mom squeezes me tight before letting go and wrapping an arm around my waist as we walk toward the exit.
“Your old room is all ready for you. We had to move some things into storage last year when we converted it into a guest room, but I pulled out your favorite sheets and comforter. You know, the fluffy pink one you loved so much?”
“Thanks, Mom,” I reply, smiling to myself and leaning into her side. “So, what’s on the holiday agenda? Did you already start the Christmas cookies?”
“No, no, we were waiting for you!” She pats my arm. “The cookie exchange over at the diner is in a couple of days, so you need to choose which you’d like to bring. We can go shopping tomorrow for whatever you need.”