Chapter 2
Chapter Two
Mia
“What do you mean you’re sorry, but you can’t come home with me for Christmas?” I froze in the middle of plopping scoops of snowball cookie dough on baking sheets at my friend Gabe’s sparkling quartz island. It was Wednesday night, and we were in his apartment, listening to Michael Bublé belt out “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.” Gabe’s rescue cat, Stupor Queenie (a name we’d given her after a long ICU rotation and too much wine), sat on the roof terrace of her kitty penthouse, flicking her tail and staring at us as if to say, Your people problems are waaay too complicated .
My other good friend Samantha Bashar, who was in specialized training at Children’s to become a pediatric anesthesiologist, was uncorking a wine bottle.
I was going to need that wine, because it felt like a race car was running laps in my chest. A wave of dizziness forced me to sit down, so stunned, I forgot to set down the scoop.
“I’m so sorry,” Gabe said, flicking his gaze downward in a way that I could tell he felt bad. He pried the scoop from my hand and replaced it with the glass of wine that Sam had just poured, which made me hate him a teeny bit less. “It’s just…Jason’s asked me to go home with him to meet his parents. That’s a huge step.” He sat down at one of his nice leather counter stools and seemed, for the first time since I’d met him, almost as bewildered as I was. “I think he’s going to propose.”
“Oh, Gabriel,” Sam said, “that’s amazing.”
Tears of happiness filled my eyes despite my panicked state. Gabe and I had met the first day of pediatric residency and bonded over our mutual terror at having to care for fragile former preemies in what we residents affectionately called the Special Scare Nursery, and we’d been the best of friends ever since. He was one of those people who loved big and hard and who, because you trusted him so much, got you to overshare before you even understood you were doing it. Hence, he knew about everything—including blow-by-blow accounts of the two years of awful dates I’d endured before I’d met Brax.
“I’m really happy for you.” I walked around the huge island to join Sam in giving him a giant hug. We’d all had our share of dating heartaches, and Jason, Gabe’s beau of two years, was amazing. I couldn’t think of anyone who deserved better.
Meanwhile, I tried to tamp down my welling desperation. I had to produce a fake boyfriend in three days. Three. Where on earth was I going to find one?
Gabe stopped to give Queenie, who had rubbed up against his arm, a scratch behind her regal ears. “I think this is it for me.” He looked me straight in the eye, with a solemn, sure expression that I had to admit made me envious. “I think he’s The One.”
His happiness was obvious. And hard-earned. We’d been warriors together, on the wards and in the dating world. And he’d done it: he’d found love. Which should’ve given me hope that someday I might find it too. Underneath my terror and my joy, I felt a tiny twinge of sadness. “Who’ll console me with ice cream and cheap but plentiful wine after I survive yet another awful date?”
“Ahem,” Sam said, pointing to herself.
I turned to her and said in a wry tone, “You’d console me by taking me to a bar and finding me a one-night stand.”
She lifted a perfect brow and tucked a lock of shiny black hair behind her ear past a pretty gold dangling triangle earring. I’d need to borrow those. “I can’t help it if I’m a problem solver. Maybe if you’d taken my dating advice, you’d be over Brax by now.”
Sam was beautiful, brainy, and sometimes brash. Adventurous and bold. Many things I wasn’t. Sometimes, I thought that maybe I connected with her so much because she reminded me of Gracie. She was also one of the kindest people I knew. When she wasn’t pushing me to be bolder, that is.
“I’m getting engaged,” Gabe said, “not moving to Alaska.”
The dizziness hit again, making the room spin. The effect of the tangled web I’d created all by myself, no doubt. Gabe coming home with me had always felt too good to be true—he knew the whole story, understood what I’d done, and hadn’t judged me. He’d just settled his steady, enveloping gaze on me and said in that calm, reassuring, I-got-your-back voice, When do we leave?
He would’ve done that—been an on-the-spot boyfriend. Even though it meant pretending to change his sexual orientation to help me. I couldn’t be angry with him.
Only myself. Yep, I had plenty of that pent up inside for getting myself into this stupid predicament.
“Look at it this way,” Gabe said. “I don’t exactly look like Brax. We wouldn’t have fooled your mom.”
“You’re both dark haired,” I said in protest. “Plus, the photos I’ve sent the past few months have been kind of out of focus.”
“How about you ask Brax?” he suggested gently. After giving me a good eye roll, that is. “He’s a logical choice. You two are close, even if you’re too bullheaded to date each other again.”
“Not to mention we’re competing for the same job. Remember that?” Another reason to stay far away.
Gabe waved a hand in the air like the fact that we were the last two candidates left wasn’t a big deal. “A job’s a job, and that can be sorted out.” He paused. “Did you know that the last time we went out, Brax told me that the chemistry between you two was positively animal?”
Sam covered her mouth with her hand in fake astonishment. “Shocker,” she said.
I frowned. “How much did he have to drink?”
“Enough to tell the truth. Look, maybe it’s time to sit down with him. You two have been tiptoeing around this obvious?—”
I shook my head. “He made things clear.” Crystal clear. He did not want to date me. Period.
“You know he’s complicated,” Gabe said. “Maybe he isn’t sure what he wants.”
I shook my head. “Last time I checked, Brax was an adult.” This time around, I was going to make certain my next boyfriend was one.
“Leave her alone, Gabe,” Sam said. “You know what happened with her ratty ex.”
Charlie had been a straight what-you-see-is-what-you-get arrow—but when I’d left for residency, he’d fooled around on me with someone he’d met at a football party. I guess he’d finally found someone as passionate about the Packers as he was.
It hit me hard, I wasn’t going to lie. Two years later, I had more perspective. My life with Charlie would have been predictable. With low-simmer arguments…and, I realized now, low-simmer passion.
And in the meantime, I’d done my best to get myself back out there.
Brax, the polar opposite of Charlie, had never put up the pretense of ever wanting to settle down, but I’d been completely swept away anyway. My brief time with him had been electric. I simply couldn’t stop myself from falling hard.
“I hate men.” I must’ve said that out loud, because Gabe came over, pried the wineglass out of my hand, and hugged me hard.
Shortly afterward, I got back to work dropping balls of dough on the cookie sheet. I couldn’t resist saying, “I thought Brax spends Christmas with his sister in Philly.” Brax and his sister had grown up in a rough west Philadelphia neighborhood. His ticket out had been a full scholarship to the University of Wisconsin, and he’d ended up staying on in our fine state for med school. He did his residency at the prestigious Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia but returned to Wisconsin last summer to work. Jenna lived in Philly, where she was married and worked as an accountant, and Brax was very, very proud of her.
Gabe started scooping dough. “All I know is that Jenna’s pregnant, and Brax is thrilled. I think he was going to make sure everything at the hospital was covered before he made a decision about going to see her.” The chief residents made the schedules, which could get tricky over the holidays. We all worked extra hard so that every one of us could get either Christmas or New Year’s off. It was common for the chiefs to pitch in and cover shifts to help it all work out.
I didn’t know much about Jenna, but I knew she was all the family Brax had. He’d never elaborated much, but from little clues he dropped here and there, Gabe and I both figured that his upbringing hadn’t been the greatest. All we knew was that he was very close to his sister.
Gabe set down his cookie scoop and grabbed my wrist. “ Ask him .”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re pushier than my Grandma D’Angelo.”
Across the island, Sam nodded. “What have you got to lose?”
A lot. Also, I was making a mess of this cookie project. My balls were all different sizes and the dough was sticking to my fingers when I tried to fix them. “Hi, Brax, remember when we dated last summer?” I said in a fake-cheery voice. “Well, I kept embellishing that to my mother, and now she thinks I have a serious boyfriend coincidentally named Brax. By the way, would you like to come home with me for Christmas?” A groan escaped my throat.
“Maybe you can get to the bottom of whatever’s holding him back,” Sam said.
“That’s the thing,” I said. “Not wanting to keep seeing someone isn’t a crime.”
“If it makes you feel better,” Sam said, “Brax doesn’t do serious with anybody.”
Except I’d thought we were serious. That he was maybe even The One.
Typical small-town girl goes to the big city and gets a reality shakedown.
Gabe stared at me. “I know what he says. But I also know how he checks you out when you’re not looking.”
I shook my head in denial. Except, to be honest, I knew exactly what Gabe was talking about. Sometimes, I’d look up to find Brax staring at me, his eyes a little heavy lidded, with fire burning in them, directed straight at me.
I might have dated my hometown honey for a lot of years, but I wasn’t born yesterday.
Sam patted my shoulder. “How about we hit the town? The bars are still open.”
“I’m not picking up some rando at a bar and bringing him home!” Geesh.
“Just an idea,” Sam said.
“Right. A bad one!” The bottom-line truth was that Brax was a heartbreak waiting to happen (again), and I couldn’t take another one. And that slow, smoldering burn that I always felt with him was just another reason not to ever bring him home—or anywhere—alone.
I must’ve looked completely stressed out, because Gabe said, “I have another solution. Maybe you should just come clean. To Brax, to your mom and dad. To everyone. Think of what a weight off that would be.”
“Tell the truth?” Sam gave an incredulous snort. “Gabe, I bet you were one of those kids who confessed to sneaking candy in the cupboard.”
Gabe shrugged. “Probably. But I didn’t come out until I was seventeen. That was a whopper to hold back for all those years.” He looked at me. “You don’t have to carry all the burdens for your family. It’s okay not to be perfect.”
“I just can’t,” I said firmly. “My mom loves Christmas. And this year, things are so emotional.” I didn’t tell them, but my sister had died right after Christmas, and as you can imagine, the anniversary of her death always brought up tons of memories. But this year, with my mom’s cancer…nope. I just couldn’t tell my family I’d been lying for months. “I need to come up with Plan B,” I said. “Fast.”
Gabe embraced me from the side, rubbing my arm. I probably felt tin-man stiff. “You’re really tense,” he said, dropping his arm and scooping up a blob of raw dough. “That’s what lying does to you,” he added sagely.
Sam shook her head at his antics. “I vote for the rando.” Sam poured me more wine and counted on her fingers. “Exciting, adventurous, and completely out of your comfort zone. Just what you need, girlfriend.”
If they hadn’t been such good friends, I would’ve tossed some cookie dough in both their directions.