Chapter 3
CHAPTER THREE
Two drinks. That was all it took before Charlie was urging Emmy into the kitchen.
“You can’t avoid your family forever,” he said, taking a step toward the doorway.
Emmy rattled the ice cubes in her empty glass and tipped up the watery remnants of her drink, her feet firmly planted on the oak hardwoods beneath them.
The second serving of alcohol had been just enough to relax her, but not enough to help her endure what was waiting on the other side of that double door.
“I most certainly can avoid it. They haven’t even looked for me in the last hour.” She was practically invisible.
“I heard your stomach growl. There’s food in there.”
“I could text my sister to make us a plate,” she teased.
“She’s enjoying herself. And I believe in you. You’re fully capable of taking a deep breath, putting on a smile, and facing them. You’ve already practiced that skill with me and look how it turned out: an uneventful hour with minimal anxiety.”
She squinted at him. “Has it occurred to you that I haven’t seen you in seven years, haven’t spoken to you in over a decade, until tonight, and I’d rather sit here with you than go in there? The threat is real.”
He chuckled.
She was actually enjoying Charlie. The last thing she wanted was for her family to paint an unfavorable picture of her.
“I’m not kidding. One of my aunts will inevitably tell you how unsuccessful and introverted I am.
Another will speak to my inability to groom myself.
My uncle might monopolize the next twenty minutes, telling you a story that will have absolutely no impact on your life. You don’t want to go in there.”
“I’m fully aware. I’ve been in to get both your drinks,” he said with a glimmer of humor in his eye.
“This whole night, so far, seems to be fun somehow for you. Why?”
“Because life is entertaining when you don’t take it too seriously.”
So he was implying that she took things too seriously? She squared her shoulders. “You don’t live with them.”
“You don’t either.”
He took a step toward her, his spicy scent tickling her nose in the best way.
“Who cares what your aunt thinks. All that matters is what you know about yourself. Just smile at her in the awareness that you know the truth. You have the upper hand.”
His words were confident.
What Charlie didn’t realize, however, was that he’d just given her a bigger blow than anyone else could.
The reason Emmy took things so seriously was because her life wasn’t where she wanted it to be at all.
In fact, she believed most of the things that the people in that kitchen would say to her.
And she didn’t want to face the disappointment.
“I’m tired,” she said for lack of a better excuse. At least this one was true. She’d tired of all of it, and if she dipped out of family Christmas, she didn’t care what anyone thought of her, including Charlie. “I think I might just head up to bed.”
He looked at his watch. “It’s eight o’clock.”
By the drop in his features, she was pretty sure she was ruining his evening too. At least he could go back to his parents’ house if he didn’t want to stay there.
But instead of allowing her to slink off, to her utter shock, he linked arms with her, and before she could think straight, he’d whisked her through the doors.
Aunt Charlotte was elbow-deep in cookie dough, while Aunt Elsie pulled a pie out of the oven and set it on the island. Jack was in the corner with Madison, while Brian and Stephen were pulling up football highlights on their phones in conversation with Emmy’s dad.
“I was starting to wonder where you’d gone,” Aunt Elsie said.
“I’ve just been in the living room,” Emmy replied. “With Charlie.” She poked his arm to designate who he was to Aunt Charlotte, but added a little extra force because he’d pulled her into the lion’s den.
Charlie flinched, but regained composure quickly, that annoyingly adorable chuckle floating down to her.
Madison radiated excitement over Uncle Stephen’s head from the corner of the kitchen.
“See?” Charlie leaned in, near her ear. “Not so bad.”
“So I guess if you’re here, you’re family, eh?” Uncle Stephen said, coming over, clapping Charlie on the back, and nearly knocking a drink off the island in the process.
Aunt Elsie’s swift hand saved it.
Emmy inwardly cringed, diving into her mental exit strategy.
“How do you know our girl here?” He winked at Emmy.
“I used to share my peanut butter and banana sandwiches with her at lunchtime back in elementary school. Her mom packed her bologna and she has a sweet tooth,” Charlie said, not skipping a beat. “But I had to be careful. She’d steal my cookie when I wasn’t looking.”
“It wasn’t me,” she said, the years of debate over a missing cookie in second grade taking hold once more. “I swear, I didn’t take your cookie that day. How can I make you believe that?”
The corners of his mouth twitched in amusement.
Saying something incriminating in this crowd could spur judgmental conversation. Uncle Stephen was enough to deal with, without him thinking she was a thief. She needed to make a quick departure before more childhood stories began.
She stabbed a few squares of cheddar and dropped them onto her plate. Then she seized a second plate and offered it to Charlie, nearly karate chopping his stomach with it. He flinched again. “Thank you. What’s this for?”
“Food.”
“How do you know I’m hungry?”
“I don’t,” she said under her breath, “but you might be in four to five hours. I’m not coming back in here, so get enough to sustain yourself.”
He grabbed one of Aunt Elsie’s Amish cookies and put it on his plate.
“Better keep an eye on that with Emmy around.” Uncle Stephen waggled a finger at the cookie.
Her dad laughed.
Traitor.
Just when Emmy thought she’d get out of there relatively unscathed, Aunt Charlotte stepped up beside them.
“Charlie, right?”
“Yep.”
“What kind of cookies did your mom pack in your lunch?” she asked him, evidently having heard the exchange.
“Oreos,” Charlie replied, spooning some baked beans onto his plate.
Aunt Charlotte perused the veggie tray, pinching a stalk of celery and dredging it through the ranch dip. “Oh, well that explains it.”
“Explains what?” Charlie asked.
“Emmy was wild about Oreos when she was a toddler. Her mother and I used them as rewards for her potty training. She’d tear off her pants for one.”
“Okay! Charlie, can I talk to you in the living room?” Emmy snatched his plate before he could browse anything else, stacked it on hers, grabbed his arm, and dragged him toward the doors.
He grasped two more cups of punch as she pulled him.
“We’ll all be in the living room soon for the gift exchange,” her dad said on their way out.
Fabulous.
Emmy yanked Charlie through the doors.
“We might have had a different high school experience if my mom had continued packing me Oreos for lunch,” Charlie said, laughing, his eyebrows bobbing as they stepped into the safety of the empty living room. “I had no idea the kind of draw they have for you.”
She rolled her eyes.
Emmy unstacked their plates and set them on the coffee table before lowering herself onto the sofa.
He placed the drinks down by their plates and sat beside her.
“I remember you in high school. You threw paper at me in Spanish class in ninth grade.”
He leaned into her space, his delicious scent tickling her nose. “I was just trying to get your attention.”
Just then, the doors to the kitchen opened, and the flock of her relatives fluttered in.
“Christmas present time!” Aunt Charlotte sang, waving her hands in the air.
Aunt Elsie pulled kitchen chairs into the room, one after another, making a large circle around the coffee table, while Emmy’s dad and Aunt Charlotte were already hunched over by the tree, pulling gifts out as the others made their way into the room.
If the spell of their conversation hadn’t been abruptly broken by the family’s entrance, it was certainly halted when Madison plopped down between Emmy and Charlie.
“Okay,” Aunt Elsie called out, quieting the room.
She placed her hand on top of a Mason jar full of little pieces of paper and shook it to mix up the slips, then moved out of Emmy’s father’s way as he loaded red and green wrapped gifts onto the coffee table.
“I’m going to come around the room,” Aunt Elsie said.
“Take one slip of paper. The person with number one chooses the first gift. The person after that can steal any opened gift and offer a wrapped present to the gift holder or open a new one from the table. Charlie, Madison brought two gifts to cover you—you’re playing too. ”
Charlie addressed Madison, “Thanks.”
“Was that a sarcastic ‘thanks’? It should be. You haven’t seen the typical gifts.” Emmy whispered to Charlie with a giggle.
Aunt Elsie held the jar out to each family member.
When it was Emmy’s turn, she reached in, pinched a slip, and unfolded it: number one.
Figures.
She had the first pick, which meant every other person could steal from her. She’d most certainly end up with mop slippers or a bottle opener that played Christmas tunes. But that was the point, right? Maybe the game would lighten her mood.
“Who’s first?” her father asked.
Emmy raised her hand, and her dad waved an arm across the array of wrapped gifts.
One immediately caught her eye: wrapped in green paper with illustrated snowcapped Christmas trees, it was shaped like a wine bottle. Emmy grabbed it by the neck. Aunt Charlotte straightened up in her chair and eyed everyone excitedly.
Emmy ripped off the paper, and sure enough, it was a bottle of white wine.
“It’s normally twenty dollars, but I had a store coupon, and the checkout lady let me use it, even though they aren’t supposed to apply coupons on alcohol,” Aunt Charlotte said, her chest puffing up proudly.
“Who has number two?” Aunt Elsie asked.
Uncle Stephen raised his hand. He chose a gift from the table, unwrapping a mini hot sauce collection that he hugged to his chest. It wasn’t long before her father stole it, leaving Stephen with a second gift, which turned out to be a bacon-scented air freshener. He seemed just as pleased.
Emmy made it four rounds before Aunt Elsie stole her wine. Her aunt offered her a gift box of a promising shape—maybe a necklace or a bracelet. She tore the paper from one end and slipped the box from under the fold.
“What is it?” Madison asked, leaning forward to see.
Emmy held it up. “A travel-sized stapler.”
“You’ll thank me later,” Uncle Stephen said.
Given his encouraging nod, maybe it would prove to be useful, and Emmy was willing to bet that no one would steal it.
The wine bottle was handed off a few times before landing in Madison’s hands, and with only a couple of goes left, she was sure to keep it. Maybe she and Emmy could drink it tonight.
Just before Charlie’s turn, he leaned into her ear and whispered, “Which one did you bring?” sending goosebumps down her arm.
Subtly, she pointed to the shiny red bag with a paper Santa belt wrapped around its middle.
The White Elephant gift, along with a pack of green tissue paper, had been a rushed buy in the airport on her way out.
She’d been up to her eyeballs with ideas for the Parody Music line, a small account she was hoping to get a chance to work on.
With the crazy holiday work schedule, Vivienne hadn’t given her enough time to shop, so she’d been in a rush.
Aunt Elsie called Charlie’s number. He reached over and took Emmy’s bag from the table.
Just as he began to pull the tissue paper out, she remembered what he’d said about hot beverages. It was too late to stop him. He’d already pulled the coffee mug from the bag.
“What does it say?” Aunt Elsie squinted at the mug.
Charlie twisted it around. “I Love New York.”
“Have you ever been to New York?” Elsie asked.
“Actually, I haven’t.” Charlie set the mug in his lap.
“Well,” Aunt Elsie said, eyeing the family circle. “Anyone can steal it! Who’s been to New York?”
Only Madison and Emmy’s father raised their hands, and with the wine and the hot sauce, they definitely weren’t trading.
Emmy sighed. Typical of her to have brought the most impractical gift of all of them.
Uncle Brian was the last to choose, and he opted for the final present on the table: a deck of trivia cards. He shuffled them while everyone else started moving chairs back into the kitchen after Aunt Charlotte offered to cut everyone a slice of Christmas cake.
Emmy was still processing the night. She’d allowed Charlie to choose a gift she’d put absolutely no thought into at all.
And, given that he didn’t drink coffee, he might have been better off with the stapler.
If only she’d known who she was buying for.
She would’ve put more effort into finding something great.
The night could only go up from here... Right?