Chapter 15
[Saint]
Lumi is avoiding me.
The other night, I’d wanted to shower quickly, to get the stink of hot buttered rum off my body and take care of my hard-on despite her offer to assist me.
If Lumi had touched me, things would be over embarrassingly quick, not to mention I didn’t want the night to turn into a tit-for-tat situation.
I hadn’t intended to make her come, but her body responded so quickly to mine.
I felt her tensing, tightening, begging for me to take her over the edge, and I couldn’t deny her.
I didn’t want to deny myself the experience of watching her let go from simply kissing me.
Stepping out of the steamy bathroom with the hope we could cuddle on the couch and watch a holiday rom-com, something in her expression said she couldn’t get away from me fast enough.
I hadn’t fucked up kissing her even if I was out of practice. But I’d done something wrong. She dashed off to her room like Jack Frost himself was chasing her.
I hated the look on her face as much as I hate the possibility that she might regret kissing me.
My game might be a little off, but everything about Lumi feels like a win. Like falling out of a sleigh but getting back up and trying again. The concept of kissing wasn’t foreign, yet kissing Lumi almost felt familiar.
Like I’d been waiting to kiss her my entire life.
Unfortunately, she was gone early yesterday morning, leaving me a note to explain she went to the gingerbread competition with her sisters. Funny, she hadn’t mentioned the activity before we kissed. Then, she stayed out later than I’d expected, when I didn’t deserve to have any expectations.
Still, I was certain she was avoiding me. Which meant the best place to catch her was at work.
Entering the post office mid-morning, I linger as Lumi helps patrons shipping packages and stacks of cards for the holiday season.
The post office is quaint with its rows upon rows of mailboxes and an antique counter for filling out forms. The mail window almost looks like an old bank teller or train station ticket office, minus the glass barrier.
I patiently wait until the lobby is clear before I step up to the counter and hand her one of two to-go cups.
“One ticket for the Hot Chocolate Express, please.”
Lumi smiles, her top teeth sinking into her bottom lip, while she reaches out for the cup I offer her. “What’s this?”
“It’s Hot Chocolate Appreciation Day, and I wanted to show you I appreciate you.” I wink.
“You mean, hot chocolate.” She lifts the cup and pops off the lid, blowing over the steam rising from the hot chocolate-y goodness.
“No, I mean, I appreciate you.” As much as I’ve tried to tell myself kissing her was only a kiss, the moment meant so much more to me. Like that first gift on Christmas morning.
I wanted to unwrap Lumi and savor the excitement, the mystery of who she is.
“I want you to know, again, how grateful I am that you’ve let me stay with you.” Let me get to know her as a person. Sure, I had lots of friends throughout the world, but not anyone who knew me for me. The real me. Lumi seems like someone I could trust.
As much as I want to bring up her disappearance yesterday or ask if she regrets our kiss the other night, the way she’s smiling at me stuns me a little bit. Like she’s put a spell on me and all is right. She’s making me a believer in the unknown.
“Is this from Love at First Sip?” she asks, ignoring my gratitude and staring at the paper mug.
“What an appropriate name,” I whisper, lifting my own cup of piping hot chocolate and taking a first sip, keeping my eyes focused on Lumi over the rim.
That kiss with her was the same sensation. Warm. Satisfying. Comfort. Love? Something you can’t physically hold in your hand. You simply believe it exists.
With her bright eyes on me, she fights another grin. “Eileen named the place because she’s in love with love.”
Ah, Eileen Burrows. I’ve learned all about the local matchmaker who lost her husband but still finds love everywhere she turns.
Sometimes even meddling to make it happen.
Like a mischievous elf, she might have worked her magic the night Lumi invited me to stay at her place. I’ll always be grateful to Eileen.
With her eyes on me, Lumi takes her first sip, and my dick stirs. My insides heat. I want to reach across this counter and pull her to me. Taste the chocolate on her tongue and feel the warmth of her mouth.
“So why a career with the postal service?” I ask, attempting to distract myself.
Lumi shrugs and glances down at her to-go cup. “The post office seemed like the closest to traveling. All these letters coming and going.” She pauses. “Then again, letter writing seems to be a dying art. Most people only mail bills.”
Slowly, she leans over the counter, and I lean closer to her.
“Sometimes.” She licks her lips. “I even read the postcards people send or receive.”
The little world-traveler wannabe takes any scraps she can get about life outside of Hideaway Harbor.
I chuckle softly at how scandalous she makes her admission sound, but then our eyes lock again.
Would she like to travel the world with me?
The idea feels too hopeful and preposterous at the same time, and I break our staring contest to glance around the post office, noticing a red mailbox near the front door. One that is roughly half the size of a standard box and reads: Letters for Santa.
While I know what the box is all about, what puzzles me is the large mailbag beside it. As if reading my mind, Lumi explains.
“Each year, we collect the letters and then distribute them to local businesses willing to help a family make their children’s dreams come true.”
With my elbow on the counter, I turn back toward her and take another sip of my hot chocolate, noticing Lumi is still leaning toward me. “Why not leave it up to Santa?”
Lumi narrows her eyes, the look cute and playful.
“What?” I innocently ask, lowering my to-go. “You don’t believe in Santa?”
Lumi chuckles. “When I was a kid, yes.”
She pauses, and in the break, I add, “Until he didn’t bring you a Barbie airplane?” A child’s heart is so easily broken.
“Until the responsibility of Santa fell on me.” She sighs, glancing at the mailbox.
“When Danny was little, he was skeptical of the big man. And I worked hard, even when money was tight and I couldn’t give Danny everything on his wish list, I worked damn hard to make this time of year magical for him. Give him faith in something unseen.”
I like her explanation.
“However,” she continues, “he thought it was creepy that some strange guy dressed in red velvet was entering our house, through the chimney, which was only a stack up a narrow passage poking out the roof.” She shakes her head, lowering her eyes. “The practicality of that kid.”
Pride fills her voice along with the sorrowful disappointment that she won’t be seeing him at Christmas.
“Did you write Santa a letter?” I ask, despite her saying she doesn’t believe.
I glance back at the red box before pulling my attention back to her, taking a moment to admire her wine-red hair pulled into a loose knot at her nape.
Soft, shorter pieces fall around her face.
Her nose is red from the steam of her hot chocolate.
Her lips are enticing when she slowly smiles.
“Not this year.” Her quiet tone is sarcastic.
“What would you ask for?” Say me. But instantly, I know the real choice she’d make. She’d want her son to come home.
“Pick anything,” I quickly amend. “Something that might seem frivolous, but really fun.” I dare her, narrowing my eyes as I rest both forearms on the counter, drawing us closer while I cradle my hot chocolate between my hands.
“Anything?” she whispers, her eyes on mine, the blue as bright as today’s sky. “A trip around the world.”
Ah, the Barbie plane and the desire to travel.
I’d like to draw a wish in the air and send it off, but she’d certainly question me after I did the same thing when little Samantha asked for an American Girl Doll during the harbor tree-lighting ceremony.
“Anyway.” Lumi sighs. “Since National Write Santa a Letter Day, the box has filled at least once, and we’ve had to move the requests to the bag beside the box in order for other kids to experience slipping their letter into the mail.”
“You’ve had an overflow,” I confirm, glancing over my shoulder without moving from my position of leaning on the counter toward Lumi.
“Record requests this year. Not that so many families are hurting financially, but the number of kids filling the box has been unusual. Even kids as old as high schoolers have snuck in here.”
She pauses another second before stating, “It’s like their faith in Santa has been restored or something.”
“Or something,” I mutter, lifting my hot chocolate and taking another sip, averting my eyes from Lumi despite sensing her looking at me. Her gaze burns against my forehead.
“Well, I should probably get—"
“It’s strange how National Write Santa a Letter Day was December fourth, and that’s the day you arrived in town,” she interjects, cutting off my weak attempt to excuse myself.
“You keeping tabs on when I arrived?” I arch a brow. “Obsessed much?” I tease, trying to distract any thoughts linking me and my accidental arrival in Hideaway Harbor to the national date.
Her gaze flips from my beard to the mailbox and then back to my face. Her forehead furrows, thoughts nearly visible in those blue eyes, dancing across them. She isn’t imagining sugar plums.
“Like I was saying . . .” I snap my fingers and Lumi shakes her head, like she’s been caught daydreaming. “I should probably get going.”
“Working on your car?” she asks, although her voice is tight. Neve informed me another box arrived this morning.
“I need to get my baby girl put back together.” My tone is meant to tease, cooing over my green machine, but the quick dulling of Lumi’s eyes has the sweet comment thickening my throat. Like I’ve reached the end of my mug, and the only thing that remains is the hot chocolate sludge at the bottom.
“Bet you can’t wait to get out of this town.” Her tone is equally meant to taunt me, but her question is more of a statement, one full of hurt, confirmed by her eyes dropping to the counter.
She has no idea the pressure I’m under. The rush I’m in to exit Hideaway Harbor. And yet, I don’t want to leave. Not without her.
With a heavy sigh, because something like Lumi coming with me can never happen, I turn toward the red mailbox again.
“I have places to go,” I whisper, unable to look at her. Promises to keep.
The post office goes quiet. Not that I’d been paying attention to the Christmas music piped into the lobby or the movement of someone in the background, behind the wall separating the front counter from the back workspace.
But a discomforting silence, like the calendar is flipping faster, and the end of my time in Hideaway Harbor is drawing closer.
“Maybe you could give me that overflow bag. I can probably put a dent in the letters.” Not probably. I know that I can. I run a toy company after all.
“The entire bag?” Lumi questions.
“Sure.” I shrug, turning back toward her one more time. “Toy company, remember?” I point to my chest, then wink. “I might have an in with the big man in red.”
Lumi’s questioning gaze continues while looking at my face. What does she see? The beard. The hair. The red jacket. Does it appear too coincidental? Or impossible?
I’m not portly or jolly. I certainly do not have the apple-colored cheeks of an elderly man or a twinkle in my eyes. Those images evolved from the original political cartoonist drawings in a magazine to the jovial design used to promote a soda.
Times have changed; so has Santa Claus.
“Anyway,” I sing, mimicking Lumi, while setting down my hot chocolate cup. I step toward the mailbag and tug the strings to seal it closed, then sling the sack over my shoulder and stand. When I face Lumi again, her eyes widen once more. She’s the one with a gleam in her gaze.
I cross back to the counter and pick up my nearly empty hot chocolate and salute her with the cup as I take a giant step back. “I’ll let you get back to work.”
Her mouth falls open, but no words tumble out.
“I’ll see you tonight,” I add before exiting the post office and nearly running into a teenage boy who should probably be in school on a Monday morning. The local schools have not closed yet for winter break.
“Sorry, bub,” he says, finally looking up and giving me a hard once-over. His mouth gapes a second.
Eventually, he holds up what he’d been looking at while he was walking without paying attention.
A letter.
“From my little sister.” His cheeks were already rosy from the chill in the air, but they turn a deep crimson color.
Sure, bub, I want to counter, but instead I offer a smile. With my hand holding my nearly empty cup of cocoa and my other hand holding the long strings of the mail sack, I shift my hip toward the teen.
“Can you slip it into my coat pocket?”
With hesitation, he opens the pocket of my jacket and tucks the letter inside.
“Thanks, man,” he whispers, adding, “She’s been really good this year.”
Maybe the letter is from his sister after all. It will be the first one I read once I return to Lumi’s house.
I nod at the boy who stalks off in the direction he came, before risking a second glance toward the post office, where I have a clear view of Lumi watching me through the window, with more questions in her eyes.
Or maybe, she has all the answers she needs.