A Christmas Heartcheck (Christmas at Juniper Hollow)

ONE KIERAN

ONE

KIERAN

The first thing I learned about turning twenty-one was that nobody checked to make sure you had someone to celebrate it with.

The second was that Seattle got really damn cold after dark in December.

I shoved my hands deeper into the pockets of my jacket and stared through the front window of O'Malley's.

Inside, Christmas had exploded. Twinkling lights draped from the ceiling.

Garland wrapped around the mirrors behind the bar.

A crooked little tree stood near the host stand, weighed down by mismatched ornaments.

Somewhere beneath the laughter and clinking glasses, a Christmas song I vaguely recognized drifted through the speakers.

The place was packed. Couples occupied the booths along the wall. Groups of friends crowded around high-top tables. A handful of office workers in ugly Christmas sweaters laughed loud enough to be heard through the glass.

Everyone seemed to have somewhere to be. Everyone seemed to belong to someone.

For a second, I considered turning around and heading back to my apartment.

I could throw on a movie. Finish the reading assignment I'd been avoiding. Go to bed before ten like a seventy-year-old man. Nobody would know the difference. Then again, nobody knew I was here in the first place.

Happy birthday to me.

Before I could talk myself out of it, I pushed open the door. Warmth hit me immediately. The scent of beer and fried food and something cinnamon-spiced floating through the air. The low hum of conversation wrapped around me as the door swung shut behind me.

A woman standing behind the host stand glanced up from the tablet in her hands. Her dark hair was braided over one shoulder, and she greeted a passing busboy with a quick burst of Spanish before turning her attention back to me. Camila, her name tag read. "Just one?" she asked.

I almost laughed. Story of my life. "Just one."

She grabbed a menu and led me toward a small two-person table near the front windows.

It wasn't tucked completely out of sight, but it wasn't in the center of the room either.

The table sat just far enough from the larger groups that I could pretend I wasn't watching them while still feeling connected to the noise and warmth around me.

"Your server will be right with you."

"Thanks."

I shrugged out of my jacket and hung it over the back of my chair before settling into my seat.

Camila had left a menu beside the napkin holder, and I flipped it open more out of something to do than actual interest. For a few moments, I just watched the room.

The Christmas lights reflected in the windows.

People leaning close to hear each other over the music.

The easy familiarity that came from years of shared memories.

A strange ache settled in my chest. It wasn’t jealousy.

Not exactly. Just awareness. Twenty-one was supposed to feel bigger than this.

At least according to movies. Instead, I was sitting alone in a bar on a Thursday night trying to figure out whether ordering my first legal drink was supposed to feel different.

A few minutes later, a woman with silver threaded through her tight, dark curls and laugh lines around her eyes, who reminded me of somebody's favorite aunt, appeared beside my table. "Hi, I’m Mara. Can I start you off with a drink?"

I opened my mouth. Nothing came out because apparently I hadn't thought that far ahead.

The smile she gave me suggested she dealt with people like me all the time. "ID?"

"Oh. Right." I dug my wallet from my back pocket and handed over my driver's license.

Her eyes scanned it. Then lifted to mine. A smile spread across her face. "Birthday today?"

I shrugged. "Apparently."

She laughed softly. "Well, happy birthday.”

"Thanks." The word came out more awkwardly than I intended.

Something in her expression softened. It wasn’t pity exactly. More like kindness… which somehow felt worse. Or maybe better. I couldn't decide.

"So," she said, handing back my ID. "What are we drinking to celebrate?"

That was an excellent question. Unfortunately, I had absolutely no idea. I looked down at the drink menu. There were pages of cocktails. Seasonal specials. Craft beers. Things involving bourbon, cinnamon, peppermint, smoked something-or-other, and ingredients I couldn't pronounce.

Panic set in. This was ridiculous. I was twenty-one years old, not twelve. I should know how to order a drink. I’ve seen it done lots of times on TV. Instead, I stared at it like it was a final exam.

Mara waited patiently.

Finally, I pointed to something near the middle of the page. "That one."

Her eyes followed my finger.

A whiskey sour.

"Good choice."

Relief flooded through me.

I had no idea whether it was a good choice, but at least I hadn't accidentally ordered something that came with a candy cane and an umbrella.

"I'll be right back."

As she walked away, I leaned back in my chair and glanced around the room again.

Twenty-one. One legal drink. One table. One person. Not exactly how I'd imagined spending my birthday, but it would do.

I pulled out my phone from my pocket. Three notifications waited for me. One was from the college. Happy Birthday, Kieran! Wishing you a wonderful day and a successful year ahead. — Student Success Services

I huffed out a laugh.

The email had almost certainly been generated by a computer somewhere on campus, but at the moment, it was still one of the few birthday messages I'd received.

The second was a text from a guy in one of my education classes.

Darius: Happy birthday. Professor Bobcombe posted the practicum schedule for January.

Not exactly heartfelt, but useful.

The third message made me pause.

Janelle: Happy Birthday, kiddo. Hope you're doing well. Proud of you. —Janelle.

I stared at it for a moment.

Janelle had been one of my foster moms. One of the good ones, but not permanent.

Me: Thank you, Janelle.

Then I rested my phone on the table.

The conversations around me swelled and dipped like waves. Laughter from one side of the room. Someone arguing about whether Die Hard counted as a holiday movie.

I smiled despite myself. A week from now, most of the people in this room will be surrounded by family. Parents. Siblings. Holiday traditions.

Meanwhile, I still hadn't decided whether I was spending Christmas Eve in my apartment or volunteering to cover somebody else's shift somewhere.

Neither option was particularly festive. Then again, I'd learned a long time ago not to build holidays into something bigger than they were. Birthdays. Thanksgiving. Christmas. Any day that came with expectations usually ended better when I didn't have any.

The trick was treating it like any other Thursday. Go to class. Finish assignments. Pick up an extra tutoring session if somebody needs one. Keep moving.

It worked most of the time.

I thought about a lesson-planning assignment that awaited me. One more step toward graduation. One more step toward becoming the kind of teacher I'd needed when I was a kid. The kind who noticed when someone was struggling. The kind who stayed.

The image of that kid—the one I used to be—stayed with me.

I leaned back in my chair and let out a slow breath.

Across the room, somebody started singing along to Mariah Carey. Poorly. Very poorly.

I chuckled under my breath. Maybe spending my birthday here hadn't been such a terrible idea after all.

Mara returned a few minutes later carrying a small plate, and for a moment I assumed she'd mixed up somebody else's order.

A slice of chocolate cake sat in the center. A single candle flickered on top, its tiny flame dancing in the warm air.

I stared at it. Then I looked up at her. "Mara..."

She laughed before I could say anything else.

"House tradition," she said.

"There is absolutely no way that's true."

"It is tonight."

I shook my head, fighting a smile. "You really didn't have to do this."

"Humor me, birthday boy."

The answer was so matter-of-fact that it caught me off guard.

A few people at nearby tables glanced in my direction, probably drawn by the candle, but nobody burst into song. Nobody clapped. Nobody made a scene.

Mara leaned closer and lowered her voice. "Don't worry. I'm not making the whole place sing."

"Thank God."

That earned another laugh.

She set the plate in front of me before straightening. "Happy birthday, Kieran."

"Thank you." The words came out quieter than I intended.

After she walked away, I sat there looking at the cake for several seconds.

It wasn't really about the dessert. It wasn't even about the candle. It was the simple fact that somebody had noticed.

Mara had known me for about fifteen minutes, yet she'd seen a kid spending his birthday alone and decided he deserved something a little more memorable than a whiskey sour and a quiet ride home.

The gesture was small. Objectively, it was probably the smallest thing in the world. Yet it settled somewhere deep inside me, touching a place I usually kept carefully guarded.

I swallowed around the sudden tightness in my throat and glanced up, hoping nobody had witnessed me getting emotional over free cake.

That was when I noticed him.

He sat alone at the far end of the bar, half-shadowed beneath the warm glow of a string of white Christmas lights. A dark sweater stretched across broad shoulders, and a baseball cap sat low on his head, as though he preferred not to attract attention.

Which was strange.

He wasn't the kind of man people overlooked.

Even from across the room, something was striking about him. Not flashy or loud. Just impossible to ignore.

His hands were wrapped around a glass. Large hands. Strong hands. The sort that looked capable without trying to advertise it. His jaw was shadowed with stubble, and there was an ease to the way he occupied the space around him that made everyone else seem restless by comparison.

He wasn't talking to anyone, or checking his phone, or watching one of the televisions mounted above the bar.

He was looking at me. Not in a way that made me uncomfortable or felt intrusive. If anything, he looked vaguely amused, as though he'd witnessed the entire cake incident and found it unexpectedly entertaining.

For a moment, neither of us looked away.

The noise of the bar faded into the background. Still, that strange connection held. Then heat crept up the back of my neck. I broke eye contact first. Because I might have been twenty-one now, but apparently, I still hadn't learned how to handle ridiculously attractive strangers looking at me.

I picked up my fork and made a determined effort to focus on the cake instead. Chocolate was considerably less intimidating than eye contact. Unfortunately, it wasn't nearly as effective a distraction as I'd hoped. I could still feel the weight of his attention from across the room.

When I finally looked up again, he was no longer sitting at the bar.

My pulse stumbled.

The stranger was crossing the room. For one completely irrational second, I glanced over my shoulder to make sure there wasn't somebody behind me. There wasn't. His attention had been directed at me all along.

He stopped beside my table. Up close, he looked even better.

Older than me by maybe a decade. Strong jaw. Straight nose. Eyes that seemed to miss absolutely nothing. A small smile tugged at one corner of his mouth.

His gaze drifted to the candle still flickering on top of the cake.

"You should probably make a wish before that thing burns down."

I looked down at the tiny flame dancing above the chocolate frosting. For a moment, I didn't answer. It wasn't anything special. A cheap birthday candle stuck into a slice of cake in the middle of a crowded bar. Yet for a moment, all I could do was stare at it.

Most birthdays had come and gone without much notice. Some foster families remembered. Some didn't. Sometimes there'd been a card. Sometimes there hadn't. More than once, the day had passed like any other date on the calendar, unnoticed by everyone except me.

The stranger shifted his weight slightly beside the table.

"I'm pretty sure there's a rule about making a wish," he said.

That pulled a laugh out of me. "Are you always this invested in strangers' birthdays?"

"Only milestone birthdays."

His answer came so easily that I found myself smiling.

The candle continued to burn between us. I stared at it for another second. Then another. The truth was, I already knew what I'd wish for. That probably said more about me than I wanted to admit.

Slowly, I leaned forward and closed my eyes. I wished for something I'd been wanting for so long that it barely felt like a wish anymore.

A place to belong.

Somewhere permanent.

Someone who stayed.

Heat prickled behind my eyes, and I opened them before the feeling could settle too deeply.

Then I blew out the candle.

The tiny flame disappeared, leaving only the scent of warm wax and chocolate lingering in the air. When I looked up again, the stranger was still watching me.

The attention should have made me uncomfortable. Instead, it did something far more dangerous. It made me feel noticed.

There was no pity in his expression and no awkward sympathy for the guy spending his birthday alone in a crowded bar. If anything, he looked as though I had become the most interesting thing in the room.

The realization sent a strange warmth through me, one that had nothing to do with the whiskey sour sitting on the table.

His gaze dropped briefly to the empty chair across from me before returning to my face.

"Is this seat taken?"

I looked at the chair and raised an eyebrow.

"Clearly," I said. "I'm fighting off crowds."

A low laugh escaped him.

The sound settled somewhere beneath my ribs.

"Mind if I sit?"

The question was asked easily, without expectation or pressure. Like he already understood that the answer might be no.

I looked at the stranger standing beside my table. The Christmas lights reflected in the windows behind him. At the half-finished whiskey sour in front of me. At the birthday cake I'd never expected to receive.

An hour ago, I'd almost turned around and gone home. Now, one of the most attractive men I'd ever seen was asking to spend time with me. Life was weird.

"Sure," I said.

His smile deepened as he reached for the chair. "Name's Thane."

For the first time all evening, I found myself genuinely glad I hadn't stayed home.