“Okay,” she said quietly.
“So what’s my exit strategy here?” he asked, nodding toward the door. “Do you want to go first and make sure the coast is clear, or—”
Her hands fisted in his T-shirt as she pulled him down for one more kiss, nearly toppling them both over in the process. “I hate being wrong.”
“Oh, I know,” he said, laughing as he regained his balance and exaggeratedly fixed his T-shirt as though she’d ravished him in the office after all. He cracked the door open, glancing out in the hallway before giving her one last grin. “I, on the other hand, am loving every second of it. Just come over Christmas Eve and be wrong at our house.”
Only after he’d left did she realize the cheesy pun he’d made with the Holiday Inn reference. At various points throughout the rest of the day she found herself randomly thinking about it, which would explain why she kept catching herself smiling for no apparent reason. It was as good an explanation as any.
* * *
? ? ?
Lauren spent the early half of Christmas Eve hanging out with Eddie, his caseworker, and his mom, Ms. Ramirez. It was awkward at first, given that Lauren didn’t quite know her role—she didn’t want to interfere too much with Eddie’s opportunity to connect with his mom, but she also didn’t want to just be some weird person lurking on the edges.
She’d ended up buying Eddie a set of graphic novels that Asa had suggested, and the present was the perfect icebreaker because it gave them all something to talk about. She genuinely liked Ms. Ramirez and was relieved that the missed visit last time had seemed like a true logistical struggle and not a sign that she didn’t want to connect with her kid. Lauren was very conscious of her own history, knew that she couldn’t see her work with Eddie as some way to go back in time and fix what had happened with her own mom. But still, it gave her a lot of hope to see their clear bond, to hear from the caseworker how well Ms. Ramirez was doing with the case plan.
Asa had told her that he always worked a crisis line shift on Christmas Eve, because it tended to be a busy night, but she was welcome to come over whenever. She’d worried about showing up too early and having hours to kill hanging out with his housemates, but that turned out not to be a problem at all. For one thing, it took her way longer than she expected just to pack. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d spent the night at someone else’s place, not counting the impromptu night at Cold World where there’d been no opportunity to plan beforehand. Was it weird if she brought pajamas? Was it weird if she didn’t?
But even those dilemmas aside, it was no hardship to hang out with Kiki and John. Elliot had already left to see their family in Jacksonville, but they’d left gifts for everyone under the tree, and Lauren was touched to see her name on one. It made her feel self-conscious about the succulent she’d brought as a gift for the whole house, but John made a show of finding it a perfect spot near the front window.
“So you’re still not telling anyone at work,” Kiki said, her mouth full of iced cookie as she surveyed the fridge for something to drink. “How long are you planning to keep that up for?”
Lauren sipped on her own sparkling apple juice. Apparently John had bought it because he didn’t drink, but it sounded good to Lauren, so she’d accepted a glass herself. It fizzed on her tongue and made her feel mildly celebratory, a small taste of the promise of the holiday season that had always eluded her.
“I haven’t really thought about it,” she said. “It just seems easier if people don’t know. There will be lots of questions, and teasing, and people will talk if we’re standing too close or not standing close enough . . . And especially with the presentations coming up, I don’t want to give Dolores any reason to think we’ve been less than professional.”
“Uh-huh.” Kiki didn’t sound particularly convinced. “There’s no rule against it. You’re not his direct manager or anything. Is this about Daniel?”
Surprisingly, Lauren hadn’t even thought about Daniel since the holiday party. She’d had no chance to interact with him since then, which she was grateful for, since she had no idea how you came back from someone comparing your breasts to snowy hills. She didn’t know that she wanted to.
“No,” she said honestly. “It has nothing to do with him.”
Kiki slammed the fridge door shut, apparently dissatisfied with the choices. “We have nothing good here,” she said. “I’m going to the gas station to get some red Gatorade or some boxed wine. Text me if you want me to grab anything else while I’m there.”
Lauren was still staring at the doorway where Kiki had left when John strolled through the kitchen. “Those are her two pinnacles of quality,” he said. “Gatorade and boxed wine. God knows why.”
“Is she mad at me or something?” Lauren asked. “Or is it weird, me being with Asa?”
John ran a hand through his black curls, wrinkling his nose. “She and Marj broke up,” he said. “So she’s a little cranky in general. It’s probably not personal.”
“Oh.” Lauren knew Kiki hadn’t been thrilled when Marj bailed on the Cold World party after Kiki had gone to Marj’s stuffy law firm party. Still, breakups sucked—especially around this time of year. “I’m really sorry to hear that.”
He gave her an assessing look, as if weighing whether to say anything else. She assumed it would be more about Kiki’s breakup, but when he spoke, it was about Asa. “We’re all a little protective of him,” he said. “Of each other, really. And especially with her own breakup being so raw . . . Kiki wants to make sure Asa’s not going to get hurt.”
Lauren understood what John meant, about how that wasn’t meant to be personal against her. Asa and his housemates looked out for one another, which was one reason she liked hanging around them so much. At the same time, it felt strange to think of Kiki being worried about how Lauren might treat Asa, when she’d been the one to warn Lauren away from Asa in the first place.
“She told me Asa was fickle,” Lauren blurted. The comment had stayed with her, wriggled somewhere in the back of her head.
John raised his eyebrows. “Fickle. That . . . is not a word I would use.”
“So then what word would you use?” Normally, she would’ve been embarrassed by the idea of grilling one of Asa’s housemates so hard about him, but right now she had no pride. She wanted information, and she didn’t care if John thought she was being needlessly nosy.
And if there was one thing she’d learned about John from their limited time together, it was that he was always thoughtful. If he was going to give her an answer, he was going to consider it carefully first.
“I would’ve said . . . searching.” He tilted his head, giving her a small smile. “But when Asa knows what he wants, he commits to it. Look at how long he’s been at Cold World—what is it, ten years?”
“True.” Sometimes Lauren wondered if that was a good thing, though. Obviously, she was glad for her sake that he’d been there that long—if he’d worked a year, two tops, like most other people would’ve done in their first minimum-wage job, she never would’ve met him.
But for his sake, she wondered if it had held him back, stopped him from pursuing other dreams.
She could’ve mined John for more intel all night, but at that moment Asa’s door opened, and he stepped out, his face lighting up when he saw her. “Hey,” he said, pulling her against him with one arm, pressing a kiss against her hair. “Merry Christmas Eve. I can see you’re already celebrating.”