Holly giggled. “Probably not. Could you imagine Grandma talking to them about her new boyfriend?”
“They had to assume she’d been dating. Grandpa’s been dead for fifteen years.” Elda closed the book and ran her hands over the embossed lettering on the cover. “We should go to the dance.”
“What? No.” Holly’d planned on making a collage out of the journal, or some kind of word art. She’d never for a second considered actually doing the things in Grandma’s calendar. Doing things was not in her comfort zone.
“We totally should. To honor Grandma’s memory. We should go meet Frank for this dance and—” Elda flipped open the book to the current page again. “Look, she’d been planning on entering the gingerbread contest. We should do that, too, for old time’s sake.”
Holly ran her fingers over the words. “Gingerbread contest starts” was scrawled over tomorrow’s page in green pen. “I don’t think we’ll have time. We’re supposed to be cleaning out the house.” The gingerbread competition and Danny Garland were inextricably tied together in Holly’s mind. One did not exist without the other. And Holly was supposed to be forgetting about Danny Garland right now.
“Whatever, time,” Elda said. “This is our last Christmas in North Pole. We have to do all the things. You know what Grandma told me when she was in L.A. for Thanksgiving?”
Elda had gotten to have one last holiday with Grandma. Holly hadn’t. She could hardly remember last summer, when Grandma had come down to Chicago for a week. What had they even talked about? Why hadn’t Holly asked Grandma what she’d been up to? Why hadn’t Grandma told her about the wedding she’d gone to a few weeks before? Maybe it had been Holly’s fault because she hadn’t asked, because she’d been too busy with her sculpting and hanging out with friends and working at the Chicken Shack. Now she’d never have the chance to get those answers.
“Grandma said she was sad that you and I and the other grandkids had grown apart, that we didn’t know each other how we used to when we were younger,” Elda said. “Like, remember when we dressed R.J. and my brother up as girls and took them to the park because we wanted sisters?”
“I totally forgot about that. I bet R.J. has no memory of it.” Holly grinned as the memories came flooding back. She remembered the time R.J. sat in an anthill and had ants running from his diaper down his legs. Or when they’d play murder mystery in Grandma’s den, using old Halloween costumes and toy weapons.
“I have the receipts,” Elda said. “We took pictures of our sweet little ‘sisters,’ Roberta and Sally. I keep them locked in my room and trot them out any time Sal brings home a new girlfriend. Usually it backfires, though. He’s proud of how his legs look in a skirt. Anyway, I’ll send you copies.”
Holly laughed. “I’d love to see those.” She took the book back from Elda. It was heavy in her hands, and the pages were soft from use. Holly stared at tonight’s entry: Holiday Dance, Town Hall, Frank. Grandma had drawn a heart next to his name. “Maybe we should go to this dance,” she said. “For Grandma.”
“Yes!” Elda jumped off the pull out couch, and the springs under the mattress creaked. “For Grandma.”
Giggling, Holly and Elda ran downstairs and raided Grandma’s closet, which was still full of vintage dresses from the ‘70s and ‘80s. When they were kids, she and Elda used to try on these frocks and then perform elaborate plays for their parents down in the living room. The musty scent of Grandma’s old clothes transported Holly back in time. Everything came back to her—the songs they used to sing, the choreographed dances to Elvis’s entire catalog, how her mom and dad used to cuddle on the couch laughing while Holly and Elda danced.
When Holly and Elda went downstairs to find dresses for the Christmas gala, a few of their younger cousins followed them into Grandma’s room and started rummaging through all the old clothes and jewelry. The little kids had never seen this stuff before. And tonight, they made plans to put on dresses and sing for their parents. Life was cyclical.
“The wigs!” Elda squealed, pulling open one of Grandma’s drawers. “I’ve been wanting to get my hands on these forever.”
Their grandma used to wear wigs whenever she had to dress up. Holly’s dad had maintained she’d just liked changing up her look from time to time, but that explanation was way too boring. “I used to think she was a spy, like on The Americans.”
Elda raised an eyebrow. “Who’s to say she wasn’t?” She plopped a blond wig on top of her head. Her long, brown locks flowed out from under the golden pixie cut, giving her a glorious two-toned mullet. “This is totally me, right?”
“Oh, for sure.” Holly grabbed a black bob with bangs that actually stayed put, unlike her real hair. “What if I started wearing this all the time, if I just showed up back home with a wig and didn’t say anything. Would anyone notice?”
“You look hot,” Elda said. “You should do it. Just start rocking the wig, like ‘This is me, take it or leave it.’”
Holly stared at herself in the mirror, running her tongue along the back of her scar again. She did look hot. She looked tough and put-together. “Let’s pick our dresses.” She grabbed one she remembered from when she was a kid—a strapless black and gold dress with a sweetheart neckline she used to call the “Wicked Snow White” dress. She pulled it over her clothes and zipped it up with a silent prayer. It fit. It was an actual North Pole miracle.
Elda had stripped down to her underwear, because she had a figure like a bikini model, and pulled on a kelly green dress with long, lacy sleeves and a pleated, floor-length skirt. “Grandma wore this to her little sister’s wedding in, like, 1979. Bridesmaid dress. I remember the pictures.” She put her arm around Holly, and they posed together in the mirror. “Almost perfect.”
They did their makeup—going for full, bold, Urban Decay glam. Elda hid her real hair under the short, blond wig, and Holly stripped off her robe (alone, in the privacy of the bathroom) and put on the dress. They found fancy capes and major platform heels in Grandma’s closet. Their grandma may or may not have been a spy, but tonight Holly and Elda were. They were going incognito to North Pole’s fanciest ball.
On the sidewalk outside Grandma’s house, Elda twirled as Holly fixed her cape around her shoulders. She glanced over at Danny’s house. It was mostly dark, save for a few lights in the back of the house.