night. I took drinks away from her at the bar before she could accept the probably-laced gift of some random douchebag date rapist. I watched lots of sci-fi with her when her high school boyfriend posted pictures of his shot-gun wedding to some idiot girl they had both hated back when they were dating.
“Landry, the one and only person who has any ability to hurt me is you.”
Suddenly her whole cramped-in-the-car tactic switches up, and she leaps out of the door and walks toward my house.
I throw my door open and run after her, slipping on a patch of black ice when I reach out to grab her shoulder. Mila turns around as my feet slide out from under me, and she rushes to grab me and keep me upright, but her panicked movements bring us both down in a heap. My shoulder takes the brunt of the fall, and Mila squashed on top of me, scrambles to face me, pressing my face between her hands and looking me over with insane worry.
“Are you okay? Are you alright?” She takes my shoulders in her tiny hands and shakes me hard, back and forth.
“I’m fine. Jesus, stop shaking me like that.” I move my head from side to side just to make sure my neck is okay, and I sit up on one elbow, Mila’s bony ass digging into my thigh. “The only thing that really got bruised is my ego, I guess.”
Her worried look melts away and she smiles a smile that grows wide just before it breaks into a series of self-satisfied snorts and laughs.
“What’s so damn funny?” I sigh.
“The idea of your ego bruised.” She puts her hands up over her mouth and giggles. “Can you imagine the amount of pressure that must have been exerted to bruise your ego of iron?”
“Are you saying I’m full of myself? Because I’m not.” I feel an instant prickle of douchebaggery once the words are out of my mouth.
And I realize, with a healthy dose of irony, how full of myself it is to even think that way. Which makes me smile. And then laugh.
And then think of Toni and what she told me about finding a girl who can laugh with me. And at me.
We laugh like two lunatics on the driveway until my mother sticks her head out the door and yells, “Quit fooling around out there before you two turn into popsicles! Get your tushes in here!”
I jump to my feet and help Mila up, fix her crooked hat even though it looks equally weird whether it’s on right or all off kilter, and run my fingers over her cheek.
She looks at me with wide, happy eyes, but the light slowly dims because her pupils get big and dark.
She wants me.
And the feeling is mutual.
I’m leaning in because I know exactly how good her lips feel when the door opens again. This time it’s Henry, and he’s out for blood.
“What are you two doing?” He jogs over, and I notice he put on a new shirt, something a little dressed up and tight, like he’s trying to show off his puny muscles.
I’d feel bad for how pathetic he is, except for the fact that Mila seems to be eyeing him appreciatively. He holds an arm out for her, and the cologne he must have taken a bath in practically knocks me back onto the ice.
He gives me a narrow-eyed look and says, “Mila, I apologize for my brother’s rude as hell behavior. Please, come in and get warm.”
I fully expect Mila to smile sweetly and come back to me, but she takes his arm and lets him lead her to the stairs without a backward glance in my direction.
I grit my teeth and try to remember that this is supposed to be about family and loyalty and forgiving and all that. But it’s hard to resist the urge to chop Henry in the back of the knees or put him in a nice, firm chokehold.
Since I can’t do either without looking like a raging psychopath, I just follow the two of them into the house, and, for two seconds, I’m five years old again, just in from a late-night snowball fight with the neighborhood kids.
It smells exactly the same as I always remember. The entire interior has this particular Christmas aroma that’s unique to my house, and only for a few short days a year. It’s this mix of apples and cinnamon, ham and firewood, cigar smoke and