Kaitlyn

I finish changing in the biggest stall, make a quick call to Ty—yes, Kaitlyn, all the Santas are rescheduled for tomorrow—and then take an extra minute to just breathe.

Jake’s different.

I can’t put my finger on it, but he’s changed somehow. Maybe it’s fatherhood. Maybe it’s the laugh lines just starting to form at the corners of his eyes.

Or maybe I’m different. Which I know I am, but is that making me look at him differently?

Whatever it is, if that mom and her daughter hadn’t walked in, I’m almost certain I would’ve jumped him here in the bathroom. And I can’t hide behind him having a wife. He’s single.

I’m single.

Our break-up was ugly. Ugly ugly. Back then, you’re a capitalistic Grinch-wipe was the equivalent of me calling someone a fucking motherfucking fuck-wad, and I threw that—and more—at Jake when I found out he was planning to go into the family business when he graduated that spring.

Yes, yes, I was going into the family business, too, but my family’s business was joy and cheer and holiday spirit. And I believed so fully in my family’s business, I couldn’t conceive of him going into an industry he didn’t believe in. Especially with his brains. And his kindness. And his inherent goodness.

He was the first man to ever fully embrace my obsession with Christmas. And not just accept it, either—he’d fallen in love with the season himself.

Or so I’d thought.

Because he still didn’t understand what was wrong with peddling plastic knock-off doodads and thingamabobs to kids who deserved real toys made by real people who were paid real living wages.

And then he’d said the very worst thing a person could ever say to me:

Your family’s in the business of lying to children.

Needless to say, what started as an argument about canned cranberries and box stuffing turned into an all-out brawl that ended with me changing my phone number and moving dorms when we got back from winter break so I wouldn’t ever have to see that Scrooge again.

I’d never been so mad about Christmas in my life. That Christmas had wrecked my heart. The next Christmas, though—

I give myself a mental shake and force myself to leave the bathroom. He’s still waiting beside the giant nose, hands tucked in his pockets. He’s chatting with a fit guy in dark jeans and a green Christmas sweater who has three girls climbing all over him. The youngest is the only one preschool age, all three have their coats unbuttoned, and I’m betting he wishes he’d had a martini or six tonight too.

The two men shake hands, and Jake gives the youngest a hair-ruffle as they pass him on the way out the door.

“Ty’s got everything under control,” I tell him. “I need to get home and get a few hours of sleep.”

A deep vee forms between his eyes. “You had any hot chocolate today?”

Daily hot chocolate.

Right. That hasn’t happened in—nope, not going there. “I’m not a kid anymore,” I tell him.

He pulls a small candy cane from his pocket, and my heart lifts not just an eyelid, but its whole freaking head, and it sniffs in interest at the offering. “Got a stir stick just for you. C’mon, Kaitlyn. Fifteen minutes. There’s a café two blocks away.”

I know the café. It’s at Rockefeller Center.

And I haven’t been in seven years.

I blink away an unexpected hotness in my eyes. This is supposed to get easier with time, not harder.

“Okay,” I tell him.

Because I can do this.

I can be strong.

He takes my duffel, tosses in my boots, and slings the bag over his shoulder before holding the door for me.

Ever the gentleman, that’s Jake.

He doesn’t take my hand—that would be silly, we’re not dating—but I’m still struck with a memory as we make small talk on our way to Rockefeller Center. It’s not so much a physical memory as it is a feeling—the feeling of innate safety that came from being escorted by a guy built like a brick. I used to imagine him as a North Pole blacksmith making shoes for the reindeer and fixing the ironwork on Santa’s sleigh.

He nudges my shoulder. “Ah, there’s a smile. Penny for your thoughts.”

“I’m picturing Ty having all the circulation to his lower extremities cut off while he’s wearing elf tights,” I lie.

It’s been eight years, but I swear Jake can see right through me.

The giant tree at Rockefeller Center comes into view, along with the sounds of Christmas music, and that little girl I used to be loses her breath at the beauty of it. We step inside a café, and Jake orders two hot chocolates to go. I keep glancing through the window at the tree.

I’ve passed it numerous times every holiday season, but it’s been a while since I looked. Hundreds of Christmas lights twinkle merrily in the night, bringing festive joy to the city. I can’t see the skating rink from here, but I suddenly want to go skating more than I want to breathe.

Jake hands me a cup of hot chocolate and one of the candy canes. “Ten stirs with the fancy stir stick still? Or have your tastes changed?”

My chest warms at the little gesture. It’s been eight years, and he still remembers my quirks. “I… It’s been a while since I had any,” I confess.

His eyes flicker, and oh god. He took that the wrong way.

Or possibly the right way.

Because it has been a while since I had any.

Especially when stir sticks were involved.

He drops his own candy cane right into his hot chocolate and replaces the lid. “Then may I suggest the full candy cane experience? Nice zing by the time you get to the bottom.”

That should not be hot, but it is, and I’m getting stirrings in places other than my dormant heart.

I watch him for a minute, and when he notices, he lifts his brows.

“You never liked hot chocolate,” I say, because I’m not going to ask him if he’ll be the candy cane in my hot chocolate, because first of all, been there, done that, and second of all, who calls her hooha her hot chocolate?

I’m blaming my brother. Just because I can.

And also because thinking about my brother makes my lady parts chill.

“I never believed in Santa Claus either,” Jake says. “People change.”

Habit has me glancing around the café. No kids, but I still answer in a whisper. “You believe in Santa Claus now?”

“Little elf showed me the way.”

Dammit, now I’m thinking about little elves in completely wrong ways. There’s something seriously messed up with me. I’ve lost my Christmas mojo, and now I’m fantasizing about short men with pointy ears and wondering what those curves in their elf shoes mean for the candy canes in their pants.

I drop my peppermint stick into my hot chocolate and take a long, hot gulp that burns my tongue with none of the peppermint goodness.

Jake gestures to the door. “Still like watching the skaters?”

I nod, and we meander to the edge and look down at the rink. I sip my hot chocolate more slowly, the minty flavor seeping in, and more memories flood my senses. Christmas morning with my family, watching my dad play Santa at a soup kitchen, our annual post-Christmas visit to the skating rink, that thing Jake did with the mistletoe when he helped me decorate my dorm room after Thanksgiving the year we were together, sitting in my apartment alone last year until my brothers showed up with Junior’s cheesecake, chocolate-covered cherries, and a roasted grocery store chicken.

“How are your folks?” Jake asks.

I swallow. “They passed away a few years back.”

“Oh. Oh, fuck. I’m sorry, Kaitlyn.”

I brush it off, because that’s what I’ve taught myself to do. “It’s life. Although, if they had to go, it really should’ve been something epic like getting squished by one of the Macy’s floats, or while trying to free some reindeer instead of a car accident.”

On Christmas Eve, which I don’t add, because sipping hot chocolate and watching ice skaters with Jake is the closest I’ve come to Christmas in the last seven years.

He doesn’t smile.

“And your parents?” I ask brightly.

“Mom left Dad, and he sold the company and retired upstate with a new girlfriend.”

“Ohmygod.”

He does smile this time. “All for the best. Mom’s even been experimenting with homemade cranberry sauce and making real Christmas cookies the last few years.”

I rub my eyebrows, which are still a little sticky from the costume, and pretend the heat in my face is just my body trying to balance its internal temperature while we’re standing out here in the cold. “I shouldn’t have judged her by her cranberry sauce,” I mumble.

“Pretty sure that wasn’t really the problem.”

“I’m sorry for the rest of it too.” I can’t look at him, but my shoulders suddenly feel lighter than they have in months. Years, maybe. “I got carried away and forgot some people have to live in the real world.”

“You believe in something. More than most people.” He angles closer until our shoulders are touching. He’s in a leather jacket and I’m bundled up in a puffy coat, but the contact still sends nerves skittering to my belly. And lower.

“Used to believe,” I whisper before I can stop myself.

The confession doesn’t do the same for my shoulders as the apology did, because it’s the same as admitting I don’t know myself anymore.

And I think Jake knows it.

He sips his hot chocolate quietly for a moment. Lights twinkle on the bare trees above us in addition to on the Christmas tree at one end of the rink. The flags wave in the soft breeze, and scents of pine and cinnamon drift through the city. Bells ring, people laugh on the rink below us.

It’s everything Christmas is supposed to be.

“You still believe in Christmas miracles?” he asks me finally.

“I grew out of that.”

“Kaitlyn Holly, you are never too old for Christmas.” He takes my hand, tosses his cup in a nearby trash can, and grabs my duffel. “Come on. We’re going to find your Christmas spirit.”

This isn’t the man I loved in college.

He’s more. “Jake—”

“No arguments. Come on. I need to tell you something, but first, we’re going skating.”