It’s Christmas Eve and Alex has had just about enough. Elisabeth came home today, and adding her screaming to a house full of people is just too overwhelming for him. By 6:00 pm he barricades himself in his room, and sits down to write Zoe a reply. In the end, it’s a short one, just a page and a half, but that’s about what he can manage with so much noise in the house. He folds it up and stuffs it in an envelope, before heading out the door.
Cuppa Joe’s is unusually quiet tonight, though that’s not unexpected given it’s Christmas Eve. Eddie is sweeping the floor and doesn’t even look up.
“We’re closing in thirty minutes,” he starts, “Oh, it’s you.” He spots the letter in Alex’s hand and heads for the counter immediately.
“You know we’re closed tomorrow, right?” he calls over his shoulder as he walks straight past the letter shelf and toward the back office, “She won’t get it for a few days.”
“I know,” Alex calls back, “I needed an excuse to get out of the house.”
“That bad, huh?” Eddie says, returning from the back with a box covered in Christmas paper and tied with a mess of curling ribbons. Alex feels a twinge of guilt that all he did for Zoe was write a ridiculous little poem.
“Elisabeth came home a couple hours ago,” Alex replies.
“Ah. New baby, that’s gotta be fun,” Eddie says sarcastically.
“Yeah. So, um, how about a decaf, so I have an excuse to sit here for a minute before going back to it?”
“Sure thing.” Eddie sets the package in front of Alex, takes Zoe’s letter and sets it on the shelf, and then pours Alex his coffee. Alex unfolds the note on the top to read it. It says:
!!!!DO NOT OPEN UNTIL CHRISTMAS!!!!
Seriously, Alex. Santa is watching.
Alex can’t help grinning, and Eddie notices.
“So what’s going on between you two?” he asks. Alex tries to cover up the grin but it’s no good.
“Nothing,” he says in what he hopes is a nonchalant tone, “She’s a friend.”
“Really,” Eddie says skeptically.
“Yes, really, Eddie, I haven’t even met her!” Alex snaps, probably too harshly.
“Ok.” He still doesn’t sound convinced. Alex closes his eyes and takes a deep breath.
“Why do you ask?” Alex prompts, because he can see that Eddie is dying to have this conversation.
“I dunno, man, it just seems like you two are always in here asking after each other. You should see the way she looks when there’s a letter for her, and it’s worse if she beats you in and there isn’t. And this,” he gestures toward the package, “for someone she doesn’t know?” he pauses before continuing, “She’s cute, you know? And I think she likes you, and someone as nice as her doesn’t deserve to have her heart broken by someone she hasn’t even met.” Alex blinks, a little shocked. Zoe likes me? That can’t be right. Can it? He’d never considered the possibility that his penpal could ever be something more than that. He’d barely even considered the possibility that they might ever be friends beyond the letters, but if what Eddie was saying was right…
“Sorry to burst your bubble,” Alex says after a few moments, “But that’s just the way she is. She’s nice to everyone and insanely cheery, like, I dunno, Will Ferrell in Elf. It weirded me out at first too.” Eddie nods but Alex can tell he isn’t really buying it. He doesn’t know what else to say, though, so he just throws a $10 bill on the counter and takes his coffee to a corner to sit in quiet for a minute.
“Change?” Eddie calls after him.
“Nah, keep it,” Alex replies, “Working on Christmas Eve sucks enough as it is.”
“Thanks man. You’re a good kid.”
Alex rolls his eyes – first Eddie accuses him of being the type to break Zoe’s heart (which could only happen if she was interested, which she’s not!) and then he says he’s a good kid. Eddie’s funny like that sometimes. He seems all tough and kind of a douche on the outside, but once you talk to him, especially when nobody’s around, he’s actually okay.
He sits quietly sipping his coffee while Eddie cleans up around him. He’s never been in Cuppa Joe’s when it was empty before, but he kind of likes it. His gaze wanders around the shop, lingering on the stack of puzzles where he hid his first letter, and the window where he’d first found Zoe’s letter. His mind keeps obsessively returning to what Eddie had said.
What if it’s true? he wonders, What if I’m making her miserable by being oblivious? I lived through that for years, crushing on Emma, He worries over the problem, because if it is true and he doesn’t say anything then he’s just putting her through the hell he’s lived with for four years, but if it isn’t true and he says something then she might think he wants more, and… He goes back and forth over what to do several times that evening.
“Hey, do you have a key?” Eddie asks loudly, right next to the table. Alex jumps – he’d been so lost in thought that he’d lost track of what Eddie had been doing.
“Wha- Sorry, no.”
“Then you’ll have to leave, boss’s kid or no,” he says, “Sorry, but it’s 7:30, I’m locking up.”
“Oh, right. No, I’m sorry, you’re right, just give me a sec.” Alex drains his cup and rushes around the counter to wash it out. He’s at the door ready to leave when Eddie stops him.
“Wouldn’t want to forget this,” he says with a wink, handing over the wrapped package. Alex blushes.
“Right. Thanks. See you ‘round.” He takes the gift and walks quickly out to his car. He doesn’t really want to go home yet, but everywhere else is probably already closed for the holiday. If he could he’d sit in his car, but with his luck some cop would come along and think he was getting ready to steal something, so he drives home, but slowly, taking in all of the decorations on the houses he passes. He even takes a few detours, driving past houses that he wouldn’t normally, just to see if there were decorations up. He passes one with lights on every tree and outlining the edges of the house and he imagines it’s Zoe’s – She wouldn’t have those annoying blow-up Santas and snowmen, but lots of lights seems right. He sits in his car staring at the house for a few minutes before another car passes him and he startles out of his thoughts. He shakes his head. Why does what Eddie said bother him so much?
A few minutes later he’s home. He sits in the car in the dark for a few moments. Once he goes inside he’ll have to deal with the chaos again. He wishes briefly that his family could be more like Zoe’s before it occurs to him that her family Christmas is probably chaos too, since her relatives all come down from Washington. But, well, he imagines it’s a different kind of chaos, a quieter chaos, where you don’t have to tiptoe around three different arguments so you don’t get involved. The version he imagines is nice, though he suspects the reality is probably still too loud for him.
Finally he gets out of the car and walks up to sit on the porch. He sets the package on his lap. He debates with himself a moment before he decides to open it – if he takes it inside everyone will want to know who it’s from and he still hasn’t told them about Zoe. After what Eddie said tonight he’s not sure he wants to. He pauses for a moment when he catches the label in the corner — “To Alex, love Zoe.” Okay, it doesn’t say love, but it’s signed with a heart, and that has to mean something, right?
Come on, Alex, he thinks with a growl. This is Zoe. She probably gave a gift to the mailman and signed it the same way. He tears open the paper.
Inside the box he finds a jar with far too much glitter and ribbons on it, with a sheet of paper wrapped around it. The sheet of paper he knew about, but he reads it anyway. It lists ten things that Zoe thinks make him a good friend. Before tonight they would probably have made him smile and that’s all, but after talking to Eddie, he overanalyzes each one. This one has got to mean she likes me, he thinks, but then Except she talks about Gabe like this too. He goes back and forth too many times to count, to the point that the exercise probably has the opposite effect than Zoe intended.
Eventually he sets the paper aside and reads the note in the envelope tucked down the side of the box. It explains the jar, and as he reads the explanation he finds himself smiling. Zoe is so… he can’t even put it into words. He wants to tell her that it’s okay, that he’s used to the way Christmas is at his house and she doesn’t have to try to fix it, but he suspects she’d have done this even if he had explained it to her. He lifts the jar to look closely at it. Flakes of glitter drift down to his lap and it smells vaguely of pine and… is that vanilla?
He tries to wipe the smile from his face, but he can’t quite do it. Despite his inner protests it was nice of her to do this. His thoughts wander back to what Eddie said, and suddenly it’s all too easy to stop smiling. What is he going to do?
december-24
