I shake my head, my heart seizing with panic. “I don’t know if I can do that.”

  Vick nods. “You can, you totally can. You know you can. It has to be better than holding on tight to all that pain all the time, huh? It has got to be better than that.”

  I squeeze my eyes shut, feeling like I’ve been stabbed in the chest as I exhale on a shaky breath, worried about moving that invisible knife with the movement of my lungs. “It always hurts, almost every single day, how I couldn’t get over him.”

  “And maybe you weren’t meant to. Maybe you were meant to try again, yeah?” Vick asks, voice soft, coaxing.

  I open my eyes and find her a lot closer to me, sitting beside my legs, putting a hand on my ankle, patting it awkwardly. “How were you sure about this guy you have a massive crush on? How were you sure that you wanted to try?”

  “His smile…it might be the most beautiful thing in the world to me.”

  Max huffs and fluffs her hair like she’s the most beautiful thing in the world, and both Vick and I snort. Vick pinches at Max’s thigh, which starts a slapping war.

  Vick looks back to me, eyes bright now, like they’re holding nothing but starlight, and really, I know she’s already half in love with this random stranger.

  There’s a part of me that’s worried sick for her, worried over her getting hurt, also more than a little jealous that she’s willing to go the distance, to try, when I’ve always been afraid to.

  I’m so sick and tired of being afraid of myself, of everything that doesn’t fit inside my tight, little circle of comfort. Shit. How did I get like this?

  And what am I going to do about it?

  I sigh, nice and long, fiddling with my fingers in my lap.

  “So what are you gonna do?” Vick asks, and my heart gives another hopeful lurch.

  “I don’t know, I guess I’m going to have to apologize, but I don’t think I should go over there right now. Yeah, I think I should call him first.” I wince at the way I’m sounding, all cowardly. I have to be brave. I want this, I do.

  Being around Brody, it just makes life better (when I get my head out of my ass) and why wouldn’t I want a chance at that? Why does the fear make all the possibilities of this not working out appear all the more real to me?

  Shit.

  “I should apologize and tell him how I feel,” I say, nodding to myself. Hell, there’s even unread text messages he’s sent me that asked me to talk, but I haven’t answered, haven’t checked those threads of messages, wanting to put some time and space between that awful moment when I literally broke his heart in our downstairs kitchen all those weeks ago.

  “Do you love him, Amber?” Vick asks, a hopeful smile on her lips.

  “I…I do. I do love him. Jesus Christ, I always have.” I nod to myself, convincing myself and everyone in the room.

  “Shit, thank you! I’ve gotta pee so bad, but I wanted you to say it out loud and I didn’t want to miss it,” Max says, hiking herself up and off the bed and making a mad dash out of my old bedroom and towards the bathroom up here, her long hair trailing behind her as if it is its own bouncy cloud.

  I sigh, leaning my head back against the wall. “Why do I feel like that was the easy part, huh? Admitting it to myself?”

  Vick shrugs. “That’s usually how it goes, I think. Sometimes it’ll hit you over the head, but I know he makes you happy. I mean, you know he makes you happy, hell, Max knows he makes you happy, so what’s the problem?”

  “I have been a workaholic all my life, and it’s going to be hard to adjust.”

  Vick shrugs again, eyes going wider, all make up better excuses. “So adjust. No one said it’s going to be easy, but just do it. Shit, I’m tired of you looking so sad, do you know you even sound sad via text? How does that make any sense, huh?”

  “Thank you, thank you for listening.”

  Vick winks at me, getting off the bed and holding out her hand to me for me to hold. “How funny would it be if we just left the room behind and hid downstairs in the basement?” Her eyes are leaping now, and I want to keep it that way, by any means necessary.

  This is good, this is so good, getting her back like this, getting the both of them back like this.

  “Yeah, sure. Let’s go,” I grin, getting off the bed, trying to be quiet in my sock feet. “Race you down the stairs!”

  TWENTY-ONE

  Boxing Day…

  I do not brave the malls, and I didn’t forget to get gift receipts for everything this year, so I don’t have to follow everyone around and exchange gifts or whatnot, so I just take the day off at home, recuperate from all the hubbub of the past few days, looking towards the future, and the looming of the new year, a new start.

  Not that I’m a subscriber to believing that resolutions can’t be made at any time of the year, but there’s nothing like the beginning of the new year, nothing like the calendar starting anew, and it’s a good reminder that we might want to start over also, give ourselves another try.

  I’m still in my sweats, but I’ve deigned to put on a bra—one less thing to do if I plan on going over to my parents’ house, or if Max and Vick want to come over so we can binge watch all the Home Alone movies that we didn’t get the chance to do yesterday after dessert and way too much wine.

  I’ve got my hair up in the messiest bun, but I’m walking around, completely absent-minded, not sure what to do first.

  I have Brody Kane on the brain, and it’s driving me up the wall, really twisting my clock with how much I want to do something about it, but I need to think about it first, since that’s who I am as a person.

  I deliberate over breakfast, foregoing anything fancy and hitting up the Honey Nut Cheerios with almond milk, and even going for a second bowl after demolishing the first one. It’s like my stomach has been used to all the overeating from the past month and a half, and one bowl no longer suffices. Plus, I know myself, I’m going to bypass the land of hunger, and go straight to dying of starvation in a single hour and I’m gonna be mad that I don’t have actual food in the house.

  I expected leftovers yesterday, but Mom’s keeping them as a ploy to have me come over so we can all talk, but I’m not falling for that trick, but still—my fridge has nothing but ketchup, cream cheese, almond milk, and a sad looking bunch of green onions that should be composted instead of eaten.

  After doing groceries, after getting my grocery shopping done for the next couple of weeks, that’s when I’m going to go see Brody at the Kanes’ place.

  Yeah…right after I get enough food to feed an elephant and its fourteen elephant babies.

  I rush upstairs to get dressed now that I have a plan, adding a hoodie on top of my T-shirt, and undoing my hair so I can wear my Montreal Canadiens tuque that’s the warmest one I have even if I do have to sacrifice warmth for fashion. The bleu, blanc et rouge doesn’t really go with much, either.

  There’s a knock at my front door, and when I get there, feet already in my boots, my heart in my throat, I have the fleeting moment where I don’t want to make the decision—I don’t want to open the door, pull on the doorknob and see him standing there.

  It’s in this moment in time that I have my answer—we’re not together anymore, and the hope about all of that changing might just kill me.

  But if I open the door, if I pull it open and let Brody into my house, and we talk, something wonderful could happen, and I could redeem myself and tell him what I need to, even if I’m not prepared, if I still haven’t thought it all the way through.

  God, am I going to wing this, when it’s so important?

  I excel at studying, at learning through repetition and practical knowledge, by writing things out, and I’ve done none of that when it comes to Brody Kane, letting my brain process shit quickly for the best course of action.

  But of course, I do end up losing so much more time that way, and there’s five days left in December (not counting today because I woke up late and burned through half of the daylight hours), and I don’t know what he means when he says that he’s rethinking everything.

  God, I’ve kept him waiting long enough.

  I’ve been waiting long enough.

  It’s time to make a change, to fight for it.

  I’m sick and tired of comparing every guy I ever meet with the perfection that is Brody Kane.

  Shit.

  I unlock and pull open the door, finding him standing there, looking so heartbreakingly beautiful that I end up losing my breath, watch it plume in the air, calling me out like that. I blink at him, and the cold December air comes wafting in as Brody stamps his feet, his hands tucked deep into the pockets of his puffy coat, his ears turning a bright red.

  How long has he been standing out there, trying to find the same courage that I’ve been trying to find, too?

  Does it matter?

  We’re here now, even if Brody is early, and I’m not prepared, but he’s here, and when am I going to get another chance like this? When am I going to say what I want to say, what I need to say?

  “Hi,” I say, my voice coming out unexpectedly rough, like it’s been dragged over gravel. “Do…” I sigh, gathering every ounce of courage my body possesses knowing that this is just the next step of many. “Do you want to come inside?” I ask, jerking a thumb over my shoulder, as if Brody doesn’t know what inside actually means.

  Okay, okay, okay. Relax.

  Deep breath in, and deep breath out.

  Do you want this, Amber? Do you want to be with Brody, yes or no?

  “Yeah,” Brody says, taking a lumbering step over the threshold and into my house as I take a step backward, letting him inside, once and for all.

  He’s picked me up from my house many times before this very moment, even been inside my kitchen, but this feels more important somehow, like he’s already claiming this place as his, like he belongs here, like I’ve been waiting for him to acknowledge it and finally come home.

  As if I’ve truly been waiting for him all this time.

  Which you have, you know you have, you’ve been waiting forever.

  Brody takes off his boots and lumbers into the kitchen, shoulders hiked up, head bowed down, like a bull ready to charge. He takes a seat at my kitchen table, and I follow behind dumbly, and take the seat across from him, the both of us still wearing our coats.

  “Do you want anything to drink?” I ask, the inner host in me rearing its hospitality-loving head. I notch my chin towards the coffee pot, left on, the coffee still warm and delicious and ready to be drunk.

  Brody shakes his head, those steely blue eyes pinning me in place, the intensity behind them making my heart race in my chest. “No. No, I don’t want anything to drink.”

  I nod. “Okay, then.”

  God, it’s good to see him, sitting right there, close enough to touch. My heart’s about to become an escape artist and make a run for it, settled at the base of my throat, choking me while I watch Brody watching me. It’s a lot, too much, and not enough all at once.

  “I don’t know why I’m even here,” he laughs, the noise coming out of him at his own expense. He shakes his head, his dark hair waving back and forth, floppier, and fluffier without any product (it looks like), looking like he may have just rolled out of bed, just like me.

  “I don’t even know why I showed up.”

  I clear my throat. “I know why you’re here,” I say. “I know why you showed up. It’s the same reason why I was going to see you, too. Why I needed to see you, to talk,” I sigh. I bite at my bottom lip, wishing he would just look at me instead of at the surface of my table where I’m sure there’s leftover crumbs, or shit, where it could even be sticky.

  I pull in a deep, deep breath and push an imaginary Go button in my head.

  “I want to apologize,” I say, swallowing hard. “Because what should have been a private conversation between the two of us wasn’t, and I blindsided you with my feelings of doubt in front of my mother, and I’m sorry for that, sorry for not giving you a chance to defend yourself and parading what’s my problem in front of my parents, at their house.” I shake my head at myself, heart twisting, lurching at the memory of the look on his face on that day.

  “I’m sorry, Brody, for hurting you in that way, for making it about me, and doing it in front of other people who don’t really have a say in who we are to each other.”

  I gulp audibly, ignoring the sting in my nose, letting out a shaky breath. I’m not going to lose it, I’m not going to lose it.

  “I’ve been thinking about you, in some capacity, for a long time, Brody. It’s been going on ten years, you know? That’s a long time to be thinking about someone, to be wondering about them, wondering what they’re doing, how they’re feeling, wondering if they ever think about you at all.

  “It scared me how much I felt for you back then, looking back on it. Who finds love like we had at sixteen? Who? And maybe it was a good idea that you left the first time around, that it gave me a reason to grow up without you, learn who I was without you constantly by my side. I don’t know, Brody, what do you think? Am I too different from the girl you knew?”

  My heart hammers in my chest, and the words die on my tongue. I watch his eyes flicker up, that steely blue somehow piercing right through my heart.

  I’m holding my breath, waiting for him to give me an answer.

  “You still wrinkle your nose whenever you have that first taste of coffee, like you’re not sure if you like it or not, right out of the pot,” he says, nodding to himself, sitting up straighter now, taking up more room, taking up more of my attention until he’s all I can see.

  “You still lick your upper lip between words when you’re frustrated, or upset, or flustered. You still wind your fingers in your hair when you’re thinking, and you still love your cousins with all your heart. I always knew you were a hard worker, Amber, so incredibly hard-working and so damn smart. You’ve got like, a thousand letters after your name, and I just, I’m so proud. So proud of you for working hard and succeeding, becoming a PT.” He shakes his head, biting down on his bottom lip before letting out a sigh, as if deliberating what to say next.

  “You still look at me the same, too, the way you used to.”

  My heart skips two beats in a row, and I gasp as it restarts again, reborn into this next moment where Brody has known all along how much I feel for him, how much I’ve longed for him all this time. I wasn’t fooling anybody, let alone fooling him.

  “It made me want to be a better person for you, do anything to get you to look at me that way again, and you did, already, even if I felt like I didn’t deserve it. My professional career is ruined, and I’m not rehabilitating as fast as I think I’m going to get to get back to playing, but the world is still all that bit brighter because you’re in my life.”

  “Brody…” I say, his name cracking right down the middle with my voice. “Brody…shit.” I swipe at my eyes and wet cheeks, sniffing hard to make myself stop. “Oh my God, why am I crying so much? Why?”

  “I’ve always wanted to be with you, Amber, always. And we had to be apart for a reason, yeah? A reason for us to grow without one another, figure ourselves out, so we can be ready to come back again. I never got you out of my head, not once.”

  “Your parents?” I snort wetly, still sniffing hard.

  Brody smirks, nods, and I’m so happy to see him looking at me like that, his eyes warming through, losing their iciness.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, getting up and coming around the table to stand in front of him. It’s my professional opinion that I absolutely should not be sitting in his lap, “I’m sorry I was scared.”

  “Oh, baby,” he says, voice soft and gentle and it makes me cry even harder. It feels like I don’t deserve for him to be nice to me after what I said, after what I did. “Please don’t cry, please don’t. I’ll start crying and then there’s gonna be snot everywhere.”

  I slap weakly at his shoulder. “Stop trying to be funny. I’ll pity-laugh just to make you feel better, and I can’t do that right now.” I swipe at my cheeks, but more tears come, and Brody gets himself upright, opening his arms, still making it my decision to move into his arms or not.

  The only answer is yes.

  I’ve been resisting and resisting, trying to keep a wall between us, but I’m still here, and all that fighting was nothing more than a waste of energy, and no matter what I did, it brought us full circle.

  I’m not that eighteen-year-old kid anymore, a whole decade has passed, and a lot has changed, but more than anything a lot has also stayed the same. My love for Brody has always stayed the same, like a quiet ember protected behind the confines of my ribcage, beating next to my heart, waiting for the waiting wind for it to be fanned into flames again.

  And it all happened when Brody Kane came back into town.

  I practically launch myself at him, pressing my cheek against his chest, winding my arms around his body, and squeezing his ribs, so much so that he lets out a little oouuufff that only makes me want to squeeze tighter, make it so our hearts beat together, side by side.

  “I’m sorry I was so scared. I’m sorry about everything, about hurting you, about being an asshole. All of it.”

  “I don’t care that you were scared, I don’t. I’m pissed that you didn’t talk to me about it, that you didn’t say anything.”

  I plant my chin on his chest and look up at him. “Have you met me lately? That’s literally the reason why Vick and Max iced me out. I keep everything to myself.”

  “You didn’t used to,” he says, pulling a stray hair away from my wet cheek and placing it behind my ear.

  He’s looking at me with so much fondness, I think my heart’s going to shatter with all the affection and love I feel for him.

  This what the Grinch Who Stole Christmas must have felt, I’m sure of it, when his heart grew three sizes. It’s gotta be exactly what he felt like, right?