“I feel ill,” I moan as I pull a blanket over my head. I’m on my stepbrother Jax’s couch—where I’ve been living like a little hobbit since The Incident—with his rescue dog, Rick Astley, curled up at my feet.
It’s Thursday night, and we’re watching the airing of episode two of Holiday Baking Bonanza, which perhaps confirms that I am, indeed, a masochist at heart. Because on the screen in front of me, a previous, rounder-faced, more naive version of myself is smiling at the camera and gushing about how Adam and I are high school sweethearts, and he’s my first and only love of my life.
Beside me, Jax tugs the blanket off of my head with one big callused hand and fixes me with a look that tells me I have chocolate all over my face.
“I recommend you stop eating that, then.” His gray eyes are dubious. “It doesn’t look right.”
I hug my bowl of vegan caramel and dark chocolate chia seed pudding tighter to my chest. “It’s not the pudding making me sick. Or even Adam. It’s her.” I point at myself—or I should say my very dumb, former self—on the screen. “How was I ever so stupid?”
“Not stupid.” Jax gives me an only slightly awkward pat on the shoulder. “How were you to know?”
Jax has been my brother since I was six years old and he was eight; when my mother married his father. The fact that we are not blood related is glaringly obvious—I’m short and freckled and pale, with smooth hands from all that time I spend baking in warm, cozy kitchens, while Jax is tall and broad, with a weather-beaten perma-tan from all that outdoorsy stuff he likes to do. Camping and hiking and fishing and the like.
Weirdo.
However, Jax and I are as close as a biological brother and sister. Have been from around the time we both realized that, despite our obvious differences, we were firmly united on one thing: our parents’ marriage was a total sham, and the two of them would be much better off going their separate ways.
Almost twenty years later, they’re still married and still very much not in love. I think my mom likes Richard Grainger’s platinum credit cards, and Rich likes having a trophy wife by his side who makes him feel, well, rich.
But I can’t complain too much. My real dad was out of the picture, and Richard was a decent stepdad in that he taught me how to ride a bike and was always happy to give me twenty bucks when I asked for it. Jax, on the other hand, has a serious disdain for his father. He will never accept a cent from him. Or be anything like him.
Case in point: rather than trying and failing at relationships, Jax simply opts not to have them. Ever.
“I wish I could be more like you and swear off love forever,” I tell him.
“No, you don’t.”
He’s right. While Jax looked at our parents’ loveless marriage and decided he didn’t want marriage at all, I looked at it and decided I wanted marriage very much—but a loving one. I wanted to put love on like a sweater, feel it all over my skin and snuggle up into the warmth and security of it.
So I did.
And every day for a decade, I did everything I could to keep that sweater fitting me.
But my work was in vain. Adam pulled a loose thread and unraveled the whole thing anyway.
Which means that, at some point—when I’m ready to acknowledge that men exist again—I need to begin the work of knitting a whole new sweater. An unbreakable one, this time.
“You’re right, I don’t,” I tell him. “And I also don’t need to sit here wallowing any longer. It’s freaking Christmas, dammit.”
“Stop with that,” Jax grumbles as he sets his beer down on the coffee table. “It’s freaking November.”
“Thanksgiving is next week and then it’s officially Christmas. The best of all the holidays, back to back.”
And my first of each in over a decade without Adam.
I push down the sour thought and wipe my mouth with my sleeve.
“Enough of this!” I declare and flip the channel… only to find myself staring at a close-up of Sebastian Slater. Number 19. Leading scorer in his division. Loves Home Alone and my yogurt parfaits.
Jax laughs, mistaking my ogling at my bathroom buddy for me taking actual interest in tonight’s game against the D.C. Eagles. “Four days of working for the Cyclones and the sports-hater is a hockey fan?”
TV Sebastian Slater is skating backwards, looking absolutely dashing in his maroon and white jersey—even as he’s yelling something to the guy on his left.
I nod at the image, thinking it weird that the guy on my TV screen currently has a bellyful of wild rice and monkfish I cooked for the pregame meal this evening before my shift ended. “I met him on Monday.”
“Slater?” Jax snorts. “Was he a jackass or what?”
“Kind of.” I remember him fleeing from the men’s restroom in horror, but then, I think of his apology in the kitchen… before we had an actual, albeit very weird, conversation. Like, we talked about freaking Christmas movies together. No idea why he was calling me “Lady M” though. Lady Maddie? That would be weird. “No, he was nice enough.”
Definitely not the monster I half-expected Adam’s favorite player to be. And, surprisingly, even more handsome in real life. Those glinting blue eyes and full, smirky lips were nothing short of… well, hot.
“I thought you said you don’t really see the players.”
“I don’t. I haven’t met anyone else, but Seb came into the kitchen on my first day looking for food because he missed lunch.”
“Oh, it’s Seb now, is it?”
“He told me to call him that,” I mumble down at my hands.
Jax grins. “Well, I’ll make sure to drop Seb into the conversation if I have the displeasure of running into Adam anytime soon.”
“Ugh, I hope you don’t. Did you hear that Mom and Richard had dinner with Mr. and Mrs. Plumlee last week and Adam was there with Elizabeth?”
“Yeah, about that…” he grimaces. “Don’t shoot the messenger, but your mom also told me that Adam invited them to the engagement party on Saturday night.”
“Of course he did.” I snort-laugh. This isn’t a huge surprise—like I said, our families are best of friends. “I bet they’ll go. Also, when were you talking to Mom?”
This earns me an eyeroll. “She dropped by the bar yesterday.”
By “the bar,” Jax means the uber-cool, industrial-looking bistro downtown where he’s a bartender. Jax is the kind of guy who works to live, rather than lives to work—again with the trying to be nothing like his dad. He’s super content working night and weekend hours so long as he gets to take off in his campervan during the week whenever he pleases.
“She came in for dinner?” I ask, surprised. Mom favors tablecloths, multiple place settings, and frilly napkins at the establishments she frequents.
“Absolutely not. She came by to drop off a bunch of supplements and self-help books for single ladies for you.”
“What?!” I demand. “What did you do with them?”
“Threw ‘em all in the trash.”
“I knew you were my favorite family member.”
“And you’re the only family member I tolerate.” Jax smirks, then turns the volume up on the TV. “Now. Shall we watch your new buddy Seb crush the Eagles or what?”
“Watch hockey?” I make a face and grab the remote from him. “No way! Let’s see what’s on the Hallmark channel. Christmas movie season is well underway, you know.”
Jax groans and puts his head in his hands. “I love you… but I can’t wait until you move out.”
I have Friday off, then work over the weekend, and before I know it, I have one week down at my new job… and I have to say it’s flown by in a nice, mostly testosterone-free way. I do not think of Adam, nor do I look at his Instagram once (progress!).
I also have no further run-ins with number 19 or any other numbered jerseys, much to my relief.
And, if I’m being entirely honest, a little to my disappointment. Only because he seemed to like my yogurt parfait so much, of course.
Stefani is a nice boss. She’s a few years older than me, with round cheeks and long, dark hair that she always wears braided. She’s basically everything I want to be when I grow up—working a job she adores, commanding the respect of everyone she works with while still being universally liked. On top of this, I never feel stupid when she explains things to me. And she lets me play Christmas music in the kitchen, even though it’s only mid-November.
I have to say, for the first time since Adam and I broke up, I’m starting to feel somewhat… normal again.
The team will be traveling to Vegas later in the week for their Thanksgiving game and Stef is planning to travel with them. Meaning I’ll get the holiday off. I plan to spend it as busy as possible to distract myself from the fact that The Incident episode of Baking Bonanza is due to air the night of the holiday itself.
I’ve agreed to go hiking with Jax on Thanksgiving, which is probably not my smartest move. But I’m also going to try to perfect my new gluten-free, dairy-free, refined-sugar-free Snickers bar recipe, which I’m super excited about. If I get it right, I might even ask Stef to take a look at it to consider for the team “treat” menu. Jake Griswold—who’s a notorious fighter and wears a permanent scowl—apparently has an incurable sweet tooth.
After our hike, Jax and I are going to brave turkey dinner with our parents. I’m glad he’ll be there when my mother inevitably comments on how much ham I’ve eaten, and talks about how svelte Elizabeth looked at the engagement party, which she and my stepdad did end up attending (called it).
Some people would think that maternal loyalty would come into play in a situation like this one, but those people have not met Kaitlyn Grainger.
Speaking of which—we’re obviously going to gun it out of the parentals’ place before the episode airs later in the evening so I can avoid a bloody World War III taking place all over the living room of my mother’s pristine home.
All in all… I don’t think it’s going to be the entirely awful Thanksgiving I envisioned after the breakup.
And so, I’m in a relatively cheerful mood when I walk into the kitchen on Tuesday morning and crank up “Santa, Baby.” I wash my hands, put on my apron, and get to work slicing papaya, pineapple and watermelon for the gut-friendly açai bowls that are on the menu for today’s late, post-skate second breakfast.
I’m so lost in my humming and chopping that it takes me awhile to notice that Stef is late.
Very late.
I’m about to call her when the team’s HR and Scheduling Manager, Adrienne, bursts into the kitchen. “There you are!”
I’m not sure where the hell else I would be at 11am on a Tuesday, but I smile at her anyway. “Just getting breakfast prepped. Stef isn’t here yet, though.”
“I know!” Adrienne cries, throwing her hands up. The woman certainly has a flair for the dramatic. Which I can appreciate. “She slipped this morning. She’s gone to the emergency room.”
My knife falls out of my hand and clatters on the countertop as I gasp. “Oh, no. Is she okay?!”
My mind is whirling, immediately going to all of the worst possible places, when Adrienne yells, “NO! She is not okay. She has a fractured thumb. Thumb!” she repeats the word, apparently for good measure.
Or maybe she thinks I’m a bit slow… which I might be. Because if I’m hearing Adrienne correctly, Stef isn’t on death’s door?
“Oh,” I breathe in relief. “Is that all? That’s all right.”
“Of course she’s not all right!” Adrienne bellows. Her volume is rather impressive given her waify disposition—Adrienne is tall, blonde, slim, and incredibly pale. She doesn’t look unlike one of the elves in those dreaded Lord of the Rings movies that Jax watches purely for the scenery. “How is one supposed to cook with her thumb in a cast?”
“Umm…”
“She’s out of commission for at least a week.” Adrienne points at me with a perfectly manicured finger. “Which means you, my dear, need to pack your bags.”
“You’re firing me?” I squeak.
Adrienne clicks her tongue impatiently. “Keep up, Madelyn. You’re coming to Vegas for Thanksgiving.”
