Alas, it was not to be.
Nicholas was a morning person.
Gag me.
He was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and happy-go-Larry, and I wanted to murder every living thing around me and go back to bed.
“I think we need a better look at what we have. We only looked at a few things yesterday.”
A few snowflakes whitened my black coat. “Why couldn’t we do this inside? It’s fucking snowing out here.”
He grinned at me. “I knew there was a limit to how much festive fun you had inside you.”
“Never say the phrase ‘festive fun’ again. It’s traumatizing, Nicholas.” I skipped back up onto the porch and under the cover where the snow largely couldn’t get me.
It wasn’t yet eight a.m., it was snowing, it was cold, and I hadn’t had anything to eat yet. This was a recipe for disaster, truly.
I at least needed food. I was borderline hangry.
Well, food, or I needed it to stop snowing.
Both would be good, too.
“All right,” he said, putting his hands on his hips and surveying the boxes. “The icicle lights are clearly better off going around the porch.”
“Are they long enough?”
He picked up the box. “Should be. I have a tape measure in my pocket.”
Oh, no.
“I didn’t mean measure it,” I groaned when he pulled it out and held it up. “No, Nicholas, noooo.”
“Yes, come on! I’m the one who’ll be getting up on the ladder and attaching them. I’m not going up and taking all the staples back out if it’s too short!” He handed me the tape measure and took hold of the end, pulling it out.
“Ohh. Fine.” I held the tape measure at the corner, and we slowly made our way around the entire porch until we had the measurements. “It’s exact,” I said when we were done adding it all up. “Either your grandma had some badass skills to measure it herself or she just knew on some building plans.”
“Probably building plans. She was a badass, but not even she could do this herself.” He laughed, putting the tape measure back in his pocket. “Honestly, I’m not surprised. She was a bit of a perfectionist, and she would have hated seeing it like this.” He picked a flake of paint off a column in the corner of the porch. “Maybe I can convince my parents not to sell this place.”
“And do what with it? Move in?”
“I could. Eventually,” he replied, looking around. “Even just the idea of restoring it would be worth it.”
I eyed him. Between that flippant suggestion and the “Mm,” yesterday when I said that he didn’t live in Snow Cove, I couldn’t help but wonder about his commitment to leave.
Was he thinking about staying?
“You sound like you don’t know if you want to leave town again,” I said breezily, picking up a box that had an inflatable snowman in it and opening it.
Nicholas said nothing as he unboxed the icicle lights. “Feed these up to me, would you?”
“Nice aversion. Shame I didn’t miss it.” I put down the snowman box and took the bundle of lights from him, pretending I didn’t see the dark look he shot my way.
He grabbed the ladder and set it up. “Can you steady the bottom of this for me?”
“I suppose. At least if you piss me off, I can move away and watch you fall.”
“And you wonder why I call you Azazel.”
“I don’t wonder, I just don’t like it.” I sniffed and put my foot on the bottom rung of the ladder to steady it for him.
He grasped the staple gun and climbed up until he was positioned correctly, then held his hand out for the end of the lights. I unwound a few feet of lights and gave him the end. He stapled it into the spandrel and continued along the string until he ran out of arm reach.
We continued on, pausing only to move the ladder so he could reach other spaces. It took us at least twenty minutes to string these lights around the porch, but when we were done, I had to admit it looked good even without them being lit.
“What next?” I asked, coming back around with the ladder under my arm. “Anything else for the roof?”
“Mm, no. I’m not sure. We should do the front yard and see what’s left.”
“You don’t trust me to mind your ladder, do you?”
“After you threatened to remove your foot? Not really.” He laughed and picked up the snowman box I’d been playing with all morning.
“No. No. Frosty is mine,” I said, taking it back from him. “That’s my snowman. I’ve wanted him all morning.”
Nicholas looked at the box in my hand. “You’re more interested in a blow-up snowman than you are me. That’s a bit of an ego hit, Quinn.”
Laughing, I took him out of the box and set it on the ground. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve asked you several times this morning and you’ve ignored me, so don’t take it out on me.”