Oh Snowy Night

What else is Christmassy? I do a little internet searching. The results depress me because I don’t have ornaments or tinsel or fake snow. I can cook though. I whip up a batch of cookies, roll the dough out with a beer bottle and then cut out shapes of trees and snowmen. They bake up nicely and the white frosting isn’t terrible. I put some of these on the tree and some on a plate for Faith to eat after she’s done with the pancakes. Outside, I find pine cones and some mistletoe. I guess there are advantages to living in the woods. I use the green and white paint on the pine cones and while the green ones tend to blend, the white ones look decent. A bag of marshmallows gets sacrificed for snowmen with little pieces of raisins for eyes. Those are probably my best work. With some extra pine boughs, I fashion a wreath and hang that under the string of painted light bulbs.

After the house—well, the living room—is decorated, I grab one of my sweaters. It’s a black one and I can’t remember how it found its way into my closet. Maybe Old Karen from the store in town sold it to me. Using the last of my paint, I decorate it with trees, ornaments, snowmen and leave it out to dry. Tomorrow I’ll put it on and Faith can take photos for her internet account.

An engine motoring up my lane catches my attention and when I look out the front window, I see that night has passed. The sun is climbing its way toward its mid-morning placement. Bear comes shuffling down the hall with Smittens riding on his back. I open the front door and Bear rumbles outside. An expensive black SUV barely misses my dog before sliding to a stop about twenty feet from my front door. My hackles rise at the unwanted intruders. This isn’t King and his woman. It’s a different set of people—a pinch-faced man and a woman whose hair has so much hairspray in it, the wintery breeze isn’t moving it.

“Hellloooo!” the woman says. “I’m Trish!” She bounds up the stairs with her hand out. The man follows behind at a slower pace.

“You lost?” I ask, folding my arms across my chest.

Trish stops one step below me. Irritation flashes across her face when she sees I’m not going to shake her hand. “I don’t think so,” she says, forcing a smile. “I was told that my dear sister Faith was staying here. I’ve come to bring her home.”

Chapter Fourteen

Faith

I roll over at the sound of voices coming from somewhere in the house. Conn’s side of the bed is empty and cold. I don’t remember moving from the sofa to bed last night, which means Conn must have carried me here. Did he not sleep with me? I sit up trying to listen a little better. The voice I hear is soft and feminine. I can almost swear it sounds like Trish but she has no idea where I am. Who is this woman? A spark of jealousy burns in my stomach. A feeling that I’m not used to. I wasn’t even a tiny bit jealous when I found out my ex was sleeping with my stepsister. It only hurts me because I still can’t believe that she would do that to me.

Right now all I feel is pure jealousy. Conn didn’t sleep in bed with me last night and now there is another woman in the house. I throw my legs over the side of the bed, hopping down from it and deciding to make my way to see who this woman is. I don’t know what’s gotten into me but I pull my pajamas from me before digging through a drawer to find one of his shirts to slide over my head. I tousle my hair a little next before finding a pair of his socks and slipping them onto my feet.

I head into the bathroom, making sure I look like I had a wild night that wasn’t only filled with Christmas movies and cuddling into Conn. I thought we’d end up making out or something but instead we spent the whole night snuggled up together with our furry babies. How did he go from wanting to fuck me as he put it to not making a single move on me? He only held me tight as we watched movie after movie. He’d often get up to get us snacks before letting me cuddle back into his side where he wrapped his arm around me to hold me close. I look at myself in the mirror trying to pull myself together. It’s probably just King again and that nice woman that came with him last time. I hate the insecurity that I’m feeling right now. More, I hate that my stepsister and ex are the ones that have given it to me.