How My Brother's Best Friend Stole Christmas

Something I’ve been trying not to do for five years.

That was the hard-core truth, right there. But I wasn’t telling my mom that. I wasn’t telling anyone that.

“We got in a fight last night,” I said.

Mom made a sound in her throat that meant bullshit.

I took off the black hat and scratched the scar tissue at the back of my head.

“That girl is all alone this year on Christmas—”

“Mom.”

“I was going to invite her to dinner.”

“I know,” I sighed.

The other part of my job? Regret.

I knew more than I wanted to about regret. I knew its face and its size. I knew how it felt like the kickback of a M110 against my shoulder .06 seconds after I pulled the trigger. “You want me to go get her back?”

“I want you to make it right, whatever it was that went wrong.”

I looked up at my mom’s face and I remembered every bit of regret I’d felt as a kid when I couldn’t keep her safe. Not from my dad. Not from poverty. Not from me.

“Oh, honey,” she said, coming forward to touch me. She moved slowly so I could lurch back if I needed to, but I held myself still and let it happen. She touched my cheek and my hand, and her smile was the safest place I knew. “You’re a big dummy.”

I was shocked for a second and then I laughed. “You’re not wrong,” I said. “But to what exactly are you referring?”

“You and Sophie Kane.”

I stiffened. There was no me and Sophie Kane. Never could be. I’d had ten minutes with her in the dark last night and even that was stolen. Stolen time. Stolen touch. My hand clenched against the remembered feel of her, like I could hold the memory tight in my fist. She was not mine to have.

“I’ve been watching you watch her for years now, Sam,” Mom said. I shook my head and she lifted her hands. “That’s all I’m saying. That girl’s alone and I was going to feed her dinner.”

I took a deep breath and held it, letting it out slow. Trying to get my heartbeat to stop pounding. Meditation was supposed to help with some of the PTSD, and I was trying my hardest.

“Wrap some up,” I said to my mom, who was no doubt expecting me to make this offer. “I’ll take it to her.”

Ten minutes later I was in my old truck, taking half a chicken potpie and a green salad with the dressing in a little mason jar over to Sophie’s place. Determined—determined—not to touch her again.

And to try and make things right.

Sophie

Well, crap. I had nothing to do. My place was clean; I kept it that way. My brother’s phone went right to voice mail. My gym was closed so I couldn’t even work out to eat up some time and burn off this energy. So I sat down in my beanbag chair, fired up my PlayStation, and got lost in my video game.

So lost I didn’t hear the knock on the door until it was an absolute pound that shook the walls.

“Jesus,” I muttered, tossing the controller down. “I have neighbors.”

There was only a handful of people who would be knocking on my door on Christmas Day and one of them was on a honeymoon, the other finger-banged me and then told me he didn’t want me, and the other one was my mother. So I schooled my face into something polite, expecting the worst, and yanked open the door only to find Sam standing there.

Snow fell down on his black hat and the shoulders of his Carhartt coveralls, and he carried a cardboard box.

Say something smart. Clever. Say something cool.

“Hi.”

Nice one.

“Hi. You want this?” he asked and then shoved the box toward me. “It’s dinner. Mom wanted you to stay.”

“Oh.” I took the box. “She didn’t have to do that.”

“You know Mom.”

“You want to come in?” I asked, baffled and slightly tortured by his being here. His eyes took in my body, one long sweeping gaze like he was checking for enemies, and I’d never been so aware of my tiny sleep shorts and my just-over-the-knee cozy socks. A Kane Co. sweatshirt rounded out the whole look.

“I’m going to shovel,” he said, jerking a thumb back at the parking area where all my neighbors’ cars were buried under snow and ice.

“It’s still snowing,” I said.

“Better to get ahead of it,” he said, and that, it seemed, was that. He turned around, took the stairs down to where his truck was parked and pulled out his shovel.

Oh my God, I thought. How Fucking Sam Porter could Sam Porter be?

The wind was freezing against my bare thighs, so I shut the door and set the box down on the island in my kitchen. There was a tinfoil-wrapped pie tin that smelled like Betty’s famous chicken potpie, and I was plenty grateful for that, as well as for the salad in a plastic container and the separate jar of dressing.