Page 103 of Built to Fall
Within seconds, the conversation breaks apart the way it always does when a group this big settles into comfort.
Eden leans in closer to Savannah, asking about the Ralph Lauren shoot, and across from them, Meredith and Braxton have shifted toward each other, heads close as they scroll through something on his phone.
Then Lina turns slightly toward me again, her fingers absentmindedly tracing the edge of her water glass. “Do you think I could pull off a red carpet look?” she asks, teasing.
“Easily. All other models might hate you for showing them up, though.” I grin.
She laughs, soft and real. “Well, if Savannah ever needs someone to trip and fall at her show, I’m available.”
“I think I’d like that.” I throw her a sly smile, my hand traveling further up her back until it’s over her shoulder, caressing her collarbone.
“You really need to stop flirting with me, Vandenberg,” she says, but there’s no real intention behind it.
Instead, it’s something that feels more like a challenge—almost like she’s daring me to continue—because we both know exactly how it could end, but we’re too afraid to act on it yet.
We’re suspended on a dangerous ledge, teetering between the friendship we’ve built and whatever the fuck we’re doing now.
And while I might not be able to see the end to all this, I know how tonight will close. With Lina in my bed, and both of us in way deeper than we ever anticipated.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
LINA
Iknew Christmas was going to be hard this year, but I think waking up on Christmas morning at my aunt’s house instead of my childhood home was the final stepping stone in realizing that my mom is actually gone.
The first Christmas without my mom was one I don’t remember. I was so deep in the throes of grief that I barely even recognized it had passed. It was also during the three-month period I spent at a house I rented in the mountains all by myself. Wallowing. Hiding.
This year I’m forced to face it. Spending it with my aunt and my cousins.
Right after I rolled out of bed, I took a shower and cried through the entire thing.
I wasn’t ready to go downstairs yet. I wasn’t ready to see the brightly lit Christmas tree with no gifts from my mom beneath it. I couldn’t even gather myself long enough to actually wash my hair. It was one of the longest showers of my life, and all I could think about was the fact that every Christmas for the rest of my life would be spent without my mom.
My chest physically hurt, and I could barely reserve the strength to turn off the water, step over the edge of the bathtub, and put back on the same pajamas I wore to bed last night.
Walking out of the bathroom, I can already smell the gingerbread cookies from all the way upstairs. I head back into the guest bedroom that Aunt Carrie says is mine now. It’s a kind gesture, but not one I want to accept. Yet, I’m currently occupying it while I wait for someone to come and drag me downstairs.
I do not want to go down there under my own volition. I need someone else to want me down there because I don’t want myself anywhere near the Christmas spirit.
Aunt Carrie’s twin girls are only four years old, and I can’t stand the idea of putting a damper on the magical, little-kid Christmas they deserve. I don’t want to ruin the holiday for everyone else with my overwhelming misery.
The only one from the house who has bothered to breach the confines of the guest bedroom is Judy, the twelve-year-old springer spaniel who barely can get her front paws up on the bed.
When she comes trotting in, tears burn my eyes yet again. Judy was my mom’s dog. She used to sleep at the foot of her bed every night, curled up so tightly you could barely tell where the dog ended and the blankets began. Seeing her now, older and slower but still trying to comfort me the only way she knows how, tears me apart.
So, I lift her back legs to help her up onto the bed before turning on the TV and crawling back into the same unmade bed next to her. I don’t even care that my wet hair is soaking the silk of my pillowcase.
I read in an article somewhere about getting over lost family members, and there was only one thing I remember reading in it.
Holidays never get easier.
So here I lie in the queen-size bed, just Judy and me on Christmas morning, hoping that isn’t true.
I barely feel like myself the rest of the morning. I had turned on an episode ofGilmore Girlsout of habit, and it hasn’t stopped playing since. It didn’t make me feel better, though, due to my poor choice of TV show.
Picking a series about a mother and daughter when I can barely say the word"mom"out loud was cruel—like pouring salt into a wound I keep pretending isn’t there.
It’s a little past one p.m. now, and I’m only now thinking about going downstairs so as not to be rude. However, I don’t think I could even muster the courage to sit up straight right now.
