Page 60 of Snowed In
CHRISTIAN
“They love walking,” Molly mutters to Megan when we leave the house thirty minutes later. “And being outside.”
“Christian warned me,” Megan says, as I take her hand. Her eyes drop down to it, but she doesn’t pull away.
Hannah, Andrew, and Daniela all power ahead, laden down with bags of towels and food, while the three of us slowpokes take up the rear.
“It will be nice not to be completely outnumbered by the Fitzpatricks this Christmas,” Molly continues. “There’s only so many in-jokes a girl can take.”
I nearly point out that she’ll be a Fitzpatrick soon enough, but I manage to keep my mouth shut.
“Your scarf is beautiful, by the way,” Molly adds. “Where did you get it? I’d love a big one like that.”
“Oh, I made it.”
“You did?” Her eyes brighten. “Jesus. I’m surrounded by artists. Hannah!”
I tense as Hannah glances over her shoulder, still marching ahead.
“Megan makes clothes too!” Molly calls, but she just nods before turning back to the front. Megan practically wilts beside me, and I feel a rare surge of anger toward my sister, but Molly at least doesn’t seem to realize anything’s wrong.
“So, how did you guys meet?” she asks. “Andrew said you went to school together?”
I launch into the same spiel I told Megan’s mother that morning, and then Molly tells Megan her own little love story, and just like that, the two of them are doing that instant best friend thing girls seem to do. They keep it up the whole way until we round the bend, and the smile drops from Molly’s face.
“What’s that?” she asks, confused.
“It’s the lake,” Andrew says, jogging back to us.
“That’s the lake? I thought it was going to be a pond or something.”
“Then it would be a pond,” Andrew points out. “And not a lake.”
And it is most definitely a lake. A sparkling blue circle of one, nestled in the middle of the sloping hills. It’s where we spent most of our summers when we were kids and might as well have been a massive waterpark to us with the way we carried on. But I have no desire to dip so much as a toe into it today.
“Let’s go get a good seat,” I say to Megan. There’s a grassy bit near us that looks like it’s been in the sunlight long enough that it will be dry, but Megan doesn’t budge.
“We’re not going to race?” she asks.
“We’renot, no.”
“Christian doesn’t do anything unless his personal trainer tells him to,” Andrew tells her.
I give him a look. “Christian likes not contracting the flu before Christmas.”
“The flu’s a virus,” Hannah pipes up. “You can’t get it just from being cold.”
“But you can get a cold from being cold,” I say. “That’s why they call it a cold. Let’s go.”
I tug on Megan’s hand again, but she just gazes at the lake, an odd expression on her face. “I can race,” she says, and I frown, dropping my voice so only she can hear me.
“You don’t have to.”
“I know, but…” Her eyes latch on to Hannah. “I don’t mind. I want to.”
“Megan—”
“I’ll race,” she says loudly, breaking away from me.
