Page 122 of Shut Up and Jingle Me
“Lucky me.”
He bumps my shoulder, eyes bright over the rim of his cup. “Admit it—you love meandmy chaos crew.”
I meet his gaze, the corners of my mouth twitching. “Maybe a little.”
He beams. “Knew it.”
And just like that, I’m smiling into my coffee, thinking that somehow, against all odds, this—him, the noise, the peppermint, the morning—is exactly what I didn’t know I wanted.
We leave the café hand in hand, steam curling from our cups as the cold air hits. The sidewalks glisten under a thin layer of frost, sunlight catching on every shimmer. Eli’s cheeks are pink from the wind, his grin too bright for this gray morning. He bumps my shoulder with his.
“You’re smiling,” he says, sing-song. “Careful, Calder. Someone might mistake you for happy.”
I give him a look over my coffee. “I’m surrounded by sugar and you. It’s hard not to get a little contact high.”
He laughs—the sound that’s been following me for months, the one that somehow feels like home now. “You love me.”
“I do,” I admit. “And I’m starting to think I might love Christmas this year, too.”
He gasps dramatically. “Did you just say that out loud? In public?”
I roll my eyes, tugging him closer by the hand he’s been swinging. “Don’t push your luck.”
He leans against me anyway, his head brushing my shoulder as we walk. “Too late. Luck pushed itself.”
The world feels softer around us. The hum of the campus fades beneath the crunch of our boots, the smell of peppermint and snow all around us.
I glance down at him. “You really think this is it? Your miracle ending?”
He tilts his head, that familiar spark in his eyes. “No,” he says. “This is the beginning. All Christmas movies just show the beginning of the love story.”
We reach the corner for our dorm, and he stops, tugging on my sleeve until I turn. He rises onto his toes and kisses me—sweet, sure, and unhurried, the kind of kiss that erases everything that came before it.
When we break apart, I’m grinning like an idiot. He looks way too proud of himself.
“See?” he says, eyes bright. “Told you you’d start believing in Christmas magic again.”
And I do. Somehow, impossibly, I do. Even though Christmas has come and gone and the New Year has arrived…if it weren’t for him and his Christmas Cheer, I’d still be the Grinch everyone said I was—walls a mile high, and a chip on my shoulder for the world, but his warmth healed something inside of me.
I tuck him closer against my side, the both of us warm despite the cold, and we keep walking—coffee cups almost empty, hearts stupidly full, the world just beginning to sparkle again.
It’s simple. It’s perfect.
It’s us.
EPILOGUE
Eli
11 months later
Our dorm room looks like Christmas threw up in it. There’s no other way to describe it. Tinsel wrapped around the bed frame, fairy lights draped across the desk, a little fake tree blinking in the corner with candy canes hanging off every branch. Even Max’s textbooks have tiny red bows stuck to them.
He pretends to hate it, but he’s the one who untangled the lights for me yesterday morning.
I flip the charity calendar on the wall to December and freeze. Our photo. The one everyone still teases us about. We’re wrapped in Christmas lights—literally tangled together—his hand resting on my hip, both of us staring at each other like we forgot there was a camera. I remember that moment, that’s when I really knew I wanted him. Before it was a fantasy, but pressed that close to him and feeling the heat come off of him, it became real.
The light catches the glossy page, and I smile. I’m never getting rid of this calendar.
