Page 72 of Fake it 'Til Christmas
She’s here.I get a flash of her scarf.The worn leather of her carry-on slung over one shoulder.Her cheeks are pink from the cold, lashes clumped a little from sleep.Her walk is all exhaustion and elegance, and even though she looks travel-wrecked, she’s the best thing I’ve seen in weeks.
She scans the crowd spilling out behind her—business travelers marching toward baggage claim, families corralling overtired kids—but at the gate itself, it’s just me and my sparkly sign.Her eyes find mine, and everything else fades.
She stops a couple of times.Then her lips twitch like she’s trying very hard not to smile.She fails miserably.
“You didn’t,” she says, her voice low and raspy from the flight.
I lift the sign higher.“I absolutely did.It was either this or a cardboard cutout of the ficus.”
She keeps walking, each step faster now.“I thought you were kidding when you said you’d win Fake Boyfriend of the Year.”
“This isn’t even me trying,” I say, just as she gets close enough to blur every line we draw between us.
Her hand is on my chest before I know it, warm even through my coat.She smells like recycled air, lavender hand lotion, and every fantasy I’ve tried not to have on lonely nights.
“Well,” she breathes, “you win the Airport Boyfriend Olympics.”
“Fake boyfriend Olympics,” I correct, but it comes out rougher than I meant—like the word fake gets stuck in my throat.It doesn’t fit anymore.Not with her this close.Not with that look in her eyes.
She’s close enough that her bag brushes my leg.Close enough that I can smell her—lavender and recycled air and something I’ll probably crave for the rest of my life.Her scarf slips, revealing the curve of her neck.Her eyes are tired, rimmed in red from travel, and maybe tears.Beneath the exhaustion, there’s a flicker of something I feel in my chest like an aftershock.
The longing?The time we’ve been apart?It doesn’t really matter.She’s here.Instinctively, I drop the sign.Let it clatter to the floor like it never mattered.
My hand finds her waist.My fingers curl into the fabric, needing something—needing her—just long enough to believe she’s really here.She startles slightly, just a breath of hesitation, but stays.
So I lean in.
My forehead brushes hers first.Just barely.Her breath hitches, her lashes flutter.My other hand slides up, fingertips grazing her cheek, thumb resting just below her jaw like I’m framing something precious.
Then I kiss her.
Slow at first.Like an apology I’ve been carrying for weeks.Like a promise that I won’t fuck up again, even when I don’t know how to keep it but still want to make it.
She exhales into my mouth.
Then she’s kissing me back—full mouth parted lips like she’s just as wrecked as I am.Like the flight, the distance, the pretending—all of it fractured the second our mouths met.There’s nothing careful about it.No play-acting.Just heat, hunger, and something that feels dangerously close to real.
Her hands fist the front of my coat and pull.Her bag drops with a thud against the tile, forgotten.She tilts her head and opens for me, and I fall into her like I’ve been starving.
It’s awkward in the best ways hello kisses always are—too many layers, too much want, zero finesse.Her scarf’s in my hand, our noses collide, someone coughs like they’re judging us—but I don’t care.I couldn’t stop if I tried.I’m kissing her like I’ve been waiting my whole life to be allowed this.
The world keeps moving.Boarding announcements drone overhead.A kid shrieks.Somewhere, someone’s wheeling a suitcase with a squeaky wheel that’s probably illegal in all fifty states and a few countries.
But all I feel is her.
Her mouth on mine.Her hands under my coat.Her heart pounding beneath all the layers between us—and maybe, just maybe, answering mine.
I can’t believe she’s right here, and I don’t know how I’m supposed to pretend this doesn’t mean everything.And now that I have her, I’m not sure how I ever let her go in the first place.
By the time she pulls back, her breath hitches.“Hi.”
“Hi,” I say, forehead pressed to hers, the airport falling away around us.My hand is still in hers.Her forehead rests against mine, and for a moment, the airport doesn’t exist.No crowds, no announcements, no missed calls or deadlines.Just this buzz under my skin and her breathing soft against my cheek.
I want to say something—something reckless or maybe just true—but I can’t get a single thought to line up that’s appropriate, so I say, “Welcomehome, Madame Wolfcraft.”
She smiles like she believes it now.I want to be the place she lands when everything else falls apart.
Winnifred’s eyes sparkle.“We need to work on our fake a little more.It doesn’t look like it with this ...this kind of sign effort.”
