Page 29 of A DIY Christmas Miracle
“It’s too early,” Jack grumbled. “Way too early to be awake already. It’s Christmas and I’m on vacation. I should be allowed to sleep in.”
“So… did Sophie kick you out of bed?”
“Huh?” Jack looked at me for a moment in confusion, then shook his head. “No. I just thought it’d be best if someone was already awake when Eli stormed the living room.”
“But Eli’s still sleeping.”
“Yeah.” Jack spun the coffee cup on the counter, giving me an unreadable look so intense it bore deep into my soul.
My heart sped up, and I had the sudden urge to squirm under his gaze, to get away from his scrutiny, so I looked away. I felt my cheeks heating, though I had no idea why. I hadn’t done anything wrong, had I?
To distract myself, I pulled my glasses off and started cleaning them with my shirttail.
“So what’s it like sharing a bed with Eli?”
If I hadn’t been expecting a question like this after yesterday’s promise that the conversation about me having a crush on Eli wasn’t over, I’d have dropped my glasses. Which would’ve been typical for me, destroying my glasses on Christmas while on vacation in the middle of nowhere with no chance of getting them replaced or repaired for the foreseeable future.
“What do you want to hear? He sleeps on his half; I sleep on mine.” Trying to pretend that this whole thing wasn’t a big deal to me, I shrugged. I was hoping to dismiss his question as trivial when, in fact, it was the opposite. Not trivial, rather… all-encompassing. It held such significance I wasn’t sure I’d be able to put the answer into words even if I tried.
“Yeah, right.” Jack snorted and shook his head. “Try again — and this time, tellme the truth.”
This was another one of those situations where a white lie would be appropriate. Just a tiny little lie to make my friend drop this topic.
If only I were a better liar. People, Jack especially, could always see right through my attempts at lying.
“I… I flee from bed every single morning so Eli doesn’t notice I’m snuggling up to him in my sleep.” I hid my face in my hands. My cheeks were burning and the feeling of utter shame was crawling through my body, settling in my burning cheeks, highlighting my inner turmoil for all the world to see.
“Just to make sure I got this right… you’re cuddling him while you’re asleep?” Jack sounded incredibly amused by my confession.
“Yes.”
“And then you’re fleeing from the bed while he’s still asleep?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
I pulled my hands away from my face and stared at Jack in disbelief. The answer was obvious, wasn’t it?
“Why? Because I don’t want him to feel molested by me and dump me to move into Marc’s room. Because I don’t think he’d like being groped or used as a pillow in his sleep, but… it’s not like I’m planning to do it.”
Jack rolled his eyes, chuckling in amusement. “I know. I knowyouwould certainly never plan something like that.” He looked at me meaningfully, as if he were trying to tell me something. As if there were a secret message hidden in his words he wanted me to decipher. But I had no clue what he was trying to tell me. “But now Eli still being asleep makes sense. He’s probably so happy about cuddling with you he doesn’t want to wake up for fear he’s just imagining it.”
“Please don’t get my hopes up,” I told Jack quietly, rubbing my chest where I felt a sharp pang in my heart. “It’s just cruel. Eli, he… doesn’t even see me. In the two-and-a-half years since we met until we ended up here together, we’ve barely spoken. If he was into me at all, he’d have told me ages ago. I mean, he’s Eli, not me.”
Jack raised his arms defensively. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m just saying… usually Eli’s like a little kid on Christmas. You could bet you’d find him sitting in front of the Christmas tree, eyeing the presents at, like, seven o’clock at the very latest. It’s only in the last four years that he’s managed not to open any presents alone, but he’s still upwaybefore anyone else.”
“Maybe he’s getting sick. I thought he was feeling a little off yesterday.”
“Yeah… maybe,” Jack answered but didn’t sound convinced by my theory. “Or he could’ve been more drunk than I realized.”
“He wasn’t.” I thought back to our conversation yesterday. He definitely hadn’t been drunk. Tipsy at best.
“Who wasn’t what?” Sophie asked, stepping up to her husband and planting a gentle kiss on his lips. “Coffee.” She sighed longingly and glanced at my coffee cup while rubbing her baby bump. “I can’t wait to finally have this baby. I want coffee, but the fucking heartburn afterward just isn’t worth it.”
For a moment, it looked like Jack wanted to say something, but in the end, he just shook his head, grinned at his wife, and waggled with his eyebrows. “Until then, you’ll just have to kiss me every time I’m drinking coffee to taste it on my lips.”
“Or you could try decaffeinated coffee,” I suggested.
