Page 4 of Carry Me Through Christmas

I was fuming as I walked out of the Winterberry Glen government building and strode to my car. What in the world gave Cole Thomas the right to assume I had been given this job because of who my father was? How did he even know who my father was in the first place? Glenians stayed out of Ridgeians business. Even if I wasn’t quite sure what this feud was about, at least I understood that much.

Did he Google me? I thought as I opened the door to my blue SUV—something I was proud to say I had paid off six months ago. Rookie mistake, Greene, always Google the opposition. Especially so you’re not taken aback by their arresting brown eyes, their shiny, perfectly mussed-yet-professional brown hair, and shoulders so wide they should be carrying a yoke with pails of water on them, regardless of what century it was.

Okay, so sue me. I had noticed that Cole Thomas was one good looking member of the naughty list, especially when you factored in those glasses that seemed to be my kryptonite, but I had to keep my eyes on the prize, and that prize was keeping Holly Ridge as its own town and throwing the best fucking Christmas festival New England had ever seen, even if it could only be two weeks long.

I felt I was now calm enough to at least drive the speed limit and not endanger everyone else on the road, so I started the car and pressed the speed dial to give Charlotte, my best friend since birth, a call. Charlotte had stayed in Holly Ridge after high school to help with her parents’ bookstore and was one of the reasons I was so glad to be back home after being away for so long.

“So, how did it go?” she asked as soon as she answered the phone, not bothering with any greetings. Charlotte may have been on the receiving end of approximately forty-five anxiety texts a day over the past week, so she knew exactly why I was calling.

“Well, Char,” I sighed, suddenly feeling way more hopeless than I had, now that my rage-fueled power walk was over, “I have to have any expenses over $250 approved, so essentially everything. They’ve cut the festival down to the last two weeks of December, and it feels like they’re trying to set me up to fail.”

“Oof,” Charlotte responded, and I could picture her adorable button nose wrinkling as she took in my news, surrounded by books with her trusty Diet Coke can in her hand. “That doesn’t sound like the best parameters for a massive financial success or a smooth and painless planning process. What was the Winterberry Glen official like?”

I snorted. “You mean, Mr. Stick-up-his-fine-ass, couldn’t-pin-the-antlers-on-the-reindeer-if-he-had-his-eyes-open, Cole Thomas? He’s what you’d expect for a money guy who seems to hate Christmas. He insinuated I only got the job because of who my dad is.”

I expected this to send Charlotte into a rage. She, more than anyone, knew how hard I had worked for all my opportunities, but she surprised me. “Wait, can we back up to the stick-up-his-fine-ass part? Is Mr. Heat Miser a certified hottie?”

Cursing myself for that slip, I knew there was no distracting her until I answered the question. “Mr. Thomas may not be exactly hard on the eyes, but he’s the enemy here, so we’re going to ignore any warm feelings I had when I looked at him for the first time and focus on the ice that gathered around my heart and anywhere else as soon as he opened his mouth.”

Charlotte’s eye roll could be heard through the phone. “Uh-huh. Okay, whatever you say, B. So, what’s next?”

“Next up is me putting together a schedule outline for him to approve sometime next week. Luckily, I could vision board a Christmas festival in my sugarplum-filled dreams, but I’ve never had to work with such a short timeline before. Some things are going to have to get cut.” I sighed heavily, wondering what portions of Christmas joy were going to end up left out of the festival this year.

“Well, I know you, and I know that having a goal and a plan is the best possible thing you can do, so why don’t you go home and get the binder I know you started already and bring it over to the store? We can brainstorm how to fit in all the town traditions and the new and innovative stuff I know you’re dying to get into the schedule? There’s story time this morning, so the store will be swamped with wee ones and exhausted parents, but I’ll be sure to save your favorite armchair for you, and we can work it out.”

As usual, Charlotte came through with helping me take my mile-a-minute thoughts and help me focus on what I needed to do next.

“That sounds perfect, Char. Thanks so much. I’ll see you soon. Oh, and be sure to hold a copy of that new fantasy romance that came out earlier this week. I feel like I’m going to need an escape here realllly soon,” I responded, swinging my car into my parents’ drive, my Head-Bitch-In-Charge energy restored and ready to tackle the parameter list Cole and I had been given and map out a bitchin’ festival.

I exited the car, so focused on running up to my room and grabbing the exact binder Charlotte had referenced—the cascading tabs were just gorgeous, by the way—that I didn’t notice my sister walking down the sidewalk to climb into her hybrid Lexus SUV until I almost ran straight into her.

“Whoa there, Blaire. Watch where you’re going!” Gretchen exclaimed, grabbing onto my arm to stop me from toppling off the sidewalk. “I guess the meeting went well if you’re in such a hurry to get to your binder and get started on the next steps?”

“How did you know I had a meeting this morning? Wait, why are you here in the middle of the day? Are the twins okay?” I asked.

Gretchen’s perfectly lined light pink lips twitched. She hated when I answered a question with a question, something I did around her because I get nervous when she puts on her cross-examination voice.

Gretchen had never actively done anything to make me feel inferior, but our relationship was a strained one. Since she was ten years older than me, she was always the example I was measuring myself against. Her pretty blond hair made me hate my perfectly fine brown hair. Her Juris Doctor from an Ivy League school made my project management degree from a state school seem like nothing to write home about. Her career advancement in private firms created the urge in me to always move on to bigger and better festivals. And let’s not even get started on the beautiful husband and cookie-cutter twins—a perfect family all secured and created, while anyone I managed to date either undermined my successes or belittled my accomplishments in front of others.

All these comparisons were internal. I knew my parents were proud of me, and I knew Gretchen loved me, but I honestly felt like all the parts of Blaire would always be less than even a portion of the parts of Gretchen.

“The twins are fine,” Gretchen responded. “Hollis forgot his inhaler, so I dropped an extra one by on my lunch break. Mom mentioned you should be on your way back from your meeting with the Winterberry Glen CFO soon. So again, how did it go?”

“There will be some bumps in the road as Cole and I figure out how to work together, but I think it will all be okay,” I said, glossing over how I really felt, like I usually did when I talked to her. She had real problems, like a sixty-hour work week, an asthmatic son, and who knows what else to worry about. She didn’t want to hear me talk about the festival she’s barely had time for since she turned sixteen.

“I’m headed to grab my binder now,”—honestly, was I that predictable?—“and am going to meet Charlotte at the store to talk through some roadblocks.”

“Sounds like a great way to spend the afternoon,” Gretchen replied. “Be sure to tell Charlotte and her parents I said hi and let me know if I can help brainstorm anything with you, too. I know the festival hasn’t been my thing in the past, but we stayed in Holly Ridge to raise the kids because we wanted them to experience small-town life. I’d love to do my part to help save it.”

As I watched her get in her car and drive away, I couldn’t help but wonder now that I was home again and older if my relationship with Gretchen would change. I definitely had some mindsets of my own to challenge when it came to my internal comparisons, but I was seeing a new silver-lining to my homecoming that hadn’t been there before.

Cole

You don’t become the Chief Financial Officer of your hometown by age thirty by accident. Honestly, nothing in my life happened by accident if I could help it. So many things in my early life had been outside of my control. I didn’t pick that I was born in Winterberry Glen to two parents who were better off apart than they were together. I didn’t choose to live in a town that held the short-stick of an inter-town feud. I didn’t choose to have the enjoyment of Christmas taken from me at the age of ten.

Given all that, it might surprise many people to find I still lived in the town I was born in. Well, that was a choice. I chose to go to the state university thirty miles away to stay close to my mom, who didn’t seem to agree she was better off without my dad. I majored in business and governance because numbers and facts were something that had always made sense to me. I embraced the job offer in the Winterberry Glen CFO’s office after I completed an internship the summer before my senior year, because it provided me with security as I finished out my college days and allowed me to continue to look after Mom. I worked nights and weekends for the old CFO, so the City Council had no choice but to hire me for the job when old Berry White retired two years ago.

I was at my desk looking over last month’s audit reports when my cell phone buzzed. Glancing at the screen, I saw my best friend’s name on the caller ID, and noting the time, knew exactly why he was calling.

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