So you’ll think of me, on those long walks home.
Merry looked at the flowers again, and this time she saw what lay in the middle of them. Reaching in, being careful not to scratch herself on the thorns, she pulled out a long, slim umbrella. It, too, had roses on it, pink ones to match the pink handle.
Before she even knew it, Merry was grinning.
“Well, who?” squealed Alice, snatching the card. “There’s no name!”
It didn’t need a name. She knew exactly who had sent the gift. Despite the fact she had sent him away last night—pretty rudely, she thought—and despite the fact that it must have cost him a small fortune to ride back in the cab, he had gone out and bought her these beautiful flowers and a thoughtful, useful present. What kind of man would do that? What kind of man would do that for her?
“I swear, I am going to explode if you don’t tell me!” Alice said.
“Then you’ll have to explode,” Merry said. “Because it’s nobody, it’s nothing. It’s…”
What was it? Christian had told her last night that he was leaving soon for the other side of the world. What did he want from her? A few weeks of dates and hot chocolates and then a sad goodbye? It didn’t seem fair that he was playing with her heart like this.
“It’s a joke,” she said, the smile falling from her face. “A stupid joke. You can have the flowers, I don’t want them.”
She ignored Alice’s stunned expression and walked to her locker. She had opened it up and put her sodden raincoat inside when she sensed her friend behind her. Turning, she saw Alice standing there, holding the umbrella.
“I don’t know anything about this,” said Alice. “But it doesn’t seem like a joke. Somebody seems to care a great deal about you.”
Merry started to protest but Alice waved the umbrella like a sword, cutting her off.
“No, Merry. I know you well enough by now. You don’t let yourself have nice things, you don’t let yourself believe that good stuff will happen. You… you walk around in the rain and then complain about getting wet.”
“That’s not fair,” said Merry. Alice waved the umbrella again, then handed it to her.
“Sometimes it rains,” Alice said. “Sometimes there are bad days. Sometimes you get soaked through. But sometimes somebody gives you an umbrella, and you stay dry.”
“Why do I get the impression you’re not talking about the weather?” Merry asked, and Alice nodded.
“Be good to yourself,” her friend said. “And when you can’t, let others be good to you.”
Merry took the umbrella, staring at it.
“Thank you,” she said. “You’re right.”
“Now come on,” said Alice, smiling. “We’d better get to work before Cradley finds us.”
What did you do? What did you do? Oh Christian, what did you do?
Christian scrubbed at the wall with his wet cloth, trying to erase the graffiti that had been left there and wishing he could erase the last few hours of his life just as easily. Last night, he’d ridden the cab all the way back to his hotel after dropping Merry off, then spent a good part of the evening trying to work out what to do next. Ultimately, he’d made the decision to leave Merry alone. It wasn’t fair to lead her on, especially when he was heading back to the Philippines after Christmas. She was one of the sweetest women he had ever met, and she didn’t deserve to be messed around. And he was already guilty of messing her around.
He sprayed on some cleaning fluid and scrubbed at the next line of text. He was in the corridor that led to the customer elevators on the seventh floor, and some punk kid had decided it would be fun to write a crude remark about Santa’s elves on the wall. They’d used a Sharpie, too. But it was slowly coming away. People walked past, but nobody even seemed to notice him on his knees, scrubbing away.
He’d made the decision to leave Merry alone, sure, but then he’d woken up the next morning and the first thing to enter his head had been her smile. He’d lain in the satin sheets of his five-star queen-sized bed and thought of Merry, and he’d had such a rush of happiness and joy and excitement that he’d made an entirely different decision. He’d bolted from his room to the Devlin Storm store in the Rockefeller, found an umbrella, then taken it straight to the florists who did all of his family’s work.
There had been a moment, just as he was leaving the shop, where he’d almost got cold feet. He’d been on the verge of telling the florist to cancel his order. But what was the harm in a few flowers? Even if nothing happened between him and Merry, even if he never spoke to her again, surely the gift would make her smile.
It was nearly Christmas, after all.
Now, though, he was feeling positively terrified at the thought of what her reaction would be. He checked his watch, his forearms bulging from the effort of cleaning the wall. It was gone eleven, and the flowers would have been delivered by nine. She probably would have found them by now. He wished he could have been a fly on the wall when she walked into the locker room and read her name on the card.
But what if she hates them?
He shoved the thought out of his head. If she hated them, then she didn’t ever have to see him again.
And what if she loves them?
Christian smiled, spraying more cleaning fluid and doing his best to clean the graffiti. If his gift worked, then maybe Merry would speak to him again, and at least he’d have the chance to explain his situation to her. It was true that he had to return to the Philippines in the new year. There were certain things he had to take care of. But the truth was the business was doing just fine, there were a dozen people taking care of it right now, people he trusted, and if he wanted to he could move anywhere.
He could move right back here.
The thought filled him with panic, but also with a powerful sense of excitement. Maybe it was time for a change after all? Maybe it really was time to come home.
He used the cloth to erase the last few letters, then gave the wall a quick polish to make it as good as new. The writing on the wall here may have been gone, he just hoped that the writing wasn’t on the wall when it came to his future with Merry.
Putting the cloth and the bottle of spray back into his trolley, he stood up and stretched. His stomach was grumbling, because he hadn’t had time to stop for breakfast after leaving the flower shop. It was almost time for his break anyway, so he pushed his trolley toward the elevators, heading to the staff canteen.
What have you done? he asked himself as he went.
He hoped the answer was something good.
12
It felt a little bit like being at a job interview, and Merry was just as nervous.
“So, we’re going to need a clue,” said Alice. She was sitting on the opposite side of the table, with Trudy to her left and Jasmin to her right. All of them were staring intently at Merry, their elbows resting on the table and their chins resting in their hands. Merry laughed, picking up her sandwich and shaking her head.
“I’ve told you, it’s nothing,” she said, a blush creeping over her cheeks. “He’s nobody.”
“A ghost, then,” said Jasmin, taking a sip of coffee.
“No, he’s very much alive,” said Merry, and all of the girls sitting opposite her whistled.
“So he is somebody then,” said Alice.
“Yes, I mean no, I mean…” Merry took a bite of her lunch just so she could stop talking. The staff canteen was half empty—it had been for a few weeks now. It used to be heaving at lunch, with so many staff taking a break at the same time it was hard to get a seat. But most of the tables were empty, and the servers at the far end of the room looked bored out of their minds. Alice had chosen a table near the wall, close to the doors, so that nobody could hear their conversation.
“I think it’s the boss,” said Trudy. “Lewis Carroll himself. I think that’s why you can’t say anything.”
“Ew!” Merry said, almost choking on her sandwich. Alice’s laughter was so loud it echoed off the wall.
“That’s it!” she said. “That has to be it!”
“No!” said Merry, taking a sip of water. “That’s just wrong. He’s like a hundred years old.”
“So who, then?” Alice said. “Who would send you a bouquet of flowers like that? From Florisan’s, too, they’re expensive.”
“Come on,” said Jasmin. “I mean, you’re obviously going to bring him to the Christmas Ball, so you have to tell us who he is before then.”
Merry took a deep breath.
“Okay, I’m not going to tell you who,” she said. “But I’ll say what.”
The three women fell silent with anticipation, and Merry cast a quick look over her shoulder to make sure they were alone.
“So, the other day I was just standing at the door, greeting people, and this guy walks in. He’s… I mean, he’s amazing, he’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. Handsome, yes, but there’s something else, something that kind of… radiates from him, a goodness, a wholesomeness. I can’t explain it.”
Merry was blushing so hard she could toast marshmallows on her cheeks. Her three friends listened on, wide-eyed.
“I felt something for him, something I’ve never felt before. It’s like… Okay, this is going to sound really corny, but bear with me. It’s like, you know how when you’re a kid you make a Christmas wish, and Santa brings it to you. Every single wish is different, and he brings you exactly what you ask for.”
“Uh, Merry,” said Jasmin in a fake whisper. “I have news. Santa isn’t real.”
“No, I know,” said Merry. “But when you’re a kid you think it’s magic. It’s just your parents, they pick your presents, but in your heart, when you’re young, you know it’s something else, something incredible. That’s how it feels now, with him. I feel like he’s a perfect present for me and me alone. He’s my Christmas wish come true.”
“Wow,” said Alice. “So you’re dating?”
“That’s just it,” said Merry, losing her appetite and putting the sandwich back on her tray. “We’re not dating. We’re not anything. We can’t be together.”
“Why?” said Trudy through a mouthful of fries. “He sends you roses, and umbrellas, he’s the perfect man.”
“But he’s going away,” said Merry. “He’s leaving in a few weeks, he lives in Asia.”
“Oh,” said Alice, with a genuine expression of sympathy. “That sucks.”
Merry shrugged sadly.
“It does. I don’t even know how I feel about it. I’m still so angry with my ex. I can’t even remember what it’s like to trust somebody, or to be in love.”
“That’s easy,” said Alice. “How did you feel when you saw the flowers?”
“Sick,” said Merry. “Sick, and shaky, and like my head was about to explode, and happy, but sad, and sick. Did I say I felt sick?”
All three girls laughed.
“Whoa boy,” said Jasmin. “That’s love if ever I saw it.”
“No, it can’t be,” said Merry. “Because I only met him two days ago. It can’t be love.”
“Hey ladies!”
Everybody turned to see Diane walking across the room, a bottle of OJ in one hand and a wrapped sandwich in the other. She sat in the chair next to Merry, grinning.
“You would not believe the day I had yesterday,” Diane said, and Merry was infinitely grateful to the woman for taking the attention away from her. “Walker surprised me, he drove me up to Bear Mountain in his Porsche. He brought this picnic with him, and we had it by the river. It was so romantic, and he gave me this.”
She flashed the necklace she was wearing and the three women opposite Merry squealed again. It was a beautiful piece of Jewelry, woven strands of gold and silver with a teardrop shaped pendant. The diamond in the middle of it looked the size of Merry’s pinky nail.
“Oh wow,” said Jasmin. “That must have cost thousands.”
Diane held up both hands, all her slender fingers extended.
“Ten,” she said. “He told me. That’s the advantage of having a boyfriend who works on Wall Street.”
Diane turned to Merry, and the smile on her face was strangely cold.
“Speaking of which,” she said. “I saw the flowers upstairs. Have you told them who gave them to you?”
“She won’t tell,” said Alice, pouting. “The spoilsport.”
“Oh won’t she,” Diane said, her eyes glinting like sharpened steel. “Well I know who it is.”
“What?” said Merry. “How?”
“Because my cousin works in a bar down 5th Avenue,” Diane said. “And she saw you there two nights ago. She recognized you from the photos on my LifeWrite account. She wouldn’t have said anything, except she said you were with the most gorgeous man she had ever set eyes on.”
Merry’s cheeks were practically on fire.
“She said that nobody could take their eyes off him all night. She even took a photo, because she didn’t think I’d believe her.”
“Show us!” said Jasmin.
“I don’t need to,” said Diane. “Because he works here.”
“I knew it!” said Trudy. “It’s Lewis Carroll!”
“Ew,” said Diane. “No, not him. It’s—”
“Please,” said Merry. “I don’t want it to—”
“It’s one of the janitors,” said Diane, with a little laugh that made Merry’s blood run cold.
“A janitor?” said Alice, frowning. “What?”
“Surely not,” said Jasmin, her face wrinkling. “That’s just weird.”
Merry squirmed in her chair. She felt horribly uncomfortable and she wasn’t even sure why. So what if Christian was a janitor? That didn’t take anything away from his amazing personality, his kind soul, and his generous spirit. She didn’t care at all what he did for a living, in fact she admired a man who worked with his hands, who wasn’t ashamed to get a little dirty.
But something in the way her friends were staring at her made her feel ashamed, for a reason she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Diane had just told them all how her rich boyfriend had driven her out of the city for a romantic picnic before splashing out on a ridiculously expensive necklace. Alice was dating a lawyer, and Jasmin had just broken up with a partner in an architecture firm. Merry had heard countless stories of how they had been spoiled and pampered by their men, and the thought of them judging her on her choice of boyfriend made her feel about three inches tall.
Maybe that’s why she said it—nothing to do with how she herself felt about Christian and his career, and everything to do with how her friends felt about her.
“He’s not a janitor,” she said with a little laugh. She stared at the table and clenched her fists, hating herself for what she was about to say. “Why on earth would I date a janitor? He’s… it’s not who you think. He’s got a good job, he’s earning good money. He’s definitely not a smelly old janitor. No way.”
Everyone had fallen quiet, and Merry glanced up to see that nobody was looking at her. They were all staring to the side, their mouths open. Merry’s heart actually missed a beat, a wave of dread pouring over her.
Please, she begged, but even before she turned around she knew who she was going to see there.
Christian stood in the open canteen door, his trolley in front of him. He was pale, and his mouth was open as if he had been physically struck. He looked at Merry with glossy eyes, as if he couldn’t believe what he’d just heard. He shook his head, then he turned the trolley around and left the room.
“Oh no,” said Merry, pushing herself up so fast her chair toppled over behind her.
“He really is hot,” said Diane, still smiling.
“Merry, go get him,” said Alice, her expression one of deep sympathy. “Go now, before it’s too late.”
Merry ran through the door, calling Christian’s name and seeing his trolley abandoned next to the wall.
It was already too late. He had gone.
Christian pushed through the staff door so hard it slammed agai
nst the wall, almost splitting the plaster. He stormed down the corridor, his head spinning, his heart drumming. Behind him he heard Merry’s faint voice calling his name, but he didn’t turn back.
Her words had hurt. They’d pierced him like a blade and left a gaping wound. How wrong had he been about her? All this time he’d thought she was kind, and sincere, and honest, and understanding, but in reality she was just like everyone else he’d met since he’d been here. She was just like Amy, his ex. All she cared about was the money.
He walked back onto the store floor, losing himself amongst the shelves of microwaves and coffee machines, the sound of Underneath the Mistletoe doing nothing to brighten his mood. Merry’s words echoed in his head—he’s definitely not a smelly old janitor—and he felt his blood boil. He wasn’t even a janitor, but the fact was she had judged him based on the job she thought he had, she had belittled him, she had reduced him to a cliché, and that was unforgivable.
But it was a good thing. It made his life so much easier now. He could forget about Merry, forget about love. He would focus on the job at hand, find out what was going on in the store, and then get out of New York City before it did any more damage.
He heard the sound of a door behind him, and he peered between two microwaves to see Merry emerge onto the store floor. She was beside herself, sobbing openly and trying to conceal her tears with her hands. Seeing her so upset took the edge off Christian’s anger. He just couldn’t stay mad at her.
“Christian?” Merry called out, her voice shaken by the sobs. A few customers turned to watch her, some of them giggling to themselves. At this rate Merry was going to get herself fired, especially if Mrs. Cradley showed up. Christian took a breath, then walked out of the aisle and over to Merry. When she saw him coming her sobs doubled in strength.
“I’m so sorry,” she said. “I’m so, so sorry.”
My Christmas Billionaire Page 9
