Winter Wishes

by Fern Michaels

  I take the elevator to the lobby, tromp past the receptionist, and leave the sleek, jewel-box building that houses Oglethorpe & Larkin’s Philadelphia offices. I usually take the bus when I run errands for Roberta, but today I walk to the taxi stand on the corner and climb into the first yellow and black cab idling at the curb.

  “Bean to Sumatra and Back,” I say, slamming the door. “Twenty-Ninth and Oxford.”

  Roberta doesn’t do peasant coffee. I found that out the hard way when I brought her a Starbucks on my first day of work. She turned her head, raised her hand, and shooed away my offering as if it were an offensive goblet of swill. “Away, thou dost offend my refined sensibilities with such a rancid offering.” Her Majesty will only consume Kopi luwak coffee, an outrageously expensive Indonesian blend made using partially digested coffee cherries eaten and defecated by an Asian palm civet.

  You heard me. Roberta Pellett, Queen of the Adverts and Tormentor of Underlings, drinks espresso made from the turds of a beady-eyed rodent. Thirty-five dollars per cup, which, coincidentally, is the same amount I spend for a crate of Ichiban Ramen noodles at Costco. Ah, the plight of the little people!

  My phone vibrates in my pocket, letting me know I have just received a new text. It’s probably Roberta asking me to fetch a tin of Harrods Sweet Biscuits to go with her rat shit coffee. Maybe she wants me to fly world-renowned pastry chef Jimmy Leclerc in to make her a fluffy vanilla sponge with orange currant buttercream frosting or a tray of his Ladurée Vanilla Macaron.

  I pull my phone out of my pocket, look at my screen, and smile. The text is from my college roomie and good pal, Vivia.

  Did you know cold weather can cause depression and kill your sex drive? That explains why they call sexless people frigid.

  #ThingsThatMakeYouGoHmm

  I immediately respond:

  Preach. There’s nothing hot about thermal underwear, chapped lips, and red, runny noses.

  Send me some California sunshine before my libido enters permanent hibernation.

  Vivia texts me back:

  Ha! You mean Queen Roberta hasn’t commanded you to rearrange the heavens so the sun shines only on Oglethorpe & Larkin?

  I laugh out loud. The taxi driver looks at me through the rearview mirror and I shrug.

  “Funny text,” I explain.

  He nods his head. I go back to messaging Vivia.

  Guess what I am doing right now?

  Having sex with Colin Monaghan? Fight the cold, shag an Irishman.

  I snort and text back:

  I wish. 21 degrees with a wind chill of -6 and I am on an expedition to fetch Her Majesty’s coffee beans.

  She’s Shackletoning you. Brutal.

  Shackletoning? Is that some new slang?

  Vivia explains:

  Shackleton. Sir Ernest Shackleton, the dude who went on all of those polar expeditions. You’re bravely venturing into hostile environs in search of the Kopi luwak. Hopefully, your mission will turn out better than Shackleton’s.

  Didn’t he die on his last expedition?

  That’s what I am saying. GTG but wanted to tell you I read your latest Colin Monaghan fan fic.

  Good stuff. Keep writing.

  Thanks!

  I write fan fiction about Irish actor Colin James Monaghan (born May 1, 1982, in Dublin, Ireland, to Catriona and James Monaghan). I have been fan-girling over him ever since my freshman year in high school, when I went on a date with Camden Jeffries to see Kiosk. While the other girls in my class were sighing over Ben Affleck’s boyish charm and Josh Hartnett’s apple-pie grin, I was daydreaming about Colin’s unruly hair, expressive eyebrows, and bad-boy snarl.

  Some people—mostly ex-boyfriends—have suggested my feelings for Colin have made a detour from fangirl to obsessive simply because I write fan fic about his movies and RPF (real person fiction) about him.

  I disagree.

  Writing fan fic provides an outlet for my untapped creativity. It’s not like I am stretching my imagination fetching coffee and proofing copy written by other people. And yes, it also lets me indulge my passion for all things Colin.

  I used to operate a Colin Monaghan fan site, but market research shows that microblogging platforms like Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook are more popular. In other words, blogs and comprehensive Web sites require sustained attention. We’ve become information and stimulation junkies. We need a hit and we need it fast. Besides, managing a Web site and blog took too much of my time so I shut it down and opened a Tumblr account instead. Fecking Love Colin is the number one Colin Monaghan feed on Tumblr. My most popular post got 86,127 notes, which speaks more to the enduring appeal of the OOMA (object of my affection) than my mad Tumblr-posting skills.

  “Twenty-Ninth and Oxford,” the driver says, pulling to a stop in front of Bean to Sumatra and Back. “That’s twenty-six dollars and fifteen cents.”

  I hand him my company card. He slides it through his credit card machine and hands it back to me. I slip the card back into my pocket and climb out of the cab. The cold air bitch slaps my cheeks and knocks the breath from my lungs. I will never get used to living in such an abusive climate.

  The tinkling of bells and the warm earthy scent of coffee beans greets me when I push the door open and step into Sumatra.

  “Hey, Grace! Back so soon?”

  Yes. I am on a first name basis with the owner of a coffee store even though I don’t drink coffee. It’s just another one of the peculiarities of my life.

  “Hey, Rafi,” I say, climbing onto one of the stools and unwinding my scarf. “Roberta must have binged on the stash I hid for emergencies. She’s going through serious Kopi luwak withdrawals. Any way you can hook us up with a few bags of beans?”

  “Sorry,” he says, dispensing hot chocolate from a machine he keeps for children into a mug and spraying whip cream on top. “I’m out.”

  “No way!”

  “Way.” He puts the mug on the counter in front of me and sprinkles chocolate jimmies on top of the whip cream. “I am expecting a delivery anytime, if you want to hang.”

  “Sure.”

  The doorbells tinkle. A cluster of red-cheeked, camera-toting tourists hurry through the door, stomping the snow from their boots. Rafi excuses himself and greets the customers. I wrap my hands around the mug of chocolate and inhale the sweet-scented curls of steam. I drink my chocolate and work on my latest fan fic piece, a romantic, slightly dark tale loosely based on Colin’s movie, A Year Without Summer. It’s the same piece I was working on when Roberta surprised me, but the beauty of Google docs is I can work on my stories on any device and they’re never saved on Oglethorpe & Larkin’s servers.

  Forty minutes later and fully tanked up on creamy hot chocolate, I am armed with three bags of Roberta’s precious beans and huddled in the back of a taxi inching down Twenty-Ninth Street. An accident has brought traffic to a near standstill.

  I pull out my iPhone, open Google docs, and continue working on my Without Summer fan fic.

  . . . I kept my arms wrapped around his waist as his magnificent beast carried us over the slumbering city to an abandoned warehouse beside Grand Central station. He vaulted off the horse and reached up to help me down, his strong, unfamiliar hands lifting me from the back of the beast. Hand in hand, we moved through the darkened warehouse, climbing the stairs to the place he called home. And it was there, in his lookout above the city, that he made good on his promise to steal my . . .

  “We’re here, miss,” the cab driver says, startling me. “Oglethorpe and Larkin building, right?”

  I look out the window at the steel and glass building towering into the clouds and nod my head, still lost in the dreamlike world of my creation, the world where a burglar (played by Colin Monaghan) seduces me. I pay the driver, grab the Bean to Sumatra and Back bag, and jump out of the cab.

  Continuing to type, I walk into the lobby, step onto the elevator, and jab the button for the sixteenth floor.

  . . . innocence. He removed my pelisse, dr
opped it on the floor, and lifted me in his arms, staring deep into my eyes as he carried me to his bed.

  “Do not worry, my beauty,” he says, brushing my hair off my cheek. “Nothing will happen between us that is not meant to be.”

  The elevator dings and the doors slide open. I step out, my fingers flying over the screen. I keep typing as I walk back to my cubby.

  . . . he stands over the bed, staring at my naked body with his strange, ageless gaze. I hear the steady, urgent rumbling of a train approaching, feel the vibrations in my bones. Golden light from the train’s headlamp fills the warehouse. The light illuminates him—his sleek black hair, the sharp angles of his handsome face, his broad . . .

  It takes me a moment to realize I am hearing the words as I am typing. Not in my head. Out loud. I look up from my phone and my heart plunges to my Caribou boots.

  “Don’t leave us in suspense,” Roberta says, smiling tightly. “Does the Irish rogue steal her innocence?”

  She is sitting at my computer with several of my coworkers clustered around her, including Kale, the guy I’ve sorta been seeing. He looks at me and his lip curls up like he’s just gotten a whiff of rancid milk.

  It’s then I realize I left my Google doc open on my computer. That means everything I typed into my iPhone was instantaneously synched with the document on the screen. Roberta has been reading my story aloud, word for word, as I was typing it.

  A wave of bile rises in my throat. I think I am going to be sick. I drop the bag of coffee beans and slap my hand over my mouth. Tears fill my eyes and blur my vision.

  Roberta claps her hands.

  “Let’s go, minions,” she says. “We’ve all had a good laugh, but now it’s time to get back to work.”

  My fellow minions scramble back to their cubbies, a few of them smiling sympathetically or mumbling a “sorry” as they pass. Kale brushes by me without a backward glance.

  “Grace,” Roberta says, turning on her heel and stalking back into her office. “A word.”

  My feet feel as if they are sunk in concrete. Each step is an effort. Somehow I make it into Roberta’s office, shut the door, and sink down onto the chair opposite her desk.

  “I am not your therapist, so I’m not going to analyze what that sad psychodrama means,” she says, leaning back in her chair and forming a steeple with her fingers. “However, I am your superior, and your misuse of company time and equipment leave me no choice but to discipline you.”

  I blink, still lost in the haze of the nightmare.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “What don’t you understand, Grace? You were attending to private business on company time and corporate policy as dictated by Human Resources requires I draft a formal letter of discipline and suspend you for an appropriate duration.”

  “Private business?” I say, blinking back fresh tears. “I was getting your coffee.”

  She narrows her gaze.

  “Are you blaming this on me?”

  “What?” I shake my head to clear the fog. “What do you mean? I don’t even know what ‘this’ is.”

  “Look,” she says. “Perhaps you were writing your little romance while running an errand for me, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that one of our clients could have walked by your station and read the words popping up on your screen. Do you know how humiliating that would have been for me?”

  This is a joke, right? Roberta is joking. I humiliated her? The rat shit coffee has finally gone to her brain. She’s probably contracted some rare brain-eating disease from the partially digested coffee cherries. It’s the only explanation.

  “Do you want to be here, Grace?”

  “Of course.”

  She narrows her gaze. “Are you certain?”

  “Working at Oglethorpe and Larkin is the culmination of seven years of sacrifice, commitment, study, and debt.”

  “That still didn’t answer my question.” Roberta cracks a smile, but it’s one of those creepy smiles that usually come just before the butcher knife is plunged into the unwitting victim. “It’s not uncommon for postgrads to experience career disillusionment. You’ve finally achieved everything you worked so hard for, but is it what you had hoped?”

  I am in crazy debt. I spend my days fetching coffee for a tyrant and my nights eating ramen noodles. I thought I would be writing CLIO Award–winning commercials and landing major accounts. Of course my life post college isn’t what I had hoped. Not that Roberta of the thirty-five dollars per cup coffee habit could possibly understand my frustrations.

  “Your silence speaks volumes,” she says. “I am not going to draft a formal letter of reprimand, but I am placing you on three-week unpaid administrative leave. I would like you to take the time to think seriously about your future. I will see you after the holidays and you can tell me if you wish to remain part of the Oglethorpe and Larkin team.”

  “That’s not—”

  “You’re dismissed.”

  I stand and walk to the door.

  “And, Grace?” I turn back around and look at my boss. “Have a merry Christmas.”

  Chapter Two

  ELEVEN LUNATICS

  I am hypnotically staring at the blinking lights on my sad Charlie Brown Christmas tree and trying to swallow a mouthful of Schweddy Balls when my phone rings.

  A few Christmases ago, Ben & Jerry’s released a limited edition flavor called Schweddy Balls, vanilla ice cream, malted milk balls, and rum-flavored fudge. After Roberta’s harsh treatment, I decided to make my own version of Schweddy Balls by mixing rum, hot fudge, vanilla ice cream, and malted milk balls in my blender. I might have added more rum than Ben and Jerry added to their holiday flavor.

  My phone stops ringing.

  I know how this looks. I am hosting a pity party for one, right? Well, if your father abandoned you when you were eight and your mother was too absorbed in her own bitterness to recognize her rising level of toxicity, and you worked such crazy long hours that you barely had time to nurture a relationship with your house plant, let alone a steady boyfriend, and your boss humiliated and suspended you three weeks before Christmas, you’d slurp down some Schweddy Balls and host a pity party for one, too.

  My life is just like the final, romantic scene from Bridget Jones’s Diary only without the diary and the friends and the weekend in Paris . . . and Mark Darcy. Basically, my life is the pathetic beginning of that scene.

  My phone rings again. I flip it over.

  “Hey, Viv.”

  “Hey, girlfriend.” Vivia’s voice sounds unnaturally subdued. “What are you doing?”

  “Sitting in my jammies, drinking Schweddy Balls, and watching the needles fall off the branches of my Christmas tree.”

  Vivia whistles. “Schweddy Balls? It’s only . . . three o’clock there. Things must be bad.”

  “Horrible.”

  “I take it you saw the post?”

  “What post?”

  “What post?” Vivia cries. “Wait. Why are you home in the middle of the day?”

  I tell her about returning from the coffee run to find Roberta reading my Colin Monaghan fan fic aloud to my coworkers.

  “OhmyfreakingGod! That so did not happen.”

  “It so did.”

  “Did she fire you?”

  “Suspended without pay for three weeks.”

  “Oh, Grace,” Vivia coos. “I am so sorry.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Roberta sits on her Oglethorpe and Larkin throne declaring, ‘Let them drink coffee.’ But powdered heads always roll when royalty ignores the needs of the little people. Roberta’s day is coming . . . and we will have front row seats at the scaffold, girlfriend.”

  Vivia’s loyalty acts like a jackhammer to the dam holding back my tears.

  “Go on, girl,” she whispers. “Have a good cry and then take a ginormous swig of your drink. Have I told you how absolutely genius I think it is that you combined Ben and Jerr y’s with booze? Flannel jammies, sappy chick flicks, Ben and Jerr
y’s, and booze. Those are my go-tos whenever I am suffering from a broken heart. I just never thought to combine them all at once.”

  I am about to tell Vivia that I am not suffering from a broken heart when I remember her comment about a post and I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach—a sick feeling that’s definitely not from the ice cream and rum.

  “You said something about a post,” I say, walking over to my desk and waking my computer from sleep mode. “What post? What are you talking about?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Vivia!”

  “Seriously, Gem,” she says, calling me by the pet name she gave me when she found out my initials. “Now might not be a good time to get into it. Just promise me you will stay off social media for the night, ’kay?”

  My computer monitor flickers on and I slide my mouse over the pad until the pointer is on the Facebook tab. I click it and hold my breath.

  “You’re going on Facebook now, aren’t you?” she asks.

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t do it,” she warns. “Step away from the computer, Grace. Just turn off the monitor and step away from the computer. Have another drink instead. I know, read me some of your Colin fan fic.”

  If Vivia is asking me to read her fan fic, I know whatever she is trying to keep me from seeing must be wicked bad. Vivia has never said anything negative about my writing, but I know it’s not her thing.

  The Facebook home page comes up on my screen. I type my log-in information and password into the boxes and wait.

  “Jesus, Mary, and Jojo singing ‘Leave,’” Vivia says. “You’re doing it, aren’t you? You’re signing on to Facebook.”

  I chuckle. Vivia has a penchant for dramatics. It’s one of the things I love about her.