Holiday Healing

by Erica Lee

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  A few days after my Santa debut, Layla and I woke up early to begin our day of watching Christmas movies with nana Harvey. When nana Harvey walked into the kitchen while we were eating breakfast, she had an apologetic look on her face.

  “Adrienne I hate to ask you this when we had the day planned out, but Missy from the diner just called. She is sick and can’t go into work today. Any chance that you could go in and work the cash register for me today?”

  “That’s no problem at all,” I lied and hoped that I sounded convincing. It was the first time ever that nana Harvey had asked me to work that I truly didn’t want to. I normally loved working in all of the different businesses around town, but I was dreading the fact that I would have to miss out on a whole day with Layla.

  To my surprise Layla turned to nana Harvey and questioned, “Would you mind if I went to the diner today too nana? I could just hang around to make sure everything runs smoothly and that the patrons are happy.”

  A wide smile spread across nana Harvey’s face. She must have been excited about Layla volunteering to do some work at one of the family businesses after all this time. “That sounds like a wonderful idea! You two head upstairs and get ready quickly, then the three of us will head to the diner.”

  Within 15 minutes, we were heading to the diner. As soon as we arrived, I immediately took my spot at the cash register. In between swiping credit cards and giving people change, I watched Layla work around the diner. She started by talking with all of the employees, one at a time, to check how things were running and if there was anything she could do for them. Then she stopped at each table and spoke to the customers, asking how their food was and reassuring that they were happy with the service they were receiving. Most people knew who she was, so they asked her about her life and how everything was going in LA. She kept a bright smile on her face with every person she talked to and threw her head back in laughter when they said anything that had even a semblance of humor to it. She was a natural at running a business and seemed to really be in her element working at the store.

  Spending the day swooning over her management skills made the hours pass by quickly and before I knew it we were closing up the diner. I walked over to where nana Harvey and Layla were standing and nana put her arms around both of us.

  “You girls worked hard today. Why don’t you go have a seat in one of the booths and I’ll prepare some food for us in the back?”

  We quickly agreed and took a seat in one of the booths near the back of the diner. Layla smiled across the table at me. “Sorry we didn’t get to watch Christmas movies today,” she apologized.

  I shook my head. “It’s no problem at all. I can watch Christmas movies anytime. It’s not every day that I get to watch you work your magic.”

  She raised an inquisitive eyebrow at me, so I continued. “It was fun watching you run the diner today. You are really really good at it.”

  Layla smiled bigger than I had ever seen her smile before, which is saying a lot since that girl always had a smile plastered to her face. “Really? Thank you. That means alot to me. It felt great to be working here again. It just felt right. I love the problem solving and customer service that comes along with running a business. There is no better feeling than figuring out the perfect way to run a place and watching your hard work come together.”

  I loved the way her face lit up when she talked about this. “Maybe you should try to find a job in management or something similar. You are clearly very passionate about it.”

  The wide smile on her face got a little smaller after this comment. She shrugged her shoulders. “That’s a little hard to do in LA with no college degree. Interviewers don’t really care about how much experience you had working some mom and pop shops back home if you don’t have a business degree to back it up. I probably have more experience than 95% of the people they are hiring, but without a college education, I’m never getting a job like that in LA.”

  Then come back here and do it I wanted to scream at her. Stay here with me. Work your dream job. Just don’t leave me. Of course, I didn’t say any of that because that would have just made me sound like a crazy person. She didn’t have to know that her nana’s weird live-in employee had fallen head over heels for her in a matter of weeks.

  “You could always go to college,” I suggested. “It’s never too late to do that.”

  She made a face and scrunched up her nose, like the mere suggestion was enough to make her sick. “It’s a possibility. Definitely something to think about, but I don’t know. I’ll just see where life takes me.”

  I couldn’t help but smile and roll my eyes at her nonchalant response. “You know, it is ok to plan every once in awhile.”

  She shook her head furiously. “No. Planning just leads to heartbreak. You plan stuff, it doesn’t work out, and then you’re disappointed. No planning means no disappointment.”

  When I first met her, this response probably would have annoyed me. But now that I knew about her past, it made sense. She probably had so many plans that involved her parents that had been torn away from her. I know I did and it didn’t sound like I was even nearly as close to my parents as she was to hers. I still wished there was something I could say to make her feel differently though. She had helped me so much over the last few weeks and I wanted to be able to help her in return.

  Before I could think of what else to say, nana Harvey showed up at the booth with burgers, fries, and milkshakes for all of us. We spent the rest of the night talking and laughing together, but the whole time I found myself hoping and wishing that I was at least making a small impact on Layla’s life.

  Chapter 15: Layla

  I was woken up to the sound of my alarm going off at 8:30. I couldn’t believe that I had actually become the type of person who would set an alarm for such an early time on a Sunday, but it was Christmas Eve which meant I only had a day and a half left at home. That meant just a little over 24 hours left with Adrienne. Of course the thought of leaving nana was also tearing me apart, but I knew that she would call me almost every day and come to visit at least twice over the next year. But I didn’t know what would happen with Adrienne. Would she forget about me once I’m gone? I felt like we had gotten really close over the past month, but I didn’t truly know how she felt about everything. All I know is that she changed my life more than she will ever understand. She showed me that it is ok to feel and that I don’t always have to run away when things get hard. Although, I’m honestly not sure what to do with that information.

  It wasn’t worth thinking about now though. The next day and a half had to be spent spending quality time with Adrienne and nana. When I walked into the kitchen, I found that the two of them were already awake. Of course. Even when I wake up hours early, I would still never be on their level. When they saw me walk in, they both had shocked looks on their faces.

  “Whoa. To what do we owe the pleasure of your company this early, your majesty?” Adrienne joked. I rolled my eyes at her, then went to make myself some coffee.

  “Sorry we didn’t make you any,” Adrienne apologized. “We thought we had a few hours at least.”

  I smiled over at her while my coffee brewed. “Nope. I thought you guys would want to be graced with my presence as much as possible since I’ll be leaving you soon.”

  Nana stood up and wrapped me in her arms. “Of course we do sweetheart.”

  I tried to look past her at Adrienne and for a second, I thought I saw a look of sadness pass over her face. But when I looked again she was smiling over at me and shaking her head.

  “So, what’s on the agenda today?” I asked.

  Nana pointed to the ingredients sitting on the kitchen counter. “Well, most of the day is going to be spent making cookies for church and then tonight is obviously the Christmas Eve service followed by the Christmas Eve Ball at church.”

  Of course. The Christmas Eve Ball. I had almost forgotten about that. Every year our church hoste
d a formal Ball after the Christmas Eve church service. It was a way for the whole congregation to celebrate together, while raising money for a chosen charity. Nana had clearly missed it every year she was visiting me, but I should have known there was no way she would miss it if she was home.

  The rest of the morning and part of the afternoon were spent making Christmas cookies. Adrienne was making hers from scratch, while I was taking cookie dough from the store and rolling it into balls. At one point, I snuck up behind Adrienne to see what she was making.

  “And what do we have here?” I asked while peeking over her shoulder.

  She smiled back at me. “I’m making peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. I’m just about ready to roll them into balls and throw them in the oven. Want to try some of the dough?”

  I nodded my head, so she turned around and brought the spoon to my mouth. I savored the amazing taste of peanut butter mixed with chocolate chips.

  “This is amazing. But do you know what would make it even better?”

  She gave me a skeptical look, so I took that as my sign to continue. “Just a dash of cinnamon. It would be perfect.”

  Adrienne’s face went serious and she shook her head. “I don’t think cinnamon would mix well with the other ingredients. Plus, how much is a dash? Do you mean a teaspoon? A cup?”

  I shook my head with a big smile on my face. “Nope. I mean a dash.” Before she could react, I scooped a handful of cinnamon into each hand and threw it into her cookie dough mix. “See. A dash.”

  Adrienne turned around to look at me and her face was red with anger. I gave her my best “oops” smile and her face softened. She smiled at me then turned around to mix the batter.

  “You better hope this is good or else you’re dead meat.”

  “Well, it looks like we better test it out.”

  Adrienne brought the mixing spoon up between us and we each took a bite from the opposite side. I found myself wishing the spoon wasn’t there and that my lips could be on hers instead. No. These were crazy thoughts that I needed to stop from coming to my head. As soon as I took a bite of the cookie dough, I realized this was the second best thing I could be doing with my mouth right now. The cinnamon had made them even better. I breathed a sigh of relief, then looked to Adrienne to hear her thoughts. Her eyes went wide.

  “Oh my gosh! This is amazing! I never would have guessed that cinnamon would mix well with the other ingredients.”

  Before I could open my mouth to answer, nana swooped in and put her arms around both of us. “Oh yes my dears. Sometimes things that don’t seem like they would go together at all are actually perfect together. You just have to give it a try.”

  That was weird. It almost felt like my nana was referring to Adrienne and I. No, now I was just overthinking things. Just because my mind is always stuck on Adrienne doesn’t mean that everyone else’s is too.

  We finished putting the last of the cookies into the oven, then headed upstairs to start getting ready for the night.

  Church started at 7, so I decided to be ready ahead of time to surprise everyone and got downstairs at 6:30. I was the one who was surprised when I realized that I had beat Adrienne. I looked up when I heard the sound of high heels on nana’s wooden staircase and what I saw took my breath away. Adrienne was wearing a green dress that fell right below her knees, which went pretty perfectly with my red dress that fell just above my knees. We couldn’t have coordinated our outfits better if we were a couple who had planned them out. But we weren’t a couple and I needed to stop thinking like that. For now, my only focus was on the girl walking down the stairs. Adrienne’s hair was down and she had put little curls in it. She must have been wearing contact lenses because she didn’t have her glasses on. When she wasn’t hiding behind her glasses and button up sweaters, it was even more obvious just how gorgeous she was. Although, at this point, I had grown very fond of her everyday look.

  When she was in front of me, I tried to find the right words. “Adrienne. Wow. That dress.”

  Ok that wasn’t exactly the suave words I was going for, but Adrienne didn’t seem to mind as she gave me a shy smile.

  “Do you like it? Nana helped me pick it out.”

  I figured the goofy grin on my face had to be giving away just how much I liked it. “Adrienne, I love it. It’s perfect. You look beautiful.”

  I did a twirl then looked back at her. “What about mine? Did nana do a good job helping me pick out this one as well?”

  She looked me up and down in a way that made my whole body heat up. “Yes. You’re absolutely glowing Layla. You look amazing.”

  Throughout church, all I could think about was Adrienne. I know I should have been thinking about Jesus since it’s almost His birthday, but I was too enchanted with the girl sitting next to me to be focused on anything else. Luckily, once the service ended, I became focused on dancing instead. I had everyone on the dance floor with me from newborns to the oldest member of the congregation, Mr. Mendez. Well, almost everyone. Adrienne was sitting down just watching the whole scene take place.

  I decided it was my mission to get her on the dance floor. When our eyes met, I pointed to her and then motioned for her to join me. When that didn’t work, I pulled the whole dancing lasso trick, where I threw an imaginary lasso at her and tried to pull her in. She laughed and shook her head, so I danced my way over to where she was sitting. I held my hand out to her and she just stared at me with her arms crossed.

  “You might not realize this, but I’m actually a lot like my nana. I’m not going to take no for an answer, so you might as well just save us both the trouble and come out on the dance floor with me.”

  I raised an eyebrow at her and she sighed loudly, then took my hand. When we made our way onto the dance floor, I danced circles around her while she mostly just bobbed up and down in one place. Only a few minutes after getting her onto the dance floor, “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” started playing. We both stopped dancing and awkwardly stared at each other for a few seconds.

  To my surprise, Adrienne smile and reached her hand out to me. “May I have this dance?”

  We melted into each other’s arms and I quickly forgot about everything around us. I laid my head on Adrienne’s shoulder and took in her scent. I wanted to remember every little piece of her after I left. Except, there was a growing part of me that felt like maybe I shouldn’t leave. What was I really going back to in LA? Was it worth it for what I would be leaving behind?

  I picked my head up and looked into Adrienne’s eyes. “Is there any reason you can think of for me to not go back to LA tomorrow?”

  Adrienne looked surprised by my question and seemed to be considering how to answer it. She opened and closed her mouth a few times before words actually came out. “What are you asking Layla? Are you thinking about staying? Do YOU have a reason to stay?”

  I shrugged my shoulders. What was I supposed to say? My reason is you. I’ve only known you for a month, but you have still changed my entire life and I can’t imagine leaving you now. I couldn’t admit that. That would mean opening myself up to pain if she didn’t feel the same way. I had worked so hard to keep myself from hurting these past 10 years, I couldn’t imagine doing something that could leave me completely heartbroken.

  “I guess I don’t have a specific reason. It just came to me and I thought ‘why not?’ Maybe I could give it another try. Maybe the memories won’t make me as sad anymore.”

  Adrienne made a face that I couldn’t read. It was almost a mixture of sadness and questioning. “I think you should go.” She hesitated then added, “If you can’t think of a good reason to stay, I think you should go. You need to start making decisions that are good for you, not just ones that seem like a good idea at the time.”

  I felt like the wind had been knocked out of me. If I was trying to save myself from heartbreak by not being honest then it wasn’t working because in that moment I felt like my heart had split into a million pieces. It was hard to believe that such
strong feelings could be one sided, but I guess that’s just how life works sometimes.

  I tried to smile at her so she couldn’t see how much her response was hurting me. “Well, you’ll at least drive me to the airport right? That way we can get a little more time together.”

  Adrienne looked away and I could have sworn that I saw a tear rolling down her cheek. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. I asked nana Harvey if she could have someone else drive you. It would just be way too hard for me to say...I mean...it would be hard to travel on Christmas.”

  I tried my best to mask my rising disappointment. “Well then. It looks like we better enjoy the time we have left!” I twirled her in a circle, then brought her back into my arms. Even if she didn’t feel the same way, I wasn’t going to pass up the opportunity of feeling her close to me.

  Chapter 16: Adrienne

  I thought I would feel more excited about waking up on Christmas. Granted, I hadn’t felt excitement on Christmas morning since everything had happened with my parents, but I really thought this year would be different. Things had been going so well until last night. Dancing with Layla last night had been magical, but the moment was ruined by talking about her leaving. For a minute, I thought maybe she was truly thinking about staying. Except when I asked her why she would stay, she told me that she didn’t have a good reason. It was just another one of her whims. That hurt more than I expected it to. I didn’t want her to stay on a whim. I wanted her to stay because the thought of being without me tears her up inside. I know that’s how I feel. It felt wrong to tell her that she should leave, but I wasn’t sure what else I was supposed to say. She had opened up to me about how sad it made her living here after her parents were gone. I didn’t want her to stay just because she was caught up in the christmas spirit and realize that once all the decorations went away it was still the same hometown that carried so many sad memories.