Christmas As We Know It by Sarah Sutton

Author:Sarah Sutton [Sutton, Sarah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Golden Crown Publishing, LLC
Published: 2021-12-01T00:00:00+00:00

White-knuckled, I drove Mom’s station wagon to the school a little after three, but by then, the snowplows had done decent damage on the roads. Judging by the sky, the plow’s job wouldn’t last long if the gray clouds covering the sky had anything to say about it.

It wasn’t often I got access to the station wagon. Usually, Mom needed it for work, and if Jason didn’t have access to his dad’s SUV, either Taylor or Mateo could drive me somewhere. When Lexie got her learner’s permit and eventually her own license, the opportunities for me to use the station wagon would decrease, so I needed to use it while I could.

Though there was a snow day today, I turned into the parking lot of Hillhurst High.

With four more days until Christmas, until the Winter Festival officially began, every adult was working overtime. There were several cars in the lot, and even from the brief glance I got, the football field was littered with moving bodies. Not quite the normal volunteer numbers, but enough to get work done.

Pulling on my mittens, I shoved out into the cold.

This was the year I got to volunteer; I wasn’t missing a single day. Taylor and Mateo had stayed home—“Why would I go to school on a day off?” Taylor had demanded—but I couldn’t.

“Mimi!” Bentley’s voice cut through the static in my mind as I stepped onto the football field, and he walked around a stack of boxes, grinning. His nose was red, matching his cheeks, hinting he’d been out in the cold for quite a while. He looked cute, almost like an elf. “You made it. You didn’t have to come, you know.”

“I wanted to,” I assured him as a volunteer passed between us, unable to fight a smile. All the nerves from last night had fallen away, where I was afraid to linger in his car for too long. I stared at his mouth now, at his easy grin, a spark lighting in my stomach. “How long have you been here?”

“Ugh. Hours. I almost wish school had been in session.” He gave a short laugh, though it wasn’t as jam-packed with humor as normal. “Is it just you? Is Jason coming?”

Jason. I thought about my cell phone, which I’d left in the car's glovebox. I was too afraid to text him back, too afraid to face my thoughts from last night head-on. “Just me.”

“Well, we need the extra hands, so ‘just you’ is perfect.” Bentley came up alongside me and pressed his hand on the back of my Christmas coat. My pulse skipped happily in response. See, despite your brain malfunctioning last night with Jason, these flutters are totally for Bentley. Good. “Mom will probably jump for joy at the sight of you.”

“A lot’s happened since yesterday,” I mused, taking it all in. Everything had a fine layer of snow dusting over it from the fresh sprinkling. Someone had come through and shoveled a path down all the aisles of picnic tables and set up tents, shoving the snow off to the side.

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