Mistlefoe: SPORTY Christmas by Mari Loyal

Author:Mari Loyal [Loyal, Mari]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-10-24T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 17

CONOR

Something’s not right, and it’s not just because I can’t get this damn felt wrapped around a baseball properly. Who came up with this garbage idea?

Ah, right. Us.

Sierra and I sit in my living room, or the disaster zone it has become. The coffee table between us is piled high with felt sheets in festive colors that we cut out to the size we need to wrap the baseballs with.

She makes a lot quicker work of it than me, just dropping a baseball in the middle of a felt square, gathering up the corners, and wrapping them with twine. Then she glues a strip of golden felt around the mess to make it look like the top of a Christmas tree ornament and you know what? It looks damn near perfect, whereas my creations look like a drunk kindergartner tried crafts for the first time.

But that’s not the issue, I’ll get the hang of it eventually. What’s making a bead of sweat form on my forehead is Sierra.

It’s like she’s avoiding me, which is hard to do when she’s at my house and there’s literally no one else in a three mile radius.

“Hey, Sierra.”

She flinches.

What the hell? Was my voice too loud?

I lower it to ask, “Can you please slow down for a second? I need to see it again.”

She sighs, but starts from scratch slower. Snap, that’s the part I was missing. I was just gathering up the felt corners and tying them, but she makes a quick twirl that really brings the felt together at the top. That trick I can definitely adopt. I can’t mimmic the deftness of her smaller hands for this kinda stuff, though.

“Cool, thanks.” I better pick up because she has a much bigger completed pile than I have.

For a while, the only sounds are the crackling fire consuming the logs in the fireplace, and the rustling of felt against our hands. I keep checking on her from the corner of my good eye, but she’s so focused on what she’s doing that it’s almost like I’m not here at all. A little wrinkle appears between her eyebrows as she concentrates on tying up the twine. She bites the corner of her lip ever so slightly as she works and I have the most feral urge to lean over the coffee table and bite it for her.

I should’ve kissed her earlier in the elevator. The problem is, I was deathly afraid of my face not hiding consequences from our coworkers.

Focus on your baseballs, asshole, I say to myself.

“How many of these are we making?” I ask when I can’t stand myself any longer.

Sierra hums from deep in her throat and I don’t know why suddenly that sound makes me boneless. I have to make a conscious effort to keep sitting upright.

“I’d say we should fill that whole box. With use, the felt will start peeling off and making the balls too hard to latch onto the velcro tree.”

“Makes sense. We do want people to win sometimes for it to be fun.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.