A Christmas Delight

25. Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-five

Maisie

A ndy is back tonight and has decided to help us despite Nina telling him to go and enjoy the fair. These two are killing me. I can’t believe nothing happened between them with Andy sleeping at Nina’s place. Nina seemed so sure that Andy didn’t see her that way. Does she see him that way? I thought she did, but I might have been wrong.

A splashing sound makes me whirl around. The crowd seems agitated around the Catch a Duck station, little kids giggling and running to catch rubber ducks rolling in the snow.

“What the hell is happening over there?” Andy asks.

The crowd parts, and I see Joel standing there, and Finn struggling to push himself out of the duck pool. “Um, can you guys take over?”

Nina looks in the same direction as me, and recognition lights her face as she sees Joel. “Yeah. Go ahead and report back. I want the tea.”

I trot over to where Joel is standing. As I get there, Finn finally gets to his feet, his jeans dripping.

“You’re a psycho, you know that?” he yells at Joel.

“What’s happening?” I ask, and both men turn to me. I nearly flinch at Joel’s dark look.

“Ask him,” Finn says. He picks up a stuffed penguin from the snow and pushes it against my chest. “Here. The one you wanted.” Then he stomps off under the gaze of the people around us.

I look at the penguin, confused. I didn’t want this. I didn’t want anything. “Did you push him?” I ask Joel.

“Did you hug him?” His gaze is pinning me to the ground.

“What?”

“You did, didn’t you?”

“No.” It occurs to me that I did, even though I didn’t want to. “Well, not really. He hugged me. It kinda took me by surprise.”

Joel scoffs. “Oh, is that right? What about asking to hang out with him? What about the penguin? Did that surprise you too?”

I stammer over my words, caught by surprise. What does he mean, asking to hang out? I didn’t ask anything. “Listen, he just apologized for being a jerk and said we should stay friendly since we’re bound to run into each other—”

“And you said yes because you just say yes to everything everyone asks you to do.”

My words catch in my throat. Catherine’s words flash back to me. Be careful around that man. He’s very jealous. And he’s got quite a temper.

I brushed off her words at first, but now that I think about it, Joel is jealous. He felt threatened by Andy, and I had to reassure him.

I look around, realizing that everyone can hear and see us. Joel is at the center of the gossip after the stunt he just pulled. “Why don’t we go somewhere more private and talk calmly—”

“I just can’t believe you’d want to be friends—or more—with him after the way he treated you.”

“Or more? There’s no ‘or more.’ What’s gotten into you?”

“Why are you lying?”

My teeth clench as my throat tightens. “Really, you wanna talk about lying? Great, let’s do that. Why didn’t you tell me that Catherine was in town?”

I can see the punch of my words on his face.

“Yeah, she paid me a little visit,” I say. “I knew you were off these past few days, but you kept swearing everything was fine. Why couldn’t you tell me? It’s not such a big deal, is it?”

He shakes his head, trying to find his words, but nothing comes out of his mouth.

“Unless it is a big deal. So, what? You saw her and you realized that you still loved her?”

“This has nothing to do with Catherine—”

“Oh, be freaking for real! Your ex is here, and now you’re all messed up. And because you can’t admit it, you decided to throw a tantrum about me and Finn so you could put the blame on me. On him. The problem comes from you, Joel.” My voice is rising, and everyone is staring but I can’t stop. “Your jealousy and your trust issues come from you, not me.”

Joel lets out a drawn-out sigh, shooting me an icy look. “If you’d rather be with him, you could just say that, and we can end it there.”

My teeth clench, my heart slamming my chest. “I don’t want to be with him, but you’re right, we should end it there. Why would I want to date a controlling man with abandonment issues? Your red flags are showing, Joel.”

A flash of hurt flashes through his eyes, but it’s gone in a second. Now he looks at me, slowly shaking his head as though I’m his biggest disappointment. “That’s on me, really. I knew I didn’t want a relationship. But I thought for a moment that you were different. I was wrong.”

Tears blur my vision and roll down my cheeks. Words swirl in my head, fighting to make it out of my mouth, but if I say something else, it’s going to be something mean, filled with poison. I’m wasting my breath and my energy arguing with him. He won’t hear me, and I spent too much time in my life trying to convince people that I was worthy of love. Worthy to be respected and listened to. If Joel can’t see that, there is nothing I can do about it.

It feels like an eternity until I can finally force my body out of its paralysis. I drop the stupid penguin that I never wanted and sidestep Joel. He doesn’t turn to me as I walk in the direction of my booth.

I hesitate for a moment, maybe wait for him to look at me, to chase me down and apologize, to tell me that he didn’t mean any of it. But nothing happens. We’re both stuck, our backs to each other, until he starts walking away. I go the opposite direction and break down crying by the time I reach Nina and Andy.