Snowed in for Christmas

Chapter 21

Chapter Twenty-One

Benjamin

JETT’S KISS LINGERS ON my lips long after he leaves my room. I touch my own mouth, scared to wipe that kiss away, but desperate to cling to it in whatever way I can. I won’t forget the feel of his mouth, I promise myself. No matter what diverging paths our lives set us on, I’ll remember him. I’ll remember this.

I glance at my bag. The bird he whittled for me lies tucked under my clothing. I hid it during the scramble this morning, terrified of my dad seeing it, but it’s like I can see it through my T-shirts and sweatpants.

I want you to have it. I want you to … to remember this.

“I will,” I say softly. He can’t hear me, and I can never tell him to his face, but I’ll keep our promise regardless. Even when we leave this place, even when we’re students living in our separate dorm rooms, even when we’re polar opposites who are supposed to hate each other, I’ll always remember the time we shared here. And when I graduate and move on with life, I’ll take that little bird with me. No matter where I end up or who I end up with, I’ll keep that piece of my life with me forever. It’s hard to imagine anyone but him beside me, but it’ll probably happen some day. We’ll graduate. We’ll move on. We might even move to different states. Who knows where my research could take me? As the ache fades, new people will fill those holes in our hearts. That’s the way life goes. But he’ll always be my first, and I’ll always remember him.

I turn away, fighting down a rush of emotion as my imagination conjures up someone else taking his spot in my bed. It’s hard to fathom sleeping on someone else’s chest, having a different man’s arm around my waist, tasting a stranger’s kiss. The men in my imagination are faceless, shadowy figures, more figment than tangible human.

I shake my head, staring down at my feet as I take several deep breaths. Jett’s feet pad down the stairs. If I delay too long, everyone will wonder where I am. I have no choice but to put myself together and join the rest of the family.

Is that what we’ll be some day? If our parents continue dating, will this indiscretion go from a gray area to something far worse? What if my feelings don’t fade like they’re supposed to? What if my dad marries Charlotte and I still feel this way about Jett the whole time?

I shudder, but at least the fear gets me moving. I leave my room, which I’ve only slept in about half the time I’ve been here, and head downstairs. Everyone is in the living room, but I detour to the kitchen, getting myself a glass of water and ignoring the hot chocolate sitting out for me. My stomach can’t handle the richness right now. Behind me, Jett is talking, but I tune out the words, at least until I hear him come up beside me at the sink.

He’s standing way too close. When he reaches over me, his smell hits me, and my head goes light. He’s holding a glass, but he doesn’t actually fill it. It takes me another second to realize I’m the problem. I’m standing in front of the sink, mute and motionless as I stare empty-eyed at the stainless steel.

I scoot over too quickly. Jett starts the tap, but under the rush of the running water, he mutters, “You alright?”

“No,” I say simply. What’s the point in lying when it’s so painfully obvious?

He turns off the water and sets his hand on the edge of the sink, right beside mine. As he tilts his head back to gulp down water, he reaches out with his pinky, brushing it against the side of my hand. Even that fleeting contact sends a wave of warmth rolling through me, and for an instant I feel a little less like crumbling to the floor in a pitiful heap.

“Me neither,” he says.

He turns away, striding back into the living room. For all the world, he looks and sounds like he’s completely fine. Is he that good at acting? I’ve never been one to pretend at feelings I don’t actually possess. Often, it’s gotten me in trouble. People call me blunt or mean, but I’m not trying to hurt anyone. I simply never learned how to be anything other than myself. How others go around wearing pleasant masks all day, I don’t know, but it never worked for me.

Which is going to make this chat in the living room really, really hard.

I top off my glass and head to the living room clinging to it. If I can’t falsify my emotions, perhaps I can hide them behind the glass as needed. It’s the only chance I have at concealing what happened these past several days.

Dad and Charlotte stand in front of the fireplace. The easy chairs sit off to the side. The piece of furniture most directly facing them is the couch. The couch where Jett already sits.

I have no choice, so I force my numb legs to take me to the couch so I can sink down on the far opposite end of it. At least this part will look believable to our parents. The Jett and Benjamin of a week ago would definitely place themselves as far apart on this couch as we could. For very different reasons, perhaps, but hopefully the effect is the same.

Our parents make no indication that they notice anything amiss. Once I sit, they shoot each other a nervous look. Charlotte is wringing her hands and standing a full step away from my father, who stuffs his hands in his pockets. Like me, he wears glasses, but his hair is darker than mine, and he’s never without his five o’clock shadow, even first thing in the morning. Charlotte, meanwhile, clearly had a big influence on Jett. Her curly brown hair spills past her shoulders. Her eyes match his, bright, rich amber like tree sap.

“Okay, so, what in the world happened?” she says. “Are you both alright? When we found out you were trapped it was bad enough, but I almost called emergency services when I heard about the power outage. How did you stay warm?”

Drink number one. I raise my glass and down a gulp of water before I can flush from that question. Because the way we stayed warm that first night is definitely not something I can disclose.

Fortunately, Jett is steadier than me. “Relax, Mom. We’re obviously fine. You saw that we had that fire going.”

“But you couldn’t shower,” Charlotte says. “You couldn’t cook. You couldn’t do anything. What did you do all that time?”

“I mostly slept,” Jett says. “Ben-jamin,” he clearly reminds himself to say the whole thing instead of just “Ben,” “I guess he studied or something.”

He doesn’t look at me when he waves dismissively. It’s very nearly the old Jett, the one from before all this.

“How was your food supply?” Dad says.

“I took care of it,” I say. “I had a spreadsheet. We had more than enough, even without the ability to cook.”

Dad sighs. “I’m so sorry, Benjamin. It shouldn’t have been on you to survive a situation like that. Thank God you came here prepared.”

“Definitely came in clutch,” Jett says. When our parents both look at him, startled, he hastily adds, “I mean, in a nerdy way. Spreadsheets and all of that.”

I push my glasses up my nose to hide a smile. “It worked, in any case.”

“Right, yes,” Dad says. “And we brought a ton of groceries with us. We’ll be making a huge dinner tonight to make up for you boys surviving on peanut butter sandwiches.”

The conversation dies. Dad and Charlotte share a look. I want to do the same with Jett, especially as unspoken words clutter up the air. There’s something more they aren’t telling us, but I can’t even guess what it is. Unless they know somehow. The thought sends a cold trickle down my spine, like an ice cube slipped into the back of my shirt. Dad swallows, then he clears his throat.

“So, um, there was one other thing we wanted to discuss.”

Charlotte sighs. “We know we brought you out here to try out a family Christmas, but … it seems that won’t be possible.”

This time I do look at Jett, unable to control the urge. The same question lies scrawled across his face. Do they know? Have we ruined Christmas with our indulgences?

Charlotte steps closer to my father, taking his hand in hers. “So, listen, boys, back when we booked this, six months ago or so, Paul and I really, really wanted to make this work. We believed we could make it work. We were thinking of next steps, but we decided we needed to have everyone together for a holiday before we did anything drastic. This is your lives too. It wouldn’t effect only us if we decided to … move things forward.”

“But,” Dad says, “things … didn’t go as planned in the past few months. It was too late to cancel the trip, but it was starting to become clear to both of us that…” Dad looks into Charlotte’s eyes, smiling sadly, smiling the way I must have smiled at Jett up in my room. “We’re not right for each other.”

The words hit like a bomb dropped in the middle of the room. I gape, making no attempt to keep my eyebrows from climbing toward my hair. Jett’s mouth hangs open, and he blinks far too much.

“Wait, are you saying…” he starts. “Are you saying … you broke up?”

Dad and Charlotte nod at each other, eyes still locked, hands still clasped.

“It wasn’t going to work,” Charlotte says softly. “We want different things out of life.” She finally looks back at Jett and I. “But we’re still friends. There’s no bad blood between us at all.”

Dad nods. “I still care about Charlotte, and I still care about you, Jett. That hasn’t changed. That’s why we went through with the trip, so you boys can know that everything is fine. You did nothing wrong. This is between Charlotte and I, but we can still have a great Christmas here together. None of that will change. Of course, we were hoping this trip might be a little more peaceful and a little less … trapped in a blizzard with no power, but we couldn’t control the weather.”

My mind is whirling. I barely hear him. Dad’s words turn into static when they hit my brain. I set my water glass aside, afraid it will slip from my limp fingers if I don’t.

They’re not together. It’s over. They aren’t dating. There’s no possibility of them getting married or anything like that. They’re just friends. That fighting I overheard every time I called my dad this week, it wasn’t merely tension because of the storm. Things must have been that way for a while. I was only witnessing a brief glimpse.

Which means Jett and I…

I sneak a glance at him. He meets my eyes for a single beat before I hurriedly look away.

No, it would still be too weird. It would still be such a drastic shift. If we got together right away, our parents would have to be fools not to realize something happened during the blizzard, and I can’t live with that. I don’t know exactly what this means for our situation, but it’s not as simple as our parents breaking up and us miraculously beginning to date.

I jerk to my feet.

“Benjamin?” Dad says.

I can feel Jett staring at me from where he sits on the couch, but I ignore him and my father both as I stride away.

“I think I need a minute,” I say.

No one calls out after me as I charge up the stairs and into the room I claimed when I arrived here. I throw the door shut, my heart thudding in my ears. Is this the end? Or has Jett and I’s story just begun? I don’t know, and my head is too screwed up for me to figure it out. Regardless of our parents, our situation will never be quite that simple.