If someone had told me five years ago, I’d be on a ladder hanging twinkle lights in thirty-four-degree weather, I would’ve laughed in their face and ordered another beer. But here I was with half-frozen fingers, a staple gun, and my brother below me acting like the foreman of a construction site made entirely of bad decisions.
“Higher on the left,” Callum said, pointing like a man who had opinions about symmetry.
I squinted down at him. “You sure? From up here, it looks straight.”
“That’s because you’re crooked,” he said.
“I’m fine,” I said, firing another staple into the wood. The gun misfired, shot empty, and made a sad clicking sound. “Mostly fine.”
Callum chuckled, shaking his head. “You’re hopeless.”
“Hopelessly festive,” I said, grabbing another strand of lights.
The Rusty Stag looked like a construction zone that had been taken hostage by Christmas. Half the entry was covered in fake snow, the other half in tangled cords, and we’d gone through at least two boxes of lights that had mysteriously stopped working. It was the kind of cheerful chaos Lydia loved, and the kind of thing I tolerated because my brother looked happier than I’d ever seen him.
“Lydia said they’re leaving Seattle this afternoon,” Callum said, like he wasn’t dropping a grenade into my otherwise peaceful afternoon.
I grunted. “Did she?”
“Yeah. Probably be here before dark.”
“Great.”
He paused. “That’s all you’ve got to say? Just great?”
I stapled another light with more force than necessary. “Yup.”
“Not even gonna pretend you don’t care?”
“Nope.”
He snorted. “Right. Because you two were just casual drinking buddies, huh?”
“Exactly,” I said, climbing down from the ladder and grabbing another strand. “Two people having drinks. Maybe a few bad decisions. Totally casual.”
“Uh-huh.” He bent down to untangle a knot in the lights, his tone infuriatingly smug. “You’ve been in a mood ever since she stopped coming around.”
“I have not.”
“Yeah, you have. You started fixing things.”
I frowned. “What does that mean?”
“You don’t fix things, Drew. You duct-tape them, threaten them, or replace them. But last week, youfixedthe jukebox.”
“It was skipping,” I said.
I didn’t say that it kept skipping on the song I’d quietly thought of as ours. Which was silly, because there was never anus…just something casual that I pretended was more. But whatever. I didn’t need the constant reminder that she’d ghosted me.
“Exactly my point.”
I muttered something about overbearing older brothers and went back to stapling. The truth was, I’d been restless ever since that last night with Melanie. The kind of restless that made sleep feel like a waste of time and quiet feel too damn loud.
She’d blown into my life like a hurricane in high heels with big blonde hair, a bigger attitude, and a mouth that would make a preacher turn around.
And for a while, it had been fun. Real fun. Until one morning, she sat up in my bed, ran a hand through her tangled hair, and said with complete confidence, “That ship has sailed.”
Then she got dressed, kissed me once like a punctuation mark, and walked out.
