“Does your family like traditions?” I ask, wanting to know more about her family and hoping that I’ll be lucky enough to meet them someday.
“Oh god, my mother is the queen of them. I swear every year around the holidays, she tries to add a new one, and it’s like,Mom! We have enough of them already!”
“What’s your favorite one?”
“I can tell you myleastfavorite one.”
I chuckle because, of course, Blake would have to think about her favorite, but immediately knows the one she doesn’t like. “What’s that?”
“At Thanksgiving, we go around and say something we love about someone else at the table.”
“Doesn’t everyone do that?”
“Sure. But my family isextraabout it.”
“How so?”
“We have these blue glass plates.” She holds out her hands in the shape of a circle, and I admire the ink on her forearms. “Years ago, my grandma had us each cut out a paper snowflake. Then she had each of them etched onto a glass plate, and on the underside of our snowflake plate are our initials.”
“That’s cute.”
“Just wait.” She holds up a hand, silencing me. “We set out the plates randomly and sit at our usual spots. Before we dish up, we look under our plate and see whose initials we have. Then we go around the table, andthat’sthe person we say something nice about.”
“What if you don’t like the person whose plate you got?”
She ponders that for a moment. “I don’t know, I guess you just make something up then.”
“You’ve never gotten someone you don’t like?”
“Nope. I always offer to set up the table so I can cheat and put Grandpa’s snowflake plate at my spot.”
Laughter bursts out of me, and I’m not sure why, because that’s not shocking at all. But it is funny as hell.
I collect myself quickly and ask a follow-up question before she has a chance to change the subject. “What happens when someone new joins the family? Do they get a plate?”
She eyes me suspiciously, but I can see the smirk she’s trying to hide. “They cut out a snowflake, and my auntie makes them a new plate.”
“So, Sam has his own plate?” I probe.
“Yes. Sam has his own plate...”
She opens her mouth to say something, but I cut heroff. “If I got your plate, I’d tell everyone I love your snarky retorts.”
She slows and looks up at me, hesitantly. “I?—”
“I’m just teasing, Blake.”
“Shut up and listen.” She holds up a hand to silence me once more.
She closes her eyes, gearing up for whatever she has to say, biting her lower lip in the process, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous for what’s about to come out of her mouth next.
“If I got your plate…” She opens her brown eyes, and they soften. Her chest heaves with deep breath, and I can practically hear her heart beating out of her chest from here. “I’d tell you I love you.”
I’m stunned speechless.
“I would tell you that I wholeheartedly, in my own fucked up way…love you.”
I don’t stop my body when it goes into autopilot and pulls her in for a kiss. I hear her cup of ice cream squish between us, but I don’t give a shit. Blake just told me she loves me.On purpose.
