“Merry Christmas Eve,” Charlie said with a huge smile on her face.
Harper’s smile had to be at least as large as she said, “Merry Christmas Eve, but I thought you were going to do alittledecorating.”
“Oh shit, did I do too much?”
Her smile started to slip, so Harper closed the gap between them and said, “Absolutely not. This is perfect. I love it.” She took the flute, swirled it, and sniffed. “A poinsettia?” Charlie nodded as Harper wrapped her arm around her waist and took a sip. “I know I’m the mixologist, but this is pretty damn good.”
“I am a woman of many talents.” Charlie threaded her now free hand into Harper’s hair and pulled her closer for a kiss.
“Clearly.” Their kiss was short, but she needed to know. “How did you get all this done in such a short period of time? And how did you get that tree in here? And after you spent an hour in the bar too?”
Charlie laughed. “Well, I was at the store, and there was just Christmas stuff everywhere, so I bought everything that was cute. And the tree…well, I paid a lovely gentleman at the Southernmost Christmas Tree Stand a smallish amount of cash to drive it here, bring it inside, and put it in the tree stand.”
“Wow. Did you have him decorate it too?” The notion was a little funny, but Harper didn’t really care either way because the feel of Charlie’s skin, separated from her fingertips by only the silkiest of fabrics, was beyond distracting. She pulled Charlie even closer.
“Nope, that was all me.” Dean Martin morphed into Sam Smith’s “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” and just like that, she and Charlie were spontaneously swaying to the music.
“I love this.” Harper hadn’t been planning to say it until the words were coming out of her mouth, but it was entirely true.
“Me too,” Charlie whispered into her neck. She grazed her teeth across the spot where Harper’s neck met her shoulder, and her knees started to buckle.
“Easy there.”
“Who? Me?” Charlie leaned back until she could see Harper’s face.
“We’re trying to share a PG-rated dance here.”
“I think we might be more like in PG-13 movie right now if the MPA were to pay attention to how much of our bodies are touching. And honestly,I’maiming for R.” She ran her index finger from the bottom of Harper’s throat down to the top of her Scissor and Gavel V-neck shirt and back and forth along the collar, tugging downward just enough that Harper’s mind struggled to stay on task.
“But…we still have drinks to enjoy. And…”
“And what?” Charlie chuckled.
Harper squeezed her eyes shut as she tried to focus past the sensation of Charlie’s finger grazing the top of her bra cup, which felt like a Herculean task in that moment. “Um, and Franky probably needs to go out.”
“Nope. I took her out about twenty minutes ago, so she should be good.”
Harper couldn’t think anymore. She’d have loved to check out all the Christmas decorations, but that was going to have to wait until tomorrow. She tipped her head back and downed the poinsettia in less than three gulps.
She took a full step back and held out her hand to Charlie.
“I didn’t realize this was a chugging drink.” Charlie laughed as she spoke. “But I’m game.” She downed the rest of hers. “Ready?”
Rather than answer in words, Harper took her hand and led them down the hallway toward her bedroom, but it also felt like heading toward the rest of their lives together.
Epilogue
Almost a year later
Charlie lifted the sledgehammer over her head and swung it at the wall between the two apartments over the bar. She and Harper had spoken a lot about whether they wanted to buy a new place after they’dofficiallymoved in together a few months ago. Not that they hadn’t been essentially living together since Christmas Eve the year before, but Charlie was officially giving up her separate space with the swing of this hammer.
Although the idea of buying somethingnotover a bar was appealing, they’d ultimately realized that they really liked where they lived. One flight of stairs as a commute when Harper finished work at three a.m. some nights, Charlie being able to swing by in the evening for a drink, being able to see the ocean from expanded windows on three sides of the building, and being in walking or biking distance of nearly anything they wanted, including Charlie’s yoga studio, outweighed the desire to have a place that didn’t share a floor, ceiling, or wall with anything else. And the insulation between the bar and the apartments was impressive, so they barely ever heard anything from below.
But they did want more room, so a few months ago, Charlie had undertaken the task of renovation herself. Shecould haveafforded to pay a contractor, but where was the fun in that?
She’d known absolutely nothing about renovations before, but her dad had undertaken quite a few in her childhood home,so she’d called him in to give her a crash course in plumbing and drywall. He’d convinced her to hire an electrician for any new wiring, which was the right move. It had been amazing to bond with him over something new, and having her parents stay with them for a few weeks at the end of the summer had been pretty much perfect too.
She’d taken the renovations in phases, doing her original side first, then they’d moved into that side as she’d started renovating Harper’s original side. Now the only thing left was to open the wall, tie the flooring together, and finish the drywall in the new opening. Sure, there would still be a lot of cleanup and some touching up, but saving this for last had allowed them to never feel like they were living in a construction zone, which was worth it. And it was perfect timing because her parents were coming to stay for the holidays the following week when the university semester ended.
