Page 54 of Puppy Christmas

Chapter 11

Lila was quick to close her internet tab when Dawn walked into the office, but not quick enough.

“Ooh, are we going on an ice-fishing trip?” She wrapped her arms around Lila’s neck and dropped a kiss on her cheek. “I mean, dead fish are gross, and the last thing I want to do is sit in a wooden hut on a frozen lake for hours on end, but you know me—I’ll try anything once. Twice, if there’s alcohol or an attractive man involved.”

“Don’t worry. I’m not taking you ice fishing.” Since the damage had already been done, Lila clicked open the tab again. The Inland Ice Fishing Adventures website wasn’t very modern-looking, but it did promise a frosty good time.

“Then who’s the lucky girl?” Dawn pulled up an ottoman and parked herself on top of it. “Or would it be more accurate to call him a ‘lucky guy’?”

Lila turned to her with a finger outstretched. “Don’t.”

“I didn’t say anything!”

“You didn’t have to. I can feel you thinking it.”

Dawn pulled the mouse from under Lila’s fingertips and began scrolling through the page. “Fish-cleaning facilities on-site? Taxidermy and mounting options available?” She shuddered. “That sounds like a living nightmare, not something you pay three hundred bucks for. Does Ford fish?”

Lila gave up on trying to pretend this was anything but what it so clearly was. Dropping her forehead to the desk, she said, “Yes. No. I don’t know.”

“Hmm. Have you noticed any fishing supplies in his house?”

“Uh, no?”

“Does he tell boring, long-winded stories about the catch that got away?”

“Dawn, you know he doesn’t!”

Dawn closed the tab with a flourish. “Then he doesn’t fish. People who kill things for fun are like people doing a juice cleanse. Five minutes into the conversation, and they’ll make sure you know.”

Lila picked her head up from the desk, but only because the edge was cutting into her skin. Also because trying to hide anything from Dawn was fruitless. She’d dig and prod and crack jokes until every last secret was extracted.

“I’m trying to find a good winter date activity for the two of us,” Lila admitted, hoping she didn’t sound nearly as pathetic as she felt. “This website I found said to try ice fishing.”

“Did they also tell you to do a juice cleanse? Lil, you’ve got to stop believing everything you read on the internet.” She turned Lila’s chair until they were sitting with their knees bumping. Lila’s knees were encased in a pair of sensible gray slacks; Dawn’s had ripped-open holes with just the right amount of artistic disintegration. “What happened to the good old-fashioned dinner and a movie? Or, you know, dinner and sex?”

Lila felt herself coloring up, but she forced herself to meet her sister’s frank gaze. “I wanted to plan something fun.”

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I find sex pretty fun. I haven’t talked with Ford very much yet, but I’m guessing he agrees with me.” She made a show of reaching for the landline. “I can call him right now and ask, if you want.”

Lila made a mad dash to prevent her sister from putting that threat into action. She was the kind of person who totally would—and not feel an ounce of regret or embarrassment afterward. “Please don’t,” she said, her hand over Dawn’s on the receiver. “I’m trying to show him that I’m experienced at fun, no-strings-attached dating, not some sort of freakish schoolmarm who never gets out.”

Dawn’s lips pursed in the way that usually preceded a piece of worldly wisdom that Lila neither wanted nor needed to hear. “To be fair, you’renotexperienced at fun, no-strings-attached dating.”

Well, obviously. That was the whole problem. She’d asked Ford out on a wave of bravery and had ridden that crest all the way from Helen’s house. But now that she was here, surrounded by the familiar file cabinets and sticky notes lining the walls, she had no idea what she was doing. When she was with Ford, being the funny, lively woman of the world he seemed to think her was easy.

On her own, however, she was nothing more than what she’d always been—a neurotic mess who couldn’t even come up with creative winter date ideas without Google’s help. It would be laughable if it wasn’t so depressing.

“Can I ask you something?” she asked before Dawn could follow up with any more of her less-than-helpful insights. “Something serious?”

Dawn let both her hand and her playful attitude fall at once. It was one of the things Lila loved most about her—how quickly she could move from frivolity to frankness and back again. Like most of the things Dawn said and did, the frivolity was mostly for show. No one felt things as deeply as her sister did.

“Absolutely.” Dawn made the motion of an X over her chest. “Consider this a judgment-free zone for the next twenty minutes.”

Lila hesitated, trying to determine how best to put her question. It wasn’t, as Dawn probably assumed, about possible date venues. She needed help in that department—obviously—but she’d find something eventually. Diligence and determination could go a long way.

“If you were to meet me on the street or in a café somewhere—not as my sister, but as a complete and total stranger—do you think we’d be friends?” Lila was aware of how rushed the question came out, so she slowed down and tried again. “What I mean is, if we hadn’t been born into the same family, do you think you’d want anything to do with me? Socially speaking?”

Dawn didn’t respond right away, staring at her in a wide-eyed, meltingly compassionate way instead. Lila did her best not to squirm under that stare, which she knew was meant to discompose her. That was Dawn’s other way of eliciting secrets—rampant kindness.