AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yep. I saw him out on Seadog Lane with Marigold today, and Harlow...he's hot."
Harlow cackles uncontrollably. "Girl. Iknow."
"But Tilly thinks he's about thirty."
"Sounds right."
"He's probably not single anyway," Athena says, looking up at the top of the Christmas tree again and feeling wistful. "And even if he was, he wouldn't be interested in someone like me."
"Someone like you?" Harlow leans forward and slaps her sister's thigh through the blanket. "Don't be an idiot, Athena. He'd be lucky to have someone like you even glance his way."
"Someone like me? You mean a former librarian who, until six months ago, was a twenty-four-year-old virgin? A book nerd who is currently living with her mother and her kid sister?"
"Okay, I meankid sisteris maybe a step too far..."
"But seriously. My only source of income at the moment is working on special projects for the library that I normally would have passed off to our interns. I think they just took pity on me or something."
"BS," Harlow says, waving a hand. "There's nothing to pity. They're giving you the special projects on contract because Dad was the President, not because they feel sorry for you."
"Ah," Athena says with a roll of her eyes. "Even better for my self esteem."
"Hey, get used to it. Own it. Work it to your advantage. The only reason I'm still freelancing on marketing projects is for the very same reason. Girls in their early twenties with marketing degrees and good fashion sense are a dime a dozen.” Harlow motions at the fuzzy zip-up Christmas onesie she's wearing. It's covered with reindeer and big white snowflakes, and she's got her curly hair pulled up into a red scrunchy on top of her head.
Athena picks at the blanket on her lap again. "Do you think for the rest of our lives we'll just be Jack Hudson's daughters?"
Harlow looks up at the ceiling like she's trying to come up with the right words. "Yes," she says decisively, fixing her gaze on Athena. "I do."
Athena takes a deep breath and reaches for her phone. She unlocks it and opens Instagram. "Okay, then I need your help."
"Oh?" Harlow sounds intrigued.
"I want to meet Elijah Hartley. And I want to impress him. I need to find out who he is and what he likes and see if we have anything in common." She finds his profile and scrolls through his photos, looking for clues as to who he might be. "I can't turn twenty-five in February and still have had only one semi-thing with a guy. And not only that, but my only semi-thing can't be with a total douchebag."
"Diegoisa loser," Harlow agrees, taking the phone when Athena hands it to her. She scrolls through Elijah’s photos too. "Oooh, look at this. Here he is shirtless in Central Park, training for a marathon or something. Damn, he looks good without a shirt."
Athena snatches the phone back. "Not helpful," she says with a frown, though she stops and looks at the photo before moving on. Hedoeslook amazing shirtless. "But look at this--he likes to bake."
"So? You can't boil water."
"Come on. I can bake!" Athena protests. Harlow looks at her dubiously. "Okay, I can bake Pillsbury cookie dough. But he does other stuff too," she says, looking at his photos. "He paints. He volunteers at a school. He has a dog. He loves London."
Harlow looks unimpressed. "I've never seen you paint. You didn't even babysit as a teenager, so I doubt you're a giant kid-lover. We've never had a dog. And you prefer Paris to London." She ticks each item off on her fingers as she goes.
"You're killing my buzz." Athena flops back on the couch and stares at the ceiling. "Maybe we have nothing in common,” she says, defeated.
"Maybe you don't need specific things like that," Harlow says. "I really think you should just be you and see where it goes. Assuming that he's here long enough for you to meet him."
"He will be," Athena says with a knowing sigh. "I'd bet you a million dollars that he stays for Christmas."
"Then start a dog-walking business, run into the craft store and buy some oil paints, and try not to burn a batch of cookies," Harlow says sarcastically. "But really, just be yourself. I promise you, any guy worth your time will like you for you, Athena." She reaches out with her foot and prods her sister teasingly. "Just make sure you check the next apple you pick for worm holes before you take a bite."
Marigold
Marigold is taming and pruning her bougainvillea blossoms in the garden, snipping full blooms of hot, bright fuchsia flowers to put in vases throughout her cottage. Having Elijah there has reinvigorated her in terms of all the little touches that she likes to do around the house: placing fresh flowers in each room, opening the windows to let the warm winter air blow through the house, and pulling out long-buried Christmas decorations and dusting them off so that the place feels more festive. When it's just her, Marigold falls easily and happily into her solitary routine, and she normally does Christmas by stringing lights through the palm trees in her yard and placing a two-foot tall potted palm in her front room, hanging a few ornaments on it, and playing a Christmas mix on her stereo system. It's not lonely at all to her; she's raised her son and lived that chunk of a woman's life that revolves around making a house into a home for her family, and for the most part, she relishes her independence now as she enters her fifties.
But having Elijah here with her for the holidays is grounding, heartwarming, and fun in a way that she's forgotten about. It's like being a hands-on mother is so ingrained in her that all her maternal instincts go into hibernation when her baby is off in the world, living his life like the grown man that he is, but they spring to life again the moment he appears on her doorstep.
"Hey, Mum," Elijah says, walking out the back door and into the walled garden and breaking into her thoughts. He's wearing nothing but a pair of long shorts and a smile, one hand rubbing his flat stomach and the other holding a mug of coffee.
