Cruel Winter with You (Under the Mistletoe collection)

I am fucking furious with you,” Marc tells me.

In the firelight, his eyes are silver, as cutting as a blade. They remind me of the way his face hardened four months ago, after I told him all those horrible, false things, after I walked away from him and the shore.

But then his expression shifts to something different. Something wistful. “I’m just not furious for the reasons you think.”

“Yeah?” I ask. I glance briefly at the raging storm, but the tequila makes looking anywhere but at him very difficult. “I was a bitch to you. The things I said were unnecessarily cruel. That has to be the reason.”

“Jamie . . .” He sighs. His anger looks a lot like sadness. “You’re not as unreadable as you think.” I have no clue what he means. Before I can decode it, he asks, “Why are you so sure that it wouldn’t work out between us?”

“Is this your next question?”

“Sure.”

I blink at my empty glass. “I’ll need a refill, then.”

“Too bad. You’re done for tonight.” In a single, firm sweep he moves the bottle out of reach. “And fuck this stupid game. Just tell me why.”

“You’re the one who wanted to play—”

“Just answer my question, Jamie. And I’ll tell you what it is that makes me so angry.”

I shouldn’t. Tell him the innermost workings of my mind, that is. He could use them to hurt you, a voice warns. Does it matter, though, when I’m already so good at hurting myself? “You have no idea how messy the inside of my head really is. In fact, I’m probably like my dad. Impossible to be with. Somehow, sooner or later, everyone I really care about leaves. And I wouldn’t be able to— You’d get bored. I’m not interesting or exciting. I mean, the week after our fight, you were literally dating a model—”

He scoffs.

I am suddenly, irrationally angry. “Well, it’s true. Your sister sent me that picture of you with—”

“Ryan, right?”

I lower my eyes.

“She and I do hang out a lot. She’s great. A fantastic person.”

“I’m glad,” I mutter, and then stand, meaning to . . . go lock myself in the bathroom to escape this conversation. It’s a mistake, because I’m much less steady than I thought I’d be. It gives Marc ample time to rise to his feet.

“She’s really intelligent, too. Ryan, I mean. Went to college for computer science, and is a bit of a cybersecurity genius. And funny.” He stands in front of me, making it impossible for me to look away from his face. “And you know what else she is?”

Jealousy burns against the roof of my mouth. I grit my teeth and shake my head.

“She is not you, Jamie.” Marc enunciates the words slowly, like he wishes he could drill them into my skull. “She and I are working on a coding curriculum for girls, that’s it. She wants to use her platform to get more women interested in comp sci. Although she did ask me out, a little after your birthday. And you know what I told her?”

Another shake of my head.

“I told her that it wouldn’t be fair for me to accept, because any relationship between the two of us would be dead on arrival. I told her that there was someone else. I told her so much about you, she could probably pick you out in a lineup and buy you a Christmas present you’d really enjoy. And when she asked me why you and I weren’t together, I told her that it was because you had rejected me. But I also explained that your attempts at pushing me away were so fucking clumsy, a toddler could have seen through them. ‘She’s afraid,’ I told her. ‘She has lost so much in her life, she can’t imagine a scenario in which a romantic relationship works out. But she’s smart, too. And brave. And once she realizes that she’s lying to herself, she’s going to come back to me.’ I was so sure that you would, Jamie. But you never did. And Ryan noticed. So she asked me out again, but she still wasn’t you.” His voice is getting louder. Or maybe it’s my brain amplifying every word. “And the whole time, I was fucking furious. Want to know why?”

A small nod.

“Because I knew how much the bullshit you were pulling was hurting you, Jamie. I knew that you lied. I knew that you wanted to be with me as much as I wanted you. There will never be anyone but you for me, and I swear, I want you so much, I want to give you so much, I cannot imagine anyone capable of making you happier than I mean to make you. And what drives me out of my mind is that you know it, too. But you’re too much of a coward to admit it even to yourself, and—”

“I did!”

A pause. His breathing is labored. “What?”

“I did admit it,” I nearly yell in his face. “You are the one who never replied.”

Marc’s frown deepens. “Never replied to what?”

“I called you, Marc. I apologized. The day after my birthday—I left a voicemail.”

He physically recoils, as though I just punched him in the stomach. “You left a voicemail.”

“On your phone.”

He blinks. “Who the fuck leaves voicemails?”

“Plenty of people. Doctors’ offices. Me.”

“Shit, Jamie. I haven’t listened to my messages in decades.”

“What?” It’s my turn to blink. But . . . there’s simply no way. “Don’t you have a very important job that requires you to know very important things?”

“I do. And I have a very important phone number associated with that very important job. It’s not—and this will shock you—the same number I used when I was sixteen and made seven dollars an hour delivering for Giuseppe’s Pizza Place. Which is, incidentally, the number you use.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. Oh.” He pulls his phone from his pocket and taps at it a few times.

“I . . . It doesn’t matter, Marc. I can just tell you what I . . .”

I’m interrupted by a metallic voice.

You have one new message. Press one to listen.

“Jamie.” He exhales loudly. I’ve never heard, or seen him, this upset. “What the fuck?”

“You . . . don’t listen to it. It’s been months, and—”

His eyes never leave mine as he presses 1. And I want to die on the spot.

Marc, about yesterday. I . . . I fucked up. I don’t really think you’re immature. And it’s not true that I’ll never be interested in you. I will be. I mean, I am. It’s just that . . . Is it an excuse if I tell you I had a shitty week at work? It made me feel really bad about myself. And then you said all those nice things about me, and I was sure that I’d disappoint you, and I panicked, and . . . The thing is, I think you’re right. I’m really scared. Constantly. To end up like my dad. That the more people know me, the more they’ll want to leave. It’s why I spent years with Shane, because I knew I could handle him leaving me. But you . . . I like you. So, so much. Always have. You and I have always worked, and if we start something and it ends up not working out, it will destroy me. But I’m starting to realize that pretending that I don’t have feelings for you will also destroy me, so . . . If you’d like to go on a date or even . . . even hang out as friends, if that’s all you can accept from me after the things I’ve said, it would really make me . . .

In the background, my voice blabbers on, saying more things about love, and fear, and hope. But I have stopped listening. Because Marc’s phone is now hitting the floor, and he’s pressing me against the wall, hands around my face, tongue in my mouth, body covering mine.

And that’s when the lights come back on.