Celeste

The morning sun reflected off the fresh snow and filtered through the curtains in Celeste's bedroom. Celeste stirred, her head throbbing, and wiped at her face. Pulling her hand back, she found smeared mascara and lipstick on her palm. She had slept in her makeup. Rolling over, she found herself in her own bed, though she didn't remember how she got there.

Alicia was sleeping next to her, still in her red dress, though it was now paired with a set of Celeste's pajama pants. Celeste was still in her green dress too, though no pajamas had been added. As she sat up, her vision swam. A beat had started in her head, like the pounding music from last night.

Last night...

What had happened last night?

She racked her brain, but it was all a blur. She remembered being unable to stop staring at Jared and that girl. But then there was a big ol' void, a gap in her memory. The sinking feeling in her stomach told her something had happened, something awful...

But what?

Or maybe her turning stomach was just the hangover starting to hit.

She was swearing off shots. And green drinks. Maybe green things all together. She held her head.

Alicia awoke next to her, blinking at the sunlight. "Hey," she said sleepily. Despite the fact she had also slept in her makeup, she still looked great. "How're you feeling?"

"What happened last night?" Celeste said, still holding her head.

Alicia let out a loud laugh that made Celeste's head throb even more. "Oh, jeez, Cee. Where to start?" She laughed again.

"It's not funny!" Celeste said, picking up a throw pillow—Christmas-themed, of course—and whomping her friend with it, though the movement only made her own head swoon. "I did something bad, didn't I? Didn't I?"

"Bad?" Alicia said, between giggles and dodging the pillow. "I wouldn't say bad. Actually, you were, like, my hero last night."

Celeste loved Alicia like a sister, but her friend's definition of 'hero' did not make her feel any better. To Alicia, streaking was considered heroic. If Celeste had been worthy of the title of 'hero' in Alicia's eyes, then she definitely had something to worry about.

"Oh my god, what did I do?" Celeste asked, her voice going high-pitched as the panic set in. "What did I do?"

Alicia leaned her head on her hand. "Remember Sterling?"

"Sterling?" she echoed the name. "Like your brother's friend? The one staying with Olly? That Sterling?"

Alicia nodded. "That Sterling."

A flashback hit. She remembered standing at the bar, apologizing to him for insulting his tattoo or insulting the fact that he had tattoos. She couldn't quite remember which. Okay, that hadn't been her greatest moment, but at least she had apologized. She wasn't sure it hadn't been very articulate, but it still counted for something, right?

Only, she was pretty sure that wasn't why her stomach was in knots...

Her head throbbed more as she tried to remember the rest.

As she was talking to Sterling, Jared had walked past, going... somewhere.

And she remembered going after him.

To do what, though? Talk? Beg?

But it was all just smeared together, like the lipstick across her face.

Until...

There was Sterling, again, just standing there. She was so happy to see him, though she didn't quite remember why.

She stumbled towards him and...

And...

"Oh my god!" Celeste cried. "I KISSED HIM?!"

"Yeah, you did!" Alicia cried, holding her hand up to get a high five.

Celeste did not give it. Instead, she grabbed one of her decorative throw pillows, pressed it to her face and screamed. Alicia dropped her hand and pouted.

It was a minute or two before Celeste came up for air.

"I kissed him?" she groaned. "I kissed him? I kissed him?!"

"Yep."

"Why?!"

"I don't know," Alicia said, flopping back. "I only got there at the end, just in time to watch you throw yourself into his arms. He was so shook." She laughed again. "Sterling's so uptight, it was so funny to see him all flustered like that. Like I said, you're my hero."

Celeste returned to screaming into her pillow. "Why, why, why did I kiss him?" she cried.

And then it hit her. Through the blur, she remembered seeing Jared...

He was in some hallway, standing under a neon-coloured sprig of mistletoe, lip-locked with the little blonde he'd brought with him. And then her heart was breaking all over again. The memory was a little sharper here, like the pain of it cut through the haze of the alcohol. The realization hit that Jared didn't want a break—he had actually broken up with her. And he was with the other girl now.

And at that moment, she had been surprised to find that she wasn't sad.

She was angry.

She wanted revenge.

She wanted Jared to feel as hurt as she did.

She had turned away then and saw Sterling just standing there...

"I wanted to make Jared jealous," she said softly. "I remember now. That's why I kissed him. I wanted to make Jared think I had moved on, too. I... I... I am..."

"You are my hero," Alicia finished for her.

"No!" Celeste leapt out of bed and started pacing around the room. "I'm horrible! Forcing myself on Sterling like that? Using him to make another guy jealous? Who does that?"

"Drunk girls," Alicia said, like that made it any better. "Heroes. Drunk heroes."

"That doesn't matter. I'm the worst! I need to find him! I need to apologize!"

"Well, that should be easy," Alicia said, rolling over and propping herself up. "Since he's already here."

"WHAT? He's here?"

Alicia shrugged. "Yeah. I let him sleep on our couch."

Celeste scrambled to her bedroom door, cracked it open, and peered through the gap.

And, just as Alicia had said, there was Sterling.

He was currently folding up the blankets that he had been given him for the night and stacking them up at the end of the couch.

Celeste closed the door again. "Why did you let him sleep on our couch?" she hissed.

"He didn't have a coat and I wasn't going to send him out alone in the cold dark night when it was practically a blizzard," Alicia said, stretching herself out in the bed. "Especially after he carried you home."

"That doesn't mean...." Celeste froze. "Wait, he carried me home?"

"Oh, yeah. After Sterling and I managed to drag you away from the scene of the kiss, you totally passed out. I was complaining to Olly about how I wouldn't be able to get you up the stairs to our apartment and Sterling just," Alicia shrugged, "offered to help."

Celeste hid her face in her hands. She, thankfully, didn't have any memory of being dragged around like a pathetic rag doll, but still, she was blushing so hard she was sure her face matched her hair. She needed to apologize. She needed to make this right. She needed to make it up to him. But to do that...

"I have to go out there, don't I?"

"Well, if you're going to apologize like you were saying," Alicia said. "Yeah, you do."

Celeste took a deep breath and went to the door again—

"Wait, wait!" Alicia said, leaping up and pulling Celeste back. "I didn't mean right this second. Your apology can wait a minute or two so I can do something about your..." she waved her hand over Celeste's face and grimaced, "...everything."

For the first time, Celeste glanced into the mirror that hung on the back of her door. Her reflection startled her. In addition to the red lipstick that had been smeared across her cheek, she had rings of smudged mascara around her eyes that made her look like a raccoon, and her hair looked like she had lost a fight with one.

"Oh," Celeste muttered. "Good call."

🎄

After a hurried refresh in her ensuite bathroom—washing her face, combing through the tangles she had once called her curls, and finally changing out of the borrowed sequined dress—Celeste stepped out of the room.

Sterling was just sitting politely on the couch, staring at his phone. He looked up as he heard the door open, and he did not look particularly impressed to see Celeste. He had lost the Christmas sweater from last night and was now dressed in all black—black henley, black jeans, even black socks—and she could see an edge of the tattoo poking out from the collar of his shirt, trailing up his neck. Once again, he looked grimly out of place in the midst of all her sparkling Christmas decorations.

"H-Hi," Celeste said, giving him a little wave. Almost immediately, her face flared hot.

He eyed her. "Well, I see you lived through the night," he said, getting to his feet. "Now that you're okay, I'll be heading out. When Alicia's awake, tell her that I—"

"I'm sorry!" Celeste cried, the words practically bursting out of her.

Sterling stopped and blinked at her. "For what? For the tattoo thing? You already apologized for that."

"No, for the," she dropped her voice like it was a secret, "t-the kiss."

"Oh." He didn't seem that bothered. "That."

Celeste was quickly losing her nerve, and she knew she needed to get it out while she could. "I shouldn't have kissed you. I don't know what I was thinking. It didn't mean anything. I was just trying to make my boyfriend, no, my ex-boyfriend, jealous and—" She stopped herself. She was full-on babbling, and he didn't need to hear that part. "That doesn't matter. What matters is that I'm sorry. I shouldn't have used you like that. I'm sorry. Again."

He gave a half-laugh. "Used is a little much. It was one kiss. I work in bars, so that wasn't the first time a cute drunk girl surprised me with a kiss. Not a big deal."

Cute? Her mind went blank as she froze. Did he just say I was... cute?

"Anyway," he said, making a move towards the door. "I should be going."

Her brain sputtered back to life. "Wait!"

He paused and turned back to her, his eyebrows raised, looking somewhat exasperated. The look on his face said, What now?

"I feel like I should make it up to you," she said. "As thanks, and apologies, for everything you did and... everything I put you through." She tried to smile, but it felt more like a grimace.

Sterling shook his head. "You're a friend of Alicia's and I owe her a favor, or two, or... Well, like I said, don't worry about it." He reached for the door handle.

"But—"

"Don't think you can just leave without saying a proper goodbye!" Alicia screamed as she bounded out of Celeste's room. Celeste wondered how long she'd been lingering at the door, listening to them. Probably the whole time.

Alicia launched herself at Sterling, wrapping her arms around his neck—

Celeste was flashed back to her blurry memory of last night, of Jared with the blonde's arms around his neck. Her chest got tight. Sterling might not think their kiss was such a big deal, but it was to her—it was the first time she'd kissed someone other than Jared in years. She had to blink several times to keep the swell of tears at bay.

Meanwhile, Sterling had been caught off guard by Alicia's attack. She used this to her advantage to pull him into a tight hug.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you!" she cried, nearly smothering him. "Thank you so much for dragging my dear friend home. You really saved us. There would've been no way I could've dragged Celeste's deadweight up the stairs to our apartment all by myself."

"Not you, too," he groaned, pulling her off his neck. "It was nothing. If you need a favor, I'm here." He punctuated it with a serious stare.

Something about his look bothered Alicia. "Don't start on that again," she grumbled back, swiping at his arm. "I was just thanking you for the nice thing you did. It doesn't have to become a thing."

"The offer still stands," he said with a shrug. "Always."

"I told you, I don't want it!" Alicia shot back.

"It still stands," Sterling said again.

Alicia's eyes brightened like she suddenly thought of something. "Well, if you want it to be like that," she said, dancing away and running over to Celeste's side. She grabbed Celeste's arm and pulled her close. "Then let us buy you brunch!"

"Us?" Celeste whispered to her friend.

Alicia tightened into Celeste's arm as she leaned in close. "Play along!"

"With what?" Celeste whispered back. She had no idea what the two of them were talking about. They were squabbling like siblings.

Alicia shook her head.

"Brunch?" Sterling made a face. He looked downright annoyed now. "I don't have time for brunch."

"But it's to repay your favor!" Alicia said, tipping her head to the side in her best act at playing innocent. "And I thought it was important to repay favors?"

Sterling frowned, his jaw going tight, and he exhaled through his nose like a bull, but it didn't look like he was going to object.

Celeste looked between the two of them as they stared each other down. Yeah, there was definitely something going on, something she didn't understand. And something she definitely didn't want to get in the middle of.

But Alicia wasn't backing down, and neither was Sterling...

She had an idea.

"What about coffee?"

Alicia turned to look at her. "Coffee?"

"Yeah," she said. "If he doesn't want brunch, then why don't we buy him a coffee? It's still something."

"But I want—" Alicia began.

"No," Sterling said, smiling at Celeste—really smiling. The same smile that she saw last night before everything went blurry, that lit up his usually gloomy face. "Coffee's perfect."

🎄