⚠️ Brief mention of abuse. Read with caution.

Chapter Twenty

Mikah

It was a shit start to Christmas. The holiday itself wasn't until tomorrow, but I was supposed to have been to Galena hours before. Unlike Ollie—who had left hours before the ice storm earlier in the week—I opted to stay back and manage the restaurant. It was also my plan to finish up any last-minute shopping—which was all of it. None of my gifts were going to be wrapped this year. My saving grace was finding a bunch of gift bags and tissue paper on sale. The presents were now in my trunk, and all that was left to do was pack and hit the ice-covered roads.

I'd been gone from the apartment all day. So I was surprised to find Hallie asleep on the couch, wrapped tightly in a blanket while the weather channel playing in the background. It was rare for her to fall asleep here, and while I wanted to believe she looked peaceful in this spot, she looked anything but. I place the back of my hand on her forehead, feeling the clammy, cold sweat that had her hair wet sticking to her temples. Her cheeks were flushed bright red—the same tint as when she'd get embarrassed. The shivering worried me the most.

I kneeled on the ground beside the sofa, rubbing her back until her blue eyes flickered awake. I may have greeted sleeping beauty with a smile, but it was rejected with a groan and one hell of a cough. She hacked until she could barely breathe, turning her face from red to blue. I regretted waking her, but it didn't last long. Soon she was sleeping again, and I was stuck in a hard spot.

My phone screen was swiped many times, ready to make a call that I knew wouldn't go over well. We had plans for family pictures tonight. My mother's traditions were something she looked forward to every single year. And while usually I loved going home for the holidays and being with my family, this year felt different. Hallie was supposed to be with her family tonight, and me with mine. I'd been dreading time away from her all week. Now, she was here, and this was the only place I wanted to be, making the decision easier than I'd originally thought.

Standing from the couch, I selected my mother's number and left the apartment, careful to close the door softly behind me. I was almost to the restaurant floor when she finally answered. It sounded quite busy in the background of her hello?

"Hey, Mom."

"You're missing the gingerbread house. How much longer is your drive?"

I sighed and clutched my hair with my free hand. "About that..."

"Oh, no." Her disappointment was obvious. "You didn't hit ice, did you? Ollie missed it and had a beautiful drive over."

"I uh, I haven't even left, honestly," I admitted. I swung the door open to the kitchen of the restaurant and began flipping on lights. "I don't think I'm coming this year."

"Mikah," she said, more bummed than I'd envisioned. "It's Christmas..."

My mother loved having everyone home more than anything. No one could blame her for that. She was lonely in that house most days. Part of me wanted to reach out to her sooner... to talk to her about the possibility of Hallie coming home with me for Christmas. I didn't want Hallie anywhere near Rick and Jodi's house—holiday or not. And while I wanted to use that as my excuse to bring her home with me, the real reason was I wanted to spend Christmas with her.

"Hallie has a horrible cold. Possibly the flu. I'd hate to bring that home to everyone."

"Uh huh..." I could hear Mom's smile, and it made me form my own. "Still embarrassed, huh?"

While the memory of the sex swing had crossed my mind, that was not it. "Let's just never bring that up again."

There was the sound of a door clicking on the other end of the line, and the voices in the background of my mother's call faded. "Are you dating Hallie, Mikah?"

I lifted myself onto the countertop and sat atop it, dropping my head into my hand. "No."

There was a long pause while I waited for her to call my bluff, but she didn't. She was waiting for me to clarify what it was she walked in on, and the term friends with benefits suddenly felt cheap. Hallie was more than that. It was becoming harder and harder to keep that admission to myself.

"Mom, she's..." I stopped again.

"She's special to you."

I exhaled. She'd said it perfectly. "Yeah."

"You know, in those years you were with Shelby, that's not an admission you ever made, Mikah. Everyone knew you and Hallie had something between you when in Mexico. You don't look at each other the way you two do and not have something... special."

I was sure everyone meant Sloan and Ollie were onto it. Probably Kit too. Honestly, they all were before I was aware of it. There were pranks, and bets, and arguments... and now she was the girl I wanted to spend every damn minute with.

"She thinks you don't like her," I said with a laugh, knowing how wrong Hallie was about that.

"I love anyone who makes my children happy. I'd love it if you'd bring her around for me to get to know her outside of your bedroom."

I cringed. It was not something I was ever going to live down. For now, I could live with that if it meant I was staying on my mother's good side and getting to stick with Hallie tonight. I'd already been gone longer than I'd wanted to be. I asked her to hand off the phone to Ollie as I hopped back to the floor from the counter. I was about to steal from his kitchen.

"What's up?" Ollie asked.

"How the hell do I make soup?"

***

I tried to be quiet as I reentered the apartment, careful to close the door softly behind me. It didn't matter. Hallie stirred and eventually rolled over to find me standing with a container of hot soup in my hand. For as exhausted as she looked, she appeared equally surprised to find I was still in Chicago.

She frowned. "Oh, Mikah. What about your mom's Christmas? She's going to hate me even more now. I didn't get you sick, did I? Everyone is passing it around the nursing home..."

"There was no way in hell I was leaving you alone with that fever. My mother is fine and understands. Let's face it... if you have the flu, I'll likely catch it in no time."

It was logic she couldn't argue with. We'd both be riding out Christmas from our plague-filled apartment, and I was more than okay with that. Hallie kicked all her blankets off, revealing her favorite sweat pants with a nursing school tee. She fanned herself, now warm when just an hour ago she was freezing to the point of shaking. I held my hand to her head again, noting she was still clammy.

"It's so hot in here," she said, kicking the sweats off until she was just in her underwear and the tee.

"Any other day, I would have been taking advantage of this."

Hallie smiled for the first time tonight and smacked my shoulder. "Where did you get soup from? Everything is closed?"

I held up the clear container and gave it a shake, watching the vegetables and noodles swirl around. "I made it. Don't worry. Ollie helped me over the phone."

She accepted the soup, beaming up at me as she did. Her arms wrapped around the bowl, followed by a sneeze that made both of us jump. "This is the first time I've ever had an excuse to get out of Christmas with Rick and Jodi. How sad is it I'm relieved to be sick?"

Not as relieved as I was. I hated the thought of her being anxious and alone in that house, uncomfortable with an adult who'd taken advantage of his situation. My head couldn't wrap around it still, but it was something Hallie said herself she didn't want to talk about. Things didn't add up in my head. It didn't stop me from having many questions about her younger years, but now I wasn't sure what topics were safe and which weren't.

Hallie took her soup to the kitchen, where she plated each of us with a serving. Thankfully, it remained warm. I was hesitant to watch her take a spoonful, blow on it, and take the first bite. She nodded approvingly and took another, making me good about taking my first bite. It wasn't the best soup I'd eaten, but it was edible and kept us fed on a cool December night. After each having a second helping, Hallie showered while I made some slice and bake cookies.

When Hallie reappeared, she looked a lot better than when she'd left. Her nose was still pink and agitated from the constant use of tissues, but her coughing didn't seem as bad. The table beside the couch was now covered in cold medicines, tissues, and cough suppressants.

Hallie took a bite of her plain sugar cookie and tucked her feet beneath her butt as she sat on the couch. "What was your favorite part of Christmas as a kid?" she asked. "Other than the gifts, obviously."

The gifts were never my favorite part, but it made me think back to being younger and living at home. It wasn't the decorations or the food. It wasn't a holiday movie in matching pajamas. I thought back to being roughly ten years old and spending this very night with Kit and Ollie.

The memory was a happy one, as told by my expression before I ever started. "Ollie, Kit and I were determined to catch Santa bringing our gifts. So we set up a blanket fort in the living room, and we had a sleepover in there. Our plan was to have shifts where one of us would stay awake and the other two would sleep. We brought Santa's cookies in there as bait. Ollie always fell asleep during his watch and would forget to wake us. Looking back at that now, I think he knew the secret and wanted it to stay magical for Kit and me for as long as he could."

"That's a good big brother," Hallie said as she offered me another cookie.

"The best," I agreed, feeling shitty that he couldn't say the same about me. "I'm not to him."

Hallie put her hand on my leg. "That is not true. At all. He was in a dark place and it was you who brought him home, Mikah. If it weren't for you, hell, maybe he and Sloan wouldn't be together today."

While I wanted to believe that, I knew he came back from his breakdown because of Sloan. I just gave him a nudge in the right direction.

"Besides, at least you speak to your brother. I don't even have my sister's phone number," Hallie said.

"You have a sister?"

"And that's exactly what I mean," Hallie clarified. "Jillian. She's in high school. I mean, she's my adopted sister, but I guess, legally... we are siblings. Thanksgiving was the first time she'd really spoken to me. I told her she could text me, and then neglected to give her my number or get hers. I don't even know if she has a phone. I think she hates me, anyway. Usually, she avoids me at all costs."

"I'm sure she doesn't hate you. She just doesn't know you."

"Yeah," Hallie agreed with a nod. "Maybe."

She began another coughing fit. I fetched her a bottle of water before heading off to the shower. When I came back, the sight before me had me grinning from ear to ear. Hallie had turned the entire living room into a blanket fort. She used the kitchen stools to give it height, fastening the blankets to them with hair ties and clips. Every one of her girly pillows was inside, with more blankets. She even covered the TV so we could see it from inside.

"What's this?" I asked, excited to get in and see the rest of it.

"I realized I've never made a fort before." Hallie tucked her hands behind her back and rocked proudly on her heels. "I didn't have much of a childhood. I thought this would be fun for our Christmas Eve."

"Well," I said, loving everything about this. "If we are going to do it. Let's do it right."

I left for my bedroom and returned with an air mattress I'd purchased after leaving Shelby. It seemed like a lifetime ago. We aired it up from inside the tent, which ended with us having to make the tent even bigger to fit it. But soon we had all the lights in the house on, except for the glow of the TV. We were both excited to find the movie, The Hangover, and settled in to our home for the night—with Hallie lying her head on my chest and wrapping herself into me. While I was positive I was not leaving this tent without her cold, it was more than worth it to feel her giggles and watch her hide her face at the cringeworthy moments of the film.

"Oh, gross." Hallie lifted the blanket to stop the sight of Stu pulling out his own tooth at the end of the movie and had us both laughing while half awake. "That has to hurt. Could you imagine? I was seventeen when I got my wisdom teeth out, and even with anesthesia, those hurt."

While I was laughing and agreeing with her, still watching the credits roll, my smile faded away, realizing what she'd just said. She was snuggling in close to me, close to falling asleep again. My head was racing, trying to recall the story she'd told me about getting her wisdom teeth removed and TJ viewing her paperwork. She'd already had the D&C.

"Hallie?" I asked, wishing I didn't have to.

"Hm?" she asked, sleepily.

I hesitated.

"Were you eighteen?" I whispered.

Her body tensed against mine. After a minute, I felt the slightest shake of her head. It was all I needed to know. I kissed her hair, pulled her in as close as I could, reminded her she was safe, and felt her fall asleep in my arms. We drifted into Christmas together.