Page 98 of How My Neighbour Stole Christmas
“There’s an idea. Everyone likes those.”
“And nothing screams Christmas like a maraschino cherry in a baked good.”
“Very true,” I say, gripping Max’s shoulder. “Okay, let’s run to the Myrrh-cantile and grab some cherries. And we’ll use the recipe that we found online.”
“The one on All-Recipes?” he asks.
“Yeah, seemed legit.”
“That’s risky, going in with a new recipe we’ve never tried,” Max says.
“Can’t be worse than what we just made. No offense to your mom, but that was shit.”
Max scratches his chin. “Yeah, it wasn’t great. Although…have you ever had a fruitcake that tasted good?”
“Never,” I answer.
“Exactly.”
“Okay, let’s pack up our supplies, grab the cherries, and then head on over to the school for the competition.”
Since we need to show our work in front of Tanya and demonstrate how well we can bake, the competition takes place in the K-12 school, in the gymnasium where they have portable convection ovens set up and baking stations ready to go. We provide the ingredients which are quickly looked over, and then we have three and a half hours to mix and bake. Max and I have been timing ourselves and so far we’ve hit the time limit, but the taste? Well, that’s been a miss.
I fill up a tote bag while Max does the same—me focusing on the ingredients, him focusing on the tools we’re going to need.
“So…about the date,” Max presses.
I roll my eyes. “Dude, there’s nothing to talk about,” I say. “We went out, we irritated each other, put on a show for the townspeople, and then went our separate ways.”
“Is that all that happened?” he asks with a lift of one brow.
Christ.
“Dude, if you know something, just say it.”
“You kissed her.” It’s a statement, not a question. Clearly, he’s been participating in the town chatter. And here I thought he might be better than that. But I guess since I’ve been avoiding the topic, he had to go somewhere else for the information.
“I didn’t kiss her because I wanted to,” I say. “I kissed her because Martha and Mae spotted us under some mistletoe and made us.”
“Uh-huh…and how was it?”
Unexpected.
Soft.
Fucking delicious.
A kiss that I can still feel now. A kiss that I wish I could forget, but for the life of me, every time I think about that night, I think of how her lips felt against mine, how they were tentative, but then forceful when I parted our mouths. I think about how I wish I’d have pulled her in closer, dug my fingers into her hair, and spent so much more time exploring her mouth rather than pulling away.
And of course, all these feelings and thoughts have maddened me because the last thing I want to be doing is thinking about Storee in that way, especially since the hate is still there.
The irritation.
The need to challenge her.
Beat her in this competition.
I don’t need thoughts of her mouth on mine weakening my plan of attack.
