Page 109 of How My Neighbour Stole Christmas
“You say that as if you have experience in the matter.”
“Maybe,” he says his eyes fixed on the road.
“Perhaps you’ll tell me what kind of experience.”
“And give you insight into the competition?” he playfully says. “Nah, think I’ll pass.”
“Doesn’t seem very strategic to save your competition from a snowstorm.”
“As a matter of fact, it is,” he says. “If I left you there to freeze to death, then it wouldn’t be a competition at all. I’m not one to win because of a forfeit—I want the challenge.”
“Ah, I see, so saving me back there was a selfish move?”
He glances over at me for a split second. “Probably in more ways than one.”
Cole
What the fuck are you doing, Cole?
It’s a question I keep repeating to myself over and over as I glance toward Storee, checking for the hundredth time that she’s okay.
When I saw her car pulled off to the side, I felt my entire being go hot with fear. I knew immediately that it had to be her. I’ve seen that car parked in the driveway next-door, and it was headed the same direction as me. It had to be her, and when I saw her tear-stained face, well…fuck, it made me drop the animosity, the pent-up anger, and all I wanted to do was help.
Protect.
Make sure that she wasn’t scared.
Make sure that she was okay.
I went into helping mode.
And when she continued to cry in my truck, visibly shaking, she broke another wall that I had erected between the two of us, and before I knew it, I was holding her, stroking her hair, wanting to remove all the fear that was taking over her body.
Because I know that fear.
I feel it every time I drive in the snow.
It’s the way my parents died…driving in a snowstorm.
Nearly ten years ago. I got that phone call, telling me what happened.
Altering my life forever.
And it’s times like these that I wish I’d been with my parents and hadn’t been left alone.
The fear is so strong, so prevalent during the winter that I make sure to drive in the snow. I make sure to practice. I make sure I don’tallow the fear to turn me catatonic, because that’s what it would do if I allowed it.
So when I woke up this morning and saw that it was snowing, I didn’t even think twice about driving to Clayton. If only I’d checked in on Storee first to see if she was going. Selfishly, I didn’t consider her. I was so focused on myself, focused on conquering the fear once again that always pricks at the back of my neck when I travel in the snow.
I should have asked.
“I’m sorry,” I say before I can stop myself.
“Sorry for what?” she asks, sounding confused as she blots at her tears.
“For not checking in with you before I left, seeing if you needed a ride today.”
“Oh…why would you?”
