Page 13 of It Happened on Christmas Eve
‘Sure.’
As we leave the park, I get a spark of a long dormant feeling in the pit of my stomach. I can’t quite figure what the feeling is. I’m not sure I even want to figure out what the feeling is.
‘I’m taking you home now.’ I say firmly.
‘Fine.’
‘Good.’
‘Great.’
‘Awesome.’
‘Excellent.’
‘Stop it.’
‘You stop it.’
‘Let’s both stop it.’
‘Okay.’
‘Okay.’
‘Fine.’
‘Adam!’
Chapter Eight
Christmas Eve 6:25 p.m.
Finally! Finally, we’re on the way back to Adam’s house and this blasted day can be over and done with. Heading past Jerret and Hobbs Bookshop, I glance into the brightly lit window. It’s covered in Christmas decorations and I almost jump when I am faced with a massive cardboard cut-out of Adam’s face alongside small stacks of his latest book, part four of his Young Adult seriesThe Newcomers.I wheel the chair around to face the shop window.
‘As if I’ve not had enough of you today, now I have to see you in my local bookshop too!’
‘I know, it’s embarrassing. Come, on let’s go,’ Adam replies quickly, not laughing along as I expected he would.
I point at the cardboard cut-out picture. ‘That’s the smile you were doing at the woman in the perfume shop.’ I tease again, but Adam doesn’t crack even the tiniest of smiles. And then I remember what Marcy said about his latest book tanking. Eek, and here I am stopping him right in front of the bookshop window so he can think more about his failures. Nice, Phoebe.
I take the break off the wheelchair and am just about to speed us away when a tall, elegant woman of around my age, half steps out of the bookshop.
‘Adam Westbury?’ she says, pulling the soft dark grey shawl she’s wearing more tightly around her shoulders. ‘I thought it was you!’ She flicks her eyes up to me and, clearly deeming me uninteresting, continues to speak to Adam. ‘I saw on Twitter about your skating mishap, you silly pup. Anyway, you simply must come in and sign the stock we have. There are rather a lot of copies left!’
There shouldn’t be a lot of copies left, should there? That doesn’t seem like a good thing. I look at Adam, his mouth is set in a grim line.
I clear my throat. ‘We actually have somewhere to be! Sorry!’
‘No, no, it’s alright, Phoebe!’ Adam says with a cheerfulness that, after being around him for the past couple of hours, I now suspect is a touch forced. ‘I can sign a few books very quickly, if you don’t mind?’ He looks up to me with an apologetic smile.
I’d really rather not but signing some books seems like a thing he should definitely do to encourage more sales if he’s not had any.
‘Marvellous!’ says the woman, opening the door wide so that we can get into the shop. ‘You have quite the entourage,’ she says, looking at the tree with a wrinkled nose and then at me with the same expression.
‘Phoebe Cook,’ I say, extending my hand once we’re inside the shop.
‘Fliss Mayhew,’ the woman says with a simpering smile. I give her my firmest handshake and feel not even a slight bit guilty when she winces. There are some people in life, who you can immediately tell are douchebags.
