Page 18 of Light Up My Life

The morning streets during December always felt so empty after the crowded nighttime viewings. Hardly any cars were on the road, no people crowding the sidewalks.

“I’m going to add snow to the globe,” I said to Marcus.

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why? For the competition.”

“You don’t need to do more, Jaz. The yard looks good. People like it. They’ll vote for us.”

“Yeah, I know…”

“You put too much pressure on yourself sometimes.”

“I do not. I like to do this kind of stuff.” Which was the truth.

“Then make your snow, Edna,” he said, throwing his backpack behind the driver’s seat.

“Edna?” I asked, confused, as I opened my side of the car.

“That girl from the Frozen movie.”

“Elsa.”

“That’s her name?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Huh.”

“You’re a goof.” I pulled the door shut as he started the car.

“Elsa?” Marcus asked again like he thought I’d change my mind.

As we drove past the Moreno house, I saw Ryan heading to his car. He didn’t acknowledge me as we passed. Our eyes barely met and then we looked away just as quickly.

“The prince got up early today,” Marcus said.

“Be nice,” I said with a laugh.

“Be nice? Aren’t you the one who called them royal snobs? And that other time you said their thievery destroys Christmas or something like that.”

I was pretty dramatic. “The Grinch,” I said. “I called them grinches.” And royal snobs.

“Is the season softening your feelings about our evil neighbors?” Marcus asked, not letting me get away with my tiny show of goodwill, apparently.

I was going to give myself away if I didn’t stop, so I said, “Maybe we should steal one of their decorations before they steal another one of ours.”

They’d really only stolen the one thing, all those years ago. But occasionally, when we were unpacking Christmas decorations and couldn’t find something we swore we’d had the year before, we speculated that it might’ve been our neighbors.

“They don’t want our trashy stuff,” Marcus said.

“It’s not trashy,” I said.

He chuckled. “I know. It was a joke, Jasmine. I’m on your team, remember?”

His words reminded me, once again, that there were teams. Opposing sides. Enemies.

“Now that you’re friends with your hot neighbor…” Fiona said to me at lunch.