“Oh! You’ve named one of them after me?” At Deirdre’s panicked expression, I say, “Kidding, D! Gosh. I can’t say it enough: you two need to chill. Take a deep breath.”
“These are critical decisions, Maura, decisions that could affect the rest of our lives.” Oh, Lord. She’s using her Dr. Snow tone now. I can definitely hear her telling her heart patients about the importance of diet and exercise in this exact same voice.
Goaded by the condescension, I snipe, “Really, Deirdre? The wedding flowers could make or break your future happiness?”
“Someday you’ll understand. When you’re a bride, you’ll want everything to be perfect. When you’re ready to have children, you’ll see how— how loaded every decision seems to be. Life is so easy when you have only yourself to answer to.”
After she delivers what she believes to be the final word on that topic, she carries the dirty dishes into the kitchen, leaving me alone with Greg, who rolls his eyes at his future wife’s back.
“Don’t even,” I warn him. “You’re as bad as she is.”
“There’s nothing wrong with having goals and a plan. I can help you come up with one of your own, if you want.”
It’s a common misconception that I have no aspirations. I do. My main one simply happens to be for me not to be goal-oriented, and to keep my life as uncomplicated as possible.
Plus, Deirdre and my brother have enough goals and plans for all of us. It’s important for society to be balanced. Those of us who are more, shall we say, “laid-back,” keep the world from going haywire with all these driven freaks like Greg and Deirdre, the couple who manages to make the most intimate of Christmas Eve get-togethers tense.
I glower at him. “Plans aren’t fun.” Before he can contradict me, I rush forward with, “Oh, my gosh! Speaking of fun, I’ve been dying to tell you this for over a month, but with the holidays and work and… stuff— Plus, I didn’t want to mention it in front of Mom and Dad at Thanksgiving, because they would have asked a bunch of uncomfortable questions, but—”
“You’re moving to L.A.?”
My face falls. “No.”
“New York?”
My jaw tightens. “Are you trying to get rid of me?” I say it lightly and with a slight smile, so I won’t let on that he’s ruining my moment. But he’s totally ruining my moment.
“I’m trying to figure out what would be exciting in your world.”
“Uh, gee. Thanks? How about you let me finish?”
He shrugs, then waits.
“You’ll never guess who I hung out with at the Chiefs’ Christmas party. Jet Knox!”
“The quarterback, Jet Knox?” he asks skeptically.
I tilt my head at him and make a face. “How many people on the team—on the planet—are named Jet Knox? Of course, the quarterback!”
“You’re kidding, right?”
Offended he finds this so incredible, I pound the table. “I’m serious!”
“Wow. So, is he a cool guy? Man, I wish I’d known you were going to meet him; I’d have sent my Knox jersey with you for him to sign. Damn.”
I don’t tell him I probably wouldn’t have agreed to do something that dorky. It’s a moot point, anyway.
“Yeah. He was nice. Good sense of humor.” Smells great. Looks nice in a suit. Knows how to make a girl feel like the only woman in a room. Collects phone numbers he never plans to dial…
“Who’s this?” Deirdre asks as she returns to the table with pie and coffee.
Before I can open my mouth, Greg answers, “Mo danced with Jet Knox at the Chiefs’ Christmas party! Can you believe it? How cool is that?”
I sip my coffee and roll my eyes, but I can’t quite keep the delighted smirk from my face. It was cool, and he was hot. If this is going to be my one bite of the fame enchilada, I should probably get some chews from it. After all, something this insignificant has a pretty short shelf life. If I’m still talking about it more than a year from now, it’s just embarrassing and pathetic. For now, it’s fresh enough not to make people retch when they hear it.
For once, Deidre, the snow queen, looks impressed. She raises her eyebrows at me and says, “Hm. Any chemistry there? How fun would it be to date someone like him? Interesting, if nothing else…” I can see her wheels turning, and she says after swallowing a bite of pie, pointing to me with her fork and squinting her eyes, “Do you have any interest in journalism or PR? Because if so, he could probably help you get a foot in the door.”
I sigh so enthusiastically that I almost shoot pie from my nose. She looks alarmed when I cough and sputter. After nearly a minute of this, her medical training is about to kick in when I hold up a hand and say, “I’m fine. But I don’t have any ulterior motives with Jet Knox. I don’t even know the guy. We talked at a party. That’s it.” Sip, sip, sip. Cough, cough.
“There’s nothing wrong with networking,” Deirdre says. “I was simply brainstorming.”
Yes. Brainstorming. Toss ideas out there and hope one of them sticks or leads to a better one. Because, for some reason, she and Greg are obsessed with fixing me, figuring out the perfect formula that will turn me into a winner.
Dating Jet Knox would certainly do the trick. Then I’d never have to do anything else with my life.
Puh-lease.
So far this Christmas Day, I’ve listened to sixteen covers of “Last Christmas” and read two books. I’ve also consumed five cups of tea, but I’ve since moved on to spiked eggnog (I’m on my third cup). I’ve refused, however, to huddle under anything remotely resembling an afghan, to avoid doing exactly what I pictured myself doing in all of my lonely Christmas nightmares. Also, I’m not wearing fingerless
