Five Brothers' Christmas Surprise Read online

  “I’m done with my work today,” I tell him .

  “Oh. Good. Why don’t you get started on tomorrow’s, then?” he says, the cigarette dangling from his mouth, unlit .

  “This is my last day, remember?” I ask, forcing myself to give him a polite smile .

  Remember, it’s your last day , I tell myself. Just grin and bear it for a few more minutes .

  “Oh. Right,” he says. He waves a dismissive hand and says, “Fine. Leave, then .”

  And, that’s it. I get my freedom back .

  If only it were just as easy for my mom, too .

  Emma

  “T hank you so much for letting me stay here.” I can barely look at my cousin in the eye because her apartment has sucked all my attention. It looks like a page out of a magazine .

  “Of course,” says Piper, my cousin. We used to play a lot when we were both little girls, having sleepovers at each other’s houses .

  Yeah, I used to have a pretty normal, perfectly happy childhood, until my dad cheated on my mom and left us for the other woman—not that things were better when he was around. He wasn’t a very good liar and he left plenty of horrible breadcrumbs for us to find .

  Things weren’t much better for Piper. After her mom died, her dad completely lost the ability to function, to the point where he couldn’t hold down a job and almost lost the family home .

  Now, though, she’s doing really well for herself .

  I almost couldn’t believe it. Piper was just a poor student with a financially irresponsible dad once .

  Then, suddenly, she was married .

  I only heard about the wedding after the fact, but apparently it was a lavish event held at a swanky, brand-new hotel. I heard the owner of the hotel himself let her use the venue as a personal favor, although the place wasn’t even officially open yet .

  Many of the guests were regulars in the gossip tabloids and financial papers because she was getting married to the heir of some hoity-toity bank. And with all the money his family was swimming in, they didn’t even have to pay the hotel to use their prime, beach-front wedding venue .

  Life is unfair .

  But I need some help now, and Piper’s the only person I know in a position to be able to offer that help. So for now, I’m putting aside my annoyance at not getting an invite to her wedding .

  “Your apartment is beautiful.” As I follow Piper inside, I can barely keep my mouth closed .

  My jaw keeps dropping at the sight of the marble floor, the textured wallpaper, the designer furniture . . . Everything’s in muted, natural colors and nothing in particular jumps out to grab my attention, but somehow that makes the décor captivating in its entirety. This place is pure, understated elegance .

  “Thank you,” Piper says, twisting around to give me a smile .

  The hallways opens out to a big, open space that I think is a living room, although it’s at least five times bigger than any living room I’ve seen before. The space is flooded with light, pouring in from the floor-to-ceiling glass panels along the edges of the apartment .

  The entire city is visible from up here—San Francisco in all its glory. I can see the ocean and everything .

  “Are you sure it’s okay for me to stay here?” I ask, suddenly feeling out of place. My clothes are from the discount rack and the duffel bag that contains those clothes appears tattered and worn, the fabric fraying from age. Everything in this place looks like it belongs, except for me .

  “Of course it is, Emmy,” Piper says, calling me by the nickname she gave me when we were little. She takes my hand and pulls me along the glass wall. “Don’t be silly. You’re always welcome in my home. This is just like old times, when we used to have sleepovers .”

  “Thanks, Piper,” I say, resisting the urge to tell her that neither one of our homes looked remotely like this .

  I’ll have to admit, I’m glad for the physical contact because the height is scaring me more than it should .

  What can I say? I’m a small-town girl. The tallest building I’ve ever been in, excepting this one, was my high school, which had three stories .

  Now, we’re so high up I don’t even know what story we’re on. The cars on street level look like toys. I can’t even see individual persons all the way down there. If I squint, I can maybe spot groups of people moving together as they cross the street, for example .

  “This is your room,” Piper announces as she pushes a door open and holds it for me .

  I didn’t think it was possible before, but my jaw slackens even more. “Wow. This is, like, the size of my entire house back home .”

  Piper laughs. “You’re exaggerating. I’ve seen that house and it’s not that small. Come on in .”

  I enter through the open doorway and stand there like a statue, not sure what to do .

  “Just put that bag anywhere. It looks heavy,” Piper says .

  “Oh. Right. Thanks.” I drop my bag to the marble floor and feel shame dripping like cold, melting ice from the top of my head to the tips of my fingers. I wonder if my bag will leave a mark on the spotless marble when I move it .

  “I’m sorry I can’t stay long, but make yourself at home, Emmy. I have to go pick up my daughter from school. Feel free to wander around and help yourself to anything, okay?” Piper asks sweetly .

  “Okay,” I say. “Thank you so much, Piper. This means a lot to me .”

  “Don’t mention it. I know what it’s like to be a new girl in the big city. I’m happy to give you all the help you need .”

  “Seriously, you’re too nice. Thank you .”

  “Seriously, it’s not a huge deal. You need to stop thanking me,” she says. She points to a white door at the other end of the bedroom. “The bathroom is over there if you need to freshen up. You must be tired after that long trip. You can draw a hot bath if you want and maybe take a nap. There’s some food in the fridge, too .”

  “Thank—”

  “Hey, what did I say about the thanks?” Piper asks, smiling .

  I laugh. “Okay, I’ll stop .”

  “Good. I’ll see you later, okay ?”

  “Yeah. I can’t wait to meet your daughter,” I say .

  “She’s adorable. You’ll love her.” Piper pauses. “But then again, you can probably take that with a grain of salt. I’m kind of biased. See you .”

  With that, Piper pulls the door shut and disappears. I hear her hurried footsteps leaving the apartment .

  Then, it’s silent .

  It’s not the kind of silence I’m used to, with birds and insects singing in the background, with leaves rustling and wind blowing. This silence feels artificial. All I can hear is the humming of the fridge and the air conditioner .

  Everything feels foreign, but in a good way. I can’t wait for my new life to begin .

  * * *

  I watch in amazement as Olivia, Piper’s six-year-old, picks round pieces of kiwi and green grapes and shovels them into her little mouth .

  “Green is my favorite color,” Olivia announces. It’s uncanny how much her eyes look like Piper’s when she glances up at me .

  “I can see that.” I note that, yes, everything on her plate is green. It’s after dinner, and for Olivia’s dessert, Piper has cleverly arranged five grapes around each piece of kiwi in such a way as to make them appear like a turtle .

  “I like blue, too. Blue is my second favorite color,” she says again without any prompting. She grabs a cup with both of her tiny hands, making it look like a giant-sized pitcher. Milk stains the creamy skin above her lips as she gives me a smile. “My cup is blue .”

  “Do you like yellow, too?” I ask .

  Olivia shakes her head, sending her blonde pigtails flying in the air .

  “Did you know that if you combine yellow and blue, you get green ?”

  “Yes,” Olive answers excitedly. “Blue and yellow and green are friends !”

  I laugh at her enthusiasm. She’s acting like any geek would when she meets so
meone who even remotely shares her obsession .

  As Olivia jumps down from her chair and leaves the dinner table, she yells out, “I can turn blue and yellow into green. Let me show you .”

  Piper grins as she watches her daughter run into her room. “She’s such a show-off .”

  “She’s a smart one. I don’t think I knew about complimentary colors when I was her age,” I say, taking a sip of my hot chocolate and letting the warmth seep into my flesh .

  It looks damp and chilly outside, with grey, heavy rainclouds hanging low in the sky, dumping fat drops of water all over the city. I can see everything from the luxurious comfort of Piper’s apartment .

  “I taught her that,” Piper says with more than a hint of pride in her eyes. “She’d used up her tube of green water color and she asked me for a new set, even though all the tubes were still pretty full. So, I taught her how to make her own green color, which got her interested in all the other colors .”

  “You’ve always been super creative,” I say. “Do you still make music .”

  “Yeah. These days, though, I play for a private audience of die-hard fans.” Piper grins. “Olivia and Rafe love the silly songs I made up for her .”

  I hear the pitter-patter of little feet on the marble floor before I see Olivia running up to us. She lays a big piece of white paper and a colorful metal box on the dining table before she climbs back up to her chair .

  “Finish the turtles before you start drawing, please, Olivia,” Piper says in a firm mom-voice I’ve never heard her use before .

  As I watch them interact, I can’t help but feel a pang of jealousy in my chest. Inwardly, I’m turning green, but unlike Olivia, I’m not such a big fan of the color .

  I don’t know what bothers me more—the fact that I only got to enjoy the kind of idyllic childhood Olivia has for the first handful of years of my life, or the fact that I haven’t had a chance to give the gift of such a childhood to my own offspring .

  I ignore the dark emotions swirling in my chest and try to focus instead on the bright colors Olivia’s mixing in her little plastic palette .

  I’ve seen pictures of Piper’s billionaire husband on magazines before, and I’m glad he’s away on business tonight. I’m pretty sure meeting him would only intensify my ugly feelings of envy .

  Later that night, before Piper puts Olivia to bed, she lets me use the computer in her husband’s home office to check out job ads .

  Sitting in Raphael Holt’s big, cushy, leather chair with the city sprawling out beyond the glass wall behind me, I realize I have it good .

  There are probably a lot of people shivering in the cold out there, sleeping on pieces of cardboard under bridges. With no money to my name, I’m just as poor as those people. I’m lucky to be warm, dry, and surrounded by more opulence than most can ever expect to experience .

  Still, I can’t shake off the feeling that I need to get out of here. Piper’s home is nice, but I don’t belong here .

  I go through the list of jobs that match my qualifications. There aren’t too many of them and not for the first time, doubt pollutes my bloodstream, telling me that I can’t do this after all, that I’ll have to crawl back to Ted and go back to working in that musty, windowless storage room .

  Maybe I should’ve started looking for a job before coming here to the city, but I was told I might have to be available for interviews right away, so I decided to wait .

  Now, I wonder if that was the right decision. I wonder if any of the decisions I’ve made up until this point in my life have been right .

  After all, going back to live with Mom and Ted after college turned out to be a big mistake. Maybe I’ve been making the wrong call at every turn in my life .

  It’s possible I’m simply bad at this whole adulting thing and I’m doomed to a life of misery and poverty .

  As I compose yet another cover letter, a name catches my attention .

  Fraser Archer .

  Could it be . . . No way. It can’t be .

  But surely, it can . . . right ?

  San Francisco is the closest, biggest city to Rockvale—the small town where both Piper and I are from. If we’re here, there’s a big chance one of my high school crushes is here, too .

  Of course, Fraser never paid me any attention. He probably didn’t even know my name. He and his brothers were too popular to notice a wallflower like me, whose head was always buried in some book (except when I was taking surreptitious glances at the Archers ).

  All the career-advice articles say that personal connections go a long way. There’s no harm asking if we really went to the same high school, is there? No, not at all. It’s not weird. Job seekers probably do this kind of thing all the time .

  My fingers dance on the keyboard as my heartbeat quickens. If this is really the Fraser Archer, it’s possible I’ll get to see another familiar face in this strange city soon—a gorgeous , familiar face .

  Of course, that’s only if I get an interview . . . which is a big if .

  I re-read the cover letter I’ve typed up on the big computer screen. Except for the last paragraph, it looks pretty similar to most of the others I’ve already sent out tonight .

  P.S. Did you go to Rockvale High School, by any chance? Your name sounds familiar .

  Does that sound too casual? Should I say something more like, ‘As you may notice on the resumé that I’ve attached to this email, I’m alumnus of Rockvale High School. I recall a certain Fraser Archer who was in the same school, and I’m curious if perhaps we’ve already met as fellow students .’?

  Nah.

  If this is really Fraser, he probably appreciates the casual tone of my note. It’d be a different story if this letter were addressed to someone like Sandy Archer or Austin Archer, for example .

  I click the Send button .

  Already, I can’t wait to read the reply .

  Austin

  T hey say Christmas comes earlier and earlier every year. No kidding .

  As soon as Halloween decorations come off, merry jingles start playing at the malls and Christmas trees show up everywhere, not to mention the fat fucks in red velvet suits and fake white beards .

  I stare at the plywood house that’s been erected in the middle of the mall. Styrofoam reindeers are parked right in front of it, while a guy in a fat suit sits on the red-and-gold sleigh .

  Mall Santa—poor son of a bitch—is faking a smile as yet another brat climbs up to his lap and lists off the toys he wants to see under the Christmas tree this year. Probably some combination of the top 100 most popular toys. For all the credit that kids get for their imagination and creativity, they’re really not that original .

  Is it really any surprise, though? Their parents aren’t that original either .

  Just look at the line that’s formed just outside Santa’s white picket fence. It’s like someone’s set a uniform that fucker follows. Almost every single parent in the line is wearing some kind of a heavy black coat and holding the latest iPhone up whenever it’s their kid’s turn to get on mall Santa’s lap .

  I’ll bet good money that they’ll put those pictures up on Instagram and Facebook to fish for compliments. I can already see the captions .

  “The center of my life <3 <3 <3 ”

  “It’s raining outside; thank Jesus for my sunshine and my joy ”

  “Taylor’s been a good girl this year, Santa ! :) :) :)”

  People tell me I’m too cynical for my line of business. But hey, does an oil magnate have to be deeply passionate about fossil fuels? Yeah, don’t think so .

  But somehow, when my business involves selling shit to tiny humans, I’m supposed to turn into a fawning fool at the sight of my customers ?

  Nah. Call me heartless, but I don’t see why this should be more than just business to me .

  E-commerce is the way of the future, and we’re simply here to take advantage of a gap in the market with our new website and phone-based application. No more, no less .

>   When I make a presentation to potential investors, I tell them we make it easy for kids to compile wish lists of their favorite toys from multiple online retailers .

  They also love it when I tell them about our kick-ass suggestion engine—courtesy of our in-house nerd, Sandy. What that means is the system tells kids about similar toys to the ones they want .

  Usually, these toys are more pricey, of course, which means that we earn a bigger commission when our little customers whine enough that their parents have no choice but give in to their demands .

  We also make our own toys. Like store brands at big grocery-store chains, these aren’t as pricey, but we make decent money off these products .

  We may sell toys, but this isn’t just child’s play. Christmas may be a celebration for most people, a time to lay off work and just laze around while the kids run wild in the house .

  But for us, it’s do-or-die time .

  That said, sometimes I think I’m the only one who gets that .

  While I’m busting my ass, running around getting stuff done, it seems like all my brothers do is fuck around. I may play just as hard as they do, but I work hard, too .

  On the other hand, sometimes I catch Sandy possibly playing some online game on the computer .

  Also, Hudson still hasn’t quit his band yet, even though it doesn’t make any money .

  Fraser gets the job done, usually by the sheer force of his charm—don’t tell him this, but I get jealous of the fact that he doesn’t have to work hard to make deals happen sometimes .

  And Ian . . . Well, we’re all just glad he’s staying out of trouble for once .

  I don’t think they understand how important it is that we get things right this holiday season .

  Online businesses move so fast three retailers probably open up and close down every time you blink. The people with money wield all the power, and they don’t have years to watch and see if a certain investment pays off .

  So, even though this is only our second holiday season, it’s probably our last chance to prove we can do this .