Page 40 of With This Mask
So, on Christmas day, I wake up in my dorm room, alone. But it’s to a flood of texts.
Alec:
Good morning, beautiful. Wish I could spend the day with you, but I hope it’s still amazing. I’ll call you later and you can open your gift.
Isabella:
Merry Christmas! I’m excited for our dinner later! See you in a few hours!
Mom:
Call me as soon as you’re awake! Merry Christmas!
I smile, feeling pretty damn grateful to have so many amazing people in my life.
I sit on the edge of my bed and hold my phone up, hitting the FaceTime button with my mom.
“Merry Christmas, baby!” she answers enthusiastically.
“Merry Christmas, Mom,” I reply with a smile.
“You got a tree!” she squeals. “It’s adorable. I’m so glad you decorated!”
“I—” I nearly explain, nearly correct her that it wasn’t me who put it up. But I hesitate. Do I want to tell my mom about Alec? It started out so… dirty.
“What is it?” Mom asks, knowing. She always knows.
“It wasn’t me who put it up,” I say hesitantly. I’m panicking a little. I wish I’d thought about this beforehand. Do I want to tell her? “I’m… I’m kind of seeing someone. He put it up.”
“What?” Mom gapes dramatically. She was always great at the supportive dramatics. “You’re seeing someone and I’m just now hearing about it?”
“It’s new, Mom, calm down,” I chuckle. “We’re kind of still testing the waters. I wouldn’t say it’s something to write home about yet.”
Because it started out as no strings attached sex.
“What’s his name?” she encourages. “Where did you meet? Is he nice?”
I chuckle and shake my head, because I knew this was coming, the moment I opened my mouth. “His name is Alec, and we go to school together. We got paired up for this project and well…”
“A meet cute, I love it!” she exclaims. Mom is the best cheerleader.
“Alec keeps me on my toes, but in a good way,” I say. I don’t know that I can say Alec is nice. He does nice things every now and then, but I wouldn’t call him nice. But you can’t tell your mother that.
“As long as your happy, baby,” she says, and I can feel her support coming through the phone. “Now, open your present, I’m dying to see what you think!”
Later that evening, half an hour before I’m supposed to head to Isabella’s house for dinner, my phone buzzes. I pull it out to find a FaceTime from Alec.
“Hey,” I answer with a smile. “How’s Christmas at the mansion?”
“Trust me, I’d rather be just about anywhere else,” he says as he brushes his hand through his hair. He looks… exhausted.
“Oh no,” I say, my expression falling. “That bad?”
He shrugs. “It’s what I expected. Dad’s a tyrant. He’s fighting with his sisters. My cousins are assholes. Victoria’s family is coming over later, and I know Dad is going to be watching us.”
My nose scrunches at that and my stomach turns sour. “That’s exactly what you want to hear, your boyfriend spending Christmas dinner with the woman he’s supposed to marry.”
“Not funny, Winters,” he says, and I can see in his eyes how much this is killing him. “Trust me, I’d love nothing more than to get the hell out of here and come see you.”