Page 47 of A Hexcellent Chance to Fall in Love

I stared out the window. The rain was getting harder, faster, and I couldn’t make out the individual drops or the puddles anymore. The anger in this storm was palpable, and I couldn’t help but relate. “Yeah, sure,” I squeaked out.

“What’s wrong?” Christina asked. “You’ve been kind of off all evening.”

Had I been? I didn’t mean to be. I thought I’d been doing a great job at keeping my feelings tightly bottled up. I wanted this to be a night to remember, even though it wouldn’t be. “I’m sorry.” I forced a smile.

“See, that’s not the real you. What’s going on?” She tilted her head at me, and took a moment before tentatively asking, “You don’t still think you’re cursed or something, do you?”

I turned away from the window to face her. “What would make you think of that?”

“To be honest, I haven’t stopped thinking about it.” She let her gaze fall to the floor. “I keep thinking that I’ll wake up one morning to a text that you decided to leave.”

I took her hand. “I would never do that.” Not on purpose anyway—leaving, however, was inevitable.

“I know, but…” She shook her head. “I guess I’m just being—”

Lightning flashed and thunder crashed simultaneously. A shadow passed right over Christina’s face.

“Look out.” I leaped forward, wrapped my arms around her, and spun Christina away from the window as one of the giant trees from outside came crashing through. Something pressed against my back as our legs got tangled, and we both hit the ground, glass raining down around us.

Her chocolate peppermint breath from the Andes mint she’d eaten earlier caressed my cheek. “You’re a superhero; that’s your secret to not being afraid,” she said, but her voice wobbled a bit.

“Just call me Captain Reflex,” I tried to joke. “Are you okay?”

She was quiet for a moment, her gaze scanning my face. “You’re holding me a little tight.”

“Oh right.” I released her and scrambled to my feet.

Christina stood, and a small gash on her forearm dripped blood onto the ground. I grabbed a costume package nearby, tore it open, and pressed the fabric of whatever it was to the open wound. “Is it a bad thing that it doesn’t hurt?” she asked.

“Not necessarily. I bet your adrenaline is pumping.” My heart was pounding, too, but for a different reason. Everything about tonight was already so unfair—and now this? Why was the universe being so cruel?

A branch hung through the window, and jagged shards of glass were scattered on the floor—one of the pieces larger than a headstone.

It was amazing she wasn’t hurt worse. I had to at least be grateful for that.

“The Dead of Night will pay for all of your medical expenses.” I pulled the cloth away to get a look.

The cut wasn’t terrible, but it likely needed stitches, and there would definitely be a scar.

Christina stared at the ground. “If you hadn’t…” But she didn’t finish her thought. She didn’t need to. If she had been standing where she had been before I stepped in and pushed her out of the way, a huge pane of glass would’ve hit her. “Are you okay?” she asked me this time.

“I’m fine. But we should get you—”

“No. Maybe you don’t feel it either.” She tugged my arm to spin me around, and she gasped.

“Your jacket. Oh my god.” She pulled it off, jamming it in my hands.

The back of my leather jacket had a diagonal slash from shoulder to waist, and from the feel of her cool fingers against the skin on my back, it had also torn through my shirt. “There’s nothing there. You’re fine.”

“Don’t sound so disappointed,” I said to try to lighten the mood.

Her hand gripped my arm, chilled fingers against my warm skin that sent ripples all the way up and into my chest. “It’s not funny.”

I shook my head. “No, it’s not.” There was nothing funny about tonight at all.

“That thing should’ve sliced you in two.

” She was right. That was exactly what it should’ve done, but I had to be in top physical health at all times for the store, so this was the blessing that came with my curse.

Nothing could hurt me. Physically at least—inside my chest, my heart was slowly cracking in two.

“I guess I got lucky. Turned at the right time.” There was nothing else I could say. The truth would’ve been harder to believe.

She flinched and let go of me, instead wrapping her hand around the cloth still pressed to her arm.

“You should get that looked at.”

She nodded.

“You’ll be okay.” She had to be okay. I needed her to be. There was no other option.

Her eyes locked with mine. “Because you got me, right?”

I swallowed the lump in the back of my throat. “Yeah. I got you.”

But she didn’t move. Her gaze flickering back and forth between me, the broken window, her arm, and my torn jacket, which was now on the ground. Rain flew in on the wind through the gaping hole where the tree had smashed the glass, getting us both wet.

“This whole thing is really real, isn’t it?” Christina asked. “That’s why you aren’t hurt.”

I just nodded. There was no reason to say I told you so.

“But I don’t understand,” she yelled over the howling wind.

I took her hand and led her away from the window and the rain, and to the seats we’d passed on our way into the back room. When the store vanished tonight, it likely would fix the window, or it didn’t matter. It would be an empty building—ready for the next tenant to move in.

Christina’s whole body shook as I set her down and got her that White Claw. “What’s this for?”

“I thought maybe you could use a drink.” I pulled a chair up in front of her so that our knees were touching.

She cracked the can open and took a healthy swig. “Tell me everything.”

“Are you sure you want to hear this?” I asked. She hadn’t wanted to hear it the last time I tried.

She nodded, and I pulled her arm toward me, securing the fabric over her cut.

It wasn’t exactly a short story, so it would take me a while to get through it all, but that’s exactly what I did.

I took a deep breath and explained my story from the beginning—about how I’d been tricked, and the years I’ve been attached to the store, so that’s how I knew so much about the town and all the best things to order whenever we went out.

I told her about Mrs.Stein and how I thought I’d found a way to break the curse but failed.

Christina leaned in and listened with her whole body, never interrupting me.

It was the first time I’d ever talked about all of it, and I actually felt heard.

“What’s going to happen?” she asked when I was finished.

“Once midnight hits, this will all disappear.” I waved my hands over my head.

“Just like that.” She snapped her fingers, and my heart broke a little more.

“Yep.”

She glanced around at the mess from the party, all the boxes, leftover decorations, and everything else around us. “What about me? What happens if I stay here with you?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

“Maybe I’ll come with you,” she said. My sweet, kind Christina. I didn’t know what I would do without her—she was right in front of me, and I already missed her.

“Is that really what you want? For everyone to forget about you? What about your family? Your sisters?”

“I don’t know. I just know I don’t want to lose you.”

I swallowed hard, not once but twice. This was so much harder than I ever imagined.

“You won’t remember.” But I would. As much as I tried to ignore all the feelings of the last few days, they all came crashing into me.

The inevitable was here. Now. This was really happening.

She finally was ready to listen to my predicament, but it was too late.

Tonight, I would lose her, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

“I don’t want to forget you.” A tear slipped down her cheek.

“I don’t want you to forget me,” I confessed, and the backs of my eyes burned something so fierce that no amount of blinking could stop it.

Thunder rumbled the walls—like a warning, but we both seemed to ignore it. “I’m not leaving you.” She grabbed my hand and wrapped her fingers with mine, squeezing tightly.

“I don’t think it works that way.” While no one had ever been with me inside the store since the time Kitty tricked me—I’d always been the only one to get pulled away. I didn’t even have to be here for it to happen. Once midnight hit, no matter where I was, I’d be gone.

“We have to try, though, right?” Tears continued to slip down her cheeks.

I reached up and used my thumb to brush them away.

It was wrong and selfish. I had no idea what would happen once midnight struck if Christina was still in the store.

Part of me wanted her to be sucked away with it—with me—but the other part knew what she would be giving up if she did and I prayed that didn’t happen.

She deserved to live. She deserved to wake up tomorrow with her future wide open in front of her.

Her family, her students, this community needed her.

She gripped my hand tighter and leaned forward, pressing her forehead against mine.

“I’ll be back,” I told her.

“But you said I won’t remember you.” Tears dripped onto our fingers.

“You won’t.”

“Then you have to make me remember. Promise me you’ll make me remember how much I love you.”

I leaned away to look her in the eyes. “I can try, but I can’t make you feel things for me if you don’t want to.”

“But I do want to. I want to be in love with you. I don’t want to live without you at all. I don’t want to know a world without you in it.”

The tears I’d held back all day rushed from my eyes.

“But that’s how it has to be. Because very soon this will all be gone and so will I, and you won’t remember me—but I’ll be left remembering you and what we could’ve had together.

You’ll just see me as this girl that works at the Halloween store, but I’ll know what it feels like to hold your hand, to kiss you, to be with you, and I won’t be able to. ”

Her cheeks flushed red. “Then remind me. Tell me all of this on day one. Come and find me no matter where I am and tell me, and then we’ll have two months to break the curse together, not only a few days.”

“You’re angry with me.”

“Damn right I’m angry. I’m mad at myself for not listening to you. I’m mad at you for not telling me sooner. And I’m mad I finally found my person, and you’re going away.”

I shook my head. “You won’t remember any of that.” I tried to sound reassuring, but reassuring for her or me, I didn’t know.

“But you will. You’ll know how much you mean to me. And you owe it to me to try again. You have to tell me.”

“And what if it doesn’t work? What if you don’t believe me? What if we can’t find someone to break the curse?” I didn’t know if I could put her through that.

“I don’t know. We do it again.”

“How many times?” I asked. This was already so hard, saying goodbye. I didn’t know if I’d be strong enough to repeat it—especially multiple times.

“What?”

“How many times do we try—do I try? Because it’s my heart that’s breaking right now—and it will each and every time I have to leave you. Your feelings will be spared, but mine…”

“Just promise me, please,” she begged, and then she pulled me into her, gripping me so tightly like she was scared to let go. I held her back, just as scared, and I memorized everything about her. The way her breath hitched as she cried. The way my body shook against hers as I sobbed.

This was why it was called a curse and not something else. Losing someone in this way was worse than death. She’d wake up tomorrow and would never think of me again, but I’d spend the next ten months thinking of nothing but her.

“I got you,” I said. “You won’t remember, but know that anytime I say ‘I got you,’ what I’m really saying is ‘I love you.’?”

And that was it. That was how I lost Christina. I held on to her until the clock struck midnight and then everything around me went black.