Page 3 of All About Christmas

I’m wearing my long dress, standing with my back leaning against the front of my house and enjoying the evening sun, when I’m startled by a bicycle bell.

“Good evening, neighbour!” Dex, the kid who lives next door, waves to me excitedly.

He comes riding up on something that I personally think should have been taken to the scrap yard two generations before him.

It’s an old, rickety bicycle with a large, covered seat on the back.

He stops with squeaky brakes at his front door.

His black curls are tangled and his eyes glisten with elation.

“Don’t you look dressed up tonight. Are you going somewhere? ”

Bemused, I watch as he dismounts from his ramshackle rickshaw and parks it against his house.

“Hi, Dex,” I say, chuckling. “Yep, I’m going to a wedding reception.”

“Ouch, not a ceremony guest, huh? That’s got to hurt.”

“Oh, it’s not too bad, really. I think it’s a miracle I was invited at all.”

“Now, that’s the spirit. Your glass is always half full, isn’t it?” He doesn’t give me time to answer and nods toward his rattletrap. “Do you need a lift?”

I frown. “A lift?”

Dex proudly pokes his petite pigeon chest forward. “Sure. I’ve decided to start a bicycle taxi business. I still have to fix it up a bit and give it a coat of paint, but then it’ll be as good as new.”

I don’t think that bike will ever be as good as new again, but I don’t say so. Instead, I look at him enthusiastically. “That's cool.”

He puts his hands to his sides and walks a circle around his rusty death trap. “Yes, I think so, too. Hot Wheels can officially start as early as next week.”

I have to do my best not to burst into laughter. “ Hot Wheels ?”

“Yep. My parents said I have to earn my own money to pay for a PlayStation 5. And since I’m not too keen on working at the snack bar for peanuts.

.. tadaaa!” He squeezes the steering wheel and shakes the bike back and forth.

The thing makes such a racket that some nearby birds take flight.

“Bought it for ten euros on Marketplace. It’s a bit of an investment, but necessary to get something in return.

So...” He puts a businesslike expression on his face.

“I’m not officially open yet, but for you I’m willing to make an exception and take you to that wedding.

And since it’s you, I’ll make it a good price. Let’s say... twenty euros?”

I look wistfully at the open sky and then at a hopeful Dex, who has already practiced his salesman smile. He’s grinning so broadly it’s almost scary.

“Sorry, Dex, maybe another time.” I push off against the wall and straighten up when I see Noor’s car drive down the street. “I already have a ride. Good luck, though!” I get in and wave to him.

“Too bad!” shouts Dex after me. “Truly a missed opportunity!”

As I pull the door shut, I can just barely hear him shout, “Now the exclusive offer will go to someone else!”

“Who was that?” asks Noor as she accelerates and stares through her rearview mirror at Dex doing a wheelie on his pedicab.

“My neighbour’s kid,” I reply, shaking my head.

Noor turns off my street, grinning, and Dex disappears from sight. “Have you heard from Norbert yet?” she asks curiously.

“No!” I say, a tad frustrated.

Every time Norbert walked past my desk over the past few weeks, I sat up a little straighter in my chair and my heart bounced hopefully in my chest. Each time, I hoped he would say something like, “Hey, Holly, you got a minute? Because I want to offer you a grand promotion and a salary that will finally allow you to save up for your Peugeot 206.” Or: “I’ve been thinking for a while and decided that you are José’s successor and so should take over her place on the ergonomic throne. ”

But so far, he hasn’t. Instead, he keeps whizzing by as fast as a Duracell bunny on anabolics. As if, somehow, he knows what he should be doing, but for some vague reason is putting it off.

Or maybe that reason is not so vague at all. Maybe that reason is in fact very clear.

“What if he has someone else in mind?” I ask Noor, a tad worried. We drive out of town and the summer sun casts an orange glow over the meadows where the cows are grazing peacefully. “What if he doesn’t agree with José at all and has asked someone from his network?”

Noor looks ahead intently, her fingers tapping the steering wheel. “Well...” she says hesitantly.

I turn my head toward her with a jerk. “Do you know something?”

She blows some tufts of hair out of her face. The summer sun has dotted the skin around her nose with freckles. She herself hates them, but I envy them.

Noor bites her lip, transferring some red lipstick onto her front teeth. “Damn,” she mutters when she realizes what’s happened. She glances fleetingly in the rearview mirror and wipes her index finger across her front teeth.

“Noor?” I repeat nervously. “Do you know something?”

“Well...” she says again. “Pippin did say something about that...”

“About what?”

“Look, I’m not sure, umm...” She drives up a country road, and at the end is a large farmhouse surrounded by trees. As we get closer, music and laughter drifts toward us.

“Oh, come on, if Pippin says so. That guy is Norbert’s lapdog.”

Noor chuckles briefly. “Fine. Pippin said he heard that Norbert has his eye on one Olivier Wolfs.”

I blink my eyes a few times in surprise. Olivier? That name means nothing to me at all. But that last name... I gasp. “Wolfs?” I repeat, my voice appalled. “As in: related to John Wolfs?”

Noor casts me a compassionate look. “That’s what I gathered. His son, in fact.”

She drives into the parking lot, the gravel skittering away under her tires and tapping against the bumper of a shiny Tesla.

She steers smoothly into the last free spot and turns off the engine.

With drooping shoulders, I stare, unseeing, out the window at a decorative lantern for a few additional seconds.

John Wolfs is the media mogul of the Netherlands. He is, so to speak, to the TV world what the Pope is to the Catholic Church. And so, naturally, he’s fathered a nepo baby which he can now push through the airwaves of any TV show.

“Holly?” asks Noor cautiously. “Are you okay?”

“Am I okay?” I unfold the sun visor and study my reflection in the tiny mirror.

I see that my lipstick has faded slightly, and so I fumble for the tube in my clutch so I can touch it up.

I rub my lips together to spread the colour, then I turn to Noor again, who looks at me with concern.

My heart is racing like crazy, but I try to remain as calm as I possibly can.

“Didn’t you say something about an open bar?”

“I think you’ve had enough.” Noor has to do her best not to burst into laughter as she eyes the champagne flute in my hand. Her cheeks turn pink. “I love drunk Holly, but we are colleagues here. And Norbert is over there somewhere. He can see you.”

“Fuck Norbert!” I exclaim, which earns me some strange looks.

The corners of Noor’s mouth sag down and her eyes get big. “Holly!” She waves her hands frantically as she looks around. “Holly, shit!” she mutters softly. “I think he heard you.”

“Holly shit!” I giggle and take another sip of my champagne.

The bubbles sting deliciously in my throat, and I sway along to the beat of the music.

My pale pink locks dance on my shoulders and the skirt of my floral summer dress rustles around my ankles.

I was afraid I would be bothered by my feet, which I put into high, black sandals, but I feel nothing.

This would be a perfect time to walk over hot coals, should I still want to cross that off my bucket list.

None of it matters to me anymore. My boss is giving the job I worked extremely hard for to someone else. And I have no intention of staying on as an editorial assistant. Maybe they’ll want me at public broadcasting. I’ve heard they’re a little friendlier there. More wholesome. Less shark-like.

I raise my glass back up to my mouth and down the last of the golden bubbly. By now, there is no lipstick left to leave an imprint on the glass.

Maud is a beautiful bride. She wears a garland of flowers in her up-done hair, and she has on a white wedding dress with lace sleeves. Steven sways her across the dance floor and watches her with a look I reserve exclusively for a bowl of Ben & Jerry’s.

It’s almost enough to make me jealous. Almost. Despite everything, I love that they’re so happy together.

Okay, maybe I’m a tiny bit jealous. Not so much of Maud because she has Steven, but because they have found the kind of love I’ve only read about. The kind of love I didn’t actually think existed anymore. Or, at least, I have yet to find it.

“Well, there’s not much you can do about it anymore,” a nervous Noor interrupts my thoughts. “He’s heard you by now.”

“Hmm.” I’m occupied with totally different things than Noor right now. Like that it’s way too hot in here. That the colourful lights are excessively bright. And that the man standing at the bar is far too handsome.

Wait, what? My eyes dart back to the man casually leaning his elbow against the dark wood of the bar.

He really is quite handsome. He casually holds his beer while having an animated conversation with a beautiful woman.

His sharply tailored suit is tight in just the right places—a subtle hint at a nicely shaped, toned body.

His dark brown hair falls loosely around his face and his jawline is adorned by stubble.

He has cheekbones sharper than a triangular protractor and then those eyes.

.. the colour of melted chocolate, and when they flash in my direction, something tingles in my lower abdomen.

It’s as if he senses that I’m watching him.

And I don’t look away. Nope. I continue to stare at him as if hypnotized.

He tilts his head slightly and raises the corner of his mouth in amusement. And yes, he also has a dimple in his cheek when he laughs. Of course he has a dimple in his cheek when he laughs.

“Holly, you’re staring,” Noor whispers in my ear.

When I don’t respond, instead continuing my staring contest with Mister Handsome, she sighs impatiently. I see him say something to the woman next to him, straighten up, and take a step in my direction.

“Hey, Holly, have you seen the ice cream selection?”

With a jerk, I break eye contact and look at Noor, intrigued. “No, where?”