Page 78 of Just A Little Joy

You’re welcome to come back over if you want.

Nah, but thank you.

Gonna stay home and pretend not to be mopey.

If you change your mind, you know where to find me.

I was determined to get into the holiday spirit if it fucking killed me.

In my head, I’d spun this whole fantasy about how Casey would pick me and wouldn’t head off to Alaska. How he’d decide this was where he wanted to be, settle down, build something with me. That fantasy had gone about as well as the fantasy where the going-away party magically made him realize I was the guy he wanted. Spoiler: busted. Both of them.

So after I dropped him off, there was no universe where I could walk back into that house full of cheerful Daddies and their boys. Instead, I came home to a Christmas tree sitting in my living room like a big, silent accusation. It had been standing there undecorated for a week because, in yet another episode of Travis Being a Delusional Romantic Dumbass, I imagined Casey showing up at my door and us decorating it together.

My choices were to drag it outside and make my neighbors wonder what crime had happened, or decorate the damn thing by myself and try to move forward with my life.

Option B was the only one I could stomach. I didn’t care what the neighbors thought, but I didn’t want their kids asking questions. Leaving the tree bare was somehow worse, but I also refused to listen to Christmas carols while decorating like some sad Hallmark cliché.

“Travis, just put the lights up and call it a day,” I muttered.

The fir tree stood in the front window, looking tired and abandoned. Boxes of ornaments sat untouched on the floor because every time I reached for one, Casey’s face popped intomy mind, cross-legged beside me, teasing me over old hockey ornaments or shaking the wrapped presents I’d already bought him.

Christ, the presents. They were shoved in a bag in the closet, and it had taken everything in me not to bring them tonight. I hadn’t wanted him to feel guilted or cornered. Knowing me, they’d sit in that bag until I finally donated them. Not being picked hurt like hell.

I slumped back on the couch and stared at the tree. I knew I needed to move, but grief had settled so deep that even breathing was work.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

What the fuck?

Whoever was cop-knocking on my door needed to slow their roll. I peeled myself off the couch, stomped over, and yanked open the door with more irritation than intended.

“Why the hell are you pounding?—”

And there he was. Swamped in my hoodie, holding his duffel bag like a lifeline was the man I loved.

“Can I come in?”

“Yeah, of course.”

Casey stepped inside, and I noticed his hair was damp and my hoodie speckled with raindrops. Sometime in the last hour, the drizzle had turned into steady rain.

“Thanks,” he murmured.

“Hey,” I said softly, “why don’t we get you out of that hoodie? It can’t be warm.”

He gave a nod, small and tired, and I stepped forward to lift it over his head. I tossed it onto the bench and guided him into the living room.

He paused, taking in the half-lit tree with its drooping colored strands, the entire place giving off sad bachelor holiday energy.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I didn’t mean to interrupt you.”

“You didn’t interrupt anything. I was just putting lights up so it didn’t look quite so bare.”

“It’s a nice tree,” Casey said, tentative but sincere.

“Thanks. I didn’t have much to do with that part. It was delivered.”

Up close, his eyes were red-rimmed. He’d been crying. When he took the hoodie off, a notebook came with it, tucked under his arm like something he could not bear to lose. It looked weathered and well-loved, and somehow still dry, like he’d shielded it through the rain.