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Sabrina was surprised when she walked into the bakery that Thursday and saw Dustin. He always slipped out the back door as soon as he heard her key in the front lock, and she hadn’t interacted with him in probably close to a year.

“Hi,” she said, eyebrows raised.

He looked… different. He was definitely hitting puberty, now close to her height, and he was obviously spending more time outdoors because he wasn’t sickly pale. He was still thin, the kind of kid with a tiny build, but he looked fuller. Like he’d been using his body.

“Hi,” he said.

“Merry Christmas?” she offered. She didn’t really know what to say to him, they’d never spoken much. “Um… did you make sure to do extra of everything today? It’s Christmas Eve, everyone always comes rushing in for last minute rolls and dessert and… stuff.”

He nodded, gesturing to the double-stacked trays behind him.

“Here,” he said, handing her a square envelope.

She blinked in surprise but ran her finger under the envelope edge and peeled it open, pulling out a Christmas card. The cover had been done in thick, textured paint. It was the back of a girl, standing in the snow, bent at the waist and placing a carrot nose on a snowman. The girl was wrapped in a puffy red coat with a brown fur hood like Sabrina’s, dark curls spilling down her back. In the background was a small cabin, with a loaf of steaming bread cooling on a windowsill.

Inside, it just said Merry Christmas.

“Dustin, this is so cool… it looks kind of like me!” she said, genuinely delighted. “Where did you find this?”

He shrugged, pulling on his coat, and picked up his backpack.

“Will I see you on Tuesday?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Today is my last day. I’m um… starting at Riverglen after the holidays. I have to get a bus.”

“Oh,” she said, her face falling. Shit, Andy is going to ask me to do Tuesday and Thursday mornings now…

She ran her hand over the ridges of the paint. Riverglen… “Wait… did you make this?” she asked.

He nodded, the tips of his ears turning pink as he pulled on a hat, covering them up. She walked over to him, reaching out slowly and straightening his cap, before bending down and kissing him on the cheek.

He flamed tomato red and scurried out the door. It shut with a soft click behind him.

Sabrina smiled to herself, tucking the card between the pages of a book she’d brought and shoved it in her bag.

That kid is gonna be alright, she thought, but as soon as the thought formed in her mind, she had a sinking feeling that she was very, very wrong.