Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Maysilee wakes up to raspy, growl-like snores that have her eyes shooting open like tense watermelons that had been tightened with rubberbands.

First, her gaze rises to the right side of the room, at the window that had frozen overnight. The glass is crowded with ice marks and she can pick out sickles leering over from the roof shackles. It must’ve gotten even colder. Then, she brings her focus a little lower.

He’s still here, alright. Curled up on the small couch with slashes, blanket thrown over his bare shoulders… The man she’s known as Wyatt for approximately twelve hours continues to snore like a goddamn bear as he slept. She wants to scoff in disbelief, maybe with humor. She’s never heard anything like it.

Liar, she thinks as she rips her clunky phone off its charger and heads to the bathroom.

Maysilee bumps the door shut, and cannot resist pouting at the sights that cornered her. Bleak and boring and worst of all, smelling like mildew. She takes in herself in the mirror, she wasn’t looking so hot either. Her pajamas wrinkled, skin pale. Some of her makeup remains beneath her eyes, even her lipstick collects in splotches along her mouth. She dips down and turns on the faucet, awaiting the water to warm up before splashing her face with it.

As soon as it reaches a comfortable temperature, her phone buzzes on the counter. She shakes the droplets off of her hand to retrieve it, and grins at the “Papa” contact that glows on the screen.

She lifts it up to her ear. “Hi, Papa.” Maysilee says quietly.

“Hey, honey. Merry Christmas.” He begins, “your sister said you were stuck in Pennsylvania. My stupid self didn’t check the news last night.”

“Yeah, Merry Christmas. And I am. Probably until tomorrow.” Maysilee sadly smiles to herself, mindlessly twirling the end of her hairs that were fountaining downward from her bun. “I’m glad you got home safe, at least,” she adds. “I lost my freaking wallet yesterday.”

“What? How did that happen?”

“I don’t even know. But it’s not like I can do anything about it.”

He pauses for a second. “Call your bank, honey. Just in case someone took your cards out.”

“I’m going to,” Maysilee says, then begs to shift the conversation. “I’m staying at a motel.”

She can envision the perplexed expression on his face. “You had cash on you?”

“No,” she responds with descending volume, realizing the hole she’s now dug herself in. “Someone was just… really nice to me.” 

That sums it up.

“Well, they say Christmas brings out the best in people. Make sure you check for bedbeds.” Oh, she did. Wyatt even double-checked for her, despite him having the room the night prior. She supposed he just wanted to make her feel better about the whole ordeal, more comfortable. It was really sweet. “We’re missing you.”

“I miss you too,” she echoes, “I’ll be there eventually.”

“I won’t let anyone snag your strawberry cake, I promise.” 

Her mouth’s filling with a response, then she hears talking from the bedroom.

Now, she isn’t particularly nosey… but she can’t help herself sometimes. She lets her phone drift down her cheek a little, the screen and keys sticking to her skin as she presses her ear to the crease of the door.

“No, I’m still here.” Wyatt speaks in a tone that’s both strong and soft, a series of mumbles follow his words. “Beau can’t do anything, Ma. It’s the weather, not the airports.” She listens to him go silent for a split moment before sighing deeply, “I gotta go, boss’s calling. I’ll call you back.”

The voice on the other end is a lot louder, unapologetically. Maysilee cannot stand people like that, she’s never afraid to tell them to their face how it doesn’t make them look any bigger of a person. In fact, it gives off the opposite effect.

“I… I’m sorry. I can’t change anything right now, I’m doing the best I can with what’s going on.” Maysilee could physically feel the anxiety seeping into the bathroom, right through the cracks. “I’m not making excuses—” And now it all crumbles to a quiet sea, as if the line had hung up on him.

“Maysilee, hello?”

She fumbles the phone. “Sorry, Papa. I’m still so tired.” Shuffling from the room occurs, “thanks for keeping my cake safe.”

“Anytime, honey.” He laughs, “well, I should probably let you go. Get you some rest, and I’ll see you soon.”

That shuffling gets a little more prominent now. What the hell was he doing in there?

“Okay,” she whispers in one breath, they share their usual I-Love-Yous, and their lines close up. Right as that ringing on the other line ends, she jerks the knob to the door with a nice big twist, and steps out onto the rugged carpet.

Before she even has a chance to think, she’s face-to-face with Wyatt, who would have knocked her over if it weren’t for his arm catching her backside.

“Sorry.” He breathed out and pulled his grasp away, he was surprisingly warm.

Maysilee eyes him, shrugging off the fuzziness in her abdomen. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?” He’s got his boots on, his shoulders now covered with his unbuttoned flannel. His coat is tangled within his fist, and he surely would have had his bag on his back if it weren’t for Maysilee standing in front of the rack on the wall.

Wyatt looks somewhat confused at her concern. “I… was getting ready to head out.”

“Why?” Maysilee isn’t sure why she says it so quickly. Despite knowing his name, he was still a stranger. A snoring, unbelievably kind stranger with stunning dark eyes, but one nonetheless. He must think the same of her, acts of sweetness didn’t change the truth.

“I thought you might’ve wanted me to leave.” He responds, and definitely believes it.

Her eyebrows raise. She’s unable to conceal the look on her face that makes Wyatt visibly tense up. “Do you want to leave?”

He meets her squint with a widened stare. Maysilee can’t seem to divert her attention from his face. From his side, it most likely feels like she’s testing him, or trying to intimidate him; but she’s really just looking. Without him under the pouring snow or in the center of that ridiculously decorated lobby, a lot of his once hidden features are coming to light. Little scars and moles she always loves to see models bearing on magazines.

“I’d like to not spend the rest of Christmas at the airport.”

That’s clear enough of an answer. She wants to say, “Good, because I don’t want to be alone today either.” But she doesn’t. So she just smiles, trying not to give away too much.

Wyatt then brings his stare to the ground, his hand diving into his jean pocket. There must be something in there he habitually plucks at, she saw him doing it yesterday too. “I, uh, was still going to go out, then. Find somewhere open to eat.” He informs her, “I’m starving. I’m sure you are as well.”

Maysilee takes in the hidden morning sun through the window. “I don’t like breakfast,” she grimaces, and Wyatt’s calm glint jumps up to her again, he shrinks a bit. Clearly disappointed. “But I’d love some coffee.”

There’s more people in the Waffle House than he anticipated, but that was bound to happen with the countless delays. Lots of hungry people, and not everyone could stomach airport vending machine food.

Maysilee stands aside him, dressed like they were heading to some kind of fashion event, kicking the snow off her boots on the mat as the generated heat welcomes them. “Little crammed, huh?”

Wyatt turns to her, heart sinking at how she had already been staring at him. “Hopefully we can find a booth.”

She hums in agreement, pursing her lips. Her cheeks are pink from the cold, and glittery from her makeup. She had made him wait a nice thirty minutes before they had left the motel, quipping “Can I make myself look presentable first?” And when he’d told her it wasn’t a problem, she hesitantly closed the door after grabbing a fresh outfit and said: “Don’t run off.”

The thought hadn’t crossed him once. But he assured her he wouldn’t anyway, and sat back down on the crappy couch, mind bouncing in between his boss’s passive aggressive phone call and why a person he hadn’t even known for a full day wanted to keep him around.

Actually clearing out of the motel was as cold and slow as one could imagine. Barely salted roads and sidewalks, snow coming down thicker than ever before. Wyatt usually prefers his personal space, but as he and Maysilee scorned the streets together, he didn’t shrug off her leaning into him. The feathers of her coat were soft and warm and as for herself, she had a natural aroma of resin that somehow made him feel even cozier on the inside.

It was weird. It made him think of home.

“Oh, there’s one.” Maysilee hooks him out of his own head, she’d been standing on her tip-toes. When she drops down, she steps in front of him, leading the way, and he follows close behind. He thought then, how it may have been a sign of trust. While sharing the room with him was as well in a way, Wyatt just wrote it up as her wanting to pay him back. Not that she ever needed to.

Despite the rush of people inside, a waitress with braids and a notepad came up to them right away. Maysilee compliments her hair, then orders herself a plain black coffee. Wyatt only asks for a water and an order of pancakes with a side of hashbrowns. She disappears into the kitchen directly after she finishes jotting down their things, and a silence forms between the two of them.

Wyatt runs the pad of his thumb along the coin in his pocket as he keeps catching glances of Maysilee, twirling her nails under the trinkets of one of her necklaces, plucking at her coat. A part of him wants to speak to her, but he doesn’t even know what to say. He’s always been bad at making friends.

Just like yesterday on the bench, she feels his gaze, and glares right into his eyes.

Nowhere to look now, really. No snow around. So he freezes, the muscles of his biceps building sweat.

Maysilee studies him like a hawk, a breath juggles in her throat. “You’re from Kentucky too, right?” And when he nods, she asks: “where exactly?”

Fast images of the town he’d visited just days ago walk along his membrane, images of his childhood, him eventually leaving at twenty because he just couldn’t do it anymore. It’d been so long since then, so the slits of memory between leaving Kentucky, arriving in Vermont, and staying there have blurred over the years. He just remembers driving until he couldn’t anymore. 

“Well, Twelve Rivers, but I technically lived on the outside—”

“You’re fucking with me.”

Wyatt blinks, thrown by the interjection. Had he said something wrong? “What?”

Silverware clatters in the back, waves of talking filling the intervals. “That’s—I’m from Twelve Rivers.”

There’s a couple thumps of stillness, only interrupted by both of their chuckles of disbelief.

He always knew there was a more populated side of the town, but this left him starstruck. How do you start-and-end with the same person, in the same places, and not even know they existed until decades later? “Small world, huh?”

“Damn right. Smaller than I thought.” Maysilee’s white teeth poke from beneath her lip as a limp smirk plasters on her face. She motions in between them. “How did we… How’d I never see you at school? Or anywhere?”

“Uh, homeschooled. Didn’t really branch out either.” Wyatt tells her. He nearly adds, if you could even call it that.

“By your parents?”

He shrugs. “No. Not really.” He leaves out the details, no need to dump all those shitty memories on her. Of his Pa balling up his fists at him in frustration at their splintery dinner table and his Ma sobbing over it. Part of the reason why he couldn’t stand living there anymore. “I taught myself.”

“And no one gave a shit?”

“Nope.” Wyatt answers, “we were pretty hard to reach.”

“Here’s your drinks. Your pancakes should be out in a jiff.”

He smiles up at the waitress. “Thanks,” he says just as Maysilee starts to suck down her coffee. The scent is so strong it blocks out everything else, he watches her politely dab the corners of her mouth with a napkin, and a stroke of confidence bursts through him. “Sorry if it’s strange to ask, but… what do you do?”

Her lips had left a reddened stain on the porcelain mug. “I’m a fashion designer in New York.” She reveals to him without any hesitation, Wyatt soaks in how the blue in her eyes had actually lit up. That… made perfect sense. With her close care in how she dresses, the way he’s sometimes seen her looking him up-and-down. “Left for college as soon as I graduated high school, I hardly stayed for summer. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.”

“I did the same,” he blurted, and her face tilted as she waited for him to continue. “I mean, not for college. I just… got up and left. Drove until I couldn’t.”

Maysilee made a noise of interest. “Really?”

“Yes,” he confirms, “I ended up in Vermont.”

“Who the hell lives in Vermont?”

He answers genuinely: “Me?”

And she smiles like he’d just said the funniest thing in the world.

Therefore, Wyatt lets himself grin too, specs in his chest burning at how surprisingly easy it is to talk to her.

She swallows another swig of the hot stuff. “So, when you come down for Christmas, do you always fly?”

“No. I usually drive. But my brother got a job at an airport earlier this year and got me a deal on my flights. Thought I’d try it out.” Wyatt explains.

Maysilee’s head bows along. “God, that’s… fucking far for a drive. I’d rather be knocked out than having to sit through that.”

Wyatt chuckles, but he knows she’s not joking. “It isn’t particularly fun. But it’s just once a year,”

“Are you going to fly again?”

He thinks of the delays, of being stranded for days straight at this point in time. “No.”

She’s got her finger ringing the rim of the coffee cup now, Wyatt falls into the hypnotic motion of it. “Yeah, I don’t blame you, this would scare anyone off for their first time.” She says, “but, really, it’s never been like this for me. Delayed flights are normal, never went through anything like this, though.”

Wyatt frowns. “You’ve definitely gotten the worst of it.”

She laughs bitterly. Before he can say anything else, their waitress returns with his plate of pancakes and cooked hashbrowns. He tells her thank you again, and immediately reaches for the bottle of syrup on the edge of the table.

“Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat?” Wyatt leans inward, stare set on Maysilee’s bored expression over her coffee rather than his buttery pancakes. “Rush is kind of dying down. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.”

She ponders on this, but eventually sighs. “No… No, it’s okay. I’m okay.” He must look entirely unconvinced. “I’m really not a breakfast person.”

“Okay.” He says, and starts to cut into the stack. They don’t speak while he eats, which he appreciates, but he’s caught Maysilee’s attentive gape flickering between her limp hands and the pile of hashbrowns like a frantic fly trapped within an enclosed window, a dozen times at least. “You can have them.”

“What?”

“The hashbrowns,” Wyatt lightly thrust the small plate toward her, “take them. They’re still warm.”

“It’s just,” a thin piece of her braid gets tangled in her bulbous earring as she tucks it behind her ear. “Breakfast food always makes me feel like crap.”

“I figured so. But think of it this way,” Wyatt revs up, “you’ll feel a lot worse if you don’t eat. Especially now, when you’ve been dealing with insane amounts of stress over the past week.”

The hardened look in her face slowly melts into mush. He can’t tell if it’s caused by the reminder, or the fact that he cared enough to bring it up. She should already infer Wyatt has done more for her than any stranger he’s come across, but there’s a glint in her pupils here that makes him think it means more than he originally thought. 

“No one’s ever been this kind to me before.” Blares in his skull. Damn, how’s she been treated all her life? It’s difficult to imagine a girl as fashionable as her being disliked; he assumed all women loved someone like that to look up to.

She presses her tongue into her cheek, seemingly deciding. It doesn’t take long for her to make her choice. By unraveling her silverware, she tugs the plate a little closer and begins to saw delicately at the very corner of the chopped potatoes with her butter knife. Scooping bits of it onto her napkin.

Wyatt eyes her strangely. “Just take the plate, Maysilee.”

“No. I just want this corner.”

He watches her fail again-and-again, trying to slice up already shredded pieces. “It’s not going to cut the way you want.”

“It’s getting there.” Her tongue’s poking out of the corner of her mouth now.

“It’s really not.”

She huffs dramatically, snagging the plate as if it were a frisbee by the ledge, then piercing a chunk of hashbrown before biting angrily into it. “There, happy?”

After a moment of awkward stillness, his lips pull into a smirk. “I’m thrilled.” He says as she plucks more into her mouth. “Wouldn’t want them to go to waste.”

Maysilee squints at him fiercely, but there’s no shade of annoyance in her expression. His own plate’s been clean for a minute now, so he crosses his arms over himself and leans backward into the plush booth seat, forcing his wandering eyes to fixate on anything other than the sparkling blues ahead of him. They were reeling him in as if he had been caught by a fish hook.

It was the oddest feeling he’s ever had. Maybe it was the sudden newfound knowledge—that they were not only from the same state, but the same exact town. How they never crossed paths until a snowstorm and a delayed flight had gotten them tangled up. How she’s probably one of the easiest people he’s ever spoken to despite him never knowing her until last night, flurries captivating her whole.

“Do you think there’s a bodega around here?” Maysilee asks, wiping off her chin. “I could go for some wine.”

“I’m not much of a day drinker.” Wyatt says to her as they exit the bodega, welcoming bell atop jingling. The snow’s raining down in a haze.

Maysilee slows down to reach his pace. Even with her gloves, her fingers are freezing clutching the plastic bag. Containing a singular bottle of cheap, cherry wine and some snacks for both of them. Thankfully, Wyatt hadn’t paid for everything this time. She’d found a crinkled twenty at the bottom of her purse, slipped under the cover of her checkbook.

“It’s just wine, you lightweight. You don’t have to drink any.” She teases, “never cracked one open on Christmas? Your family must be cool.”

She watches him throw his hood over his head in the corner of her eye, bringing his coat closer to his body. His blood red flannel beneath looks like the sun in the milkshake of snowflakes. 

“They’re not.” If it weren’t for him being so close, she would not have heard him.

With the weather worsening, the two have a silent agreement and cut the talking. Their footsteps fall into rhythm, their shoulders brushing as they keep their sights set on the flickering, orange light that enveloped the motel sign.

The cold has seeped into her shoes once more, wind whistling through the slim openings of her coat. Winter is by far her favorite season, from the sweet memories of her Papa wrapping her neck with a soft scarf before she went out to play in the snow when she was young, to the pretty lights that she gets distracted by on her walk to work in New York now, she prefers it over any other time of the year. But she cannot wait to get inside that shitty room and warm up. She would rather not step another foot out that door until it’s time for her to head back to the airport.

Wyatt pushes the door open for her, and she slips inside, expecting heat to fold over her like a blanket.

But the room is ice cold.

Maysilee looks to Wyatt. “What’s up with the heating?”

His teeth are still chattering as he kicks the door shut, hands ducked into his denim pockets. “No idea.” He responds in a tone that indicates he’s concerned. “Should I go ask?”

“If you want,” she shoots right away, rubbing her palms up her sleeved arms. “But maybe you should get warm first.”

A smile ghosts his lips for a moment, and a string that’s holding up the mass of her heart tightens up. Then his expression falls into a state of pondering. “I’ll just go ask. We should know what’s going on.”

Maysilee steps back with a nod, allowing him to pass by her.

She expects to witness him disappear into the sheets of white just as she did last night, the only difference was, her head wasn’t buzzing with the mystery of him, drunk purely off his unwarranted kindness as a stranger. Now, it was spinning with the bits and pieces she’s found about him today. Both of them being from the same town, how he drove until he couldn’t to Vermont. It seemed that she wanted to know more about him than ever before.

Another blatant difference was the clerk from last night, standing right in the doorway when Wyatt swung open the hatches rather than being behind the counter.

“Oh, hello.” Wyatt breathed.

“Heating’s out.” She says robotically, bare hands on the dips of a raincoat that was definitely not doing the job in the hashing winter storm. “We called in a technician, but he can’t come until the weather lets up since the roads aren’t salted yet. So, probably tomorrow.” She explains while twirling a crinkled piece of her hair.

“Fuck,” Maysilee groaned, she can already feel the pair of eyes on her. How much worse could this get? She doesn’t even want to test it by asking.

“Oh, are we no longer posh, Missus Money Bags?”

She was too exhausted to snap last night, but she isn’t now. She goes to push past Wyatt to say whatever her brain was brewing up directly to her face. However, Wyatt is as stiff as a board and blocks her.

“That’s enough,” He hushes to the clerk, “uh, thanks for letting us know. You can go now.”

Maysilee grits her teeth, rolls her eyes, then stomps and slams her bottom on the edge of the bed. Shivering in anger.

The door shuts. “Well, I guess we have our answer.” Wyatt sighs as he walks over to her carefully. “Best thing we can do is… layer up.” He inspects her from above, picking apart her silence. “I’m sorry. It just won’t quit, will it?”

She tips her head up, a painful laugh building up in her throat like coal. “It sure won’t.”

His lips flatten together, his lowering brows bringing his expression into something sympathetic. He sits on the open space of the comforter next to her. “Anything that’ll make this easier?”

Maysilee barely gives the question a chance to marinate. “Some wine,” she says, and Wyatt’s probing stare is so intense it’s comforting. “And you staying with me.”

Wyatt observes her quietly from across his place at the little table the motel offered, rolling his coin across his dry knuckles. The raggedy thing was pushed in the corner of the room like it was thrown in at the last minute to make it look less like a prison cell.

Maysilee’s been talking on the phone with her bank, in hopes to freeze her card just in case it’d gotten stolen. But she’s been on hold for a good ten minutes, and he could sense her irritation.

She’s tucked her hair back into a ponytail despite the coldness of the room, sharp bangs cradling her face. Her cup of wine shrinking in capacity with each deep drink she took. How she’s lazily got her legs crossed, obviously buzzed. There’s some places where her tights have slashes in them, where goosebumps rise on her exposed skin.

There’s an edginess to her now that Wyatt can’t get enough of.

He doesn’t look away when she senses him again. He never knows what to say when this happens, all he can do is blink away, or just stare. But he doesn’t feel the need to do either of those things now, for reasons he can’t understand. He only looks at her.

Phone to her ear, she grins coyly. “You snore.”

Wyatt widens his eyes at the abrupt accusation. “Huh?”

“Like a bear,” she mouths with a wink, which causes his stomach to drop to hell. Then a ding echoes from the line. “Hello, I literally just want to freeze my card. That’s it.”

Throughout the duration of the phone call, he listens. And continues to do so when Maysilee calls up someone else, who he comes to realize is a sister back home. She assures her she’s fine, wishes her Merry Christmas, tells her she’ll see her soon, and that she loves her. When she punches in the key that concluded the call, her focus instantly drifts to him, then at his rotating thumb.

Maysilee tucks her hands below her chin, her face wrapped with both the shadows of the room and the natural light from outside. She nods at him. “What is that?”

Wyatt stops fidgeting and displays the coin on his flattened palm. “A token,” he says, “I found it on the floor at the casino when I was thirteen and haven’t let it go since.”

She gives him an amused smile. “What in the world were you doing at the casino at thirteen?” She asks respectfully, “and are you talking about the Flickerman’s one? I drove by that place so many times.”

“Yeah,” he runs the pad of his finger over the engraved stars along the curved edge, the memory of discovering it beneath one of the pinball machines blooming behind his eyes. “My family used to be big gamblers. Worked for the casino on the weekends, so they accepted bets too.” Maysilee drinks his words up like the very wine she had in front of her. “I set the odds for the betters.”

“Like, probabilities.”

“Yes. It was my whole life.”

It hurt to say. At one point, it was all he looked forward to. When relaxing in the woods wasn’t enough freedom from his tiny home, he craved the smoke-smelling halls of the brightly lit casino. Spitting out odds was his only talent; the only thing he truly loved to do.

“You don’t do it anymore? No casinos in Vermont?” Maysilee piques.

He smirks sheepishly. “No, no.”

“Why’d you stop at home then?”

“My family started parting. Slowly but surely,” Wyatt begins with a sigh, straightening out his legs below the cracking wood. “My brothers met people, started their own families. And my father and I… I don’t know. We always were awkward around one another. He cheered me on during those casino nights, but when we were at home? I was like a ghost. We both were.”

“That’s how it is between my mother and I.”

Softness fills his face. “Is it?”

Maysilee hums gently, taking another drink. “I’m a twin,” Wyatt’s brows lift. “We wore matching clothes until I was a teenager. Matching dresses, hair clips, shoes, everything. Even the same uniforms when we worked together. She would throw a fit if we didn’t.” She states, “I felt like a split version of someone else rather than myself.”

To be revealed this sort of information—of insecurities, from a person who seemed just as guarded as he was, made him feel warm and trustworthy in ways that ignited a light inside of him. He’s never opened up to anyone before about his homelife, and he can’t imagine Maysilee being one who goes around spreading her own past like honey to others either. How strange it was to untwine this smoothly in front of someone he would never see again after tomorrow.

“That’s how you get this,” Maysilee motioned up and down herself, “a mess decorated in silk and diamond.”

“I don’t think you’re a mess.” He says, maybe a little too fast.

Her pale face regains a smidge of color, the apples of her cheeks glowing red. “That’s a crazy thing to say, you know. When you’ve seen me at my worst.”

He shakes his head with a poorly hidden laugh. “You’re nothing short of an angel compared to the people I’ve come across, Maysilee.”

He’s being honest, and Maysilee’s features lift with light and melt in delicacy at the same time. He thinks of how she’s reacted to everything tender he’s said to her, like how each instance, it seems to be the first time someone has been genuinely kind to her.

“Something you said last night keeps racking my brain,” Wyatt brought up.

She blinks. “What was it? I said a lot of things last night.”

He tugs at his hot ear. “Uh, you said… no one’s ever been this kind to you before.”

“After you walked me to the room, right?”

“Yeah.” He recalled, “I don’t know why. I just… thought it was easy to be nice to you.”

She smiles again, but it’s framed like a frown. Upside down, lined with memories of sadness. “I had a hard time making friends when I was younger. I didn’t really have a filter when it came to how I complimented or criticized people’s outfits or… makeup or anything. Everyone avoided me, talked behind my back. So I was just lonely.” She explained, “I have some friends now, but they’re not anything deep, to be honest. We just show up for each other.”

“I understand,” Wyatt says, “I wasn’t too good at making friends either.”

Her rings press into her plush cheek as she props her head on her knuckles. “It’s a real shame we never met back at home then, huh?”

Wyatt allows images that never existed float into his mind. “It is.”

She stands in front of the window, a loopy grin on her lips as she lets orange sliced candy they’d snagged from the bodega melt on her tongue. After she’d washed herself down in the shower, basking in the hot water, she’d waddled out back into the cold room to her phone buzzing. It was the airport’s number, and they had called to tell her that her flight was finally taking off tomorrow. Just like Wyatt had told her last night.

“Did you ever imagine you’d spend your Christmas like this?”

Maysilee glances back at Wyatt, who’s refolding his clothes, rearranging his bag in the process. “Oh, definitely.” She jests, shuffling in the heat of her coat as she savored the citrus between her cheeks. She had a difficult time liking candy growing up. As her family’s sweet shop was her first job, she was surrounded by it twenty-four-seven. The taste and smell reeked more of poison rather than sweetness. Reminding her of how caged she was. She can enjoy it now. “Is your flight taking off before or after mine?”

“After, I think.” He answers, “10:30.”

“Okay, yeah. After.” She reiterates, turning back to the glass ahead. The falling snow is pretty much non-existent, only the fallout remains. Dying rainbow lights flicker lightly along the buildings across the road, garlands drooping with the weight of it. 

She crinkles up the candy bag and throws it in the trash, crossing the carpeted floor and worming herself under the bed’s covers. She was going to feel like absolute shit tomorrow, no doubt. Breakfast food, wine and candy. Not a good mix. But she was excited, she couldn’t stand another day stuck here and the thought of being able to sleep in her childhood bed brought a smile to her mouth.

Though, not all was well. She was going to have to call her work tomorrow, tell her boss she’s gonna have to call out for the next three days. Possibly four. It wasn’t a perfect look, but there was no way she’d get let go because of it. Not to toot her own horn, but her work is the reason why the company suddenly caught so much traction. She has a talent of bringing things to life.

Okay, she can toot her own horn a bit. She fucking deserves it.

That wasn’t the only thing on her mind, however.

Wyatt hangs up his bag on the rack, thoughtfully tucking in a sock that was peeking out. And thoughtful he was.

Maysilee doesn’t think anyone’s ever listened to her like he did. She’s had trouble talking to Merrilee about it. Even though they were as closely tied as two peas in a pod growing up, their experiences were vastly different. She was avoided like a pothole during school because she wasn’t like Merrilee. She didn’t have that perpetually soft look on her face, her hair straight and sharp rather than curled and inviting. Her clothing and jewelry matched the elements of the ground instead of things that favored the sky; earthy toned dresses, flowery necklaces. In contrast to Merrilee’s bright pinks and blues and naked, cloudless throat.

She spoke her mind; if she didn’t like something, she said it. And, sometimes she was really just trying to help. Whether it’d be a suggestion on how a girl should style her hair, or what color would flatter her better. Her opinion was never appreciated nor wanted, despite her passion on the subject. So she was left with dozens of backs turned to her besides her sister’s and Asterid March’s, wondering what she did wrong.

That rejection has stuck with her, as much as it pains her to admit it.

She just never expected a complete stranger to give her a hand so easily.

Wyatt’s walked over to the couch he’d slept on last night, making a dent in the cheap leather with his knee as he spread out the extra thin sheet for his blanket.

“Hey,” Maysilee speaks up, her whole mouth drained of any moisture when he eyes her. “It’s really cold.”

He beams knowingly. “Yes?”

She scoots over, hoping the movement isn’t awkward as hell. “You can lay here, if you want.”

At her offer, the smile fades and his expression morphs into something she aligns with gratefulness. But he hasn't opened his mouth yet.

Maysilee allows a simper to gradually pull on the corner of her lips, then rotating on her hip so she’s holding up her face as she looks up at him. “Come on, I don’t bite.” She says smoothly.

Wyatt’s gaze travels up-and-down her frame. “I don’t think that’s true,” She chuckles, and he actually grins with teeth, their uneven points give them a charm she adores. To her delight, he brings himself down on the creaking mattress and slips beside her, his warmth pooling all over her at once. “But, alright.”

The thing was, why wouldn’t she let him lay with her? He’d offered her a cigarette out of his own pack, led her to a place to rest over the airport, paid for her stay when the universe decided to hate her some more, had cared to learn about her, fed her and listened to her as if they’d been long-time friends. She would’ve been a real shitty friend if she let him freeze in their room.

And most of all, he made sure she wasn’t alone on Christmas.

The mellow lighting of the room settles on his black hair like foam on sea, wet from his own shower. It’s quite silky, too. She could imagine running her fingers through it, maybe mussing it up in the process. That style would suit him well, especially with the broadness that he has in his arms.

She’s still lying on her side when he matches her stare. They’re basically face-to-face again. She blushes like an idiot, words trying to crawl out of her throat. “So, uh…” she whispers, for some reason. Fresh blood rushes over her whole body. “I just wanted to say thank you. For… everything you’ve done for me. You’re really, really sweet.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he says back, face gleaming. “Thanks for keeping me company this Christmas.”

A smile burns at her dimples. “Of course,” she bobbed her head in a quick motion, and rested her fingertips on the chains and threads of her necklaces. “Are you excited to go home?”

“To see my cat, yes.” Wyatt says, “to go back to work? No.”

“The cat on the lighter,” Maysilee points out, mind flowering with the passionate, cutely painted picture of an all black cat with some white splotches, she then thinks of her own in New York. She wanted to cry, she’d have to call Effie too, ask her if she’d been good. He nods at that, confirming it was in fact a depiction of his pet. “What’s work like?”

“Terrible. I work on cars, my boss is ridiculous.” He exhales deeply, eyes glassy. “It’s not the… hardest job out there. It’s just boring, I guess. I work more than I sleep. I don’t like it, but it pays well. So I can’t complain much.”

Maysilee worries her lip. “I’m sorry,” she wants to say to just leave, to not force suffocation on himself, that she dealt with the same thing back in the day. But she had no idea what his situation was like, if he was living paycheck-to-paycheck or if there were even other options to work out there. So she keeps her mouth closed on that, and only thinks of his past he’d told her about. The casino, the odds. Just on the rim of Twelve Rivers. “You know, I just had a great idea.”

Wyatt crosses his arms behind his head, looking at her intently. “What’s that?”

“We said we never crossed paths in Twelve Rivers, but… maybe we can.” She begins, “I was thinking we could… um, meet up again, sometime. At the casino.”

The opal black in his eyes brightened. “You’re interested in that?”

“What? Gambling? Absolutely not.” Maysilee spits, and he snickers. “I mean, actually… I wouldn’t be against it. I would just like to have someone with me who knows what they’re doing.” She’s clearly leaning into something, and he thankfully picks up on it.

“Oh, like an oddsmaker?”

She shrugs playfully. “Maybe.”

It’s weird, but she can feel the warmth from him heating up. The edges of his tanned cheeks are undertoning with a faded scarlet. “Alright. I’ll make sure to write it down in my planner, we’ll work something out.” He agrees, and a new feeling vines around her ribs. “What’s something you like to do, then?”

Maysilee thinks on it, humming. “I’ll never turn down a drink.” She suggests, “I also… like nice dinners. Walks on a lake. Scenic stuff, you know?”

“Yeah,” he says, “got it. I know plenty of places. I’ll look into the lake stuff.”

The chill of the room dances up her skin, so she drifts beneath the covers until it’s grazing her jaw. Wyatt lingers above, pretty much hanging over her. He’s got such a strong face, she wouldn’t mind waking up to it every morning. Damn, what was wrong with her?

She’s always kind of dodged romance like wasps in the summer, swatting it away when it comes at her because she’s afraid of the sting.

“You know, it doesn’t have to be in Twelve Rivers, even. It’s far for the both of us. I just said that because Christmas is still on my mind.” Maysilee tells him truthfully. “Maybe we could visit each other.”

“You want to go to Vermont?” Wyatt sounded unconvinced, which only made her giggle. “You’d stick out like a sore thumb out there. Also, what happened to ‘Who the hell lives in Vermont?’”

The scents during that exact moment polluted her nose again. Syrup, toasted waffles, her coffee, Wyatt’s hashbrowns. Breakfast food’s made her sick since she was a kid, but she thinks she’ll remember his face under the milky headlights forever, eating away at his pancakes. “Listen, I’m a flexible woman, and I don’t mind being looked at. As long as I look good.”

“I see,” he sighed. His stare rose to the ceiling, brain seeming to be thinking of something different. “I wouldn’t mind visiting New York.”

Maysilee can’t cut back the big grin that sews her mouth upward. “Really? It’s… chaotic. You get used to it, though.” She remarked, “I could be, like, your tour guide.” He’s definitely a man who prefers quiet, which is everything New York isn’t, but there are some peaceful patches. She’d think he’d like the park, she can picture him enjoying sitting by that gorgeous water fountain. The Bethesda.

“I’d be yours,” Wyatt’s eyebrow twitches with the face he’s making. “You’re not wrong about it being less populated, but it’s very beautiful if you take the time to explore.”

“I like beautiful.” Maysilee remarked.

Wyatt shifts slightly, the glint in his eyes bleed into her like ink. “Me too.”

She felt like she was drowning into the sheets, getting the urge to do the stupidest thing imaginable. Like lean in, or drift downward and plant her face in the crook of his neck. But she ties herself back, that was pushing it. She needs to check herself before she fucks up a relationship that just came to fruition a day ago.

Even if she may regret it in two days time. When she’s lying in her childhood bed, basking in the smell of the past when her mind’s still swaying with the unforgettable kindness of the once stranger, Wyatt, who’d she started with on a bench in a snowstorm. Who took care of her when she had fallen apart.

“Wyatt?” She hushes.

“Yeah?”

“I’m gonna sleep now.”

He nods at her gingerly, a little grin on his mouth. “Okay,” he says, “I should too.”

Maysilee relaxes her shoulders, and with Wyatt’s body doing the same on cue, the motel’s mattress feels as soft as cotton for the very first time. “Goodnight, then.” She says. “Try not to wake me up with your snores.”

Wyatt leans across the bed to flick off the lamp, laughing, then the room floods with black. “Goodnight, Maysilee. Merry Christmas.”

The morning cool brushes her cheeks, rummaging through her tightly tucked back sidebraids like an excited child. The view that surrounds her now as she walks back to the airport is new.

Salted roads that were cleansed of the snow, shop owners standing on ladders to take down their festive wreaths and lights. A distant smell of diesel as trucks passed them by.

Maysilee has her head held up high as she makes way for the entrance doors, tossing a loose, confident smile to Wyatt each time she catches him scanning her with his considerate gaze. But she feels a sickness in the pit of her stomach, and she’ll pretend like she doesn’t know why it’s happening.

When Wyatt opens the heavy door for her, she spots the bench they once sat on together from afar, and a blanket of ease wraps around her.

The marble white floors are cluttered with people, each corner nearly bursting at the seams with families. Seats full with couples. She uncomfortably crosses her arms.

“We can wait by that pole over there,” Wyatt points out the area to her, “seems pretty empty.” She nods without hesitation, following him as she drags her hefty luggage behind her heels.

As they reach the paint-chipped, scaling pole they stand side-by-side, Maysilee keeps unintentionally bumping into him and he hasn’t said a word about it. All the talking around her is giving her a migraine, so she turns her body fully to him, watching him play with his coin. The silvery thing pirouetted along his knuckles like butter on a skillet.

“Coin tricks?” She asks, intrigued.

Wyatt smiles, the mole on his cheek sinks into his dimple. She finds the sight adorable. “Yes,” he brings it to stop, flicking it into his palm. “Heads or tails? You have a fifty-fifty chance of winning.”

Maysilee steps closer, studying the oddly decorative coin that was originally from the Flickerman’s casino with a squint. “Which is heads and which is tails?”

Wyatt taps the surface with his finger. “Dark silver star is heads,” he flips it, “gold star is tails.”

She hums. “Heads.” While she wears mixed jewelry, she loves the way silver shines under the moon. “What do I get if I win?”

“I don’t know. You just win.”

With that, he slingshots the coin into the air with the nail of his thumb, and Maysilee follows the light it reflects as if she were a moth.

Wyatt blinks at the golden star. “Sorry, you lose.”

Maysilee playfully rolls her eyes, the limp, heated curls of her hair have frizzed up from the wind outside. “Does that mean you win?”

“I technically wasn’t playing. But sure.”

She then slips the belt of her purse off her shoulder, looking up to him just as she dips her hand in and pulls out her checkbook. He hears a distinct tear. “Here’s your prize,” she says, “I wrote it for you this morning. Just need your last name.”

Wyatt runs the skin of his finger over the paper, and it takes a moment to realize what she’d done. It was a check, for seemingly every penny he’d covered for her. “Maysilee, I… You don’t have to do this.”

“No, no. None of that.” She waves him off, “it’s not a big deal. Seriously. It’s basic respect between friends. You cover my ass; I pay you back.”

He doesn’t want to accept it, but even though he’d only known her for days, he was well aware she was going to stand her ground. Warmth creeps up his face. “You’re really sweet. Thanks.” He says generously, “it’s Callow.”

“You’re welcome,” Maysilee peeps, and snatches the check from him with a smirk, she must’ve yanked out a pen while he was gawking over the pure kindness of it. When she hands it back to him, he can’t help but glance at her surname too. Donner. Maysilee Donner—a pretty name for a pretty girl. “First time I’ve ever heard someone call me that. Guess that side of me is only reserved for you.”

The space in between Wyatt’s ribcage burns, and before he can respond to it, a voice breaks over the intercom. “Flight 004 to Louisville, your flight is now boarding at Gate B.”

That was Maysilee’s flight. He knew because he’d watched her tuck the ticket into her pocket this morning, and now she pulls it out with a bittersweet fixing on her face.

“Finally time, huh?” He asks, referring to all the drama she’s dealt with recently.

“Finally.” She echoes, shoulders twitching under her velvet black coat. “I put my number on the back of that check, if you’re serious about meeting again.”

“Of course. I told you we could.”

That makes her glossy lips upturn into one of those reeling smiles again, and without any warning, she hauls him in for a tight hug. It’s a little constricted, he can tell she isn’t used to giving them, and she can probably tell he isn’t used to receiving them. But she tries his very best to not let that show, granting his hands to press into her back lovingly. Her floral shampoo fills his nose, as well as that resin and amber. He feels dizzy.

“Flight 004 to Louisville, your flight is now boarding at Gate B. This is the second to last call.”

Her warmth breaths peel away from the crook of his neck, and she keeps her eyes low as she hesitantly takes his hands in hers. Compared to his, battered and sprinkled with cuts from work, hers are plush and clean. “Thanks for being a friend,” she looks up at him now, “goodbye, Wyatt. Make sure to add me in your contacts before you cash that check in.”

“Thank you, too.” He returns, entirely sincere. Since he left Twelve Rivers, he doesn’t think he’s connected with anyone like this. The old familiar feeling of it all sinks in, of friendship and sweetness—but something new is brewing inside him as well. Something he’s never felt in his life. Was that shameful to admit? He’s known her for two days: it’s not an exaggeration. Though, she’d left a mark on him so deep that it felt like he’d known her for years. “I will. Be safe, please.” And it was going to hurt like hell to watch her go. “Goodbye, Maysilee.”

There seems to be nothing else to say.

So, Maysilee shoots him one last precious beam, recaps her fingers around the handle of her luggage, and presses herself on the toes of her shimmering boots to kiss him.

Wyatt doesn’t know how to react, he can feel his lips tense up in lieu of actually kissing her back. When the points of her pumps drop to the floor, his eyes are blown.

“Sorry—“

“We can try that again, if you want.”

At once, he nods. “Yes, please.”

She leans in, and this time, he’s ready for it. Her palm rests on his neck as her lips, sticky with that glittery gloss, pulsates onto his own. Prickles and punches birth along his skin and stomach, desperate for more. Flashes of yesterday morning pass his eyes, of him catching her backside when he nearly knocked her over. He holds her the same now, her chest pressed to his, her taste burrowing in his teeth, surely giving him a forever sweet tooth.

Those blunt kicks of dizziness come back to sink in his skull as her mouth detaches from his. To be nose-to-nose with someone this beautiful felt unreal. He kisses her this time, a bit harder with the knowledge that it would be months, maybe years depending on their schedules, until he saw her again.

“Flight 004 to Louisville, your flight is now boarding at Gate B. This is the last call.”

“Sorry, I—“ Maysilee kisses him again as she sharply inhales, he thinks he might be melting. “I should really—“ She plants her warmth onto his mouth one final time, panted breathing puffing out of them both like chimneys. “—go.”

His lips are covered in her gloss as she fully steps away, his cheeks catching fire. She’s running now, she has to. But she’s still facing him, heels barreling. “Call me!”

“I will!” Wyatt yells back, suddenly not caring if anyone was eyeing him crazily. He doesn’t even check if they were, he just wanted to look at her a little longer.

Into her crystal blue eyes, at the silk and diamonds that dressed her up-and-down. Her shiny hair, her pinkened cheeks. The mystery that rests on her shoulders. Soulfully, he waves at her, and can’t restrain the smile when he gets one back.

With that, Maysilee Donner leaves him in Pennsylvania, while he awaits to return to Vermont. The apricity that came with her presence in this harsh, brutal snowstorm they met in leaving right with her.

“And then,” Maysilee goes on, “I kissed him in the airport.”

Merrilee gasps. “Like, in front of everyone?”

“Uh-huh,” she grins like an absolute idiot, still being able to feel the sensation of his rough lips if she thought about it hard enough.

“I thought you hated that stuff! You always said your biggest fear was someone proposing to you in public.”

She laughs, the taste of her Papa’s chocolate cookies on her tongue. “Okay. That’s totally different.” Merrilee shrugs. “Besides, I’m a flexible woman.”

Her sisters’ brows twinge tightly. “Since when?”

“Since I met someone worth bending for.”

Merrilee smiles at that, the expression reminds Maysilee of how different they really are. With her blonde hair tucked back with clips, curling in waves, she looks like how she did when she was a teenager. Maysilee’s sharp bangs currently hang above her eyes, and all she can think of is how angelic Wyatt had looked through the slits.

“I’m happy someone was nice enough to help you, and to stay with you on Christmas,” Merrilee says with her hands crossed in her lap, “it sounds like a romance movie. I can’t believe he’s from here! Sucks he didn’t go to our school.”

“I know, right?” Maysilee returns, daydreaming, then her mouth twists into a frown. “He hasn’t called me yet. I hope I didn’t mess it up.”

“No, you didn’t.” Merrilee assures her, “you said he told you he works a lot, right? Maybe he’s just… you know. Working.”

“Yeah. Or he’s exhausted.” She knows she still is. 

“Exactly,” Merrilee bounces right off of her. She then stands, the afternoon sun thriving in the silk of her pajamas Maysilee got her for Christmas. “You didn’t mess anything up, okay? Just give it some time. He’ll call.”

And Maysilee believes her.

When it’s time for her to sleep, it’s all that’s on her mind. Him, the freezing cold they sat in together. The cigarette. The motel. His lips. The mystery she willingly wanted to get sucked up in. 

As the cotton of her childhood bed soaks around her bones, she realizes how badly she’d fucked up. Maybe she didn’t scare him off, but she had made a huge mistake. Letting her heart grow for someone who was miles and miles away. She felt sick—what had she done?

Alone in the room that she loathed growing up, her vision began to blur as if smoke had been blown into them. Oh, Wyatt Callow. Why did he have to come into her life so far away? Why did she have to fall unbelievably fast due to kindness?

In the darkness of the room, her phone begins to buzz on her dresser.

Despite the sleepiness and sadness that was plucking at her eyes, she jumps to her feet, neatly tripping over the bottoms of her pants.

Her feet land hard on her floor, her Papa would’ve scolded her for that if she were still a teenager. With her heart pounding in both her throat and chest, she overturns the face of the phone, and feels her breath freeze on her tongue. The number doesn’t look familiar to her, certainly not her boss or Effie, who she’s spoken to already today.

That had to be a good thing, right?

She thumbs the barely lit green button under the screen, and collects herself. “Hello? Maysilee Donner speaking.”

There’s a short intake of breath on the other line, and she begins to think of the worst: they mistyped a number, she’s getting prank-called by some teenagers.

Then, a recognizable soft voice comes to her like warmth on a winter day. A voice that belonged to someone who made her hell of a week survivable. “Hey, stranger.”