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The first mistletoe of the season hung right over her head.
November thirtieth. She had been walking home with Violet, newly borrowed library books slung under her arm, thick scarf wrapped snugly around her neck. Snow drifted through the air like dandelion seeds gone awry, a million snowflakes to make wishes on. It was a languid evening, clouds lazily swimming through the blue sea of the sky. Quiet, except for crunch of her boots in the packed snow, and Violet’s hummed notes floating pleasantly in the air.
“Want to come inside?” Becky asked, reaching for the doorknob. “I think we’ve got some hot chocolate, if TJ hasn’t finished it all.”
Bob let out an outraged screech at the thought, and Violet laughed softly from behind her mittened hands. She opened her mouth to say something when her eyes caught on something dangling just above the door, hastily taped to the wood. A tuft of greenery dotted with glossy white berries, swinging in the frail breeze.
“Mistletoe,” Violet murmured. “Who hung it up?”
“Probably my parents,” said Becky. “My mom’s been hanging them up everywhere so she has an excuse to give everyone kisses.” A mischievous smile split across her face, and she leaned over to give her friend a peck on the cheek. Violet giggled, and after a moment of finger-twiddling hesitancy, brushed a kiss on Becky’s curls.
“Why, thank you,” Becky teased, stepping inside. The warmth of the crackling fireplace made her feel giddy – or maybe that was just the kiss, still warm and soft on her temple like a soothing salve. She remembered those first, fleeting, bubbly moments when she’d first met Violet as a child – the girl with blonde hair who doodled in the sandbox, her purple overalls smeared with golden grains, wide, sweet eyes like lily pads. Becky had seen her over the fringe of her book, and the story she’d been reading evaporated from her mind.
The princesses she imagined in her books then wore lavender gowns and had skin like snow, their hair loose and cropped at the chin, lips curled into a docile smile. She would go to the playground, patting down her relentless curls, eyes shining with hope.
She’d been six, and she hadn’t understood what crushes really were. The bubbly feeling was hard to describe with words, which was unusual for her, because words were her solution to everything.
If she were to think of it now, her little crush on Violet was like a raincloud – it hovered over her briefly, drizzling her with cool, euphoric droplets, before fading away. It left her wet – not sopping, but just enough so that her clothes were stained, just enough for her to remember that the rain shower had happened at all.
Becky smiled to herself as she and Violet leaned against the kitchen counter, waiting for the aroma of warm hot chocolate to fill the air, the kisses they had exchanged disappearing like rain drying on their skin.
He was waiting for her in the park.
“Okay, Tobey,” Wordgirl said, landing on a patch of cleared snow, “you can’t melt all of this.”
“Why not?” He sat on a snowy branch, cradling his remote in one mittened hand. Below, a robot crouched near the base of the oak tree, pointing a laser-hot finger at the ground. “It’s so...inconvenient.”
“It’s nature.”
“Precisely.”
“That would mean disrupting the ecosystem and the peace,” she argued. “Simply put, it’s a crime. Besides, we need snow for sledding.”
“You act like it isn’t going to snow overnight,” he replied, rolling his eyes. “Nobody will miss it.”
Wordgirl rubbed her temple in frustration. It had been a while since she’d debated with Tobey like this – at least, in costume, since they debated plenty when they hung out – and she couldn’t grasp why he was resorting to petty crime. He wasn’t the type to commit petty crimes, and in the past few years, he hadn’t committed many crimes at all.
She saw him less often as Wordgirl and more often as Becky Botsford – and she’d like to keep it that way, too.
“It’s still a crime,” she persisted. “Even if it’s out of your caliber.”
He chose to ignore that statement, oddly enough, and instead gaze dreamily at the horizon. “Lovely evening, isn’t it?”
Oh, so that’s what this is. “It’s freezing and you can’t see the sun.”
“You can’t tell from your vantage point,” he said, as though it were obvious. “It’s easier to see from here.”
Wordgirl hesitated, then hovered off the ground and joined him in the crook of the tree’s branches. A few years ago she might have refused to humor him, but she easily sat by him with little more than confusion. The boughs surrounding them crisscrossed like messy stitches, their lanky branches coated in snow and ice that clung like ornaments. The barest thread of sun managed to weave its way through the wooden shroud, casting a stream of gold that bounced off the ice and made their little haven sparkle with iridescence.
There wasn’t a view – the branches blocked the sky – but there was no need for one.
“It’s beautiful,” she managed.
“As I said,” he gloated. She turned to say something equally snarky back, but then a spot of green caught her attention.
It blended in well with the tree branches, and the white berries almost had no distinction from their white background, but it was there all the same. A pinch of mistletoe tied with ribbon, dangling above their heads.
Her previous awe erred into something else entirely. Her heart squeezed, and she glanced back at Tobey, who was watching her intently, waiting to see what she would do. She held a breath, then two, and tried for a smile.
It would be so easy to lean in. So easy to kiss him, but she didn’t want to kiss him, not like this. Her feelings had festered and grown when they became friends, but Wordgirl was stagnant, a stone statue compared to Becky Botsford.
Still...would it hurt to kiss him just once? On his pale cheek, or at the corner of his lips, or...
“I’ve got to go!” she squealed, stumbling out of the tree. Her face was warm, and as she made haste, her foot slid on a sleek patch of snow. She cursed – maybe Tobey had a point after all – and flew away, her lips burning with a kiss they’d never shared.
The second bunch of mistletoe dangled over toilet paper and dirty mops.
Becky didn’t make a habit of checking upwards during the holidays, at least not at school. Most of the students took down mistletoe after their targeted pair had been made to kiss, and the plant didn’t last more than a week anyways.
Still, she hadn’t expected it to catch her so off guard. One minute she was bending over to lift a stack of copy paper into her arms, the next her eyes had latched onto that familiar green parasite, its white berries winking at her from over the dusty doorframe.
“...and then Rose told me that my sources were ‘inconclusive,’ whatever that’s supposed to mean,” Scoops prattled on, oblivious to her silence. He’d asked her for help clearing out the last of his supplies from the Daily Rag’s office – which was really just an abandoned janitor’s closet with a flickering bulb – since the school had finally raked up enough money from miscellaneous fundraisers to afford building a new stretch of extracurricular classrooms – one of which would be Scoops’ newspaper club, and, as he had enthusiastically relayed to her the other day, the Daily Rag’s brand-new office. A real office, this time.
Her plans after class had been to run back home and study for her math exam. After seeing the hopeful look on his face when he asked her to help, though, she couldn’t exactly refuse.
Well, there goes my semester average, she thought, but it was hard to be sullen around Scoops for very long. Time flew by as they packed up all his supplies – including Becky II, his typewriter (“she writes just as good as you, if you were, like, a machine”) and Violet’s Russian nesting dolls, each miniature painted to bear his resemblance.
“Becky?” He rose one eyebrow. “Don’t tell me you’re bored.”
“Oh, of course not,” she said wryly, “what could be more fun than chores?”
He peered up, noticing the mistletoe. “Oh, right. I thought there was something I had missed.”
She gave him a skeptical look. “You hung that up?”
“Nope.” He shrugged. “It was just...there. I didn’t take it down because I was busy.”
“Busy.”
“Y’know,” he said, a blush blossoming on his face. “With the paper.”
“You were hoping Violet might stop by, weren’t you?” She nudged him, mischief dancing in her eyes. “Or Rose?”
His expression crunched up like a crumbled tissue. “Don’t put that image in my mind.”
“I’m sure it’s already there.”
“Seriously, Becky?”
“Oh, come on,” she chided. “Nobody’s around to record your dreadful confession. Everyone already knows, anyways.”
His face paled. “Vi, too?”
“Violet approves,” she said with a scoff. “I think you three should talk it out. At least before break starts?”
“Maybe,” he mumbled.
She rolled her eyes and dropped the paper into the red wagon outside the door. “Maybe I’ll lock you three in a closet until you get over yourselves.”
He scowled. “Shut up.”
“Make me.”
Scoops muttered under his breath, then, quick as a wisp, kissed her cheek.
A traitorous blush spread over her face, like a case of chicken pox. In all their bickering, she’d forgotten that they were still under the mistletoe.
“That was easy,” he chirped, effortlessly willing his own momentary embarrassment away. “I should try that more often.”
“Jerk.”
“Aren’t you Wordgirl? There are better words for jerk, right?”
“Yeah,” she grumbled, “like asshole.”
“Don’t let any kids hear you saying that,” he chastised, smirking. “Wouldn’t want to tarnish your perfect role model image.”
“Todd Scoops Ming,” she said, “You are vile.”
“And you,” he replied cheekily, “are a tomato.”
Before she could get a rebuttal out, he stuck his tongue out – like the mature freshman he was – and walked off. He attempted to saunter, though it was difficult to sashay out the building when he was lugging the childish wagon behind him, looking more like a delighted kindergartener trotting off to recess than a boy who had just dished out foul vengeance.
She clenched her fists, wondering if it was worth it to catch up to him and give him a good socking. One hand voraciously rubbed at the spot he had kissed her, skin burning like he had taken a dead match and pressed it to the corner of her lips.
A dead match, she thought. Once, it had held a fire, small and flickering, barely enough for warmth. Ten-year-old Becky had held that match to her heart, desperate for any kindling she could give it, even if that meant the flames would be too much for her to handle. Every charming grin, every tip of his hat, every stupid wink. She took the gestures, small as they were, and they kept her fire alive.
Even when she’d watched him smile brighter for Violet, fit his hat on her wavy tresses, hold her hand like it was a writer’s pen – the fire kept going. In fact, it raged. She wished so hard for reciprocation, to hold his own match and press it to her heart and feel its warmth, but he had nothing to give her but dry, brittle woodchips, every scrap like a promise that there would be more.
But there hadn’t been, and it had taken a long, long time for her to realize.
Falling out of love felt like stepping out of a car after a long, winding ride. She was ready to stop gripping the steering wheel until she crashed. and instead let her own legs lead her.
When Scoops held her hand now, she didn’t feel anything other than a connection – no sparks, just a cord between them, stronger than ever.
Once, if he had kissed her the way he had just then under the mistletoe, she might have swooned. Fainted. Pressed her palm against her hot cheek and grasped it tightly, as though she were hoping the kiss would fall into her hands like a speck of gold panned from a riverbed. She would have taken it and held it in her hand like treasure, just another flimsy woodchip to feed a fragile, cold fire that burned for no one.
“Jerk,” she huffed again, and dropped her palm from her cheek. Just like that, the kiss blew away like a fall leaf tumbling through the hall.
By the time she got home, she’d forgotten they had kissed at all.
“Oh, Wordgirl,” Tobey cooed, “I desperately need your help.”
She stared at his ridiculous pose and the two Christmas cards he held in either hand. “You’re robbing the grocery store...for Christmas cards? Really?”
“I’ve been tapped out,” he groaned, “and as such, am not in the state of mind to be making brilliant homemade cards for my mother this year. Thus, I need you to help me decide.”
“Before you steal it?”
“Steal? Who said anything about stealing?” He batted his eyelashes. “I’m only borrowing for an indefinite amount of time.”
She planted a hand on her hip. “Okay, then, Tobey.” After a moment of concentration, she picked the gaudier of the cards. “That one.”
He studied it, scrutiny twisting his features. “How come?”
“Because it’s overly-dramatic and flashy,” she said, “like you.”
He beamed, almost appearing genuine. “I’m touched, darling.”
“Don’t call me-”
“Unfortunately, giving this card to my mother would imply that she’s more dramatic than me...and I can’t have that. So I’m afraid I’ll have to go with the latter.” He threw the other one away – she plucked it out of the air – and sauntered towards the exit.
“Not so fast, To-” and then she stopped, because he had lured her under the mistletoe again. This time it was hung precariously between two lanky display cases, where he stood almost expectantly, reading the inside of the card.
“Hm,” he hummed to himself, “I’ll have to re-write all of this hogwash. ‘Dearest Mom, Dad and I wish you a Merry Christmas?’” He scoffed. “What father? I knew I shouldn’t have picked from the nuclear family section. Ridiculous.”
“Yeah,” she muttered, eyes on the mistletoe, “ridiculous.” Every fiber of her was panicking, the bubbles of trepidation building in her like she was a bottle of soda. His eyes left the card and met hers, icy blue and intense enough to be scathing. The dead match in her heart flared, charring her flesh and smothering her bones in flames. She was igniting on the inside, and the only sign was the red blush seeping into her skin like spilt wine.
Her boots made no sound as she came forward. He was close, close enough to rewire her senses so that she wouldn’t realize that there were shoppers around them, gawking, that her lips had parted, that the two stands the mistletoe was tied to were leaning like miniature Tower of Pisa’s, -
She only managed to get them out of the way in time before both stands crashed in a heap of crushed Snappy Snaps boxes and Limited-Edition Captain Huggyface yo-yos, scooping Tobey in her arms and darting out of the aisle before they could get hit.
As soon as the danger passed, her frazzled nerves dropped him unceremoniously to the floor.
“Ow,” he complained, fixing his tilted glasses. “I suppose I should thank you for the daring rescue.”
“No need,” she said listlessly, still lost in space-time. “Just...doing my job.” A nervous laugh careened from her.
“Are you-”
“I’m fine!” she yelled, her smile about as natural as the processed cereal crumbs at her feet.
Tobey didn’t look convinced, but he pivoted on his heel and drew a crumpled bill out of his coat pocket, tossing it rudely at the clerk. “For your troubles.” Then, he carelessly pitched the card away and sauntered out.
Wordgirl said nothing as the card fluttered to her feet. She lifted it gingerly as one might do a bomb and flicked it open, too dazed to process the chaos that had been squeezed into the past few seconds.
Written in dark ink was a hasty Merry Christmas, darling.
He had the audacity to scribble a winking face right underneath it.
(She tried to forget about the incident. Really, she did, but it was hard to do so when her stubborn hands had placed the card on her dresser, where she could always see it, instead of throwing it away.)
Fool me once, shame on you, she thought. Fool me twice, shame on me. What happens when you get fooled a third time?
Really, the mistletoe had been in such an obvious place, she should have noticed before they even walked inside the ice cream parlor. But Victoria Best did not like the be ignored, even for a second, and Becky couldn’t ignore the girl if she tried. She had been rambling on about fencing lessons and her completely ignorant coach and something lese Becky couldn’t remember much of – the topic didn't matter. Victoria was speaking, and she could talk about the most trivial thing and still sound as though she were declaring war on the listener.
Becky liked that, so she listened raptly.
The pair slid into a booth near the frosted windows, peeling off their scarves and settling them into a cozy pile on the red upholstery they sat on. “God, winter needs to be over already.”
“Why?” asked Becky as she flitted through a menu. “Can’t handle the cold?”
“The cold is nothing,” Victoria snapped. “Wearing so much clothes is just a hassle.”
“I kind of like it. It’s really...methodical. Therapeutic, in a way.”
Victoria hummed.
“Oh, methodical means that something is done according to a specific procedure. Like a routine, basically. For instance, putting on winter clothes requires a procedure – first, a coat, then a scarf, mittens, boots...”
“I know what it means.”
“Then why didn’t you say so?”
Victoria shrugged, a strangely listless movement for her, a girl of angles and sharp edges. “You just explain things well.”
Becky recognized a Best compliment when she heard it. Normally, she would tease, but when she really thought about what Victoria said, she was too busy trying to quell the delighted fluttering in her chest. She likes the way I speak? Talk? Or is it just the way I define words? It was all too vague, but when it came to her emotions, Victoria would never give a straight answer unless it was pried from her. She hid behind words instead of using them – she always had.
Becky suspected a crush. After the dreary, unrequited saga that was Todd Scoops Ming, she’d had a clearer mind, enough to notice the loves of people around her now that she wasn’t all wrapped up in her own. Violet was the most obvious; with the way she tucked her hair behind her ears whenever Scoops spoke to her, or how she made him her most frequent muse, painting and sketching and sculpting him anew.
Rose was harder to crack – she had a natural poker face, and carried herself with subtle poise. As an investigative reporter, she knew how to hide her motives well. Still, she had her tells – hidden smiles and eyes that twinkled whenever Scoops completed her thoughts. Only his hands could linger long on her shoulders, and his words echoed from her mouth on some occasions, as though she always kept them on her mind.
Victoria was an open book, even though she tried not to be. When they had first crossed the threshold into friendship, she had been almost the same as ever, except now she had advice, and stories, and days to share. And when they got closer, she shared more, and more, until her entire heart was splayed out in the open – except not to share. It was for Becky to have, and Becky alone.
Becky swallowed, trying to push the thought away as the waitress came by. “Evening, girls,” greeted Natalya, whipping out a pad and pen. “Isn’t it too cold for ice cream?”
“Oh, come on, Nat,” groused Victoria. “Don’t be such a hag.”
“Vicky!”
Natalya burst into laughter. “Spitfire as always, Ms. Best. What can I get for you?”
“Mint chocolate-chip. One scoop, glass bowl. Chocolate for Becky.”
“I didn’t-”
“But that’s what you wanted,” Victoria rose an eyebrow in challenge. “Right?”
Becky thought to argue, but that would lead nowhere, and she didn’t want a foul spat to ruin their day – because they’d had arguments over less. A ravaging blush spread over the nape of her neck, and she suddenly regretted taking her scarf off.
“And a cone,” added Victoria.
Becky sunk lower into her seat. Her blush took on such a bright shade that she was sure she was either glowing (it had happened before, and she didn’t want to explain the more bizarre aspects of her alien biology to Victoria just yet) or experiencing a quasi-allergic reaction.
“Chocolate and mint,” Natalya repeated. She swept her mass of dark waves over her shoulder and winked at them. “I’ll be right back. Try not to blow each other up in the meantime.”
“A feat, I’m sure,” Becky muttered as the waitress left with their order. She spun towards Victoria. “And did you have to call her a hag?”
“Beckface, I make no exceptions,” she said, smirking. “You should know.”
“Okay, but a hag?”
“She called me a brat the first time we came here.”
“Gee,” Becky’s tone melted into that of sweet maple syrup. “I wonder where she ever might have gotten that egregious idea from?”
Victoria rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Anyways, how badly did you bomb your math final?”
“I did not ‘bomb’ it,” Becky corrected. “I just might have set on fire. You know.”
“That’s an awful metaphor.”
“I’m a little stressed over my score, okay?” She pulled her side bangs down, mussing her curls. “I don’t know if I studied hard enough.”
“You know,” said Victoria, her voice a smidge softer, “You could have called me. I would’ve helped.”
“I...I didn’t want to take up your time. I thought you were busy,” she admitted.
“Too busy to make time for you? Don’t be stupid, Beckface.”
The ice cream slid onto the table without a word from Natalya, who had sped off to serve another customer. Becky welcomed the distraction and stuck a spoonful of chocolate into her mouth, the cold biting her tongue. Victoria watched, not touching her mint.
Becky bit her lip. “I know, but you have other things to do, don’t you? You’re the busiest person I know.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Victoria said curtly. “Besides, there’s no way you’d get anything less than a 99 on that test if I had helped.”
“A 99 only?”
“Of course, I’d get the top score.” She grinned wickedly. “But only you would be second-best.”
Becky’s lips split into a breathless smile, and she laughed into her gloved hands. The sound spilled from them like a wind that could not be beguiled or tamed, and it brushed against Victoria softly, parting past her pointed chin and fanning over the curved bow of her lips. Now she was red, and quickly dug into her mound of ice cream to combat the sudden brimming heat.
They fell into conversation with ease. Victoria commanded war with her tone, Becky listened attentively, even if she knew nothing about the topic. She ate spoon after spoon of chocolate until her mouth was sticky sweet. She was often reminded of the heart she held in her hands – Victoria's heart – from the way the blonde watched her wipe the dark cream off her lips, the way her cheeks were still pinkish despite the cold being firmly kept outside.
When they walked under the painted red arch of the parlor’s doorway, right under the mistletoe, Victoria brushed a kiss on her knuckles and stormed off, as though Becky had willed her into submission.
Becky’s smile was wobbly as she examined her hand. She imagined that the next day, they wouldn’t talk about it. If they did, Victoria would blame the kiss on anything but herself, and Becky might not correct her.
For as much as she might like Victoria, she didn’t love her. Love was a big claim, a bold thing to say, but she had been infatuated with Violet, had crushed on Scoops, liked Victoria – and now, the only way to go was up, wasn’t it?
Silly, she thought. That’s a silly thing to say.
Maybe if she hadn’t met him, she would have loved Victoria. She would have had the courage to kiss her on the cheek, the lips. But she knew if she had, she would be leading Victoria to a prize the girl, for once, could not have.
Her heart – it was in his hands now, and stars knew what he would do with it.
“Look,” Tobey protested feebly, “is it not possible to cut a deal?”
“Considering you’re dangling from my hands right now, no, I don’t think you’re in any position to be cutting deals, Tobey.”
The boy in question blew out a breath of exasperation, crossing his arms defiantly. She had no doubt he looked ridiculous, swinging from her pinched fingers like a wilted Christmas wreath, but smothered her laughter beneath an artificial air of professionalism.
“I didn’t even commit a crime,” continued Tobey. “I was only eying a jewel on display.”
“’Eying’ isn’t the same thing as ‘calling Reginald a blind old man’ and stealing his prized diamond.”
Tobey shrugged. “Not like he’ll miss it.”
She sighed. He’d been committing odd crimes more often lately, and none of them made much sense to her. He was never one to rob jewelry stores – he didn’t fancy jewelry that expensive to begin with – and he had always left the crime scene at the slowest pace possible, as if he wanted to be caught. And she was sure he did, given that he didn’t even bother to run after stealing the jewel - just sat and waited near the cash register, balancing the thing between two idle fingers and looking awfully bored until she arrived.
She knew why he was going to such lengths, but didn’t want to think about it. If she ignored it until the season passed, then he would go back to flirting with her in other ways that didn’t involve that damned plant – because that plant was everywhere, at each of his crime scenes, dangling innocently above a particular spot that she always had to side-step before he could point it out.
Tobey’s voice brought her back to the present. “Could you at least not take me to my mother’s? I have to go to a friend’s house.”
“Oh?” She rose an unconvinced eyebrow. “Whose?”
“Er...Becky - Becky Botsford. You know of her, don’t you?”
Her heartbeat ticked like a clock. “Yeah, I know her. Why am I dropping you off at her house?”
“We have a...project. Science. A cell diagram. If I don’t show up, I doubt she’ll be happy about it.”
“She might think you’re a dishonest criminal,” Wordgirl said sweetly, “and we wouldn’t want that.”
“Yes,” he muttered, “we wouldn’t. Kindly drop me off, then?”
Wordgirl slowly brought them closer to the snowy drift, frigid air billowing past them like rogue wraiths. Her house was stitched with the glowing trim of lights, and warm light spilled from the windows. She could imagine the actions of each silhouette hidden behind the glass – her mother in the living room, humming as she watched the latest episode of Cash or Pie, her father shimmying in the kitchen as he pushed in this evening’s baked ziti into the oven, her brother upstairs pretending to finish the last of his homework.
And now, Tobey, who would invite himself in on the premise that he and Becky had a science project to complete – a science project that didn’t exist.
She landed on the shoveled pavement soundlessly, dropping him into the snow with a disgruntled hmph.
He stood up, brushed the snow off his clothes, and adjusted his glasses. “How polite of you, really.”
“I do my best.” Her eyes glanced upwards, where the bit of mistletoe dangled, still fresh, white berries swinging in the wind like bells with an invisible chime. She wondered when he would mention them, but he said nothing, preoccupied with adjusting his scarf. “I... should get going. Er, have fun with that science project.”
“Quite,” he said drilly, and she flew off, entering the house through the back window of her bedroom, quickly changing, and getting to the door just in time for the doorbell to ring. She opened it without missing a beat and stepped outside.
An expression of confusion crossed her face, not that it was that hard to fake. She wondered how he was going to excuse his sudden arrival. “Tobey?”
“Becky,” he greeted, smiling. “How have you been?”
She stared at him. “What do you want.”
“Why do you think I want anything?” He fluttered his lashes, and she snorted. “What if I just wanted to see your face?”
“Then I would think you’ve gone delusional,” she said, though couldn’t help the wobbly grin making its way across her face. “And I would also be strangely flattered.”
“Oh?” He adjusted his glasses again, almost anxious. She saw him glance up, at the mistletoe, and a monstrous blush cascaded over her cheeks like a wildfire.
“Oh,” she repeated, watching the berries glisten with crystalline droplets. Her heart raced. “Um, you must be freezing. You should come inside – like, right now.”
There was a sliver of time, a moment in which he looked at her and she looked at him, and there was a question that hung in the air like the faintest aroma, a question she could barely consider in her head when all her raucous thoughts clamored for attention.
He leaned in, slow enough for her to back away. She felt her eyes close, the wind brush against her, The ice that had pricked her skin before felt like cotton dabbing a coarse canvas. She had envisioned a kiss briefly before, on hazy evenings when she’d spent time with Tobey and he was almost kind, almost funny, almost sweet...sweet enough for her to wonder what it might like to cusp his face and taste it for her own.
If she had wanted to run, she could have. Her feet weren’t rooted to the spot, her limbs weren’t frozen in place. She was living, breathing, alive with anticipation, like a stone statue that had suddenly been granted freedom from its bust.
A car drove by. Clouds drifted above. The Earth turned on its axis. And then he kissed her.
On the cheek. He pulled away, swift, and covered his mouth with his scarf almost prudishly, as though he were too afraid to go any further. His eyes darted over the plane of her face – her freckles, the slope of her nose, the wide arch of her heightened eyebrows, the tight o of surprise her lips had formed. Anywhere but her eyes.
“Well,” he choked out. “I suppose I should be taking my leave now. After all, I interrupted whatever leisurely activity you were partaking in up until now, and for something so trivial, too, so I believe-”
“Tobey!” Her voice shot out like a dagger that narrowly missed its target.
“Yes?” When he met her gaze, he looked nearly shy. Flustered. Tobey McCallister III, maker of robots, scientific prodigy, elitist snob – flustered.
Her own lungs were tightened like a corkscrew, but when she saw his scrunched shoulders and rosy cheeks and general nervousness, they unraveled in a ribbon of relief.
“Tobey,” she repeated, softly. “Is that all?”
His eyes blew wide. Slowly, he muttered, “I wasn’t aware you wanted more.”
“Well, I’m making it aware now, aren’t I?”
“Becky,” he said, almost like a sigh of reluctance. He was unraveling, too, and she could see it in the way his shoulders sunk and his eyes began to twinkle with stolen stars.
She recalled the way he had looked at Wordgirl when she’d dropped him off at the house, the way he had pretended the mistletoe above them didn’t exist. The questions crowded her head, drowning out her rationale, and all of it answered with a simple breath of a name, a wisp of a voice: Becky.
Not once had he ever said Wordgirl’s name like that. It reminded her of the way members of the choir chanted hymns – quiet, because powerful words did not need volume. Her conscience melted.
He wasn’t slow the second time. He swooped in with vigor, a clumsy bird in flight, and she met him in the middle of the gale. Her fingers found his blonde hair, his own found the curls at the nape of her neck. Her heart hammered out a symphony of entropy. The world faded yet became startlingly neon – the background behind them had fallen to nothing, but the wind grated against her skin, combating the warmth his touches sparked on her wrists. His presence both killed the cold and became another temperature, something burning and hot, a pyre that she held in her arms.
None of Violet’s flowery softness, of Scoops’ and Victoria’s brevity. And just as it begun, it ended. She blinked, snow dotting her eyelashes. Tobey stared at her a moment before yanking himself from her arms, tripping over the front steps, and landing in the snow.
Becky’s doubt bubbled over into laughter. “Very sauve,” she managed to say through her giggles.
“It’s my middle name,” he croaked out, accepting her supporting hand. “I’m going to be frank here...did that just happen?”
“Afraid it did,” she replied, though her tone was far from regretful. Then, before she could stop herself, she said, “you know, I saw the strangest thing earlier.”
“Oh? Do tell.”
“You and Wordgirl,” she said, side-eyeing him, “under the mistletoe.”
“Ah. And what of it?”
“Well, clearly you’re big on following this particular tradition,” she mumbled, briefly touching her lips. They still felt like they were on fire. “So why not follow it through with her?”
Now he wasn’t looking at her, preoccupied with the lining of his gloves. “I didn’t see it.”
“I find that hard to believe.”
“I don’t know what you want to hear from me,” he said, his eyes straining so far from here that the pupils could have escaped their whites. “Suppose I wanted to kiss you instead of her? So what?”
Her jaw fell. “So what? Seriously, Tobey? You can’t expect me to believe that.”
A snort of derision. “How come?”
“I’ve listened to you rant about her for ages,” she said, crossing her arms and shooting him an unimpressed stare. “And even before that, everyone knew you liked her, including me – not that you were trying to be discreet about it.”
“And?”
“And? And, you had the chance to kiss her...and didn’t. What gives?”
He rolled his eyes. “Since you’ve been studiously following my career-”
“Have not, and villainy is not a career-”
“-you should know that if I were to try and kiss her, she might send me flying across Fair City.”
“You’ve been trying all week!”
He paused, raising an eyebrow. “What?”
Becky should’ve stopped there, but her mind was still hazy from their kiss, and her confusion pushed words from her mouth too fast for her to swallow. “Under the tree, in the store aisle, by the jewelry store - you always made an attempt! Getting her to come for the most ridiculous reasons, and placing mistletoe there, because obviously you wanted a kiss! And then you stopped, which is good, but – but then you kissed me, and that doesn’t make sense at all!”
She sucked in a breath and tried to calm herself. She wasn’t angry, even if her cheeks were red and her head swam with irritation. No, she was only confused on how he would settle for something he hadn’t been chasing all this time. Was she...backup? In case he couldn’t kiss Wordgirl? Or-
“Becky,” he said slowly, “I believe it makes perfect sense, considering you just outed yourself as Wordgirl.”
The wind rustled the foliage in front of them. Then, so quiet she could barely hear herself: “What?”
“Either that, or you’re a very dedicated spectator. How else would you know about all my previous attempts unless you were there? And even if you had just watched...I doubt you would be so indignant on Wordgirl’s behalf.”
“I-” Her tongue felt like lead, impossible to move, making every other word she choked out foul. “I’m not-”
“But you are.”
“I’m not!”
“Then why,” he murmured, “do you sound so jilted? As though you’ve been rejected?”
“I do not sound jilted,” she protested.
“You do. I would know what rejection looks like, dear.”
She looked away. She couldn’t deny that he knew now, and she berated herself for having blurted out all that vitriol. Stupid. You should have kept it to yourself.
“You know,” she said, “I’ve been kissed by three different people this past week. I hoped maybe one of them would be you, but I wanted it to be out of costume. I wanted you to kiss me, the real me, but I knew that wouldn’t happen. You’re in love with Wordgirl, not Becky. That’s why it was only a wish. Because it wasn’t going to happen.”
She met his gaze. “Until it did.”
A wave of silence passed. She hated it – there were always words flying between them when they were together, and the still atmosphere felt stifling, almost suffocating. “For someone so smart, you can be awfully stupid.”
She flinched. “What?”
“Becky,” he said, sighing, “what makes you think that I didn’t love you, too?”
Her heart stammered. “Everything.”
“Well, then everything is wrong. I think...at some point when I was vying for a kiss, I realized I didn’t want a kiss from Wordgirl anymore.”
“Why? You’ve - you’ve always-”
“No.” It was stark and solid, a block of ice that couldn’t be melted down. “No, Becky. That’s where you’re wrong. I didn’t just want a kiss – I wanted her. I wanted a relationship. I wanted to walk her places, go for picnics, get ice cream, read books together. If I were to kiss her, it would only be a kiss. Then she would fly away, and I would go home, and then what? Nothing.”
“At some point,” he continued, “I realized. When she dropped me off here – when you dropped me off here – I realized that I was pursuing the wrong thing. If I wanted just a kiss, that would be fine. But I...I could never be satisfied with just a kiss.”
His eyes flitted up towards the mistletoe, coated in a fine layer of snow like icing. “That’s why I kissed you instead of her. You are Wordgirl, but you’re Wordgirl in her best moments, the girl nobody else gets to see. When you babble about books, or set the kitchen on fire trying to cook, or curse out every mathematics scholar you know while doing Algebra homework - that’s you.” He looked back at her again. “If anything, I’m just sorry it took me so long to understand that.”
For once, she was speechless. There were so many things she could have said, but as usual, her mind settled on a safe, easy quip. “Sorry? You? Who are you and what have you done to Tobey McCallister III?”
He let out a strangled sound. “Should I have insulted you instead?”
“Familiar backwater,” she mumbled. “I’m going to be honest here...that’s a lot.”
“Obviously.” He shuffled on his feet. “I’m regretting saying anything at all, now-”
“No!” she blurted. “No, I’m - I’m glad you did. Really. I just didn’t know that you...”
“I didn’t know you were fond of me either,” he said dryly.
“We’re friends.” A small smile bloomed on her face, like a snowdrop pushing through icy dirt. “Of course I’m fond of you.”
“Perhaps a little more than fond?”
“Perhaps,” she said. “That was...a lot. And, frankly, I’m sure you’re freezing, so-”
“You aren’t cold?”
“Me?” She shook her head. “Nope. I just like wearing winter clothes because it’s fun.”
“Fun,” he repeated. “It’s a pity, really. I was prepared to offer you my coat one day.”
She grinned. “I’ll let you do it as a show of chivalry. But in the meantime, we’ve got a fake science project to do inside.”
“Fake- oh. Oh, that’s embarrassing.”
“I’ve heard worse excuses.”
“You’ve made worse excuses.”
“Which we will not dwell on.” She opened the door a crack, and warmth spilled in. “Come on, McCallister. We’ve got a bit to talk about.”
“Yes, like the names of those three other people you kissed who I’m sure you wouldn’t mind divulging.”
She snorted. “Among other things.” Becky grabbed his hand and dragged him inside, closing the door with a click of the lock.
Outside, faded tape finally peeled away, and the mistletoe fell from its spot above the door before a gust of wind carried it away.