The Crappiest Christmas Ever E-Book

Cora Buhlert

• Herausgeber: Cora Buhlert
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

Jessica is having the worst Christmas ever, when her parents announce that they are getting a divorce two days before the holidays.

Stuck on her own with no home to go to, Jessica heads for the mall to buy a Christmas tree for herself. Here she meets Matt, who sells Christmas trees and is having a really awful Christmas himself.

Matt and Jessica bond over their shared pain and also manage to make each other laugh. So maybe, this won't be the worst Christmas ever after all...
 
This is a short and sweet holiday romance of 12000 words or approximately 40 print pages.

Leseprobe

The Crappiest Christmas Ever

by Cora Buhlert

Bremen, Germany

Copyright © 2020 by Cora Buhlert

All rights reserved.

Cover image © Undrey, Dreamstime

Cover design by Cora Buhlert

Pegasus Pulp Publications

Mittelstraße 12

28816 Stuhr

Germany

www.pegasus-pulp.com

I. Cold Cold Christmas

“You want to buy a Christmas tree?,” Megan exclaimed, “Now?”

“Why on Earth not?” Jessica replied, faintly irritated. She sipped the last of her cinnamon spice latte and tried to ignore the fact that this was probably the last time she’d get to drink this particular blend until next year.

Next year. It still felt strange to think the words, let alone say them. Even if “next year” started a little over a week from now.

“Because…” Megan drew out the word as if she were talking to an idiot or a very small child. Jessica just wondered as which of the two Megan saw her. “…it’s December 23rd. And you won’t find any Christmas trees on December 23rd. And certainly not at six PM.”

“Why not? It’s still before Christmas, isn’t it?”

Megan rolled her eyes. “Yes, in theory it’s still before Christmas. But all the good trees were already sold days, if not weeks ago. Barely two days before Christmas is too late to buy a decent Christmas tree. Just as it’s too late to buy presents and Christmas sweets.”

“Yeah, I wanted to buy some of my favourite Christmas sweets at the grocery store this morning,” Jessica said, “But they said the Christmas sweets were all sold out and had been for days. They said I should have bought Christmas sweets in October or November and not two days before Christmas.”

“See? I told you so.”

“That makes no sense,” Jessica continued, “Who on Earth even wants to buy Christmas sweets before Halloween?”

“Normal people,” Megan said, “People who know that you always have to buy everything ahead of the season when you’ll need it.”

“That’s not normal,” Jessica countered.

“Maybe not,” Megan agreed, “But it’s the way things are. It’s called living in a consumer society.”

Jessica frowned. She and Megan had been friends since freshman year, but there were times that Megan fit the stereotype of the former marketing major and aspiring MBA a little too well.

Of course, if you asked Megan, she’d probably say that Jessica was determined to match every single stereotype of the English major and aspiring MFA living in in her personal ivory tower far removed from reality.

Jessica did not care. She liked her ivory tower a lot better than she liked reality.

“Well, I would’ve bought a tree in early December,” she said, “But until two days ago, I didn’t think I’d need one, cause I still thought I’d be going home for Christmas.”

Megan put a hand on Jessica’s shoulder in silent support. “You can hardly blame the Christmas tree vendors for your personal problems.”

Jessica nodded. “Well, I’ve got to blame someone. After all, I’m having the crappiest Christmas ever.”

The phone call had come the day before yesterday. When she’d head Mom’s voice on the other end of the line, Jessica had thought she’d only called to confirm the arrival times of her flight home. But then Mom had dropped the bombshell.

Dad was having an affair with his secretary — pardon, personal assistant — and Mom and Dad were getting a divorce. Dad had already moved out of the house and taken off for Vegas or Reno or Atlantic City or someplace like that with his secretary, while Mom was planning to spend the holidays with Aunt Hilda in Florida. And her older sister Beth was celebrating with her own a family. So even if Jessica were to fly home for Christmas, there’d be no one there. Nothing but an empty house stuffed full of memories.

Like Jessica always said, reality sucked. But dwelling on it didn’t help, didn’t change anything. So she jumped to her feet.

“Come on. Let’s just drive by some Christmas tree lots to check if they still have trees. If we can’t find one, we can go home.”

Megan rolled her eyes. “At this point, there’ll only be trash left. The crooked broken trees no one wanted.”

“That’s okay.” Jessica flashed Megan a smile and reached for the car keys. “I happen to like crooked and broken things.”

“Just like my life,” she thought.

Matt emitted a hearty yawn. He stomped his feet in the snow and rubbed his hands together to keep warm. Then he pushed up the sleeve of his winter coat and pried his watch from the gap between the cuff and his gloves.

The glowing LED numbers told him that it was just a little after seven PM. The lot closed at eight. That was another hour to go plus fifteen minutes or so for closing up. One hour and fifteen minutes in a freezing cold and nigh deserted Christmas tree lot.

When Matt took this job in November, just after Thanksgiving, he’d thought it would be fun. No more seasonal retail work in a crowded and overheated mall, instead he’d get to stand around in the fresh air all day. When there were no customers, he could exercise. Or work on his thesis.

Of course, the air next to a major thoroughfare wasn’t exactly fresh. It smelled of exhaust fumes rather than fresh pine and fir needles. And while the Thanksgiving weekend had been unseasonably warm, a cold front blew in from the North the first week of December. Then the frost came and the snow fell.

So Matt had spent the last three weeks freezing his ass off and selling Christmas trees to customers who were just as impatient and quarrelsome out here on the lot as inside the overheated mall.

Most of the good trees — the tall ones with the straight stems and a full, evenly arranged array of branches — were already gone anyway. What was left was the trash, the trees that were too small, too crooked or didn’t have enough branches. The trees no one wanted.

“First thing on Boxing Day morning, they’ll go straight to the composting plant,” his boss Jim had said, “That’s the only thing they’re still good for.”

“Then why are we still open?,” Matt had asked, “Why not call it a day and close up?”

“Because of the really desperate customers,” Jim had replied, a calculating gleam in his eyes, “Somehow, they’ve managed to miss all the clues that the holidays are coming and suddenly they realise two days before Christmas that they haven’t got a tree yet. So they come here and you can sell them even the worst trash for thirty or forty dollars and they’ll be grateful.”

But so far, desperate customers had failed to materialise and so Jim had gone home an hour ago and left Matt to man the lot and close up shop.

So Matt leant to a lamp post and watched the cars go by in the falling snow, almost bumper to bumper, snaking in an endless line towards the suburbs, where pretty houses with pretty decorations, a mug of hot chocolate and a cosy fire in the grate were waiting for them.

Privately Matt imagined something out of a Thomas Kinkade painting and rolled his eyes, because it was either that or start to cry, right here in the bloody lot. Cause he’d had that sort of home, that sort of family once. Not anymore.

He noticed that one of the bulbs in the light string that had been strung around the perimeter of the lot had blown out and went to fix it. At least, it gave him something to do.