Page 13 of Under The Meh-stletoe

"Does he like Christmas, though?" Ale asked. "Maybe he'll get out of the house for the spirit of it all."

"Yeah, he does. Not enough to leave the house most of the time. He didn't come tonight, for example."

Conversations among attendees in the square quieted to a murmur. We couldn't see the podium from our location but, according to the schedule, the Mayor must have taken his place at the mic.

"What if we pay your dad a visit?" I whispered to the two of them. "Could we convince him to do it?"

Ale also spoke in a lower volume, just as the Mayor's speech started.

"We'll probably visit a couple of other options," she said, "but your dad could really be the ticket to solve this issue."

María shrugged. "Again, I can't promise anything, but come next week. I'll butter him up for you."

"Thanks, María." Ale rubbed María's arm and the latter went into the community hall, to help prepare for the post-tree event.

"Everything set up inside?" I asked.

"Yep. I checked in earlier. There's a team finishing up the letters display for the drive, and another team making sure there's coffee and tea available for the donors. Hopefully they sponsor all the gifts."

Right on cue, the mayor reminded the attendees about the drive, and encouraged them to become sponsors.

"I can't believe he's still the Mayor," Ale continued to whisper in my direction. "What is this, his third run?"

"Fourth." I put my hands deep in my pockets to keep them warm. "I think he plans to run again."

Everyone applauded at something the Mayor said, inaudible to us with a change in the wind direction.

"Wow. He might get it, too." She turned to me, and I couldn't help but mirror her. "Anyway, we should try to convince María's dad. I think he's our best bet. I'll still call some of the people on the list my sister sent me again— some of them didn't answer the first time— and see if we can go visit them, too. Can we go next week sometime?"

Habituation required I said yes. The damn spark inside wanted me to say yes, too. Still, I hesitated.

I wrinkled my nose. "I hate the idea of begging for it."

"Who said we're begging?"

"We're visiting grown ass men to ask them for help. We're going to sit there and pretend we agree Christmas matters, and we're going to have to lean into the holiday spirit bullshit." The crowd cheered and applauded again. I checked my watch. Only a few minutes until the tree lighting. "You can't tell me you love that idea?"

"I thought you know the answer by now. I'm not into Christmas either. All the overblown fakeness— not my thing. Going on the road to find Santa doesn't mean I'm going to beg. I'll make perfectly rational, adult arguments about community building. I thought you got that piece? The community building side of things?"

The spark in my gut turned into a silly little flame, at the sight of the playful smirk on her lips, and the subtle arch to her eyebrow. I wanted to erase that smirk. With my lips.

I frowned. "As long as we don't beg. I don't beg."

A grin blossomed on her face. It punched me in the gut. "Don't tempt me with a good time. I might want to challenge you on that."

My breathing quickened. "Don't flirt with me."

Her energy flipped— her smile faltered. I squinted at her and did my best to remain serious.

"I wasn't flirting," she said.

"You were telling me you wanted to make me beg."

"That's not what I meant." Her wide eyes reflected the streetlights around us, her pupils a dark pool. "I meant it would be fun to see you hiding all the grump to ask people to pretty please dress in red and wear a white beard. Making you beg them for help… not begging me— for anything."

"Good. I typically prefer to be the one being begged... for things."

She held my gaze but it cost her. Her shoulders tensed like steeling herself required effort on her part. I shouldn't be teasing her, especially not when I wanted to make it better with a kiss. My eyes dropped to her mouth.