Stuffed: A Thanksgiving Romance Read online

  The land was pretty big, just shy of an acre full of big, old, sturdy trees, including a surplus of weeping willows that I always loved. There was a built-in pool set back from the house with a black fence around it and an assortment of chaise lounges. It would be covered now, I realized with an exhale. It would have been nice to lay by the pool and read.

  And maybe see Adam in a swimsuit again.

  "Come on, Cal," my father said, making me snap out of my thoughts. I got out, still wearing my messenger bag and going to get Albus as my father disappeared inside with my rolling suitcase.

  "Dad where did you..." I started, walking down the hallway with the wide-planked floors and white shiplap walls toward the large rectangular kitchen. The kitchen was one of my favorite rooms, after my old bedroom and father's library. It was pure my mother, upscale but still country chic. The cabinets were a light sage green. The blacksplash and countertops were a mix of different browns and tans. There was a giant island in the center and all the appliances were oversize and stainless steel. To the right of the room was what my mother called her "all season room". It was really just a continuation of the kitchen where a white rectangular table was situated in a sun-washed space because the windows went from floor to ceiling.

  My mom was facing away from me, her brown hair in a clip at the base of her neck, her thin body clad in black slacks and a simple camel-colored sweater. There were the unmistakable strings of her apron tied into a bow at her lower back. My brother was sitting on the island, picking at something there with his two fingers. Cory got the lion's share of good looks in the family, leaving me with the leftovers. He was taller, leaner, with a strong jaw, a refined-type of forehead, my mother's blue eyes, great lashes, a roman nose, and all the fashion sense the family had to offer. He was dressed in dark wash jeans and a light blue button-up that he had tucked in with a brown belt and matching shoes. His brown hair was a little longer than it should have been, but Cory was notoriously bad about remembering to do normal tasks like getting his hair cut.

  But my mother and Cory and the smell of cooking food and the nostalgia of being home, yeah, that wasn't what stopped me dead in my tracks.

  No.

  That would be none other than the towering form of Adam Gallagher standing to the side of the island in black slacks and a gray dress shirt that he tucked in. There was no tie or jacket and he had the sleeves of the shirt rolled up to his elbows, showing off strong forearms and a very expensive looking watch.

  I'd been right when I said he had probably aged well.

  I was also right about how unfair it was, especially given that he was a looker to begin with.

  But, as fate would have it, the years were uncommonly kind to him, making his already chiseled face look even more cut, his jawline stronger, his forehead more distinguished, his cheekbones just a little deeper. And his body, yeah, well it had certainly taken on a more masculine form too- all wide shoulders and strong chest under his perfectly tailored clothes.

  His light green eyes were on me and the impact of his gaze somehow made my lungs feel crushed and a slight blush rise up in my cheeks.

  It didn't exactly escape me that he looked like he stepped out of a mens catalog and that I literally looked half-homeless.

  "Callie," he greeted me first. His voice had gotten better with age too, deeper, smoother. Like a fine Scotch. Not that I knew anything about Scotch, but in books, that was how a man's voice was described. And it seemed more than fitting. And it totally made my belly do a weird wobbly thing. "Nice to see you again."

  "I, ah, nice to you again too." I felt my eyes go huge at that mumbling idiocy. "See. There was supposed to be a 'see' in there somewhere," I rushed to cover, my sweater suddenly feeling way too hot. I shook my head and swallowed past the strangled feeling grabbing my throat. "How have you been, Adam?"

  Albus chose that second to shriek in the carrier, slamming into the side of it and making the whole thing shake in my hand.

  "Alby!" Cory said, hopping off the counter and coming toward me.

  "Albus," I corrected, as I always had to.

  "Stupid name for a cat."

  "It's distinguished," I clarified.

  "It's the name of some fictional wizard, Cal," he said, smiling in a very big-brother condescending way as he reached for the carrier, set it down, and freed Albus. "God, remember her dragging us to those midnight releases, Adam?" he asked, reminding me yet again that said man was still in the room.

  "I'm pretty sure I bought her a wand at one of them."

  He totally had. It was The Half-Blood Prince. I had been fourteen; he and Cory were eighteen. And because Adam was the only one with a car at the time, our parents had conned them into taking me when it was literally the last place in the world they would have wanted to be on a Saturday night after their high school graduation. But they had taken me, dressed in my freaking Hogwarts robes and more excited than I had ever been for Christmas. And Adam had totally bought me a wand. It was Hermoine's wand and it had meant the whole world to me that summer. And, well, several summers that followed. I still had it sitting on a bookshelf at home.

  "Honey, what are you wearing?" my mother finally broke in. I looked over to find her shaking her head at me, but smiling like she expected nothing different.

  "Oh, ah, I... didn't think we would have company just quite yet."

  "Really, Pip?" Adam asked, shaking his head like he was offended. "I'm still considered 'company'?"

  My heart crushed inside my chest at the nickname that stemmed from the time when I was eight and positively obsessed with Pippi Longstocking and insisted everyone call me Pippi from then on. In all his twelve-year old annoyingness, he had continued to call me it even after I begged him to stop. But as I got older and my feelings for him went from a little sister type adoration to something less innocent, I got butterflies every time he said it.

  I forced a little smile, trying to keep things light. "I haven't seen you in six years, Adam."

  "But here you are," Cory said, either sensing the mood was a little tense or just being his usual carefree self. "Looking like a hipster librarian."

  I sighed, taking the hit because he was right.

  "Why don't you go put your bag and Albus' carrier in your room?" my mother suggested, giving me an out I very desperately needed.

  It took everything in me not to run out of the freaking room.

  I was pretty sure I didn't take a breath until I opened the door to my old bedroom, exhaling hard and taking a deep breath, noticing my mother must have put some kind of air freshener in there because where it used to just smell like old paper, it suddenly had a cinnamon spice thing going on. It was a simple room and left mostly as it had been when I left home six years before with my full-size platform bed with a foam mattress I had worked a summer to afford because spring mattresses could never seem comfortable enough for long spans of binge reading. The bedspread was the same worn starburst-style quilt my grandmother had made me before she died, all pink and yellow and purple. The bookshelves were full of my old favorites, but the ones I had grown out of enough to not bring with me when I moved.

  I resisted the urge to go over and run my hands over the spines like I used to as I dropped the carrier and tossed the messenger bag onto the bed. I reached for the hem of my giant sweater and hauled it off, leaving me in a black tank top and the leaf leggings.

  "Don't change for me, Pip," Adam's voice said from behind me, making my heart fly up to my throat as my stomach dropped to my feet and I let out a small squeak as I turned, clutching the sweater to my chest.

  "No. I wasn't. I mean... this was just comfortable plane clothes."

  "Liar," he said, giving me a wicked smile as he moved in from the doorway and went over to my bookshelves, running his hands over the spines like I had wanted to do. "I bet that suitcase of yours is full of outfits just like that one."

  He wasn't wrong.

  "Why haven't you come home in so long?" he asked, sitting down on my bed like it
was the most natural thing in the world. It wasn't. Adam, along with any boy or man, was never allowed in my room. Those were the rules from elementary school until I left for college.

  "I, ah, was always working."

  "Couldn't come just for one day?"

  "No."

  "Pip..." he said, dragging it out like it had some kind of meaning. But I had either forgotten how to speak Adam or he wasn't being clear enough.

  "What?"

  "Never did learn to stand up for yourself, did you? I bet you were the only one stuck at work every single Thanksgiving."

  Again, he wasn't wrong.

  "Well, I'm here now," I said, trying to keep things light because the way he was looking at me seemed oddly intense and it made me want to discreetly slip back into my sweater and then, maybe, disappear.

  "It really is good to see you again," he said, standing. Which was a good thing because I maybe liked the sight of him on that bed a little too much. I had fantasized about just that sight way too many times before I slept at night. Especially after I started smuggling in romance novels to my room in my late teens and got a whole new kind of sexual education. "What's that look for?" he asked and I realized he was suddenly right in front of me, towering over me, watching me with those light green eyes of his.

  I was pretty sure my tongue twisted all around itself and got into a genuine knot right then.

  I swallowed hard and tried my best to keep his eye contact.

  "What look?"

  His head cocked to the side, his expression thoughtful. Then he shook his head a little. "Never mind. Your mom wanted me to tell you that dinner will be in an hour," he said, moving away from me and toward the door. "Don't change," he added, back to me, as he went out and closed the door quietly.

  I exhaled hard, quickly scrunching up my sweater and putting it back on. I looked over at my messenger bag, thought about the chips, then thought about Adam, and then decided against it.

  I didn't go right back down, however, deciding I needed a few minutes to de-frazzle and try to not beat myself up about my less than flattering first re-impression. I had it all planned out. While he was right about my suitcase being mostly full of outfits similar to the one I was wearing, I had also, when I went out to buy new pretty underthings, grabbed a couple decent outfits as well. The type my mother wouldn't be embarrassed to see me in and my father wouldn't even notice. I couldn't change then, after Adam brought it so fully to my attention that I didn't need to change because of him.

  But my stupid, over-thinking mind, well, over-thought that.

  What did it mean?

  Did he mean that he was so used to seeing me look frumpy that he didn't think I could look decent? Or, perhaps, was it the much more innocent idea that because we had practically grown up together, that I should feel comfortable 'being myself' around him?

  Either way, I had the sudden, almost uncontrollable urge to go out and buy some makeup, scrounge up my contacts, slip into something slinky, attach spikes to my feet, and prove to him that I could do pretty and that I wasn't, y'know, that silly Harry Potter obsessed fourteen year old in Hogwarts robes he knew me as.

  But that would have to wait for another day, I decided as I went into my closet to look at the mirror attached to the door, straightening my hair a little, then deciding it was time to go back downstairs and be social.

  I was halfway down the staircase when I heard my cousin Amy's voice. I immediately stopped, my lip curling in a way that was more habit than anything. I truly hadn't even seen her face in six years and if I went another six without seeing it after this, that would be just fine with me. There was something about the scars of bullying that never fully went away. This truth was amplified by the fact that one of my bullies was my own family member. It didn't matter that we weren't kids anymore and it didn't matter that she and her posse couldn't gang up on me and say things that made me want to hide under my covers until high school was over. When I saw her walk into the hall, perfectly flawless as she had been years ago with her effortlessly styled brown hair with golden and honey highlights cut around her very angular, almost catlike face with her big green eyes and her full lips, her thin but curvy body wrapped in casual gray skinny jeans and a tight white sweater, all I could think was: run.

  But I couldn't do that. There was no dark corner in the library to hide in at lunch time. I had to be a grown up and face her.

  I had set my mind to doing that and started down two steps when I saw something that not only made my lip curl, but made my stomach drop.

  Amy walked right up to Adam, wrapped her arms around him like they were the oldest of friends.

  Then she gave him a kiss right on the lips.

  And that was when I oh-so-gracefully missed a step and fell.

  Such was my life.

  THREE

  Callie

  "Graceful as always, Cal," Amy said, a familiar sneer in her voice.

  "You alright, Pip?" Adam asked at almost the same time, but his voice was more amused than concerned. This was likely due to the fact that I had spent my entire childhood and adolescence tripping over anything in my path and often nothing but my own two feet. I rarely ever got hurt. Unless my bruised ego counted. Which it didn't.

  "Yep. Fine," I said, grabbing the railing and pulling myself up, only wincing slightly at how much my ass hurt from the fall. "Hey Amy. How have you been?" I asked, genuinely not caring but knowing it was better to show no embarrassment. She would latch on to that and make my day even more disappointing than it already was.

  I mean, really, she and Adam were friendly like that?

  I thought he had better taste than that.

  That was ungracious of me, but given how she made my life hell all through high school, I felt justified with a small bit of cattiness.

  "Oh, you know me," she said, smiling in a way that was all teeth. Literally and figuratively. "Love my job. Just moved into one of the new townhouses over on Elm..."

  "That's great. Congratulations!" I said, forcing a smile that hurt my face muscles. "I am going to go see if Mom needs any help. I'll let you guys catch up."

  "No need for that," Amy said, reaching out and closing her perfectly manicured hand around Adam's bicep. "Adam and I have never lost touch."

  Something about the way she said 'touch' made my insides recoil.

  Right. Okay then.

  "That's great for you," I said, turning and walking back into the kitchen, suddenly all-too aware that my own fingernails were definitely not manicured. Actually, they were blunt and had a two week old coat of deep blue nail polish.

  "Uh-oh. She's got that brow thing going on," Cory said from his position on the island.

  "I don't have a brow thing. I was coming to see if Mom needed any help."

  "Actually, hon, the food is just about ready. Can you grab a couple bottles of wine for the table?" she asked and I went to do just that. I was glad for the distraction because the sound of Amy's husky laughter was mingling with Adam's deep, rumbling kind and it was putting me in a mood. I had no right to feel that way, but I did. I guess spending years curling my lip at all the girls who flirted with Adam was a hard habit to break.

  "Here, let me open those," Adam said, coming up behind me unexpectedly and making me stumble into the chair I was standing in front of. He reached out, his hand taking the neck of the bottle, his fingers brushing mine. "I don't know if I trust you with a corkscrew."

  I released the bottle, setting the other on the table and moving away from him. I had a feeling that the term 'safe distance' would be applicable to almost every interaction between me and Adam for the length of the holiday. Keeping a safe distance would greatly reduce the chances of me doing something stupid such as blurt out how much I had been in love with him all through my adolescence and that I maybe still wouldn't exactly be adverse to a good roll in the hay with him. Or ten. Or maybe daily for the rest of our lives.

  Yeah, because chances were, I would blurt that out.

  That
kind of thing had Callie written all over it.

  "I hope it's not too cheesy to be going with an autumnal menu even though it isn't Thanksgiving yet," my mother announced as she and everyone else filed in, most holding bowls or platters. "We have butternut squash soup, a chopped kale, sweet potato, and cranberry salad with a sweet but tangy dressing," she announced putting her bowl down and removing the others from my brother's hand. "Then for the main course, we have stuffing filled baked pumpkins, grilled veggies, and seasoned chicken. Sit, sit," she demanded as everyone moved to stand behind the chairs they intended to take. Which meant Mom and Dad at the ends, my brother beside me, and Amy beside Adam.

  We all sat and went through the motions of passing food around. I looked down at my plate, amazed at my mother's ability to throw not one or two, but six vegetables into one dinner and it still somehow smelled divine. I owed a veggie filled meal to my poor potato-chip-filled body.

  Conversation passed as usual, slightly awkward at first as everyone found their footing, then easily.

  Until the inevitable happened.

  "Cal, honey," my mother asked, reaching for her wine with her long-boned fingers I had admired as a kid, "how is work?"