Buzzed Hearts

82: good luck charm

"MERRY CHRISTMAS!" Roma sings as she unloads her suitcase onto the bed. "I don't celebrate Christmas but I'm in that Christmas mood," she says. No one in the room celebrates Christmas except for Camila and Laurent—at least in the "traditional" way.

    "Gee thanks, Santa," Jeremy says. "You really hit the gym this year, huh?"

    "Stop hitting on my girlfriend," Elle says.

    "Chill out," Laurent says. "It's not like you don't do enough of it already."

    "Got you guys gifts too! Spent most of my tutoring money on this so appreciate." Camila pulls out her gift bags as well.

    Just because most of them don't believe in Christmas as a tradition or in any other sense, they still have their presents—all wrapped to varying degrees of neatness, with Jeremy's being the untidiest. Tonight they'll both sleepover at Laurent's room. (He's the one with an apartment suite with an included kitchen. They plan on cooking and according to Elle, "recreating the Last Supper.")

    They finish swapping presents, crinkling filling the atmosphere, joining the morning hum, and proceed to say their thanks before unwrapping.

    "Poetry? You got me a book?" Jeremy asks Elle.

    "I need to keep you literate before you start failing to communicate with us," she says. "I don't want to sound needy but if I don't have an outlet in this group, I don't know how I'll turn out."

    He rolls his eyes but flips through the pages.

    "It's really good. Promise. Might help with your song-writing," Roma says. "We picked it out together."

    At this, Camila snorts into the back of her hand—it sounds as if Roma and Elle are playing his parents and rightfully so. She opens Roma's gift to find a charm from Pandora. Though Camila doesn't wear jewelry most days (can't have anything on her wrist, fingers, and nails), Roma knows how much Camila loves glittery and shiny objects.

    Elle throws a second lump at Laurent. "Not a second gift. Kind of a half-gift."

    He opens it to find a Chelsea jersey, and he laughs sardonically before passing it to Jeremy. Then, he gives Roma a hug as he sees his autographed Arsenal book.

    Camila got Jeremy a new watch, Elle a Tarte makeup set, Roma two tennis charms, and Laurent....He tears gently into her neat packaging and finds a portrait of...himself.

    "Where'd you get this?" he asks.

    "There's some painters around here. Just showed them a photo of you," she says. For the most narcissistic person she knows, there's not a more fitting gift.

    "Open mine," he says.

    He sits closer to her on the bed, mattress sinking under his weight, and his breath makes her ears grow hot. Even though they said that distance was good, she always assumed it would be both the physical and emotional kind. But he doesn't care as he guides her fingers over his parcel—he didn't do a bad job with the gift wrap.

    Camila rips into it almost impatiently and uncovers a stuffed bunny, white and reminiscent of her pet back home.

    "There's more."

    Around its neck is a delicate gold chain, the shape of a rabbit's foot.

    "Good luck, you know? I suddenly remembered you were superstitious and I don't know how you feel about necklaces so I thought it was a safe bet but if you don't like it, you can totally return it—"

    "Shut up," Camila says softly and laughs.

    "Here," Laurent says.

    Camila turns her back to him as he clasps it around her neck. It's a short chain and she's unaccustomed to the way it falls like fluid silk, right down to the nestle of her collarbone. It fits like home, a bluebird's pretty egg inside its nest.

    "Can we make our feast now?" Jeremy stands up and stretches, almost reaching the ceiling.

    "It's not even lunch..." Roma says.