The Safety Pin Affair

s i x t e e n - relax and talk to me

and maybe for the first time
you'll get the best of me,
the part that isn't broken
like b e f o r e . . .

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My parents are weird – we all know that.

Usually, we have family movie night on Thursdays because my dad says that spending time like that will put us in a good mood for the weekend ahead of us. Of course, my mom agrees with this logic and goes along with it.

This week is different though because right now, it's Monday night and we're having family movie night. But that's because it's Christmas Eve – so we'd been watching Christmas movies practically all day.

It's kind of a tradition of ours to take it easy on Christmas Eve with just the three of us, and then on Christmas day is when we see most of our family. We take turns every year between which side we see – my mom's or my dad's – and I think this year it's my dad's turn.

My mom came walking back into the room with two mugs full of something steamy and warm. She handed one to me and then one to my dad, then left and returned with another one.

"What's this?" I asked, taking a sniff of it.

"Salted caramel hot chocolate," she said as she took a seat between my dad and I on the couch.

"Honey, you never cease to amaze me with your cooking," my dad smiled at her.

"Oh thank you, dear," she modestly shook her head. "But this one is just out of a packet. I didn't make it."

My dad and I laughed at that, waiting for our drinks to cool off so we could finally taste them. I hesitantly took a sip, burning my lips in the process but trying to ignore the feeling. It's too delicious to worry about that.

"Did you get all your shopping done for Christmas presents?" My mom randomly asked me a few seconds later.

"Yeah, I think so," I shrugged. "I mainly had to shop for you guys and Blair, and get something small for Matt." She gasped, making me turn away from the TV to look at her. "What?"

"What about Josh?" She asked, outraged at the fact that I didn't mention him.

I should have expected this. I can't go a day without my mom talking about him.

"He's not my boyfriend, so I didn't really think about getting him anything," I admitted sheepishly. Wow, now I feel terrible.

"But Matt's not your boyfriend either, and you still got him something," she pointed out, and I saw my dad nod in agreement.

"You're right," I sighed, agreeing too.

My mom gasped again and held onto my dad, her eyes wide in amazement. "Honey... did our stubborn daughter just agree with us?" She whispered loudly to him.

"I think so," he whispered back. I rolled my eyes at the two of them, chuckling at how goofy they are.

"I didn't really think about it. But now that you say it like that, I guess I can go out and get him something. I probably won't see him until after Christmas anyway," I said, making plans in my head.

Because the dance was so close to Christmas, I haven't seen Josh since Saturday night at the party and I just slept over Blair's afterwards. We've been texting on and off more recently though. Ever since he had dinner here and we made that promise about hanging out to help him with his anxiety and problems with his brother's death, we've gotten a lot closer.

He seems to be doing better and it's only been about two weeks. It's like he miraculously got cured overnight just from talking to me and hanging out a few times.