Their eyes met. “I know.”

Their eyes held longer than necessary, and I knew they’d forgotten about me, which didn’t bother me at all. In fact, a bloom of hope started to form and I knew instantly what I needed to do.

I yawned.

Broadly. Full arms extended in the air, eyes closed, head shaken, all for the dramatic effect. Then I added droopy eyes, to sell it.

“You guys go ahead,” I said, with a weariness that was only a slight exaggeration. “I’m headed upstairs to bed.”

My parents refocused on me in surprise. “You just said you wanted to watch a movie.”

“Tell me how it ends.”

Dad said, “Which one?”

I shrugged. “Whichever.” Then I kissed both their cheeks, said, “Love you,” and got out of the way as fast as I could.

I didn’t bother with the peppermint tea. I didn’t even wait around to eavesdrop. Just booked it up the backstairs to my temporary room and made a silent prayer for those two crazy kids to figure it out. Please, please figure it out . . .

Later, once I was in my sleep sweats and warm, dry socks, I stared out the window at the snow falling like mad. The weather app said it was going to be whiteout conditions all night and all day tomorrow, with the chance of it stopping sometime on Christmas Day. Over an inch of snow had accumulated by this point and you could tell it was just getting started.

Of course.

Excellent timing now that Arthur “All Perfect American Christmases Have Snow” Chakrabarti Watercress had left. At least I knew he was in Norman right then, which meant he was close enough to be seeing this, too. And maybe he was staring out a window at the same time I was, seeing the snow, and wishing . . .

On impulse, I grabbed my phone and checked Arthur’s Instagram before I could stop myself. And right there was a recent post, from thirty-two minutes ago. A video clip. Of the snow falling. With the caption: Almost perfect.

I frowned, wondering what he meant by “almost.” Hadn’t he requested—no, wait, demanded—snow on Christmas? Well, here it was. Lots of it. What more did he want?

I was tempted to leave a comment asking that very question, though I didn’t.

Then I noticed the time on my phone was 12:09 a.m., which reminded me that I needed to get some sleep. Christmas Eve would be a long day.

Who knew what it would bring?

I stood and crossed back to the bed, sidestepping a small pile of my clothes on the floor that I would deal with tomorrow, or possibly the day after, and the soft arch of my right foot landed painfully on something small, round, and very hard.

I looked down to see a dark item on the floor, caught in the beams of light reflected off the snow.