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There’s nothing more magical than the first snow—especially when it happens while you’re sleeping.
I fall asleep to a subdued world of grayish brown and awaken to a winter wonderland outside my bedroom window. Every branch of every tree is frosted in white and sparkling in the morning sun. I smile at the sight of it, a thrill of childish excitement lighting up in my heart.
The first thing I do is grab my phone and snap a photo of the magical sight outside my window. I send it to Weston.
TESSA:
SNOW!!
While waiting for him to reply, I put on a sweatshirt and slide my feet into some fuzzy socks. It’s finally beginning to feel like winter.
Like Christmas.
My phone vibrates with a new message. I smile when his name lights up on the screen.
WESTON:
I noticed
I’m about to roll my eyes at his snarky comeback, when—
THUD!
A snowball splatters against my bedroom window.
What on earth?
I stare for a moment, stunned. Then I rush to the window and peer out. Past the remnants of snow on the glass, I spot a familiar boy standing on my front lawn. A boy with an obnoxiously optimistic smile on his face. He completes the perfect winter scene, our snowy suburb shimmering around him like a Norman Rockwell painting.
I smile, throwing the window open and sticking my head out. “Weston! What are you doing here?”
“Serenading you awake!” he says, reaching one hand out theatrically. “Oh, Juliet! Juliet! Wherefore art thou, Juliet?”
I burst out laughing. “Shh! You’ll wake the whole neighborhood.”
“They’re already awake. You’re the only one still sleeping.”
“Hey! I am not sleeping.”
“You were just a minute ago.”
I lift my chin. “How do you know that?”
“Because.” He grins, forming another snowball in his gloved hands. “You always text me as soon as you wake up.”
He knows me too well. I bite down on a smile, feeling myself blush.
“Well, you might have at least told me you were coming,” I criticize, feeling rather lofty—I’m still leaning out my bedroom window, looking down on him.
“What fun is that?” Weston calls back. “You need more surprises in your life, Tessa.”
“Oh, really?”
He nods, giving me that mischievous smile of his. “Like this!” he shouts, and throws the snowball at me.
I duck just in time. The snowball flies through my window and shatters on my bedroom floor. I gasp, popping back up to find Weston laughing on the front lawn.
Impertinent boy! I want to slap him for throwing that snowball at me. But I also want to kiss him.
A surprised laugh spills past my lips as I scream out the window, “You’re going to pay for that!”
I scoop up the snow off my floor and squish it back into a ball, running downstairs as fast as my feet will carry me. The sweet smell of waffles fills the air as I fly through the kitchen, startling Grandma.
“Tessa! What on earth are you doing?”
I laugh maniacally, not stopping to explain. Instead, I run to the front door and burst out into the winter wonderland—forgetting all about shoes.
Weston’s eyes widen when I come flying out the door, sprinting at him like a madwoman. I crash straight into him, throwing my arms around his neck. He laughs and staggers back a few steps.
“Well, what do you know? I got the recluse to come outside.”
I look up into his sparkling gray-blue eyes, trying to catch my breath. “This is for serenading me like Romeo,” I say, then reach up on my tiptoes and kiss his lips.
My heart flutters uncontrollably as a rush of dizzy warmth swirls through me, making everything else fall away. He smells so good, like fresh air and first snow and that spicy guyish scent I’m quickly becoming obsessed with. I can barely feel the cold with his arms circled around my waist, holding me gently as we kiss.
Then I remember the snowball melting in my hand.
Payback.
I can’t help grinning as I ease off his lips to whisper innocently, “And this… is for throwing a snowball at me.”
I shove the snow down the back of his jacket.
“AGH!”
He recoils in surprise while I start laughing. “You savage girl!” he roars, grabbing another handful of snow and winding back to throw it at me.
I dive out of the way, shrieking and laughing. “You started it!”
Thus, battle commences. We dart around the front yard, firing snowballs at each other and filling the air with a flurry of sparkling white. Weston has better aim and hits me far more than I hit him, which doesn’t seem fair. I’d want to smack him if he weren’t so cute.
Finally, Grandma steps out onto the porch to see what all the commotion is about.
“Weston!” She smiles when she sees him. “I should have known. Tessa doesn’t get up that fast for anyone else. Tessa, what on earth are you doing in the snow with no shoes on? Come inside, both of you. I just made waffles.”
The mention of waffles has us both racing inside the house. I’m still out of breath from our spontaneous snowball fight, my fuzzy socks are caked with snow, and my hands are freezing. I breathe into them, trying to get the feeling back in my fingertips.
“Hey, that’s my job,” Weston says, stepping in and enfolding my fingers in his strong, warm hands. It feels amazing after coming in out of the cold. For a moment I just stare at him, a lovestruck grin spreading over my face.
I still can’t believe he’s my boyfriend. Even after three months, the reality hasn’t quite sunk in yet. Maybe it’s because we spent the whole summer together as friends. Well, enemies at first—but when I finally let Weston into my heart, there was no getting him out.
That sunny September day when I first truly saw him was only the beginning. I didn’t think it was possible to love him more than I already did, but in that moment, I fell completely head over heels. And my life has never been the same since.
I did stare, at first—only because I never in a million years expected him to be an amputee. I couldn’t believe he’d been able to keep it a secret from me all summer. We talked for hours that day. We sat in the park, and I asked him a hundred questions, and he gave me a hundred answers. We talked until the sun set, and as the sky turned pink and orange, he asked me if I’d be his girl. I smiled and said, “I thought I already was.” And he laughed.
Since that day, we’ve been inseparable.
He is my sunshine.
And I am his.
It’s not until we’re devouring waffles at the kitchen table that Weston tells me his real reason for showing up this early.
“It’s Saturday,” I point out, pouring maple syrup over my food. “Don’t you believe
in sleeping in on the weekend?”
“Nope. And all the boys are home, which means Mom is going crazy… so I said I’d take them sledding to get them out of her hair for a while. Wanna come?”
“Sledding? Me?”
“You say that like you’ve never been.”
“Of course I’ve been sledding. But not in years.”
“Perks of having little brothers,” Weston says. “You can act like a five-year-old without being judged for it.”
I roll my eyes, smiling. “Grandma, are you okay with me going sledding with Weston and his brothers?”
“I don’t see why not,” Grandma says from the counter, where she is ladling more waffle batter into the iron. “Just as long as you’re home by four o’clock.”
“What’s happening at four o’clock?”
“Oh, nothing important. I just… want you to come with me to do some Christmas shopping.”
By the way she says it, I can tell that’s not all—I can tell she’s planning some sort of surprise. I’m usually not a fan of those—however, Christmas is an exception. The holidays are all about surprises and secret delights. It’s part of the magic, so I try my best to quell my curiosity and ask nothing.
I suppose I’ll find out at four o’clock.
“Last one to the top is a rotten egg!” Aidan screams, kicking up snow as he charges past me with his empty sled.
“Hey, that’s not fair,” I holler after him. “I’m pulling Noah! And he’s getting too big for this.” I fire a glare over my shoulder at my youngest brother, who is sprawled on his back in the sled.
“I am not too big for it!” he shrieks, chucking a handful of snow at me. “You’re just too slow!”
“Well, I think I’m pretty fast for a guy without legs.” I shoot Tessa a smile. She’s wearing a pink puffer jacket and a fuzzy white hat with a pom-pom on it, and she looks more like she belongs on the streets of Manhattan, not trekking through a snow-covered golf course with a pack of wild boys.
I wish I could say that Noah is the only thing slowing me down, but he’s not. My prosthetic legs are the real enemy of progress. It’s awkward enough to walk through the snow with real legs, so you can imagine how much more difficult it is with fake ones. Thankfully, I’ve had enough practice to not fall on my face in front of Tessa.
But my brothers don’t treat me any different because of it. They still expect me to play the reindeer.
“Aidan’s gonna win!” Noah wails, throwing another snowball at my back. “Hurry up!”
“Noah,” Tessa says in that sweet, mom-like voice of hers, “your brother is going to make you get out and walk in a minute.”
“If we had a dog, he could pull Noah in the sled,” Henry pipes up hopefully.
Tessa frowns. “A dog?”
“Henry, Mom and Dad already told you that we can’t get a dog. It’s too much work.”
“But I’d be the one taking care of it,” Henry insists. “Mom and Dad wouldn’t have to do anything. And it wouldn’t just be for me, you know. It could be a watchdog. Everyone should have a watchdog. Don’t you think, Tessa?”
I grunt. “Don’t drag Tessa into this.”
Tessa shoots me a playful smirk. “Oh, I completely agree, Henry. Why shouldn’t you have a dog? If you’re really going to take care of it.”
“Yeah! See, that’s what I said! But Mom thinks they shed too much. She’s always coming up with some problem every time I talk about it.”
“Well, some dogs don’t shed,” Tessa points out smartly. “What kind do you want?”
“A golden retriever.”
“Oh.” She laughs. “Well, they do shed. A lot.”
Henry sighs and kicks at the snow.
We finally reach the top of the hill, where Aidan is sitting on his sled, stockpiling snowballs. “What took you guys so long?” he sneers.
“Shut up!” Noah screams,
, jumping off my sled so suddenly I almost face-plant in the snow.
“Ugh, Noah—Aidan, quit picking on him, alright?”
But Aidan has already launched one of his snowballs at Noah, which of course makes a fight break out between them. Noah starts throwing snowballs back at him, roaring like a baby tiger as he gets blasted in the face.
“Hey, hey, hey, guys—stop!” I jump into the line of fire. My little brothers halt their snowball fight to stare at me. “Let’s settle this like gentlemen, shall we?”
Noah blinks, snow on his chin. “How?”
“Well, Aidan made it to the top of the hill first… but we all know that the real winner is the one who makes it to the bottom first.”
“Let’s go!” Aidan drops his snowball and dives into his sled.
“Hey—” I leap forward and grab the rope. “You gotta wait for Noah, or else you’ll be a dirty cheater.”
Aidan moans, planting his boots in the snow. “Fine. Hurry up, Noah!”
“Henry, you go with Noah.”
“But I’m old enough to go by myself!” Noah whines.
I cross my arms over my chest. “Not if you’re still too much of a baby to walk up the hill by yourself.”
Noah pouts, but goes along. While Henry climbs into the sled with him, I grab Aidan by the collar of his jacket and say in a low voice, “If you don’t let Noah win, I’ll hide your Xbox somewhere you’ll never find it.”
He whips around, eyes wide. “You’re so mean!”
“You’re mean. Noah’s the youngest. Come on. Go easy on him.”
He groans. “Fiiiiiiine.”
I turn to find Tessa watching me with a bemused smile on her face.
“Okay, Tessa, ready to show them how it’s done?”
She giggles and rolls her eyes. “I told you, I haven’t been sledding in years.”
“That’ll be my excuse when we lose.” I wink at her and get on the sled. Tessa plops herself down in front of me, and I circle my arms around her waist. Sledding is definitely better with a girlfriend.
Actually, I’m beginning to realize that everything is better with a girlfriend.
“Okay, ready?”
“Yep!” Aidan says, already perched on the edge of the slope.
“Henry?”
He gives me a thumbs-up, and Noah bounces up and down in front of him. “Let’s go!”
“Wait,” I mutter, nudging my and Tessa’s sled up a few feet. “On your marks… get set… go!”
We all fly off the edge of the slope in unison, sending up bursts of snow in the sunlight. Tessa screams a little, squeezing my legs and shrinking back into me, which makes me laugh. My brothers fly past us, zipping down the hill in a chaos of shouts and laughter.
“Weston, watch out for that snowbank!” Tessa shrieks.
“What snowbank?”
We crash into it.
The impact sends us both spilling out of the sled and landing on top of each other in a tangled heap. We start laughing, and Tessa rolls off me, yanking my hat down over my eyes. “You did that on purpose!”
“I thought we could just fly over it,” I say, pulling my hat off to look at her. “I guess my idea didn’t work.”
Tessa gasps and scoops up a handful of snow. “You savage boy–”
“Don’t you dare put that down my neck again!” I roll out of the way, grabbing my own handful of snow to fight back properly armed.
“No!” Tessa laughs, diving to the side—but I grab her arm and manage to shove my snow-filled hand down the back of her puffy pink jacket. It’s probably not a very romantic thing to do, but I can’t resist.
“How dare you!” she screams, writhing at the cold.
I stifle a laugh. “You started it.”
“You started it when you crashed us into the snowbank!”
“Well, I didn’t mean to—”
“Oh, I think you did.” Tessa glares at me, her face all pink. Somehow, she’s even cuter when she’s mad at me. “I swear, Henry is more mature than you are.”
I tackle her into the snow and look down into her sparkling blue eyes. “I’m sorry. Will this make up for it?”
I lean down and softly capture her lips. ...
