For Blindassassin on her birthday, and for all of those who, like me, had always vaguely thought Boxing Day was related to the sport.
The Boxing Day Disappointment.
She could not fit her key into the lock, and it was hilarious. She just kept aiming and missing, no matter how hard she focused. Wait...maybe this time...almost...nope. Missed again. She would make a really bad...person who needed to aim at things. That was the funniest thought she had all day. She cracked herself up.
She didn't feel like standing anymore. She slid down the door until she landed on the floor...that rhymed. She could turn that into a song, if only she could stop laughing.
So, where was she? Right. On the floor. Maybe her new vantage point would help her with her nemesis, Mr. Key. She raised her arm, which was just so heavy, and aimed it behind her in the general direction of the lock.
Missed again.
Maybe she'd have to live outside like a pitiful, poor, homeless cat that no one wanted. The thought should make her sad, but instead it made her want to laugh again. She went with it- she had time for all the feelings.
The sad would come.
oOo
On the other side of the door, he was curled up on the couch, wrapped in a red and black plaid blanket, determined to remain unaware of whatever was happening in the hall. He'd found an after-Christmas The Wonder Years marathon, and he was going to enjoy it, dammit.
"What is that god-awful sound?" Winston asked
"I don't hear anything," he replied, turning up Kevin's dad's lecture on hippies. Kevin's dad was the best one on the show. Dirty hippies.
"Nick," Winston crossed the room to stand in front of the television, "I have to leave for work. Whatever is going on out there needs to be dealt with."
"What if it's a rat?" He asked.
"What are you talking about?"
"It sort of sounds like a rat scratching at the door. Crying out in beady-eyed rat cries. What if it's a rat? Do you still think we should deal with it?"
"Yes," Winston said, "I still think we should deal with it. Especially if it's a rat."
Nick shrugged and craned his neck around for a better view of the television.
"Fine. I'll deal with it."
"Probably for the best," Nick mumbled, his attention once again where it should be- on the television.
Winston opened the door, took one look at the drunken heap of his roommate on the other side, and said a quick prayer of thanks to Black Santa for his adjusted schedule. Winston would absolutely be willing to help, but, you know, he had to be at work.
"Nick," he yelled over his shoulder as he stepped over a half-giggling, half-crying Jess, "you're going to want to deal with this." He didn't bother closing the door behind him, and he smiled all the way down to his car. Nothing like a bullet dodged to make up for having to work the day after Christmas.
Nick growled- he had considered just doing it in his head, but decided on going ahead and doing it out loud. Jess was sprawled out like an upside-down turtle in the doorway, still crying her rat-cries.
Damn. He did have to deal with this.
"Later, Kevin. Winnie." He turned off the television and stood, keeping the blanket wrapped around him.
"Jess," he called. "Get up."
She didn't. The sounds she was making were getting worse.
He gave her a little kick. "Get up."
"Can't."
"You have to."
"Nope. No can do. Gonna live right here."
He kicked her again. "Get up now."
"Stop it!" She tried to hit him with both hands, but she missed.
"You're hitting air right now. You realize that, right?" She didn't stop trying, and he took pity on her, lifting her to a sitting position and sliding down beside her. "Why are you doing this?"
"Why were you kicking me?"
Damn. Her chin was trembling and there were crocodile tears leaking down her cheeks. Oh, he needed to make that stop. He put his arm around her, patting her head awkwardly. "There, there." Is that would people said? How was that comforting? "I'm sorry I kicked you."
"You're really mean."
"I'm the worst," he agreed. "Why are you drunk?"
"It's Boxing Day." Another tear tumbled from those blue eyes, and his heart clenched.
Fucking Boxing Day.
What was Boxing Day?
"It's a really sad holiday," she continued with the sincerity of a sad drunk. "It's for poor people."
"Well, that's us then." Had he been missing out on a holiday all this time? "We should celebrate the shit out of it."
Jess was shaking her head...a little too hard. He put a hand under her chin to hold her still. Could thirty-year-olds get shaken baby syndrome? Better safe than sorry.
"No. We can't. We're not British. You have to British. It's their holiday. For servants. Because they make them work on Christmas Day."
"They make them work on Christmas, then box the day after?" The British were appalling.
"No. Not box, like fight. Box like the little boxes they put the servants' food in." She held out her hands to show him how small the boxes were.
"That is really sad." He meant it. He patted her head again. "Don't worry, Jess. You're American. We'll never make you celebrate Christmas on the wrong day and in a box."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
She rested her head on his shoulder, and he pulled her close. He gave her a minute, then asked, "What's really wrong?"
"Boxing Day isn't enough?"
"To get you this drunk? No, it's not."
She looked up at him, and the crocodile tears were gone, but somehow she looked even more sad. "I was wrong to give Sam a second chance."
"What? Hey, no. We covered this. You were right to give him a second chance."
"No." Those watery eyes met his again, and he could see the heartbreak beneath the drunkenness. "I wasn't. I got proof when I stopped by his apartment this morning."
He didn't ask her to elaborate on her proof. He didn't want to know. Damn. He'd encouraged her.
"I just feel so stupid."
"No," he squeezed her tight. "You're not stupid. You just believed in the wrong person. Sam is the stupid one." He meant that. Sam was incredibly stupid, and Nick would love to be the one to tell him so. "Hey, you want me to go over there and beat his ass?"
"Beat his ass?" Even drunk, she managed to convey skepticism.
"I'm a tough guy. I could totally beat his ass. He should fear me."
She laughed at him.
If it meant she would smile, he'd let her laugh at him always.
"Beat his ass," she growled in one of her voices.
He hated when she did the voices. He usually tried to shut those down, but tonight he played along. "Beat his ass," he said in his best Pacino impression.
They got a little loud, and they probably could have gone at it until dawn, were it not for Schmidt.
Their roommate came home a few minutes into their game, and he wasn't alone. He had a stereotypically pretty blonde with him, and they were obviously on their way to the bedroom.
The blonde took in the scene before her and looked a little less certain than she had when she first came through the door. "What's wrong with y'all?" She asked, then turned back to Schmidt. "What are they doin'?"
"Nothing, Sarah. Nothing. Just pretend you don't see them. My bedroom is right over there."
"I don't know, I mean, maybe they need your help. Maybe now isn't the time..."
"This is the time," Schmidt interrupted. "There is no time like right now. Just keep on going. I'll take care of them, then I'll be right in to take care of you."
She giggled at his raised eyebrow.
Schmidt always managed to find the gigglers.
He watched her go, then whirled back around to Jess and Nick. "I don't even want to know what's going on here," he whisper-yelled. "I just want you to pull it together. She is Southern. Do you know what those girls can do with their tongues? I am about to ride the Schmidt-night train to Georgia, and I won't have the two of you ruining it with all of your..." he flailed, "sad."
Jess started cackling. She was a cackler, not a giggler.
"Pitiful," Schmidt mumbled as he followed his southern blond into the bedroom.
The cackling turned once again to tears.
"I do ruin things with all of my sad," she sad.
"You don't. You really, really don't. This just wasn't your year, Jess. 2013, though, that's your year."
"You really believe that?"
He wasn't a great liar, nor was he a great optimist. "Eh," he said with a shrug.
"It could be worse," she said, with the practiced wisdom of someone who was always looking for the bright side. "At least I'm not riding the Schmidt-night train to Georgia."
He shuddered. He literally shuddered.
"You know what would make me feel a little better?"
"Me beating Sam's ass?"
She shook her head. "I was thinking you could do that dance you did at that party."
"My sexy dance?"
"I've been thinking of it as your crazed monkey dance."
And he laughed. 2013 might not be her year, and it almost certainly wouldn't be his. Their time would come eventually though, and until it did, the very least he could do was dance like a crazed monkey.
It was Boxing Day, after all.