As Kara was standing there on the stage, singing, I completely lost track of time, so I was surprised to find that when she was done and she walked off the stage (to a round of smattering applause) it was already seven pm. Kara, making her way over to us, stopping for a few brief chats and brushing off compliments modestly, had clearly already realised what time it was. When she finally made it through her mass of adoring fans, she held out her hand towards me to help me up. She looked over at Lucy and Eve.
"We have to leave soon, but it wouldn't be right to go without a photo, now would it? You girls want to join?" They both nodded, jumping up. We went over to the photo booth and, dressed up with the ridiculous props (I even allowed Kara at the last minute to hang baubles in my ears instead of earrings) took a few silly pictures. After we'd taken three, Lucy and Eve got up, to allow Kara and me to take a few pictures with just the two of us. Kara pulled me close to her, putting her arms around me, and I sank into her comforting embrace. I remembered only at the last moment that our picture was being taken, so I quickly straightened out my back and opened my mouth to show just a bit of teeth, smiling exactly the way my foster mother had always reminded me I looked best in pictures.
After we were done, we said goodbye to Lucy and Eve. I was pleasantly surprised when Eve invited me to join them after Christmas break for a movie night. I really liked Kara's friends, and I was happy to find they liked me too.
"Okay, okay. Lena's amazing and you'll get to spend time with her soon, but we really need to go now." Kara said, tapping her left wrist comically as if she was wearing a watch there. I blushed, and waved goodbye to both Eve and Lucy as they walked back into the café.
"Your friends are lovely." I told Kara honestly. She smiled.
"Yeah, they are, aren't they?" Then she added: "They will, however, make us miss our bus if we don't hurry. Why don't you go pick up your suitcase and we'll meet at the gate?"
"Okay, see you in a few!" I said, turning and hurrying quickly towards my building.
I couldn't stop myself from laughing when I saw Kara's suitcase. It was as if someone had taken an entire Christmas edition of a magazine, cut it into pieces, and then pasted it all over the suitcase, adding some wrapping paper. I honestly could not figure out what colour the suitcase had been before Christmas had exploded all over it.
"What's so funny, Lee?" Kara asked, smiling. I pointed at the suitcase. Kara laughed with me. "Emmy helped me decorate it."
"Ah, that figures." I replied. It was a bit messy, to be sure, but it looked happy and it would definitely be easy to recognise in baggage claim. Unlike my suitcase, which was the most basic carry-on made of dark-blue fabric.
"The colour was already fading anyway, so I told Emmy to just go for it. We had a really fun afternoon putting that together."
"I bet." I said, smiling. "It looks lovely."
"Anyway, shall we head over to the bus station?" Kara suggested. I nodded. Fortunately, the bus station was close by, because I did not think the wheels of my suitcase would last much longer.
The sun was already setting as we arrived, and I was glad that I didn't have to travel all by myself. A bus in the dark didn't exactly seem like the safest place. We checked in at the station, and I was surprised to find that the bus was much more comfortable than I had expected. We had plenty of leg room, which meant that we could also recline our seats a bit if we wanted to. Kara had booked seats for us near the front, which I was glad for. At least this way if I got motion sick I could look out the window near the driver.
"Time to get comfortable." Kara said. "It's going to be a long ride." And she'd brought plenty of things to, like she said, make it comfortable. Out of her small backpack she pulled first a soft pink blanket with a snowflake pattern, which she spread across our legs. Then she got out a large metal thermos.
"I brought some tea for the road. We should probably wait to drink it, but if your hands get cold you can always hold it. It's almost like a hot water bottle." I had to admit, that sounded great. I'd worn my warmest pair of gloves, but my fingers were already freezing. I felt bad, however, that I hadn't thought to bring anything like Kara had: I'd just prepared a couple of sandwiches in case one of us (most likely Kara) got hungry.
I hadn't even noticed that as Kara was unpacking her backpack, the bus had already started to drive. I was happy to find that this bus ride would hopefully not feel as long as it actually was.
"So, as for entertainment, I figured we could continue with your Christmas education." Kara said, grinning. Neither the late hour nor the dark skies seemed to in any way dampen her enthusiasm. "You've already seen Elf, and well, that's my absolute favourite, but there's still plenty of other great movies. I thought we could start with Polar Express. It's more of a kids' movie, really, but I know you've never seen it, and well, it's a classic. But if you don't like it, we don't have to, of course."
"No, that sounds lovely." I reassured her. She grinned.
"Okay, perfect! And then after that we can watch Love, Actually. It's a super cheesy romantic comedy. But I mean, what's more Christmassy than love?" I laughed, and she blushed, suddenly looking over towards the iPad she was holding. She opened Netflix, and soon we were watching the movie, huddled together under Kara's blanket. I almost had to pinch myself to make sure it was real. To most people, this wasn't anything special, just watching a movie on the bus and travelling for Christmas. But I thought for the hundredth time that month that this was and would be the best Christmas I'd ever had.
The movie, I had to admit, really seemed to be made for kids, and I wasn't usually the biggest fan of animated movies anyway. But the kids in the story were adorable, and the plotline was hopeful and uplifting, and I had feeling that if I'd seen it as a child and I had lots of happy Christmas memories attached to it, I would love the movie as much as Kara did. Regardless, I was happy to be there, I thought, as Kara passed me her plastic mug covered in drawings of reindeer.
"So, what did you think of the movie?" Kara asked when it was finished. Her usual enthusiasm was still there, but the blonde seemed to be growing tired despite herself. Her eyes were squinting behind her glasses.
"It was adorable." I told her honestly.
"I know, right? Wait until you see Love, Actually. That's adorable in a whole other way. Wanna continue with that right now?" She suggested.
"Are you sure? You seem a bit tired. Are you sure you don't want to sleep for a bit instead?" Kara shook her head vehemently.
"You have to see this movie. And anyway, I'm not tired." I laughed.
"You sound like Emmy, you know that?" Kara stuck out her tongue.
"You're not exactly strengthening your case against being a child." I pointed out to her.
"Well, I'm not a child, which means I can decide when I go to bed, and I think we should start watching the movie now." I laughed again. I couldn't argue with that logic.
I liked this movie better than the one before, not in the least because this one had actual live actors instead of animated children. In fact, I was so engrossed in the movie that I didn't even notice Kara slowly falling asleep beside me, until she shifted around and her head fell onto my shoulder. I almost sat up in surprise, realising at the last moment that the blonde was getting some much needed rest and I didn't want to disturb her by moving around too much. I turned to look at her face, moving slowly so as not to jostle her, and saw that she had indeed fallen asleep. Her eyes were closed, and her mouth had fallen open just a bit. I smiled despite myself. The girl looked even sweeter than she usually did, lying there like this. Gently, I removed the glasses from her face and put them away in the backpack. After a moment, I decided to go back to watching the movie. I figured Kara had seen it plenty of times before and wouldn't mind me finishing it without her. And besides, it wasn't like I would fall asleep myself any time soon.
I berated myself mentally for choosing to travel with a night bus. At the time, it had seemed like a good idea, travelling during the night so as to have as much time as possible to actually spend in New York City. I'd forgotten, however, that I would never manage to fall asleep on a bus. The only way I could sleep peacefully was in a room with the door locked. Definitely not surrounded by a bunch of strangers. I wanted to be well rested for our trip, but I knew that realistically, this was never going to happen.
It was two am when I finished the movie, and I had to admit that the happy stories combined with the blanket on my lap and Kara's head on my shoulder left me feeling drowsy. I knew sleep wasn't in the cards, but I decided to close my eyes for a moment, leaning my head against Kara's.
Next thing I knew, I was woken up by someone gently tapping my shoulder.
"Good morning, sleepyhead." Kara said softly. "I wanted to let you sleep as long as possible, you looked like you could use the rest. But I figured you'd like to see this." She pointed out the window, and, after my initial surprise that it was already light outside, I noticed what she was pointing towards. I gasped. This was it. The New York City skyline. Even though I knew that New York City was quite close to National City, I hadn't ever imagined myself actually being there.
"It's incredible, isn't it?" Kara said. I could only nod. "I remember the first time I saw it like it was yesterday. It was two years ago, actually. Me and my ex-girlfriend went to New York City for Pride."
Pride? It took me a moment to realise what she meant. Without my consent, a picture popped into my head, of Kara dressed in her usually brightly coloured clothes, with a rainbow flag tied around her neck like a superhero cape. I smiled involuntarily, and I was glad Kara was staring out the window and didn't notice.
We spent the last half-hour of the bus ride looking out the window, pointing out famous sights to each other as we passed them, Kara of course recognising way more than I did. Finally, we arrived at the bus station. Kara had already packed everything into the backpack while I was asleep, so we only had to take our luggage out of the overhead and then we were ready to leave. We descended the stairs of the bus, Kara walking in front of me. When she arrived on the ground, she spread her arms theatrically and grinned. "NYC, baby!"