"There, all done" Kelly announced proudly as she placed the star on the top of the tree, and then stepped back to survey the results of her handiwork.
"It's perfect" Dylan applauded from beside the fireplace. For the last fifteen minutes he'd been working to get the fire started. His face and hands were covered in soot. Eventually the little spark had ignited, and now a fire was crackling in the hearth.
While Dylan went to clean up, Kelly put the finishing touches to the room, a card here, a festive ornament there. She sighed. He was right it was perfect. Over the last few hours they had transformed his place in to a traditional Christmas scene. The tree stood majestically in the corner ablaze with coloured lights and surrounded by a vast array of beautifully wrapped gifts of all shapes and sizes.
Cards depicting snowy landscapes and jovial Santas decorated every available wall space. The mantelpiece groaned under the weight of Christmas fare, chocolates and nuts and fruits of every kind. She had hung little bunches of holly and mistletoe, and from the stereo the sounds of Bing Crosby singing 'White Christmas' provided a seasonal accompaniment.
Dylan had even put up lights on the outside of the house, and she'd topped it all off with a holiday wreath on the front door. Kelly smiled ruefully, all they were missing was snow, and in Beverly Hills if you were rich enough, even that could be arranged.
She sat down on the couch and gazed around the room drinking in the atmosphere. They'd done a great job. It was only two days to Christmas, and she and Dylan had planned to spend the holidays together. Jackie and Mel had taken Erin out of town for a few days, leaving Kelly and Dylan free to enjoy some delicious alone time. She should be deliriously happy, but she wasn't, instead she had what her mom called a bad case of the Christmas blues.
She'd figured that if she really made an effort to be upbeat, if she filled the house with the trappings of Christmas, then she would feel better, but instead she felt worse. This wasn't a real Christmas; it was all a facade, as artificial as the trees she had seen adorning the stores on Rodeo drive.
She wanted desperately to recreate the feelings of warmth and peace that she'd felt last Christmas Eve at the Walsh house. Meticulously she'd replicated all the important ingredients that had gone in to that evening. Now she realised that she had been wasting her time. The happiness she had experienced that night had nothing to do with the decorations or the gifts or the turkey, it was about the people, and that was the one ingredient she couldn't hope to include this year.
Despite her Christmas funk she was making a real effort to appear cheerful for Dylan's sake. She didn't want him to know how miserable she was really feeling. She knew that he had some real bad memories of this time of the year, and she was determined to make this Christmas special for him.
These past few weeks had been rough. It had only been three weeks since Brenda had found out, but to Kelly they felt like the longest three weeks of her life. Brenda had been distraught and all of Kelly's attempts at reconciliation had been rebuffed. She closed her eyes trying to shut out the memory of some of the awful things Brenda had said. The comments, hurtful as they had been were not the worst part. Behind her hostility, Brenda's utter devastation and excruciating pain were obvious. Kelly felt dreadful knowing that she had caused it.
She missed her best friend terribly, and was desperate to make things right between them, but even if she'd known where to begin it wouldn't make any difference. Brenda didn't want anything more to do with her. She'd cut Kelly out of her life so completely they might as well be living on different planets.
Things hadn't exactly been plain sailing between her and Dylan either. Oh sure they'd talked things through, agreed that they were going to try and make their relationship work, but sometimes it felt like an uphill struggle. Despite his promises and reassurances, she was continually afraid that he might be drinking. It brought back painful memories of earlier days with Jackie, a time in her life that she'd rather forget.
She sighed heavily. It wasn't all Dylan's fault; she had to accept part of the blame. She just couldn't get that first fight with Brenda out of her mind. She was constantly taunted by the horrible things that Brenda had said, and was beginning to think that they might be true. Maybe Jake had just been using her last year; maybe Dylan was using her now. She had always been insecure about his feelings for her, always convinced that deep down he cared more for Brenda.
She didn't want to think that way, but she had to face facts, Dylan had never actually chosen. Now she would never know the truth, never know if he would have chosen her, or if he was simply with her because he could no longer be with Brenda. It had taken her so long to trust him, to allow herself to be vulnerable, now she found herself withdrawing from him little by little, unwilling to fully surrender her heart for fear of getting hurt- again.
Finals had merely added to her misery. With everything that had been going on, she'd hardly studied at all. Paper after paper seemed to taunt her with questions she simply couldn't answer. She knew she'd done badly and didn't even want to contemplate the damage she'd done to her GPA or her mom's reaction when she saw the results. All in all things were looking decidedly gloomy right now.
The only bright spot in three very dismal weeks had been the reconciliation with David and Donna. Things still weren't quite right between them, but at least they had taken the first steps back to friendship. Kelly knew that much of that was down to Donna. Donna had a big heart, and she hated arguments of any kind. She had forgiven Kelly, and had talked David in to calling a truce. It felt good to have them back in her life, but she still felt so guilty whenever she saw the sadness in Donna's eyes. She knew that Donna missed Brenda, and desperately wanted to make things right. She wished that Brenda could find it in her heart to forgive Donna this Christmas.
***
In the kitchen Dylan busied himself making coffee and cooking up a huge bowl of popcorn. He could hardly believe it was almost Christmas; the year had flown by so quickly. He sighed. He'd always hated Christmas; he'd spent far too many Christmases miserable and alone. Christmas was about families and that word hadn't applied to the McKays in a long time.
Kelly didn't have great memories of Christmas either, but this one should have been different, she had a proper family now. He sighed. She could have been spending the holidays with them, but instead she'd opted to stay home with him. He knew that she was feeling low. Oh she was doing her best to hide it but the eyes were a little too bright, the smile a little too wide.
He knew the signs because he was doing the same thing himself, trying to pretend that everything was wonderful, that he was perfectly happy. Sometimes, when they were alone together and he could pretend that the rest of the world didn't exist, he was happy, but all too often reality intruded, and with it thoughts of Brenda.
Brenda had always been a ghostly third party in this relationship, and if he and Kelly were going to make it work, he would have to exorcise that particular ghost. The problem was that he couldn't do it. He knew it and she knew it, and it was causing problems. He'd noticed that she'd been pulling back from him lately, a sure sign that things weren't quite right. He knew that he should talk to her about it but he was too afraid of what she might say.
It had been a rough few weeks for both of them, a world away from the idyllic summer they had spent together. She had needed him to be strong, but instead he had crumbled, unable to cope with his guilt over Brenda. He was still ashamed of himself for giving in, for drinking, but the truth was he couldn't have gotten through that first night without it. The hurt he'd seen in Brenda's eyes that day was etched permanently in his memory, and drinking was the only way to make it go away. Kelly didn't realise it but she was the only thing right now stopping him from opening up another bottle and diving right in.
The hardest part was seeing Brenda at school every day, and not being able to talk to her, to comfort her, to explain. God knows he'd tried, but she hadn't let him get anywhere near her, it was as if she'd built a brick wall between them. He hated not being a part of her life; it was tearing him up inside. Sure they'd been apart before, but they'd always been able to talk. They hadn't just been lovers they'd been friends, but now when she looked at him, she saw him as the enemy, and that was sheer torture.
He'd actually gotten Brenda a Christmas gift, but there was no way he could give it to her now. He'd bought it months ago when she'd first got back from Paris, when he'd been determined to make their relationship work. They'd seen it together, window-shopping on Rodeo drive. It was a beautiful silver broach depicting the masks of comedy and tragedy, the emblem of the dramatic arts. She'd fallen in love with it immediately, and had vowed to save up the money to buy it. Of course he'd gone back the next day and secretly bought it for her.
He remembered how upset she'd been when she returned a few weeks later only to find that it had been sold. He'd been looking forward to seeing her delight when he presented it to her for Christmas. He sighed. That wouldn't happen now, and the broach was hidden from prying eyes at the bottom of his sock drawer.
Dylan had never believed in fate, he preferred to think that he was a free spirit carving out his own path, but right now he really wanted to believe that all this was part of some divine master plan, fate's way of ensuring that he ended up with the right girl. He shook his head, it was a nice thought, but he didn't believe it for a second. No mystical power controlled his destiny; his fate was in his own hands.
Dylan had always run away from his problems, refused to accept the blame, but he knew deep down that the pain he was feeling right now was his own doing, no one else's. Fate was just a myth that people clung to when times got rough. He no more believed in fate than he did in Santa Claus.
***
"Movie starts in five minutes. Are you done with the decorating?" Dylan called as he entered the room laden with a tray bearing two steaming mugs of coffee and a bowl of popcorn.
"Absolutely." Kelly responded enthusiastically as she cleared a space on the coffee table. "I love this movie" she enthused snuggling up to him and scooping a handful of popcorn from the bowl.
"Yeah". He agreed swiping some of her popcorn and dropping it in to his mouth. 'It's a wonderful life' is probably the best-loved Christmas movie of all time". He'd seen it so many times he knew the words off by heart, but what the heck it was a classic, and as much a Christmas tradition as turkey and Christmas trees. As he watched the story unfold on screen, he wished that he did believe in the magic of Christmas.