Daddy's Coming Home For Christmas

Chapter Two: I Can't Let You Do That

Bethany

I slid into my usual seat at our table in the cafeteria, and set my lunch bag on the table. Every day I carried exactly the same thing; a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on cheap white bread, and an old mealy apple.

My mother said buying school lunches was too expensive.

I unwrapped my sandwich and eyed it with displeasure. I didn’t like the peanut butter and jelly. I never had, but if I didn’t eat it, my stomach would stay empty up to dinner.

Rafe came and threw his long leg over the bench, and then scooted closer to me so that our hips were touching. I tried to pretend it was no big deal. We had a perfectly platonic friendship. His hand grazing my thigh was nothing to get excited about.

And the heat turning my cheeks rosy had nothing to do with how close he was. It was just the curse of being a ginger.

“What are you eating?” He frowned at my sandwich like he hadn’t seen me eat the same thing every day since the first day I bumped into him in the hallway. “Just PB and J,” I said, keeping my voice carefully even. I didn’t want them to know how much I hated it. They might think I was fishing for pity.

He picked up my sandwich between two fingers like it might bite him. “It's all…soggy.”

“Hey, give that back,” I frowned and made a grab for it, but he held it just out of my reach. I crossed my arms over my chest. “That’s all I’ve got.”

“Yeah, that’s too bad.” He balled up my sandwich into a doughy ball and tossed it across the cafeteria, where it landed neatly in the trash can. Without another word, he climbed off the bench and strode toward the front of the cafeteria, where the students lined up to get hot lunches and snacks.

I sighed and rolled the apple between my hands. My mother always bought the cheap red delicious apples that were undersized and looked like they had been sitting in the produce section for the last two years. The skin was bitter, and the flesh was mushy. But it looked like that was my lunch today.

Gabe showed up, and took up his usual position on my left side. “Hey Red, why so grumpy today?” He leaned away from me and gave me a suspicious look. “Is it that time of the month?”

“No!” I found myself blushing again. “Your brother threw my lunch away!”

“Did he now?” Gabe looked completely unsurprised and unbothered by my empty lunch bag. He had a big slice of greasy looking pizza in front of him, along with a pint of chocolate milk, and a chocolate chip cookie the size of a pancake. I didn’t understand how he could eat that kind of junk food every day, and still look like a statue of a Greek god when he took his shirt off in gym class.

We never ate that kind of food in our house. Eating out at restaurants was wasteful, according to the Church. I could count on one hand the number of times I’d had pizza.

I forced myself to look away. If I stared at his food, he might feel uncomfortable about eating in front of me. He might pick up his tray and go sit somewhere else. Rafe had already left, I dreaded both of them deciding to abandon me. Maybe they would finally realize how pathetic I was, and leave me for good.

Biting into the apple, I wished I had a phone like the other kids. At least then I could keep myself busy scrolling, or texting…as if I had someone to text.

Suddenly, a full tray was pushed in front of me. I blinked and looked up just as Rafe climbed back over the bench to sit down. I thought he had accidentally put his lunch in front of me, but then I saw that he had a second tray for himself.

“What are you doing?” I whispered quietly.

“Buying you lunch.” he said matter of factly. “You need real food.”

The tray had a pita pocket stuffed with turkey cold cuts and vegetables, a bowl of tomato soup, a scoop of cottage cheese, a fruit cup, a brownie, and chocolate milk. It looked so good that my stomach grumbled.

“I can’t let you do that,” I whispered.

“Why not?” He leaned closer and whispered back, "I can hear your stomach, I know you are hungry."

“It’s…it’s not right.” That was one of my parents' cardinal rules. Never accept charity. I always thought that was kind of weird, that the Church said we are supposed to be charitable to others, but we were never allowed to be on the receiving end.

“It’s perfectly alright,” Gabe said from my other side. “And you have to accept it.”

I swiveled around to face him. He was cramming pizza in his mouth. “Why do I have to accept it?”

He shrugged one shoulder, chewed and swallowed before he answered me. “You’ll hurt Rafe’s feelings if you refuse.”

I turned back to Raphael. He gave me a sad face and poked out his lower lip. “You don’t want to hurt my feelings, do you? I picked it out special just for you, but if you don’t like it, I can get you something else? Would you rather have pizza?”

“No, I like it, it’s just…”

“Good, now eat, we’ve only got twenty minutes left.”

He picked up his own identical pita-pocket sandwich and took a big bite. And it did look so good…it would be a shame to throw all that food away just out of pride. I picked up a spoon and tasted the tomato soup. For school cafeteria food, it was actually very creamy and delicious. I kept putting spoonfuls in my mouth, and was almost surprised when I scraped the bottom of the bowl.

“Good girl,” Rafe said approvingly when I’d eaten nearly everything. I saved the brownie, slipping it into my bag to enjoy later. I very rarely got to enjoy sweet things, I wanted to eat it when I was alone and could savor it.

Before I could stand up to return the tray, Gabe had grabbed it from me and took it to the dirty counter, tossing his own paper plate in the garbage on his way. I felt so full it was almost uncomfortable, but it was a nice change. I sucked in a deep breath.

“Thank you for buying me lunch, Rafe. It was very thoughtful of you. I really enjoyed it.” I felt a little stiff and formal as I expressed my gratitude, but I meant every word of it.

He shifted on the bench to look at me, his honey-gold eyes seeming to take in everything, from the top of my head down to my feet with my cheap canvas sneakers. He reached out a hand and took a lock of my hair, and twirled the curl around his finger. “Good,” he said abruptly, and then he flashed that dimple and gave my hair a gentle tug. “And get used to it. I’ve already added your name to my lunch card.”

“What? Why would you do that?”

His grin only spread wider as he let my hair slip through his fingers. “Because I can.”