Thwack.
I spin around and there’s Logan standing ten feet away on the sidewalk, grinning at me like a fool. Seeing her again after a day being treated like an infectious disease makes everything better. I wipe the snow dripping down the back of my neck. “You serious? You’re challenging me to a snowball fight?”
She answers by scooping up more snow, then runs by and smacks me in the chest. She takes cover under a pitiful young maple tree at the end of Washington Avenue, dodging left, then right, laughing the entire time.
“Aren’t you supposed to be heading to work?” I call as I amble toward her. I reach down, grab a softball’s worth of snow, packing and shaping it and trying to decide what part of Logan I’m going to aim for.
“Not for another hour. I thought I’d walk you home and come back for my car after.”
I still haven’t mentioned anything to her about Nana and our Jewish heritage. This morning, when I was ready to go to school, Nana was still sleeping. She’s always the first one up. I found Mom exactly where I left her last night—sitting at the reception desk. This time she had an empty pot of coffee and a mug on the desk. A website on Judaism filled the computer screen. Her eyes were red with dark shadows underneath, and she was wearing the same clothes from the day before. Dad walked over and tried to be supportive. He told Mom and me that he’s never been big on religion but believes in God. “Do whatever you need to do,” he said.
“I don’t know what that is,” Mom said. “How do I process this?” She stood and slumped into Dad’s arms. He led her into our apartment.
Alone, I walked into the parlor. The inn, which has always been a place of comfort and warmth even when we have no guests, felt cold and haunted, even with the fire blazing in the fireplace. For the first time ever, I couldn’t wait to leave for school.
Logan lobs another snowball at me and misses by a mile. I nail her right shoulder, spraying snow into her face. She squeals and takes off running toward Sunrise Park. “Catch me if you can,” she calls.
I chase after her and purposefully let her stay ahead as I plan my next move. She’s just about to enter the park when I pitch a loosely packed snowball high above her. It showers down onto her hair.
She turns, rubs her gloved hands together, and makes a cackling sound like she’s the Wicked Witch of the West. “You’re in for it now, my pretty.” This time she scoops up snow using her hands and forearms as a shovel. She braces the wet, fresh snow against her chest and stalks forward with her snow bowl. I can’t help it, I laugh.
With three snowballs in hand, I plant my feet and start juggling, planning to use one to wash her face the moment she’s within arm’s length. Five, four, three…Ready, aim—
Logan comes in low like a linebacker, knocking me flat into a snowbank with a loud grunt. She heaves her arms up and covers my face in snow and the rest of me with her body. “I win. I win!!!” She pants like a puppy.
I grab her around the waist and roll us over, shaking melting snow all over her like a wet Saint Bernard. She covers her face with her gloves. “Who won?” I ask.
“I won!” I take her wrists and hold them above her head. She grins, a mega-watt smile. Her clumped dark lashes accentuate the gold flecks lighting her eyes. Her grin slides off her face into something intense and serious. We’re both breathing hard. I should let her up, but I find myself drawn closer, so close that I’m barely a breath away.
“Remember our bet?” I whisper.
“Yes,” she whispers back.
“I’m cashing in. What’s going on in that mind of yours?”
“This.” She kisses me and I’m kissing her and it’s not enough. Her arms come around my back. I press into her, pouring every ounce of myself into this one kiss. One kiss and it’s not enough, it will never be enough. How is it that we’ve spent so many seconds, minutes, hours, days, inches from each other and deprived ourselves of this?
A car honks and startles us apart. We laugh. Logan lifts an arm and waves at the passing car. I roll off her, stand, and reach down, offering her a hand. Her cheeks are pink from the cold and from our PDA.
“Not bad,” Logan says, brushing off some snow from her jeans.
“Not bad?” I fake insult.
“There might be room for improvement.”
“Maybe not interested.”
She fists my coat, yanks me forward. “Maybe I’m not, either.”
We’re kissing again, and it’s everything, everything, and yet not enough. I want more. Her. Me. Us. Together.
“There’s an inn down the street if you need a room,” a girl calls from the open passenger window of a pickup truck. The guy in the driver’s seat gives me a thumbs-up, then drives away.
Laughing, eyes sparkling, Logan starts walking backward toward the inn. “C’mon, Mr. Room-for-Improvement, I’m starving. Let’s go see what Nana baked for you today.”
My kiss-crazed high tanks as I take my time joining Logan.
When we enter the inn’s parking lot, Mom is dragging a large plastic garbage bag toward our fenced-off dumpster. Oh no. I forgot to take out the trash? On warp speed, I recheck my daily a.m. to-do list, but for the life of me, I don’t remember.
I jog over to Mom and head off the lecture. “Sorry. I got it,” I say, taking the bag out of her hands and hoisting it off the ground. Spying the unfamiliar car, I ask, “We have guests?”
She nods. “Walk-ins. Mr. and Dr. Schaefer will be here through the weekend.”
I know what she’s thinking ’cause I’m thinking it, too. Dollar signs.
Mom turns to Logan. “What happened? You’re soaking wet. You’re both soaking wet.”
Logan laughs. “Snowball fight. I won,” she adds, smiling at me as I dump the garbage. I send her a pointed look. We both won.
“Did things go all right at school today? Any problems?”
“Nothing more than we expected,” Logan answers.
Mom glances over to me for an explanation, but before I can say more, Nana, dressed in a housedress and a flour-covered apron, comes around the corner with the recycling bin in her hands. I rush to take it from her.
“You brought us Logan!”
“Hi, Nana.” Beaming, Logan strides over and kisses her cheek.
“Ma, I told you I’d get that. Go inside before you catch a chill.”
“I’m perfectly capable of carrying a little trash. Stop treating me like I’m fragile, Mikayla. I’m fit as a fiddle.”
“Ma—”
Nana lifts her chin. “I’m going, not because you’ve ordered me to but because these young ones need some hot chocolate.” She takes Logan’s hand. “Come with me, sweet girl. Let’s get you warm and dry. We have a nice fire blazing in the parlor.”
As they go ahead, I hang back with Mom, and just as I open my mouth to say something, Nana’s strangled scream stops me cold.
We run, Mom at my heels.
Nana’s hand shoots up, shaking, pointing. It takes my mind a second to comprehend. On the stone above our apartment entrance, someone’s written in blood-red spray paint, “Death to Jews!” Next to Jews is a swastika.
“Oh my God!” Mom cries.
With more force than I could have ever imagined, Nana shakes off Logan, making her stumble. “Not again!” Panic rises in her thick-accented voice.