Me, Myself, and Her

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Sixteen: White Christmas

The last day of school before Christmas break wasn't structured at all. Each room seemingly had a different thing going on for students to enjoy. Annie, Holly, and Meghan usually just hung out in the cafeteria and talked, but considering they had Max now and this was their last middle school Christmas, they decided to enjoy it.

Steve also warned her that high school didn't do anything like that. That really pushed Annie to want to enjoy what they could while they could.

Another thing that was different was Max. Usually, the girls got each other gifts, and Annie totally planned on doing that again this year, but she was struggling. Max wasn't like Holly and Meghan. Not only did she not know the redhead as well, but she also liked said redhead.

The girls were sitting together in the "snacks" room. It was just like it sounded: the teachers baked cookies or bought other snacks and that's where the students ate them (to minimize the mess).

Annie was deep in though. Holly and Meghan shared a small look before the latter cleared her throat. "So, we should totally do Secret Santa this year," she said.

The other two girls looked up with confused looks. "What do you mean?" Max asked, not knowing what that was.

Holly smiled. "Yeah we should! It's really fun, so we put all our names on pieces of paper and then into a cup. Then, we each pick a name out of the cup. If we get our own, we drop it back in and pull someone else's. Then whoever's name we drew we get them a gift! Nobody else is allowed to know who you got until the gifts get exchanged."

Max smiled and nodded. "Yeah, okay yeah that sounds cool. Are we just getting that gift or something for everyone else, too?"

"Oh, just the Secret one. Kinda defeats the purpose if we get each other all gifts," Holly answers. "We can throw a fun little exchanging party and everything!"

Annie was smiling, really excited about this. "We can do the party at my house! I'm sure Steve won't mind, he honestly might have something else going on. If not, it'd still be fun!"

The girls excitedly nodded and Meghan jumped up to grab a plastic cup and a piece of paper. When she came back over, she placed the cup in the middle and then tore the paper into four pieces. "Don't fold yours in any weird way! It needs to be a surprise."

Pencils in hand, each girl wrote their name on the piece of paper then folded it twice before throwing it into the cup.

Holly grabbed the cup once her paper was dropped in and mixed it around, her hand on the top while the shook it around to get them all nice and mixed up.

There were several thoughts going through Annie's head. This was a great idea! She didn't exactly have that much money and didn't want to cheap out on gifts for her closest friends so this was a good way to only have to buy one gift and not have to make it cheap and sad.

However, she was stuck between wanting Max and not wanting her. If she didn't get her, then she'd have an easier time finding something for Holly or Meghan. But then she'd feel sad that she didn't get Max anything especially with the obligation her crush seemed to hold.

But then if she did get Max, she would have no idea what to get her. Lucas and Dustin would be no help because they've known her as long as Annie did. She was terrified of Billy, so that was never happening. Her parents were a mystery to Annie, and she didn't exactly want to talk to them. But then she could really get Max something awesome to show her she liked her.

After the Snowball- just a few days ago- where she saw Max kiss Lucas, she's been kinda depressed. Her mind was racing with thoughts telling her she was dumb for thinking Max would like her, or girls at all! Her hopeful side got the best of her, sadly, and she was mad it did.