Christmas and Eve

my roommate needs to come home

countdown: one day
(part two)

Eve wasn't getting up.

Marilyn wasn't in the dorm. Marilyn might never be in the dorm again. And if that was the case, Eve wasn't ever getting up again. She wanted to hide under her fuzzy blankets forever. However, that wasn't going to happen.

"Get up, Evie. We've got things to do." Liz was in her room, pulling open the curtains and shoving a cup of Starbucks into Eve's face. "It's Christmas Eve, you're not spending all day in bed."

"Yes, I am. I don't wanna get up," Eve mumbled. "I don't have anything to get up for."

"You have me-e," chirped Liz, uncharacteristically happy as she sat on the side of Eve's twin-sized cot. "And I'm gonna get you up and out today. Go get dressed."

"I don't wanna." Eve was whining like a little kid now, trying to pull the blankets over her head.

"Evie, you can't sit in bed like this all day, just because Marilyn-"

"Don't mention Marmie."

Liz sighed, pushing off the bed and kneeling by Eve's drawers. "Here." She tossed a a sweater at Eve's face. "Put it on, we're going out." Eve mumbled a complaint under her breath and stumbled out of bed and into the bathroom, changing into her new outfit. The clothes made little difference in how she looked. Her hair still had lost its pretty curled sheen, her rosy cheeks looked too red and sickly. The sweater wasn't flattering to her curvy shape like it usually was and the leggings made her legs look fatter than normal.

"I look disgusting," Eve muttered, turning away from her own reflection.

"You look fine, Evie." Liz's words drawled out with impatience, as she was already half out of the door. "Look, we're going to go have some fun, okay? It's Christmas, and you've got the whole dorm to yourself. We can do whatever we want in here. Isn't that great?" Eve shook her head. Liz tried to hold in a groan. "Well, it's gonna feel great in a minute. Come on." And with that, she pulled Eve from the dorm.

Outside, it had begun to snow again, and it was a lot colder than Eve had expected. "It doesn't feel great," Eve grumbled. "And it's been a minute."

Liz rolled her eyes. "When did you become the grinch? I don't think I can live with two Jewish grinches living next door to me," she said.

"You won't have to worry about it much longer. Marilyn's moving out."

Liz paused, midway through the white dusted sidewalk. "She wouldn't. She loves rooming with you." The notion seemed utterly impossible to her.

"I threw a plant at her and now she's gonna switch dorms cause she hates me."

"You threw a what at her?" Liz's eyes went wide, and she started to laugh. "That's why she's moving out? Oh, Evie!" Liz clapped an arm around Eve's shoulders. "She'll get over that. Friends fight, don't you know that?"

"She hates me." Eve wasn't budging from her stance on the matter.

"Forget about Marilyn. Today is about enjoying yourself, and you've been looking forward to it all month. Are you seriously going to spend it moping around? Cause that's so not in the Christmas spirit."

Liz's inspiration speech was completely lost on Eve. "I'm a Jew. I shouldn't have any Christmas spirit." She sat down on a bench, forgetting for a minute about how cold it was and how much snow was about to get on her ass.

"Fine, then it's not in th Hanukkah spirit!" Liz threw her hands up an exasperation. "It's not in your spirit, Evie. You're a girl who likes to be happy and have fun and make people feel good. This is the time of year when everyone wants to know someone like that." She sat next to Eve, pulling something out of her coat pocket. "I'm lucky that I have someone with all that joy that usually only appears around Christmastime. I'm lucky that I have you and that you are the sweetest most joyful person ever. Because everyone needs an Evie in their life."

Eve was staring at the ground, wringing her hands together anxiously.

"Do you want one?' Liz asked, holding a cigarette out between her fingers. Eve shook her headd. She didn't want to think about the smell of cigarette smoke, and how it mixed with the burning smell of pines on that night, and how the light from those burning pines had illuminated Marilyn's face as she laughed, and how Marilyn looked happier than Eve could ever remember at that party.

"Why do you smoke? You know it's gonna kill you, don't you?" Eve asked as Liz blew her smoke in the opposite direction.

"I started cause there was a cute girl who smoked. And we'd take smoke breaks together." Liz grinned, twirling the cigarette between her fingers. "Isn't that funny? I let some girl ruin my own health and my life because I thought she was hot."

"Oh." Eve looked down at her hands again. The snow fell.

"That's why I was worried about you and Marilyn."

"You thought she was a bad influence?' asked Eve in astonishement. Marilyn was probably the best influence out of all of them. She was a straight As, organized student president of literally everything. How could she be a bad influence?

"I mean, not in the way I am. But she's kind of a downer, Evie. And I don't want to dragging you down." She put out of cigarette in the snow and tossed it into the nearby trash. Returning her hands to her warm, fur lined pockets, Liz stared warmly at Eve. "Don't let anyone dull your happiness, Eve. It's one of the best things about you. And you shouldn't let anyone stop you from being your happy self."

Eve glanced up at Liz again. The snow fell. It fell lightly on Liz's eyelashes and on Eve's nose and in her hair. Few other students were out on the campus.

"Thank you, Liz. Seriously," Eve said quietly. For the first time that day, a smile flickered on her unpainted lips. The snow fell. The sole passerby, a premed student who wasn't very religious as he was somehow still in school, disappeared around the corner. The snow continued to fall. No one else was in the courtyard.

No one else saw Liz kiss Eve on the bench, in the snow.