Lift // Hamliza

• chapter 30 •

• Alexander •

After a few more grueling days of school, it was once again time for a break. Thanksgiving was tomorrow and I was planning on spending it with Eliza. Her extended family was coming to her house for the holiday, and she invited me along.

I'm excited. Usually all I do for Thanksgiving is spend a little more money to buy rolls and microwaved mashed potatoes and mac and cheese to eat alone in my apartment. Now, for the first time in a long time, I'll actually celebrate the holiday with people I'm thankful for.

I was helping Eliza prepare some of the stuff for tomorrow. People were arriving at 2 and we were eating at 4. It's about 8pm right now. We've been lazy all day until Eliza decided we had to give up our comfortable warm spot on the couch to make food that we had to wait 20 hours to eat.

Not a very good deal, is it? No. But I love her, so I'm dealing with it.

"No, Alex! You have to put butter in it after we cook the potatoes. Don't put the butter in the water, they need to boil first!" She pulled my hand away from the pot of boiling water and took the butter from me.

"Sorry! It's not my fault I never learned this. How do you know all this anyways?" I asked as she laughed at my cluelessness.

"My mom, obviously. Didn't your mom teach you to cook at all? Even when you were young in the Caribbean?" I cringed at the mention of my birthplace but tried to think back. Much to my distress, my memories of my mom were beginning to fade after all these years of her being gone.

"Uh, I don't really think so. I mean, the easy stuff like pasta and toast, but not a Thanksgiving meal. We just never had enough money for that." I admitted quietly, rubbing the back of my neck and glancing away. Eliza kissed me and smiled at me.

"Hey. It's alright. Is this going to be your first real Thanksgiving?" She asked. I nodded in response after a moment more of thinking back.

"Well, that means it has to be fun and you're not allowed to be sad." She tapped my nose and bounced away as I laughed. She grabbed her phone and clicked Apple Music, and I watched as she scrolled through her many playlists and albums. She finally clicked on her playlist titles "Broadway Favorites", which we created together.

The first chord of the song rang out and she grabbed my hands, and we started dancing carelessly to the song.

Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes, five hundred twenty five thousand moments so dear...

We started singing together, Eliza's crystal clear soprano voice mixing beautifully with my tenor notes. I spun her around me, grabbing her arms as she giggled, disrupting her beautiful singing for just a split second.

Five hundred twenty five thousand six hundred minutes, how do you measure, measure a year?

We continued to sing the whole song and dance like total nerds around the kitchen, not caring about whatever food we were trying to cook. At the end of the song, we both sang quietly, ending in a sweet and gentle kiss.

"I love you so much." I whispered.

"I love you too. More than you can ever imagine." She smiled back at me, her dark eyes glowing with happiness and love.

"Hey Eliza, not to ruin the moment, but is the water supposed to be boiling over the pot?" I asked, seeing the overflowing pot containing potatoes and water spilling hot water over the sides.

"No!" She immediately pulled away from me and began to mess around with the stove and the pot as I just laughed and told her not to burn herself, at which she simply turned around and fake glared at me.

This is going to be the best Thanksgiving ever.

a/n: so I clearly haven't posted in a while. I've been going through kind of a lot, and I didn't really clarify on my a/n on Speak Up but here's the whole thing.

so basically the 2nd quarter of school just ended so for 3rd quarter they decided to like us with homework and I spend a lot of time on that so yeah. I also started my second semester of my acting courses and dance is in full swing again.

And something that's really been hurting me is my best friend and I had a huge fight and she hasn't talked to me in a few weeks. It hurts really bad and I miss her. I also feel like I'm falling for someone that I shouldn't be but I can't tell.

My last excuse (they're all terrible and stupid, I know) is that I've been insanely anxious and overwhelming depressed and unmotivated to do anything lately. I started cutting after a month clean and I'm just an exhausted, worried and sad mess.

I know you guys probably don't want to hear about every problem of my life but I feel like you deserve an explanation since I went on a short updating hiatus. But yeah. Thanks for reading and I love y'all.