Noelle's Christmas Crush (3 page)

Noelle smiled, showing her teeth. “Yes, and my teeth are pearly white. Sorry I was late. Mom made eggnog pancakes.”

“That sounds awesome!” Hailey said beside her.

Mrs. Rubio nodded from the front seat. “I'll have to ask your mom for the recipe.”

She drove off, and the girls reached the school a few minutes later. Jess's mom popped open the hatch in the
back and the girls loaded up with bags of food and clothes for the drive.

They were right on time, but the gym was already buzzing with activity. Mr. Clark, the Student Council advisor, was frantically trying to organize the bags of clothes and food that were coming in, while a bunch of kids milled about, looking confused mostly. Noelle quickly spotted Noel sorting through a pile of clothes on a folding table.

Her friends saw her looking.

“Noelle and Noel, Noelle and Noel,”
sang Alyson and Hailey to the tune of the Christmas song, and then they burst out giggling.

Noelle blushed. “Yeah, he's here. So what?”

“You invited him to your party, right?” Jess asked.

“Not yet,” Noelle said. “I don't have his e-mail address.”

“You have to invite him,” Hailey said, wiggling her eyebrows. “Then maybe you could get him under the mistletoe.”

Her friends burst out giggling again, and Noelle thought she might melt into the floor from embarrassment. Luckily, Mr. Clark saved her.

“Okay, all student volunteers, circle up!” he yelled
over the din. He had a loud voice, and everyone moved quickly about, surrounding him.

He looked down at a clipboard. “All right, we need a team of kids at the entrance, helping people get bags out of their cars.” He pointed to four kids. “You, you, you, and you.”

Then he glanced at Noel. “You're sorting clothes, right? Let's get you a partner at your table.”

Then he pointed right at Noelle!

“Noel and Noelle, you're a team,” he said, and then he smiled when he realized how that sounded. “Noel and Noelle . . . that's perfect together!”

Noelle desperately tried not to blush, but she felt her cheeks grow hot. Behind her, she could hear her friends giggling. She was dying to look at Noel, to see his expression, but she didn't dare.

Mr. Clark assigned the rest of the tasks and then clapped his hands.

“All right, everybody, let's make this work!” he shouted, and everyone ran to do their job.

Noelle followed Noel to the table where he'd been working.

“Hi, there,” he said with a smile. “Okay, so basically,
we need to sort out the clothes into four piles: men, women, boys, and girls. And we should try to fold everything.”

“Like laundry day,” Noelle said, and Noel smiled. “No problem.”

“I like your shirt,” he said. “I love this time of year, don't you?”

He picked up a T-shirt and started folding it, and Noelle got up the courage to reply.

“Yeah, sure,” she said, and then she scolded herself.
C'mon, Noelle. You have a better answer than that.
“I mean, I really love this time of year. It's my birthday, too. And I was named Noelle after Christmas. Because my birthday is around Christmas. On Christmas. I mean, I was born on Christmas Day. You were born on Christmas Eve, right?”

She was so nervous that she could barely stammer out her reply.

That was so not graceful. Or cool. Or smooth. Pull yourself together!

She picked up a sweater and started folding it.

“Yeah,” Noel replied. “I was a Christmas Eve baby. My mom keeps telling me that Christmas babies are
special. So I guess you're special too.”

Folding the clothes had a relaxing effect on Noelle. Plus, Noel was so nice.
Okay,
she thought.
You can do this. Just be normal.

“It's pretty fun to have a Christmas birthday,” Noelle said, talking more normally this time. “Everyone is always in such a good mood.”

“I know!” Noel said. “And everyone thinks Christmas birthdays are so cool.”

“Except when they forget about them,” Noelle pointed out.

Noel smiled knowingly. “What about when they do the ‘two for one' gift?”

Noelle nodded. “Exactly!” she cried. And then before she could even think about it, she found herself saying, “And for the past few years my birthday party has been combined with our family Christmas party. Which is okay but kind of stinks, too. So this year I am totally having a separate birthday party before Christmas. So it's separate. It's going to be great. You should totally come.”

Oh
no
! Did she just invite him to her birthday party in the uncoolest way, like, ever?

Yes, you did!
Noelle fretted. She wanted to climb
under the folding table and hide there.

But Noel gave her a friendly smile. “That sounds great. I'd love to. I love parties. Especially at Christmas time.”

Noelle couldn't quite believe it. He was coming! But she didn't even tell him when it was. Should she tell him? And of course he didn't even know where she lived . . .

She took a breath. “Can I have your e-mail so I can send you an invitation?” she asked.

Noel whipped out a small notebook and pen from his back pocket and wrote his e-mail address on it.

“Thanks,” Noelle said as he handed it to her. She tucked it into her pocket, trying to act casual, like someone who got e-mail addresses from boys every day.

The rest of the morning flew by as bag after bag of clothes was delivered to their table to be folded. They talked some more about school and people they knew, but mostly they sorted and folded as quickly as they could. Well, Noelle started to slow down a little on purpose when they were almost done. She could have folded clothes with Noel forever. She kept touching her pocket to make sure the note with his e-mail address was still there.

Finally, every last piece of clothing was in its proper place.

“Good work, people!” Mr. Clark said in his loud voice. “You guys are amazing. If your ride is here, you can head outside.”

Jess, Alyson, and Hailey ran up to the table.

“My dad is here to pick us up,” Alyson said.

Rats,
thought Noelle. Alyson's dad was always early for everything. She wished Hailey's mom was picking them up today. She was always late.

Noelle turned and waved good-bye to Noel, and he waved back.

“Bye, Christmas-birthday buddy!” he said.

She smiled. “Bye!”

Her friends started to giggle behind her, and Noelle turned and quickly pulled them toward the door.

“Oh my gosh, that was so cute!” Hailey said, and Noelle didn't argue.

Noel was definitely cute. And he said he would come to her party!

AS SOON AS ALYSON'S DAD
dropped noelle off, she ran upstairs to her room and flipped open her laptop.

“Noelle? Is that you? How did everything go?” her mom called up the stairs.

“Fine,” Noelle called back, not taking her eyes off the screen. She went right to the invitation website and clicked on “Add Guest.” She typed in Noel's e-mail address, and then, closing her eyes, she made a little wish as she hit send.

Please let him say yes!

She stood up and walked away from the laptop. Then she counted to ten out loud.

“One-one thousand, two-one thousand . . . ”

Right after she hit “ten-one thousand,” she clicked on “Check Replies.” She scrolled through the “yes,” list and saw Jess, Alyson, and Hailey, of course, and her grandma, and Madeline, her friend from chorus. But no Noel. Not yet.

Well, what did you think
? she scolded herself.
It's only been ten seconds! He might not even be home yet.

Mrs. Winters walked into the room. “Lunch will be ready in a minute. What kind of homework do you have this weekend?”

“I have to study for a math test,” Noelle reported, “and my world civ poster is due. Jess is going to come over tomorrow to work on it with me, if that's okay. After her basketball practice.”

“That's fine,” her mom said. Then she got a mischievous smile on her face. “The Holiday Channel is starting their Christmas movie marathon tonight at seven. I'm thinking cocoa, popcorn, slippers . . . what do you say?”

“What do you think I'm going to say?” Noelle replied with a grin. “Of course!”

Christmas movies were another reason why Noelle loved Christmas so much. Even the bad movies had lots of snow and lights and decorations, and they all had a happy ending.

That night after dinner, Noelle took her favorite space on the comfy green couch (last cushion on the right). Her mom made cocoa, and her dad made popcorn. Then they
watched two movies in a row. The first was a corny one about a Christmas choir trying to win a contest, but it had the snow and the lights and the decorations and the happy endings, so that was all good. Andrew stepped into the living room and rolled his eyes when he saw that one. But the second one was a comedy,
Elf
, and Andrew came in to watch it, even though he was texting most of the time.

“Bedtime, Noelle,” her mom said with a yawn when the movie ended, and Noelle didn't argue. First she checked her e-mail: no new responses. Noelle sighed. Well, maybe he just didn't have a chance to respond yet. Or maybe he had to ask his parents. She decided not to worry about it. After all, he said he would be glad to come. “Just think happy thoughts,” she said, which is what her mom told her to do when she was worrying too much and couldn't fall asleep. She dozed off dreaming of Christmas carols and cocoa and feeling extra-Christmasy. It was a nice feeling.

The next day Jess came over in the afternoon, wearing her green Pine Valley Basketball T-shirt (
PV HOOPS
) and sweats. Her auburn hair was pulled back in a ponytail, as usual.

“How was practice?” Noelle asked as they headed into the family room.

“Good,” Jess replied. “I wish you were playing.”

“I'm too short,” Noelle protested.

“You are not,” Jess said. “You're taller than half the girls on my team.”

“Well, it's too fast,” Noelle said.

“It's not faster than soccer, and you're great at soccer,” Jess pointed out. “You should play.”

Noelle had known Jess a long time—since second grade, when Jess was new in school and Mrs. Keystone had assigned Noelle to be her buddy. She knew a lot about her friend, including the fact that Jess was impossible to argue with.

“I'm not playing basketball,” Noelle said flatly. “It takes place in the winter, and I'm busy in the winter with . . . winter stuff. But I'm joining track in the spring, I promise.”

“Fine,” Jess said. She looked around the family room. “Wait, something's wrong in here. There's no Christmas stuff.”

“Didn't I tell you?” Noelle asked. “Mom says I get the whole room just for my party this year. It's a Christmas-free birthday zone.”

Jess nodded. “Cool. I can't wait for your party. Hey, did you ever invite Noel?”

“Last night,” Noelle answered. “He gave me his e-mail address at the thing yesterday. But he hasn't replied yet. I checked, like, ten times this morning.”

“Well, it hasn't even been twenty-four hours,” Jess reasoned. “He probably has to ask if he can go, and you know what that's like. It's hard to get a straight answer from parents sometimes.”

Noelle nodded. That's what she had been thinking too, but hearing Jess say it made her feel better.

The family room had a table and chairs by the window on the back wall. Jess plopped her backpack on the table.

“You have the poster board, right?” she asked. “I brought markers. And we might need to print stuff out.”

“No problem,” Noelle said. “I'll get what we need.”

A few minutes later the girls sat down to work on their posters.

“So it's supposed to be a travel poster for ancient Babylon,” Noelle said. She had her hands on her hips and was staring at the blank page. “Let's see . . . there's the Hanging Gardens, and the Ishtar Gate, and the Euphrates River . . . I think you're right. We should probably print out some pictures of this stuff. It's not so easy to draw.”