A Daydream Away

A Daydream Away...[Part 9]

"Brownie mix tastes better than the actual brownies," Ethan said, looking into the oven.

Finals were over. It was a week until Christmas. Right now, Ethan was over at my apartment and we were making mint chocolate chip brownies.

"But you can't bring brownie mix to a building party," I pointed.

"Sure you can. Everyone can put it in cups and drink it," Ethan said. I laughed.

"Ew, that is too much chocolate," I said.  "Hand me the bowl of gumdrops," I said. He pushed over the bowl. We were sitting on my kitchen floor with bowls of different candies and frosting on the ground. While we waited for the brownies to bake, we were decorating gingerbread men that we would take to the Children's Hospital. It was something we did every year, just to give back a little.

"Remember when we were kids and we did that lemonade stand?" Ethan asked me. I smiled.

"And we made like twenty dollars," I reminisced.

"And then we donated it to charity and our parents loved us," Ethan finished. I gave him a sympathetic smile. The first few weeks after his mother died, he found it hard to cope with the fact that he was essentially an orphan now. Although he was legally an adult and was able to live on his own, he still didn't have any parents. I tried my best not to make him feel like he was missing out on something. My dad made sure to treat him like a son, which wasn't any different than how he used to treat him before; Ethan was always like part of the family.

"Is Austin coming to Christmas dinner?" Ethan asked after a moment. I shook my head. "Nuh-uh? I would have expected him to seeing as it's your first Christmas together and all that," Ethan said.

"Yeah, I thought so to, but when I asked him, he said he wanted me to go over to his house for dinner. And I'm like, well I can't skip out on Christmas dinner with my family; it's tradition, you know. And then he said that Christmas dinner at his place was tradition to and that it was for most families," I explained.

"Why don't you guys just do it together?" he asked, making frosting buttons on one of the cookies.

"I suggested that, but he said that his relatives and stuff were coming over, so that would be way too many people," I answered. Ethan nodded, understanding.

"So now what?" he questioned. I shrugged.

"Now, we're just doing the separate dinners. He said he wants me to come over for lunch, though," I said.

"How do you feel about that?" he asked, looking at me with his blue-green eyes. I sighed.

"I don't know. You know how much I like spending the day with Dad and Kay and you. There's no arguing with him, though," I replied.  We fell into silence, making shapes with frosting and putting candy on the cookies.

"You two doing all right?" he asked me after a few moments. I looked down at the gingerbread girl I made.

"Sometimes I feel like he's absolutely perfect for me. But then other times, I feel like I have no idea who he is. We've taken to arguing a lot these days," I said.

"Yeah, you told me. I'm sure it'll blow over," he assured me. I gave him a smile.

"I think we've made enough cookies," I said, looking at the five trays of cookies.

"Yeah, I think so, too. But there's still so much candy left over. I told you not to buy so much," he said, looking the bowls.

"Well, I guess we'll just have to eat it," I said, popping a gumdrop in my mouth.

"Fatty," he said, throwing an M&M at me. I laughed and threw a limegreen gumdrop at him. He caught in his mouth.

"OOOOH!!!" we both cried at the same time.