Member-only story
The Single Girl’s Guide to Christmas
Some things are stranger than fiction.
Every year, Emily heard the same old spiel from all manner of people in her life.
“You want to spend Christmas alone?” her coworkers would ask, horrified, as if the very thought was anathema to them. “Don’t you want to open presents with your family?”
“Everybody’s on vacation,” Emily said this year. “My parents decided the holidays were better spent on a cruise to the Bahamas. And my sister’s abroad for school. It’ll be fine. I have plenty to keep myself occupied.”
Her coworkers wouldn’t say anything more, but they would look at her with pity in their eyes as if she were the saddest thing during the holidays other than a Grinch or a Scrooge. It was bad enough that Esther, the person with most seniority in the office, even let Emily have the first cup of coffee from the pot just the day before Christmas Eve.
At least this year it was just about her family. In prior years — when she didn’t go over to her boyfriend-of-the-moment’s place for the holidays — the judging gazes had followed her as if it were no wonder that she had yet to snag an engagement ring from anyone she had dated. But things like that just didn’t matter to her. She was happy and healthy, so what more could she want out of her lot in life?
