" Everyone looks at us expectantly when we emerge from the downstairs, and I’m sure it’s just my imagination but I can’t help but feel that a suspicious hush has fallen over the room.

I wave, like an idiot. “Hey. Sorry I fell asleep.” I point behind me, down the stairs. “After we were talking. And playing cards. You know.”

Miles screws his face up. “Thanks for the update.”

He tugs at the strap of a floral apron around his neck and picks up a can opener. Granted, it’s a sort of fancy version of a regular can opener, but my brother turns it around in his hands like it’s a complicated rocket engine part salvaged from NASA. Are we really entrusting this fetus with dinner preparation for thirteen people?

Andrew starts to explain to him how to use it, but I stop him with a hand on his arm. “No. He will learn through the suffering.” I turn to give the same warning look to my mom, but she seems perfectly content at the kitchen table with a glass of wine in one hand and a paperback in the other.

Miles looks like he would very much like to give me the finger, but then his expression clears and a smirk pulls at his mouth. “Dude.” He points upward. “You two are under the mistletoe.”

In unison, Andrew and I turn our faces up to the doorway overhead. Miles is right. The festive sprig is now hanging from a red ribbon pinned into the doorway.

“I didn’t know that was there,” I burst out defensively "

― Christina Lauren , In a Holidaze