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her sleeve.
“You were in Sweden?” Boomer asked.
“No,” I said. “The trip got cal ed o at the last minute. Because of the political unrest.”
“In Sweden?” Priya seemed skeptical.
“Yeah—isn’t it strange how the Times isn’t covering it? Half the country’s on strike because of that thing the crown prince said about Pippi
Longstocking. Which means no meatbal s for Christmas, if you know what I mean.”
“That’s so sad!” Boomer said.
“Wel , if you’re around,” Priya said, “I’m having people over the day after Christmas. So a wil be there.”
“So a?”
“You know she’s back in town, right? For the holidays.”
I swear, it looked like Priya was enjoying this. Even her pipsqueak brothers seemed to be enjoying this.
“Of course I knew,” I lied. “I just—wel , I thought I was going to be in Sweden. You know how it is.”
“It starts at six. Feel free to bring your friend here.” The brothers started to tug on her again. “I’l see you then, I hope.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Sure. So a.”
I hadn’t meant to say that last word aloud. I wasn’t even sure Priya heard it, she was whisked away so fast by the ru
“I liked So a,” Boomer said.
“Yeah,” I told him. “So did I.”
It seemed a lit le strange to have two run-ins with Priya while on my Lily chase—but I had to dismiss it as coincidence. I didn’t see how she or
So a could possibly t into what Lily was doing. Sure, it could be one big practical joke, but the thing about So a and her friends was that while
they were always practical, they were never jokers.
Natural y, the next consideration was: Did I want So a for Christmas? Wrapped in a bow. Under the tree. Tel ing me how frickin’ great I was.
No. Not real y.
I’d liked her, sure. We’d been a good couple, insofar as that our friends—wel , her friends more than mine—had created this mold of what a
couple should be, and we t into it just ne. We were the fourth couple tacked onto the quadruple date. We were good board game partners. We
could text each other to sleep at night. She’d only been in New York for three years, so I got to explain al kinds of pop cultural references to her,
while she’d tel me stories about Spain. We’d made it to third base, but got stuck there. Like we knew the catcher would tag us out if we tried to
head home.
I’d been relieved (a lit le) when she’d told me she had to move back to Spain. We’d pledged we’d keep in touch, and that had worked for about
a month. Now I read the updates on her online pro le and she read mine, and that’s what we were to each other.
I wanted to want something more than So a for Christmas.
And was that Lily? I couldn’t real y tel . For sure, the last thing I was going to write to her was Al I want for Christmas is you.
“What do I want for Christmas?” I asked Angelina Jolie. Her ful lips didn’t part with an answer.
“What do I want for Christmas?” I asked Charlize Theron. I even added, “Hey, nice dress,” but she stil didn’t reply. I leaned over her cleavage
“What do I want for Christmas?” I asked Charlize Theron. I even added, “Hey, nice dress,” but she stil didn’t reply. I leaned over her cleavage
and asked, “Are they real?” She didn’t make a move to slap me.
Final y, I turned to Boomer.
“What do I want for Christmas?”
He looked thoughtful for a second, then said, “World peace?”
“Not helpful!”
“Wel , what’s in your Amazonian hope chest?” Boomer asked.
“My WHAT?”
“You know, on Amazon. Your hope chest.”
“You mean my wish list?”
“Yeah, that.”
And just like that, I knew what I wanted. Something I had always wanted. But it was so unrealistic it hadn’t even made it to my wish list.
I needed a bench to sit down on, but the only one I could see already had Elizabeth Taylor, Hugh Jackman, and Clark Gable perched atop it,
waiting for a bus.
“I just need a sec,” I told Boomer before I ducked behind Ozzy Osbourne and his whole family (circa 2003) to write in the Moleskine.
No smart-assness (assy-smartness?) here.
The truth?
What I want for Christmas is an OED. Unabridged.
Just in case you are not a word nerd like myself:
O = Oxford
E = English
D = Dictionary
Not the concise one. Not the one that comes on CDs. (Please!) No.
Twenty volumes.
22,000 pages.
600,000 entries.
Pret y much the English language’s greatest achievement.
It’s not cheap—almost a thousand dol ars, I think. Which is, I admit, a lot for a book. But, criminy, what a book. It’s the complete genealogy of
every word we use. No word is too grand or too in nitesimal to be considered.
Deep down, you see, I long to be arcane, esoteric. I would love to confound people with their own language.
Here’s a riddle for you:
My name is a co
I know that’s a childish tease—the truth is, I’d love to let the mystery remain, if only for a lit le longer. I bring it up solely to emphasize the
point—that even though my parents had no idea (and I’m sure my father would have worked wil ful y against it), somehow they pegged me with
my very name to know that while some fel ows would nd their creature comfort in sport or pharmacy or sexual conquest, I was destined to get
that from words. Preferably read or writ en.
Please note: In case you happen to be an heiress, hoping to bestow a Christmas wish on a lonesome mystery boy/linguistic rabblerouser—I
actual y don’t want to get the OED as a gift, as much as I would love to have one. I actual y want to earn it, or at least to earn the money (through
words, in some way) to get it. It wil be even more special then.
This is about as far as I can go without some sarcasm creeping in. But before it does, I must say, with utmost sincerity, that your cookies are good
enough to bring some of these wax statues back to life. Thanks for that. I once made corn mu ns for a fourth-grade project on Wil iamsburg and
they came out like basebal s. So I’m not sure how to reciprocate … but, believe me, I shal .
I was worried I was being a lit le too much of a word nerd … but then I gured a girl who left a red Moleskine in the stacks of the Strand would
understand.
Then came the hard part. The next assignment.
I looked over to the Osbournes (they were a surprisingly short family, at least in wax) and saw Boomer st-pounding with President Obama.
Stovepiping over the rest of the politicians was Honest Abe, looking like the European tourists taking his picture were worse company than
John Wilkes Booth. Next to Abe was a gure I pegged as Mary Todd … until she moved, and I realized it was the guard I was supposed to seek.
She looked like an older, less bearded version of fondle-friendly Uncle Sal. There was, it seemed, no limit to the number of relatives Lily could
employ.
“Hey, Boomer,” I said. “How would you feel about doing something for me at FAO Schwarz?”
“The toy store?” he asked.
“No, the apothecary.”
He looked at me blankly.
“Yes, the toy store.”
“Awesome!”
I just had to be sure he was free on Christmas Eve.…
six
(Lily)
December 24th
I woke up on Christmas Eve morning, and my rst instinct was sheer excitement: Yay! It’s nal y the day before Christmas—the day before the best
day of the year! My second reaction was pitiful remembrance: Ugh, and with no one here to share it with. Why had I ever agreed to al ow my
parents to go on their twenty- ve-years-delayed honeymoon? Such a brand of sel essness was not meant for Christmastime.
Grandpa’s calico cat, Grunt, seemed to agree with me about the day starting out less than auspiciously. The cat aggressively rubbed himself across
the front of my neck, draping his head over my shoulder, then growled his signature grunt directly into my ear to indicate, “Get out of bed and