Christmas in Two Words

By Betty Maxine

 

A CHRISTMAS STORY TO GET YOU INTO THE SEASON'S FEELINGS

 

Avoiding going home for Christmas was what Chidera Brown did best. It was better for her to love her family from afar. Close proximity created nothing but friction.

 

She'd developed a great excuse each year her parents called asking if she was coming home; "work needed me".

 

It'd never failed her until this year when her boss decided that she'd worked hard enough. She didn't know why he chose to be nice this year because his change in behaviour cost her the perfect excuse.

 

Christmas in Two Words is a cute and cosy story of family reuniting, the first spark of a new relationship and the necessities of Christmas.

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Betty Maxine
• Release date: Dec 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393158592

Betty Maxine

I'm just your 20-something-year-old university student with loads of stories in my head :)  I have a tendency to write short stories and I love creating cosy escapes from real life. 

Book preview

Chapter One

A lovely thing about Christmas is that it’s compulsory, like a thunderstorm, and we all go through it together.

~Garrison Keillor

I WAS HOPING TO WORK through this year’s holiday but it seemed the prayers of my family were stronger than my wishes. All my happy bubbles were popped when my boss, who was usually a jerk every chance he got, decided that he was giving me Christmas off.

Just my stupid luck, I sighed as I watched him smile for the first time since I started five years ago.  

I had successfully avoided family gatherings for the past five years I had been at this job – which was the only thing that made me stay on as a crap-no-future-in-sight-junior-editor. I definitely qualified to be in the club of weirdos because most people took jobs so they could have the flexibility to have a social life and spend time with their family. I did not. I didn’t want the stuck-up parties nor the overly formal dinners.

Just thinking about how my mum hammered proper etiquette into my brain was making me tired. When they had interviewed me for this job, they told me I might be required to work through Christmas. I happily gave them a sign-me-up-for-this-shitshow smile.

So, I guess I’ll see you in the new year, Dera. I flinched at the mention of my name. He had always called my name in full so calling me Dera sounded odd.

Send me the most recent article when you get back to your desk and you are free for the next month. Also, I want you to know that you are not undervalued here. Actually......

Turning his head like a Cheshire cat to ensure no one could hear what he was about to say, he leaned in and lowered his voice. One would think he was about to tell me the combination to the vault in the bank and exactly how they were going to rob it. Mrs Stewart is retiring in the new year.

Finally. That old hag had been sitting on the senior editor role for the last century. She was the reason this good-for-nothing magazine had nothing to write home about. Every new idea we brought up in those stupid two-hour long meetings were shot down with her two-barrelled gun or rather should I say those beady eyes that peered through the lenses of those glasses that refused to stay put.

And they have officially offered me the role, Peter said as his voice took on a higher octave than usual.

It all made sense now. No wonder Mr-Two-faced-shit was smiling. They had offered him a promotion. I knew there had to be something behind this change in behaviour. It couldn’t just be the holiday season. Even Christmas didn’t bring miracles that big.  The only thing that could twist this man’s heart was green – or should I have said purple since that was the colour