It might've been the best sleep I'd ever had but it was cut too short when the sudden smack on the car window startled me awake and reminded me that I was curled into Jade, both of us basically naked.

I barely got the chance to open my eyes when the door was ripped open, Jade and I both sitting up on the back seat with a gasp and my mother standing outside, jaw dropped.

"Dahlia?!" She practically screeched the word as if it were a battle cry and slapped her hands across her eyes. "What in God's name is going on here? Wha— wh—"

Ivan poked his head in the door and saw Jade and I stretched across the back seat. Some of the clothes and coats had slipped off us during the night and I was scrambling to ensure I was covered up. "Oh, what the HELL?"

He stood behind the door and I could see him through the windows, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Can you close the door!" I said. "It's freezing."

"Oh I bet it is," mom snapped, hand still across her face. "When you're wearing no clothes in the back of a car with a man like some. . . hoochie! We were all worried sick when you didn't show up last night and this is what you were doing?"

"It's not what it looks like!" I said as mom flailed about outside of the car in thick snow, her enormous coat hood bordering her panicked face.

Jade, who was warm and firm and somewhat unbothered beside me, whispered, "it's kind of supposed to be what it looks like."

"Oh, right," I clutched the coat around my chest and peeked at him, doing my best to ignore how good he looked leaning casually on an elbow with his bare chest pressed against me.

"Well," I shouted to mom, still having a moment outside. "It's sort of what it looks like."

Actually, watching her trip over mounds of snow and panic was the best way this entire thing could've gone.

Jade and I sat next to each other in the back of mom's Range Rover, fully clothed. Ivan sat passenger and mom kept looking at Jade through her rear view mirror as if she were escorting a criminal to prison.

After everyone had calmed down, Jade and I had dressed and Ivan arranged for my car to get picked up by a tow service. He explained that when we didn't show up last night, he'd checked Jade's location on Snap Maps and seen that we'd stopped. No one was too worried until the early hours of the morning when we were still in the same spot and neither of us were answering the phone.

"You could clearly see we'd crashed, right? You're not that ignorant," I said, breaking the silence that'd only been going on for the last two minutes but was unbearable already.

"Excuse me?" Mom snapped. "Ignorant?"

"Well, acting like we'd purposely not shown up last night so we could stop and fuck on the side of the road is about as ignorant as it gets."

I looked over and saw Jade staring at me with a brow raised. I couldn't help being a brat, I was tired, confused and sick to death of mom and her insanity.

Ivan turned in his seat and shot me a similar look of disbelief.

"You're just as bad," I snapped.

"I'm sorry," Ivan said. "But opening the door to find you and my best friend twisted together with no clothes on, threw me off a bit."

"Grow up," I reached across the middle and took Jades hand, lacing our fingers together. Ivan's eyes widened. I'm so glad Jade suggested this. "Yeah it was mostly for the purpose of keeping warm after we slid off the road and almost died. But also, we are dating."

Ivan's neck almost snapped as he twisted further to look at Jade. "What the fuck man?!"

Jade just shrugged and unbuckled his belt, sliding over into the middle seat so he could slip his arm around me and kiss me on the cheek.

Oh, he was loving this.

Mom was surprisingly silent, but I could see her knuckles going white at the grip she had on the steering wheel.

The drive back to Whistler was unbearably long, quiet and thanks to Jade, kind of cute. He snuggled me the whole way home and it was getting hard to remind myself that this was just... for the plot. It was to piss mom and dad off and nothing more.

But then I remembered his tattoo and the way he looked at me last night and the way he held me and the way my heart responded to his smile. It was confusing because this was Jade and even though I'd always thought he was beautiful and kind of generous and sweet, he was also the biggest pain in the ass I'd ever met.

          When we got to the apartment, Jade and Ivan carried the bags behind mom and I. The whole place was decorated to the nines. Lights glittered all over the shrubs outside. Inside there were wreaths, bows, ornaments and gorgeous life size figurines. The windows were covered in decals and the Christmas tree was floor to ceiling with red and gold.

Mom slipped out of her coat, threw it on the rack and stormed into the kitchen.

Inhaling a deep breath, I followed suit, figuring I might as well get it over and done with. Dad sat at the kitchen island with a glass of scotch and his reading glasses on his nose.

"Hi dad," I mumbled, leaning against the wall and refusing to get comfortable. Mom was still moving as if she had a fire under her ass, practically ripping the fridge door off its hinges in search of wine.

Dad peered over at me and then his gaze flicked to Jade, coming in slow and purposeful, as he often moved, not a care in the world. I looked at him as he stood beside me and winked. It was so subtle but it told me he was right here.

"Dahlia," dad said as if we hadn't seen each other in the last two hours, rather than two years. I wasn't sure what I was expecting but it wasn't that. "Good of you to come home for Christmas. Jade, thanks for joining us."

"Hmph," mom scoffed, picking up the glass of wine she'd just poured. Standing with her back ramrod straight, she glared at Jade and I as if she were doing her best to decipher a foul joke she'd just heard. "When did this start?"

"What start?" Dad looked between the three of us.

"These two are an item," mom chimed with sarcastic enthusiasm, pointing between Jade and I.

"Good to see you both," Jade gave them a quick salute, not at all shaken at the interrogation. In fact, he moved closer and slid his arm around my waist, his fingertips gently pressing into the space under my ribs, so intimately.

"Well we—" I started, but mom cut me off.

"No, I don't want to hear it," she swiped her wine glass off the countertop. Her cold attitude managed to smother the joy of Christmas, not for the first time in my life and she started to leave the kitchen. "Jade, you weren't invited and I quite frankly, do not know why you're here."

My heart lurched for him. I was used to being given shit by my mother, but I'd never heard her be so rude to Jade. She loved Jade, had always welcomed him with open arms and sided with him when he and I would bicker in front of the family.

Glancing up at him, there was nothing in his face that alluded to hurt. He looked down, meeting my concerned stare and smiled, pulling me in a little closer. What was happening to my heart?

Dad slipped off the bar stool, giving us a small nod as he left and Ivan trailed into the kitchen. I should never have come back. What was the point in trying to mend bridges and restore relationships when this was the sort of reciprocation waiting for me? Mom in a mood and dad acting like my existence was just that... existence that made no difference to him.

"So sometime between me calling yesterday morning and finding you this morning," Ivan pointed at us, glaring. My back was still up against the wall, literally and figuratively. "You two went from hating each other, to dating. I call bullshit."

"Is that so hard to believe?" Jade asked, giving Ivan a pointed stare. "Really?"

Ivan stared back and it was clear something was passing between them, something unsaid. My gaze flicked between the two of them. Jade's challenging glare, Ivan's equally as interrogative.

"It's not real," I relented because the silence in the kitchen and the very real tension of the atmosphere was putting me on edge. "We're not dating. It was just a bit of a laugh to fuck with mom and dad."

Ivan signed and propped his hands on his hips. "Bit immature?"

I pushed away from Jade and slipped my coat off, draping it over a dining chair by the windows that faced the pool area. I stared out at the snow covered concrete and the trees lining the fence, the tips speckled in white. Mountain tops sat in the background, meeting the pale blue sky.

I loved everything about this place, except for the way it made me feel when I was here and that was an inexplicable tragedy in my opinion.

"I don't need a lecture, Ivan," I said, feeling defeated and no longer in the mood to spar.

It was draining to face the reality of having two parents that loved you conditionally. Conditions I couldn't meet without making myself miserable. What sort of trade off was that? Lose myself in order to be loved, or love myself enough that I don't feel their loss?

"Doll?"

I peered over at Jade who stood beside Ivan, hands in his pockets, toque still covering his curls.

"You okay?"

"Mhmm," I sighed and contemplated the next move. "Listen, Ivan, the last thing I need from mom and dad is to get an earful because I decided to be a brat and lie about being in a relationship. I'll never hear the fucking end of it. Do me a favour and keep it to yourself for the next few days."

He gave me a small nod of agreement and then turned his sharp stare on Jade.

"Don't mess around with her feelings, Jaden. Grow up a little and be honest for once."

Jade stepped in close to Ivan and stared down his nose at my brother. What the hell was happening? Why was my entire family suddenly turning against the golden boy?

"Don't fucking start with me, Ivan."

"You're my best friend, but this is going too far, even for you."

Jade inhaled a quick breath, shot me a long glance, as if he wanted to say something and the words were building in his chest and then he turned on his heel, storming out of the kitchen.

The sound of the front door slamming followed him a moment later.

Ivan and I stood still for a moment, neither of us knowing what just happened. What I did know, was that when Jade left, he took the fraction of comfort I felt with him. The walls felt taller, the room smaller, the air felt thicker. Ivan was my brother and I loved him but it wasn't the same. He was loyal to mom and dad, he always would be. And I knew without a doubt, Jade would choose me. I wasn't sure when I became so sure of that fact, but it was a life line I'd been gripping since we arrived.

"Who is slamming the door?" Mom's shrill voice came just a moment before she appeared in the kitchen with her empty glass. She'd slipped into soft linen pants and a woollen knit, her dark hair sitting in waves on her shoulders.

Ivan ignored her and flicked the kettle on to boil. He lifted the tin of cocoa in question and I gave a small nod as mom rinsed her glass in the sink.

"Jade left then?"

I sat on a barstool opposite the two of them and shot mom a glare before she looked up. "Since when is he not welcome?"

Mom wiped her hands on a dish towel, her gaze casually moving over to Ivan who was preparing our cocoa with his head down. "I'm sure, Ivan has some vague idea of what his friend did. Or should I say your boyfriend. Interesting how that happened. Can't say I'm surprised of course. You always had a knack for self sabotage."

I bit the inside of my cheek, knees bouncing up and down.

"Yeah," I exhaled a breath. "I actually set out and orchestrate all of my decisions specifically to upset you."

Mom rested her palms on the lip of the bench and sighed at me.

"That's not what I said. You just don't seem to make decisions that will better your future. What on earth can Jade possibly offer you. Apart from a few laughs?"

"Mom, if you knew what it was like to laugh with the person you love, you might not have married dad."

Ivan froze beside mom, whose eyes had widened more than I'd ever seen.

"Excuse me?"

As nervous as I felt to be under her scrutiny, I knew the words would eat me alive if I didn't let them out.

"Why doesn't my happiness matter?" I asked. "Why do I have to do what you think measures success instead of what fulfils me? Why can't I love someone because of the way they make me feel instead of what their bank account looks like? I don't want the same things you want and I never have."

Mom stared at me with an expression that was impossible to read and then when I thought she was going to explode, she left the kitchen, leaving Ivan and I alone again. He stirred the hot water into the cups he'd prepared and he looked at me as if I'd just told him a secret. One he found amusing.