42
Cookie baking was in full swing around noon when the doorbell rang.
“Want to get that, honey?” Sarah’s mother asked. Her hands were currently buried deep in cookie dough. “I’ll bet it’s Nancy. I told her she could borrow my big cake pan.”
“Sure,” Sarah said, wiping her hands on her own traditional Christmas apron, the one with the sassy girl elf on the front, winking as she placed a huge star on the top of a tiny tree.
Sarah passed her father sitting in the living room, apparently too mesmerized by the football game to have heard the doorbell.
Sarah opened the door.
“Joe! Wh-what are you doing here?”
Within what seemed like seconds, Sarah’s mother appeared behind her. Joined surprisingly quickly by her father. The best Sarah could do was give Joe a tentative smile and widen her e
