Christmas was going to be different this year. Of course, Sylvia had decided it would be the moment she’d told her dad she would not be coming home, before promptly hanging up the phone. He could spend Christmas with his new family, but it would have to be without her. It would be fine. Sure, spending Christmas in her university dorm might be lonely, but Christmases with her dad had been stained by the feeling for a long time.

Despite that, Sylvia couldn’t wait for her roommate to leave. Meagan had been complaining all week about having to go home for Christmas. About her nosy relatives asking her how her classes are going, if she was partying safely, and if that “Jack” boy she kept talking about had asked her out yet. It all made Sylvia’s face hot and her skin start to itch, but she was not confrontational by nature. She always seemed to say the wrong thing, so she thought she’d be better off just staying quiet. Continuing to throw mental darts at Meagan’s head would have to suffice. 

One thing that made this Christmas feel strange was the quiet. For most of Sylvia’s life, Christmas had been loud. From her dad blaring cheesy Christmas songs in the car, to arguing over how many birds my true love gave to me over the dinner table, or the sweet hymns of midnight mass on Christmas Eve, Christmas had always been accompanied by noise. But that was before her family as she knew it had been torn apart for good. And it seemed that Christmas would continue to haunt her silently, as the whole floor of her dorm was seemingly abandoned. The droning hum of the radiator and the incessant ticking of the clock were starting to drive Sylvia up the wall already. 

 The anxiety-induced, caffeine-fuelled frenzy of exam season had left the floor in various states of disarray as everyone fled the university, suitcases in hand and working central heating in sight. There were colourful strips of paper half-hanging from the bulletin board in the hall, paper snowflakes hanging from the ceiling that looked suspiciously like they’d been cut from old essays, and a paper plate of cookies in the common room that might have been lifted from the cafeteria. All evidence of the Residence Fellows’ weak effort to make the hall look festive, before giving up halfway through. It was fair. They must have thought that no one would be there to notice. Sylvia’s decision to stay had been a last-minute one, and all signs pointed to her being alone.

Sylvia resigned herself to a quiet Christmas, even though it was still two days away. She imagined her dorm like a snow-covered graveyard, without so much as a ghost for company. That was until she heard the music. Floating in from down the hall, the song began softly and slowly got louder, more confident. It sounded jazzy, Sylvia thought. But she couldn’t quite place it. 

There was something alluring about it. Something magnetic, pulling her in. It wasn’t like Sylvia was a major jazz fan, but perhaps it was the promise of company that compelled her to follow the music. It led her all the way down the hall to the common room, where she stopped short of the doorway.

There, sitting on that ratty blue couch, was the musician. A boy, probably nineteen like Sylvia, with a shiny brass saxophone held up to his lips. He looked a bit lost in his own world. In front of him sat a spiral notebook and the sad plate of cafeteria cookies on top of the shoddy wooden table, wobbly and scratched from years of use by rowdy college students. The boy looked a bit out of place in comparison. He was nicely dressed, but not in a flashy way. He wore a green sweater and black pants; they were simple, but had an expensive look to them.

She’d seen him in the hallway before, maybe in the elevator once or twice, but they hadn’t spoken. He was somewhat of a ghost to her. He always had a kind of far-off look.

She lingered in the doorway until the boy stopped playing. He put the instrument in one hand and flipped the page in his notebook. A stray blond curl fell into his eyes and he shook his head to move it when he finally saw Sylvia. 

“Oh! I thought it was just me here. Sorry, was I playing too loud?”

“No, it was good! You were…” Sylvia cut herself off, already regretting her choice of words. “I’m Sylvia,” she tried as she finally stepped into the room.

The boy stood up from the couch and extended a hand to her. “I’m Jack.”

Sylvia accepted his hand hesitantly. Who shakes hands anymore? Maybe he was just one of those kids with really formal parents, Sylvia thought.

“Was that an original?” Sylvia gestured to the boy’s instrument, now abandoned on the couch.

The boy—Jack—shook his head with a hint of a laugh. Someone laughing at her questions would normally have made Sylvia nervous, but his laugh sounded light as air.

“Is that a completely insulting guess?” She asked. Chemical equations, data charts, those she knew. Music was not her area of expertise. 

“It was I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” Jack said.

“That’s ironic.” Everyone who was going home for the holidays had done so by now. Anyone still stuck on campus either couldn’t go or didn’t want to, but pointing that out seemed like a poor choice now. Jack shifted in the seat he’d returned to on the couch.

“It’s a rough arrangement. The acoustics are better out here than in my room, but it would sound way better in a proper space. Like the theatre! Have you been?”

Sylvia didn’t think it sounded rough at all. “No. Are you in drama, then?”

“No, no, I couldn’t possibly. I’m in law. Music’s just a hobby.” Jack looked down at his hands and the saxophone lying beside him, as if they might explain their uselessness. “What do you do?”

“I’m studying neuroscience. Other than that…I don’t have much time for anything else, to be honest.”

 “Wait, you’re not Jack Rivera, are you?” she asked. Meagan had been fawning over some guy on their floor named Jack Rivera for weeks, but the boy in front of her didn’t exactly seem like her type. He was less football quarterback, more shoved-in-a-locker, band geek type.

“No!” Jack said, raising his hands defensively. “He’s the other one on this floor. Whatever you’ve heard, it was him.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean—it’s just that my roommate Meagan thinks he’s cute.”

“I don’t know if I’d say that…” Jack paused. “He’s uh, interesting.”

Sylvia thought she saw the boy turn a shade redder, but he turned his face away.

“Do you know him well?” If there was something to know about Jack Rivera, she figured she should warn Meagan. Then again, did she want to?

“Unfortunately, I live with him.”

“You’re roommates? Why would they put two people with the same name together?”

“I think I’m being punished for something I did in a past life,” Jack said with mock-seriousness. “Or maybe this one,” he muttered.

This guy was funny. But Sylvia wondered if maybe there was a hint of truth behind it. “He’s that bad?” She asked.

Jack’s eyes were wide as he nodded. “Did you hear about that kid who got pushed in the river, first week?”

Sylvia nodded. She didn’t know how the poor sap ended up in the river, but everyone was talking about it during orientation.

“Yeah, Rivera was the one who pushed him.”

“What a jerk. You know, if you saw him do it, I’m sure you could report it.”

“Yeah…I don’t think that would do me much good.” Jack paused for a moment, seeming unsure how to continue. “How’s your roommate, uh—Meagan?”

“Don’t get me started,” Sylvia sighed, putting a hand to her temple. “She’s made it her personal mission to corrupt me ever since I got here.”

“Corrupt you?” Jack questioned, eyes squinted in suspicion.

“I think she means well, but it doesn’t really show. She’s constantly trying to drag me to frat parties or clubs or wherever she thinks ‘fun’ might be that night.”

“She sounds fun,” Jack said, but the raise of his eyebrows betrayed his words.

“She thinks I’m missing out on the ‘college experience.’ Maybe I am.”

“I don’t know. I hate parties, but I understand wanting to do what everyone else is doing. Just watching from the sidelines can be exhausting.”

Sylvia was a little disappointed that Jack didn’t take her side, since she’d just agreed that his roommate sucked. But maybe he had a point. “Meagan and Rivera must be doing something right if they’re having more fun than we are,” Sylvia conceded.

Jack considered that for a moment. “I guess that’s fair…I’ll admit, I am a bit jealous of people like that.”

“Like what?”
“You know, popular kids. People who float through life like it’s easy. Like it’s nothing.”

Sylvia could sympathize with that. She often felt like she was watching life happen from the outside. Did Jack feel the same way?

“So, why are you stuck here for the holidays?” He asked. There was a tinge of genuine curiosity in his voice that rattled Sylvia. She hadn’t expected to have to explain herself.

“I can’t,” she tried. It was the truth, but not the whole truth. The truth under a lampshade.

“What do you mean?”

“My family’s too far.” That was half true, which was about as much as Sylvia could stomach giving up to someone. “Why are you still here?” She said, returning the attention to him.

“I uh, had some things to take care of.”

“That’s mysterious,” Sylvia replied, then waited for him to elaborate.

Jack started to turn red again. He just raised his eyebrows at her, questioning.

Sylvia couldn’t help but fill the silence. She pressed on, without considering whether or not it was a good idea. “Do you live far?”

“Er, not really.” It was a non-answer.

The words just kept pouring from her mouth. She’d felt comfortable with this boy for half a minute and now she couldn’t stop digging herself in deeper. “Then why stay?”

“Look, I just didn’t feel like it, alright?! It’s not a good story,” Jack snapped. There was a glassy sheen to his eyes that hadn’t been there before.

There was a twinge of shame in Sylvia’s chest. She’d done what she always did. She pushed too much. A heat started to creep across her face, and she was sure it showed. She hadn’t wanted to answer for her choices, so why had she turned the question on this boy she barely knew? She had gotten stuck on it. He had stayed at school over the break too. Maybe he understood. She wanted to find out for sure, but she went and screwed it up.

“Sorry—I shouldn’t have pried. I’ll—I’m going to go,” Sylvia said, her voice small now.

“You don’t have to…” Jack started, but she was already heading out the door.

She shut herself back in her room. The dorm was quiet again.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The next evening, Sylvia heard music again. For a brief moment, she wondered if she was imagining it, or if the monotony of the dorm had finally driven her insane. Then she remembered the cute boy from yesterday. Since when was he cute? It didn’t matter, anyway. She’d messed things up with him. Besides, she’d already resigned herself to a dreary night getting ahead on her readings for class. She was learning to understand the human brain from a biological perspective. That was easy. Trying to ignore the music was harder, especially now that she knew where—or who—it came from.

She snapped her book shut, pulled herself away from her desk, and cursed her stupid anxiety and her stupid freezing dorm. Fuck it. It was Christmas Eve, and she did not want to be alone. She threw on a burgundy sweater over her shirt and jeans and resolved to give whatever she had started with Jack another chance.

Once again, she found him in the common room. As soon as Jack caught sight of Sylvia, he stopped playing, which Sylvia found oddly disappointing.

“Hi. I didn’t know which room was yours. I thought…” 

“It worked.” A smile broke on Sylvia’s face. Jack had wanted to see her again. “Hey, I’m sorry about yesterday—”

“Me too,” Jack said before she could finish. “Don’t even worry about it. We’re both stuck here; it’s a weird time for both of us. We don’t have to talk about it.” He smiled, just a touch. It was barely there, but Sylvia’s frustration melted easily. She couldn’t help but agree.

BEEEEEEEP! BEEEEEEEP! BEEEEEEEP!

“Who the hell is setting off the fire alarm?!” Jack complained. “There’s got to be like ten people in the building!”

“Who knows. I don’t really want to die before Christmas though,” Sylvia replied as she made her way out the door towards the stairwell.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

The moon was high in the sky by then, struggling to make an appearance through the clouds. Sylvia strained to search the small crowd of students that had gathered out front of her dorm building for a familiar face. She spotted a tall, dark-haired girl she had shared a class with. What was her name again? Priya, that was it.

“Priya!” Sylvia called as she made her way over to the girl. “Any idea what’s going on?”

“Wasn’t me. They haven’t swept the building yet. I bet someone left a fake Christmas tree up with those old, sketchy lights,” Priya answered.

“On Christmas Eve. Unbelievable,” Sylvia heard Jack say from behind her. She hadn’t realized he’d followed.

Jack’s gaze was fixed on the security guard talking to the firefighters, maybe twenty feet away. His eyes narrowed at the security guard when Sylvia noticed that he was keeping an eye on Jack as well. She wondered with mild interest at the gears she imagined were turning in his head. What was going on behind those deep brown eyes?

Jack turned back to Sylvia and nodded towards the academic buildings. “Let’s get out of here. I know where we can get something with a little more kick than stale cookies.”

Sylvia hesitated. This guy was turning out to be very unpredictable.

“It’ll be fun. Promise.” Jack extended a hand to her, and the mischievous smile spreading across his face made her stomach twist—whether it was butterflies or stomach acid, Sylvia couldn’t be sure. But she wanted to find out.

He led her to a building she hadn’t been in before, though they were virtually all the same. Boxy, uniform classrooms with chalkboards, projector screens, and plastic chairs under nauseating fluorescent lighting. They went in through the back entrance and up the stairs until they reached the floor bearing a sign marking it as Law and Legal Studies territory.

“There’s a case of champagne in the Department Lounge for some bullshit award they’re presenting next term,” Jack explained as he continued to the room he was looking for.

“Should we really be stealing from the Law Department? Aren’t there security cameras?”
“Most of them are just there to scare you. I know which ones to avoid anyway. Trust me.”

Sylvia wasn’t quite sure why she should trust him, and she was not usually one for breaking rules, but it was an invitation to do something kind of dangerous. He kept surprising her. It made her want to keep peeling back the layers that made him up to see what was underneath.

Jack stooped in front of the door labelled Lounge.

Sylvia crouched down to whisper to him. “Do you really have to tie your shoes while we’re in the middle of committing a crime?” She scanned the hall impatiently.

But then, Jack produced a slender, curved piece of metal from his boot. He knelt in front of the door and proceeded to wiggle the tool into the lock.

“How do you know how to do that?”

“When you’ve had enough doors locked on you, you learn to pick them,” he said with an uncanny cheerfulness. 

Before Sylvia got the chance to ask what that meant, the lock clicked open. Jack pushed the door open and crossed the room to a storage closet. Sylvia followed close behind. Jack opened the closet to reveal, among stacks of printer paper and other office supplies, a solid cardboard box. Jack flipped open the flaps quickly, but not before Sylvia glimpsed “Donation courtesy of Prof. Quinn” written in permanent marker on the top of the box.

“How’d you know this was here?” She asked.

“I uh—had an inside source.” He pulled a bottle out of the case and handed it to Sylvia, standing behind him.

Tilting her head, she held his gaze.

“It’s kind of a long story,” Jack said with an apologetic smile. He carefully closed the box back up and shut the closet door.

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

“Oh shit.” Jack grabbed Sylvia’s shoulder, pulling them both back behind the corner.

“Security’s still there?” Sylvia asked. She leaned out slightly and saw the firetruck still parked in front of their dorm building. The security guard was still out front too.

“Yeah. Clearly the building isn’t burning down. How long can it take to search for a non-existent fire?”

“It could be a small fire,” Sylvia replied. 

Jack glared in response.

“But we can’t walk past security with that,” she continued, gesturing to the bottle Jack had tucked behind his back.

“And we can’t stay out here.” Jack tucked the bottle into his elbow and tried to blow some warm air into his hands. Neither of them had grabbed a coat after the alarm went off.

“Okay. New plan. You want to go check out those acoustics?”

“You want to break into another building?”
“I don’t think it counts as breaking in if I know the door code,” Jack said with a sly smile. He actually seemed to be enjoying this. Even though she was freezing, Sylvia couldn’t deny that it was kind of fun, sneaking around.

“I’m starting to question your law school ambitions.”

“Tell me about it.”

They trudged through the snow to the bridge, across the river, and up the hill until they arrived at an old stone church.

“I thought we were going to the theatre?”

“We are! They renovated this place a few years ago. A much better use, I think.” Jack continued around the building to a side door that Sylvia hadn’t seen in the dark. 

Compared to the boxy, brutalist buildings that populated the rest of the campus, the ornate stonework of the church-turned-theatre was striking.

Jack punched the code into the keypad and the lock released. Jack stepped inside and held the door for her.

“After you.”

Despite her freezing limbs, Sylvia hesitated to follow him. She hadn’t set foot in a church in years. It just wasn’t the same anymore. It never would be again. She had tried to once last year, and all the memories of attending Mass every Sunday with her mom and dad had flooded back. But it didn’t feel warm or comforting like she’d hoped. Instead, it was like a cold wave had washed over her, a cold she just couldn’t shake off. Religion hadn’t been a comfort for her in a long time. 

“C’mon, you can’t stand out in the cold forever.”

Sylvia took a deep breath, then followed Jack inside.

The walls were lined with tall, arched windows. The sliver of moonlight that made its way through the stained glass cast streaks of blue, yellow, and red across the stage, interrupted only by the single spotlight that had been left on.

Sylvia stood back to take it all in.

Jack jumped up to sit on the stage, his shiny black boots dangling off the edge. He set right to ripping the foil off the champagne bottle. He bit his lip in concentration, and Sylvia forced herself to tear her eyes away from him.

The whole theatre was circular, with the stage tucked to one side, and the rest was taken up by wooden pews which now acted as theatre seats. Above was a grand, vaulted ceiling that sloped into a dome lined with even more windows.

“It’s beautiful.”

“It’s my favourite place to hide out on campus. Here.” Jack finally got the bottle open and now offered it to her.

Sylvia pulled herself up onto the stage to sit next to him, tucking her feet under her knees. They passed the bottle back and forth, sipping and chatting all the while watching the snow pile up outside. She wasn’t sure how long they sat like that. The knot that had been tightening in her chest over the past few days leading up to Christmas loosened slightly. She might still be lonely once the new year began, but maybe she didn’t have to be quite so alone tonight. And it was warm in the theatre. Much warmer than the dorm, but the champagne might have helped with that. Jack too.

Jack suddenly swung around and hopped up onto the stage. He stepped into the centre of the spotlight and looked out at an imagined audience. “I wish I had my saxophone. The reverb in here is incredible.” He said, then shouted: “Echo!”

“Actually—fuck it.” He grabbed the now-empty champagne bottle and held it out in front of his face.

I’ll be home for Christmas

You can plan on me…

He began to sing, a performance for an audience of one.

Please have snow and mistletoe

And presents on the tree

The acoustics were lovely, Jack was right. His voice echoed off the walls until it filled the whole room.

Christmas Eve will find me

Where the lovelight gleams…

Sylvia felt like she was swimming in it, but that might have been the champagne. Still, Jack’s singing was entrancing.

I’ll be home for Christmas

If only in my dreams.

Sylvia wanted to tell Jack how great his singing was, but she could not stir the words. It felt like all the air had been sucked from her chest, leaving only the thumping of her heart. That beating was all she could hear in the absence of Jack’s voice. And maybe it was the champagne, or maybe it was because it was Christmas Eve, that she decided to listen to it.

She stood up from her spot on the stage and joined Jack in the spotlight. She looped her arms around him and started to pull him in closer when he put a tense hand on her shoulder.

“Sylvia…what are you doing?” His eyes were wide as an owl’s, and certainly disconcerted.

Oh fuck. She’d botched it completely. What was she thinking? Her head was spinning.

Jack took a step back, then another. He shook his head and spoke slowly, “I’m sorry, I can’t—”

They both heard a sudden beeping noise, then a static shhhhhh. Jack only looked mildly annoyed that they were about to be caught, which made Sylvia uneasy.

In walked the security guard they had seen earlier, looking none too happy to have been called out a second time on Christmas Eve.

“Yeah, I found ‘em. Just some kids,” he said into the radio. “Look who it is. Mr. Quinn. Look! You brought a girlfriend this time.”

Jack just gave a sarcastic smile. Sylvia wished she could sink through the floor and disappear.

“I’ll be taking this,” the security guard said, swiping the incriminating empty bottle from Jack, and pointing it at him accusingly. “And it looks like I’ll be contacting Professor Quinn.”

“Go right ahead. I’m sure he’d love to hear about this,” he retorted, glancing at Sylvia out of the corner of his eye. She thought she might just die of embarrassment.

“Who’s Professor Quinn?” Sylvia tried to whisper to Jack, but the sound travelled anyway.

“My father,” he answered at the same time the security guy said, “Head of Legal Studies.”

“Which does not make you exempt from a trespassing charge,” the security guard said pointedly. 

“We both know that’s not going to happen,” Jack replied. 

“We’ll see. C’mon. Out you go,” he said, ushering them out of the theatre. “You too, miss.”

They were escorted to the residence reception, where Jack once again encouraged the security guy to make the call. Sylvia fidgeted nervously while they waited. She kept sneaking glances over to Jack, but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. Who even was this kid? She felt that same sting of shame creeping all over her body. This had all been very foolish.

The security guard returned looking even grumpier than when he’d left. “Don’t look so smug, little Quinn. This is your last warning. Now get out of here.”

Thank god. Sylvia took a deep breath. Wordlessly, she and Jack exited and put some distance between themselves and the whole incident as quickly as possible.

The cold and the anxiety did well to sober them both up a bit. The snow was coming down lighter now; tiny crystals floated down around them, as if in slow motion. The walk back along the river to their residence building would have been peaceful, if not for the weight of everything unspoken, like a string pulled taut between them. 

Sylvia had it all wrong. She didn’t need the cute boy she’d stumbled upon in the common room to fall for her. If that had been the plan, pushing him for answers had certainly been a wrong move. What she had wanted all along was a friend, and just maybe, she and Jack could make that work. For everything that had gone wrong in the past day and a half, they still had something in common. They had both chosen to stay at the school over the break, believing that it would mean spending Christmas alone. Sylvia had a twisted little hope that just maybe, that meant there was a wound in him that was the same as the wound in her. She would have to push again. And Jack would probably push back; it’s what she would do. But maybe that’s what they both wanted. There was only one way to find out.

“Why are you here, Jack?”

“Same as you. Didn’t feel like going home.”

“You could have, though. You must live close by if your dad works here.” She kept her voice even, not wanting to sound accusatory. Just curious. “So why?”

“It’s not a good story,” Jack said dismissively.

“That doesn’t matter. It’s yours,” she tried.

“You don’t want to hear it. You just think you do because you have a crush on me or something,” he bit back.

“That’s not fair. I like you, but I don’t want anything out of it.”

“You don’t really care. It’s none of your business anyway.”

“I do, Jack. I do. I want to know.”

Jack snapped. “I can’t go home! Is that what you want to hear? My parents’ house is ten minutes from here and they won’t let me in the door!”

“What—” Sylvia started, but he wasn’t really looking at her anymore.

“They said nothing would change. That they don’t care that I’m gay! But they—they looked at me differently. They don’t want me around…I’m not sure anyone does.”

“Jack…”

“No. Just—just don’t.” Jack slumped to the ground. For once, he was quiet, all the light gone from him. Sylvia let him be for a minute, not wanting to provoke him further. But it was clear to her that he was being driven by loneliness, not anger.

She sat down next to him and sent up a silent curse to the university for not clearing the walkway of snow. Or at least salting it. Jesus, it was cold out here. She could tell Jack was shivering too, though it looked like he might have been crying as well. She couldn’t see it before, in the dark. Now, up close, she could see his eyelashes were wet and sticking together. Sylvia thought they might freeze that way from the cold.

“You didn’t deserve that,” she said quietly. “No one does. To treat your own kid like that, it’s…it’s just vile.”

Jack gave a subtle nod. Of course that didn’t fix anything, or even change anything, but Sylvia hoped it might be a small reprieve from the weight he must be carrying. She turned her eyes away from him, giving him the space to compose himself.

“Your turn,” he said finally.

Sylvia almost shut him down again, but when she looked back up, there was something in his eyes that crumbled her resolve—hope. That someone else might not be going through the same thing, but still might understand what they were feeling. It was the same hope she’d had.

Sylvia took a deep breath, and then a chance.

“I can’t go home either.” A chill crawled up her spine. Could she do this? She hesitated to continue.

“No, no. Don’t do that. I went first,” Jack protested.

It took a lot of courage for anyone to expose themselves the way Jack just did. She owed it to him to try and be as brave.

“My mom died,” Sylvia began, “Five years ago.” She could feel Jack pull away a fraction of an inch, probably trying not to react too strongly. She pushed on. “My dad remarried, and he moved in with her and her kids. So I can’t go home, not really.”

Jack nodded intently, taking this in. A minute passed in silence. What could possibly be comforting?

“I think…home might be a feeling, not a place. I think it’s something you carry with you.”

“I think I like that better. Then home can be wherever you are.”

“Or wherever you want it to be.”

Despite the chill, Sylvia felt a touch warmer. It would not last forever, but perhaps it would be enough for now. She stood up and shook out her frozen limbs.

“Alright. Can’t stay in the cold forever, now can we?” She said, extending a hand to him.

Jack’s lips curled into a smile. He accepted the help up.

“Merry Christmas, Jack.”

“Merry Christmas, Sylvia.”