Good Elf Gone Wrong: A Holiday Romantic Comedy

The street in front of my parents’ house was a parking lot when I walked up the next afternoon. The snowstorm had cleared out, and the sky was a crisp blue. The sunlight reflecting off the white snow was blindingly bright.

I grimaced as I headed up the walkway, bracing myself for nosy relatives. Everyone must want to know the latest gossip on Kelly and well, me, for that matter.

Pugnog snorted in his baby carrier as I let myself in through the front door.

“Roscoe Energy Solutions is here!” Dakota said, freaking out as she raced over to me.

“Here? Why? How?” I said in confusion.

“Didn’t you see the news?”

“No.” I had fallen asleep in a champagne-and-cake-induced stupor and only woke up when the cleaning lady demanded she be allowed inside for my dirty towels. Now I was ready for my afternoon snack and another nap.

“What happened?” I asked as I set Pugnog’s carrier down on the floor in the foyer.

“It’s really bad, Gracie,” Dakota said as she ushered me inside. The motion-activated dancing Santa started singing “Jingle Bell Rock.”

“What did you do, Gracie?” James demanded when I went into the living room where my family was gathered.

“I didn’t do anything. I haven’t even been here. Oh, hello, Mr. Roscoe.” I weakly greeted the CEO of Roscoe Energy Solutions.

“Can I get you anything? Water? Tea? Coffee?”

“You can get me information on why these notebooks, your notebooks, are all over the news,” he said, pointing at the TV, where a blond reporter on the national business news network was talking about shocking revelations about Roscoe Energy’s subcontractor EnerCheck Inc.

The stock ticker on the bottom of the page showed Roscoe Energy shares dropping sharply.

“It’s breaking news in the business world. The big hedge funds smell blood in the water. Svensson Investment is downgrading Roscoe Energy’s rating, and Van de Berg Insurance has allegedly quietly been telling their clients to prepare for the worst and up their policy coverage. Still no word from the CEO of Roscoe Energy,” one reporter said. “Back to you.”

“Up next,” the news anchor said. “Will there be a federal investigation? We have our legal expert here to join after commercials.”

“This is a travesty. This is a disaster!” Mr. Roscoe thundered.

One of the corporate lawyers that flanked Mr. Roscoe dropped a stack of printouts in front of me on the coffee table.

“Where did you get this?” I asked, sitting down hard in a chair.

“A better question is why were you keeping a log of every little thing that could be used to take us down, Gracie?” James demanded.

“Because none of you were listening to me!” I shrieked. “I told you not to put all the family on payroll and have foreign unpaid interns”—I made air quotes—“to work for the company. I told you it was a bad idea. I told you not to invest the payroll in James’s friend’s cryptocurrency scheme. I told you.”

“If you knew it was a bad idea, why did you write it down? Didn’t you think of how this would look?” my dad demanded.

“The notebooks were in my secret drawer. It was hidden.” I pressed my hands to my throat. “No one knew about that drawer except for me and Dakota and … wait … Kelly. You went snooping in my room, didn’t you?”

“Me? I don’t even work at EnerCheck.” My sister acted offended.

“According to these documents, you are one of the highest-paid employees,” the VP of finance stated, pointing to a highlighted entry from one of my Festivus journals. The older man looked like he was going to have a stroke, he was so red-faced.

“Kelly, I swear to god.” I raced up to my bedroom, Kelly running up behind me.

“It’s not me. It wasn’t me.”

I tore off the window-seat cushion and opened the secret compartment in the built-in bookcase.

It was empty.

“You did this,” I yelled, running back downstairs. “Dad, do you see this? She stole my journals just like she stole my toys when we were little and wrecked your car and stole my laptop. You did this because you were mad that I broke up your marriage, Kelly.”

The CEO’s lawyers had to hold him back.

“You tanked a multibillion-dollar international corporation over some girlish spat?” he hollered at us.

“To be fair, Kelly was banging Gracie’s boyfriend in the kitchen,” Granny Murray said as she headed out in her skimpy exercise clothes, wearing a shirt that said Yes I Strip!

The dancing Santa started screeching “Jingle Bell Rock.”

“I don’t care who was cheating on who—”

“Kelly. Kelly is the one who is cheating. There is no ‘both sides,’ there’s just Kelly. She ruins everything.”

“I count on you to be the mature one. You’re the oldest. You have to watch out for your younger siblings,” my dad scolded me.

“Kelly is a grown adult woman.” I pointed at her. “Look at her. She was supposed to get married tomorrow.”

“It doesn’t matter. We are all going to prison, Gracie.” My dad shook me by the shoulders.

“Prison?” I squeaked and sat down. “Kelly, how could you?”

My sister was defiant. “I didn’t send anything to anyone. I don’t know how the news got those notebooks.”

“I believe you, Kelly,” my dad said kindly.

“Seriously? This is all her fault. But of course you always give her a pass and punish me for what she does.”

“This isn’t about Kelly,” my dad thundered. “This is about you.”

In the corner, my mom was crying. “We’re ruined.”

“Damn right, you’re ruined,” the CEO snapped at her. “You all cost me billions. I’m coming after each and every one of you.”

“There’s no need for that,” James said, puffing out his chest. “I take full responsibility for what happened, and we’ll make it right. That’s an EnerCheck Inc. promise. First off, you’re fired, Gracie.”

“What?”

“Fired,” he repeated snidely.

“Fine. None of you know how to run this company anyways.”

“The company’s swirling down the toilet now,” Dakota said, “so it’s probably better you don’t get sucked down that toilet of incompetence too.”

“You’re fired too then, Dakota,” James snapped, “and you, Kelly.”

“Me?” My sister screeched. “But Daddy, I need that money to pay for my Mexico trip.”

“You’re not fired, honey.” My dad rubbed her back.

“How did it end up that EnerCheck Inc. was in charge of such a critical piece of our company’s infrastructure?” one of the Roscoe VPs asked pointedly.

“Because Mr. Roscoe’s daddy gave him that job,” Granny Murray said, hustling back inside, “and he’s incompetent. Forgot the cookies I was going to take to Janice.”

We watched her grab a box from the side table.

“Carry on,” she called and headed back outside, the motion-activated Santa wailing and dancing away.

“Here is what we can do,” the CEO’s lawyer suggested. “I have some contacts at TechBiz. We’ll paint Grace O’Brien as having a mental breakdown due to her sister and ex’s infidelities. We’ll turn this into a tabloid story, not a business story. The stock will go back up. It will be something we laugh about at the next corporate retreat.”

The door opened. The dancing Santa started singing again.

“Can someone lock that old woman outside?” the CEO bellowed as Granny Murray’s voice filled the foyer.

“Amen,” Grandma Astelle muttered.

But Granny Murray wasn’t alone.

“Oh fuck,” the CEO said when Hudson walked in. The older man’s face went white, and his chest rose and fell. He raised a shaking hand, like he’d seen a ghost of Christmas past, as Hudson regarded him from across the room.

“You—you sold me out. You sold me out,” Mr. Roscoe choked out. He turned to me, eyes wild. “Are you working with Grayson Richmond? After everything Roscoe Energy Solutions has done for your family?”

The VPs were freaking out.

Hudson let out a long breath.

“You know Hudson?” I was confused.

“Probably from the country club,” Hudson drawled.

“The country club? Everyone knows what your company does,” the CEO sputtered, looking like he wanted to bolt out a window.

“That data was clearly stolen. There will be jail time,” the head lawyer barked. “And you, Grace, you’re going away for a long time. Roscoe Energy will have its pound of flesh.”

The CEO seemed to rally. “Call the police. I know the prosecutor. We have to get ahead of this before the quarterly earnings report.”

“It’s right before Christmas for maximum chaos. Everyone who can handle it is out of town,” the VP of finance said in a low voice. “This couldn’t have happened at a worse time.”

“I don’t care. Make it happen. All of them, Hudson included, are going to jail. We’ll show the shareholders we have this situation under control.”

Hudson clicked his tongue, sauntering into the room to stop in front of the CEO.

“Not so fast. Because your company takes federal money, the release of these notebooks falls under the whistleblower laws. Of course, the incriminating material was handed straight over to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists.”

“Hudson, what are you doing here? I don’t understand,” I begged.

He ignored me.

“Those notebooks were given to me by a concerned employee, a Ms. Kelly O’Brien.”

“I knew it!” I shrieked.

“I didn’t give them to you,” Kelly argued.

“Yes, you did,” Hudson said, leveling his gaze at her. “You told me all about them, where they were, and that I, quote, just had to read them.”

“This … this—” the CEO stammered, looking frightened. “I need to go. Tell my assistant to book us a flight to South America.”

The men from Roscoe Energy Solutions practically ran out of the house.

Hudson’s mouth turned down at the corners as he watched them leave.

“Gracie,” he said, kneeling down in front of me. “Please let me explain.”

“Don’t even talk to me,” I snapped, jumping up, sending the papers flying. “I don’t want to hear you say it. I don’t want to hear you say it’s not what it looks like. Because it looks like you stole my private journals to what? Fuck with me? What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“We let you play hockey with us,” my brother added.

My family, normally noisy, was quiet, subdued, in shock at what had just happened.

His silvery gray eyes were sorrowful.

“Gracie, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I—It was—I’m sorry. I’ll help you. You can come live with me. We’ll find you a different job. I’ll take care of you. You can come work for me if you want. You would be perfect for my line of work. You can bring your cousin, too, even your grandmother.”

His expression was pleading.

“Your line of work,” I said slowly. “What do you even do?”

“I solve problems,” he said carefully.

“I’m a problem?” I spat.

He closed his eyes.

“No. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. I love you, Gracie. Please understand that. I don’t want to live without you. We can be happy together.”

“I am not working for you. You ruined my family’s company,” I screamed at him. “You stole from me. Wait.” Things started clicking into place as I realized I had no idea who Hudson was this entire time.

“The maintenance men. They worked for your company. They were trying to get access to our servers. Did you hack the servers? Did you hack my phone?”

He winced.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“Yes,” he admitted. “They work for me. And yes, we did access EnerCheck’s servers, but there wasn’t anything useful on there, Gracie, because you’re the one who made that place run. I’ve never met anyone like you. From the moment I saw you on the bus—”

“The bus?” I shrieked at him. “You orchestrated our meeting on the bus? You planned this whole fucking thing. You were just using me. This was all one big lie. You’re a monster!”

“I am a monster,” he said helplessly, “but it’s not a lie to say I fell for you, Gracie. I care about you, very much. I love you. I don’t want to lose you. You are the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“You’re fucking delusional. I would rather spend Christmas on a tropical island getting sunburnt than waste another minute with you.”

“I knew he didn’t actually love you. I knew it,” James crowed, chest puffed out like a cartoon rooster. “He wanted to take our family down, and you let him manipulate you.”

“It wasn’t like that, Gracie,” Hudson begged me.

On the muted TV, breaking news was being announced that Grayson Richmond was about to start a press conference. I stared at the screen as a green-eyed man with an expensive watch and an Italian wool coat stepped up to the microphones.

“Oh my god.” I turned to Hudson. “That’s him. Grayson Richmond is your friend from the bar.”

“We’re not friends,” he said quietly, standing up.

“So Grayson tried to ruin my company because he wants to, what, buy it? Make us pay for something? Did you insult him at a charity dinner or scrape up his car, Dad?”

“I’ve never seen that man before in my life,” My dad swore.

“Maybe you were mean to him at the country club?” I needed some sort of explanation for why my family and I had been targeted.

“Gracie,” Hudson said, crossing his arms, “none of this was about you or your company or your family. This was a stepping stone to ruin Roscoe Energy Solutions. You and your family are insignificant. You were collateral damage. It wasn’t personal.”

“Wasn’t personal?” I choked out. “You pretended to be my boyfriend so you could steal my journals. You tricked me and lied to me. We had sex, Hudson. That sounds pretty fucking personal. Wait. That night at your apartment …”

He looked away from me.

I was going to puke.

“I needed access to your laptop,” he said, voice barely above a whisper.

“Hudson Wynter, you are the worst man I have ever met. You ruined my life. I hate you.”

I started sobbing.

“Get out!” my aunt yelled at Hudson. “You’re going to hurt the baby.”

“The baby?” Hudson barked.

He grabbed my upper arm.

“Sugarplum, you think I ruined your life? You think you’re the blameless victim here? You’re the one who hired me to help you get revenge on your sister for sleeping with your ex-fiancé. You act like you’re mad that I’m a mercenary, but you were all too happy about it when people you hated were the target.”

He slammed an envelope full of money on the coffee table, the same envelope that had For Hudson written on it in my handwriting.

“News flash. Your life, Gracie, was already shit. Blowing up your dad’s company? I did you a favor. Now you can actually go out and live your life, away from your parents’ oppressive control.”

“They’re not controlling. They’re family.”

“Your family is fucking toxic,” he snarled.

“Just because you hate your family doesn’t mean that other people do. How’s this for a hot take? Maybe if you’d been a better son, your family would still want to talk to you,” I said hotly.

“You fucking—” He bared his teeth at me. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“No shit. Because you lie all the time.”

“I’m a liar? I’m an awful person?” he spat, looking over me. “Sugarplum, you’re the one who decided to fake a pregnancy.”

“It’s fake, Gracie? I’m not going to be a grandmother?” my mother asked in shock.

“Thank god,” my father muttered.

“I knew she was just fat,” my cousin Connie added.

I glared up at Hudson, chin trembling. Never had I hated anyone more in my life than Hudson Wynter at that moment.

Hudson shook his head.

“You’re as fucked up and as toxic as me, but you hide it behind your poor little spoiled holiday Cinderella routine when you, Gracie, are the creator of your own misery. You let these people use you and walk all over you so that you can be the martyr and be holier than though and play the victim.”

“And you”—I stabbed my index finger in his chest—“walk around with a chip on your shoulder, the coldhearted bad boy who’s too cool for Christmas and gets to fuck other people over just because they live in the nice part of town and like nice things.”

“You’re privileged and out of touch,” he shot back.

“Says someone who is literally a landlord. What else do you own in this town besides the Canning Factory, hmm? Fine. Don’t say anything. I’ll find out. You run around pretending to be a poor, exploited working-class American when really you and I aren’t so different after all,” I continued.

“I am different from you,” he shouted, slamming his hand down on the table. “You have happy Christmas memories. You want to know my last Christmas memory? My mom’s shitty boyfriend, who was way too interested in my five-year-old sister, fell asleep smoking and burned down our fucking house. I had to throw my siblings out of a window to save them. Then the police acted like I had set the fire and threw me in prison, in adult fucking prison, Gracie. That’s where I spent Christmas that year, and my siblings went into foster care. I don’t have a fucking collection of toys in my childhood bedroom because I don’t have shit from my childhood.”

He was breathing hard.

“Everything I have is because I worked for it. I don’t get caught up in petty shit like someone sleeping with my fiancé, because I have too much real shit I’m dealing with. You should have just taken a hockey stick to James’s face and been done with it. But no, you wanted someone else to do your dirty work for you, so that you can stay the blameless, pure, good-girl virgin.”

“Hear, hear!” one of my uncles shouted, setting off the singing, dancing Santa.

“You mean like how you made me do your dirty work so you could suck up to your nonfriend the billionaire? Now who’s being a martyr? How much money did you make off of me?” I screamed at him. “Tell me.”

He looked away, lips thin.

“Tell me,” I demanded.

“Five and a half million.”

“Five and a half—well. All right then. I guess I’d sell out a random stranger for that amount of money too,” I said snidely. “Merry fucking Christmas. Go buy yourself something nice.”

“Fuck you, Gracie. I hate my job, I hate Grayson, and I hate Christmas, and you better turn off that fucking singing Santa,” he said, making a knife hand at the dancing decoration, “before I throw it out the fucking window.”

“I don’t hate Christmas, but I hate you. I hate your stupid jeans and your boots and the fact that you can’t wear underwear like a normal fucking person. Also all your tattoos are trashy.”

“Fine. I hate your flannel pajamas and all those mice in your bedroom—it’s sick. I hate the Christmas cookies and those aprons you wear and all the desserts you bake. Who needs 3,000 Christmas cookies?”

“Oh yeah?” I screamed at him. “I wish I’d fucked your brothers instead of you. All of them. All at once.”

“Fuck you,” he roared.

“All your brothers are all hotter than you, and they smell better, and they’re taller.”

He flipped me off and grabbed his helmet, pushing through my stunned family members.

“Fuck you and your entire shitty family. Not you, you’re actually cool, Granny Murray,” he said to her.

“Right on.” Granny Murray gave him a thumbs-up.

“Don’t talk to him,” I shrieked at her.

Hudson slammed the door behind him. The china in the cabinets shook.

I struggled to open the window to scream at him as he climbed on the black motorcycle.

“Fuck you, Hudson Wynter. I hope Santa drop-kicks you off a roof!”