“No, I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s just—it gets old when people look at me and assume I’m dumb. I’ve kind of had it with that.”

“Yeah. Okay.” He nodded. “Consider me enlightened.”

“I will.” I set my cup on the counter. “Consider this a free coffee, then.”

He smiled. “I will.”

That night, I’d just finished tucking Brett into bed and Gretchen was about to read him a bedtime story when the doorbell rang. “That’s odd,” Gretchen said. “Look out the glass before you open the door, okay?”

“I always do,” I assured her, trying not to get aggravated by the fact she still treated me as if I couldn’t take care of myself.

“Who is it, who is it?” Brett chanted as I hurried down the stairs. Bear was barking like crazy, and racing back and forth in front of the door.

I peered through the windows and saw Sean standing on the doorstep. He waved at me, and I opened the door slowly. “Hey, what are you—”

Bear leaped at him, nearly knocking him over, then ran past him to Conor, who was standing behind Sean and holding a sled.

“Come on! Let’s go sledding!” Sean cried.

Conor gave me a look, like: I don’t really want to be doing this. I was talked into it.

I wasn’t so sure I wanted to do anything with the two of them, either, considering the way they bickered. But, then again: sledding with the Benson boys? I hadn’t had a better offer all year. Or all last year, either.

“Hold on—let me get my boots and coat, okay?” I pulled the door open wider. “Come on in and have a seat.”

“It’s okay, we’ll hang out here,” Sean said. “Just hurry!”

I ran to Brett’s room to let Gretchen know where I was going. “Have fun. Be careful though,” she said. “Don’t break—”

“Anything. Anything at all,” I said. I grabbed my boots, slid into them, and picked up my new, striped scarf, mittens and jacket.

“This is so great!” I said as I stepped out the door and zipped up my coat.

“You like sledding?” Sean asked.

“Oh yeah. I’m all about the sledding,” I said as we started walking down the street.

“You keep saying that. How can you be ‘all about’ everything?” Conor asked.

I cast him an irritated glance. “I’m multi-faceted,” I said. “Is that so wrong?”

“Oh, no. I’m all about being multi-faceted,” Conor teased.

I ignored him and turned my attention back to Sean. “So, where are we going?”

“Minnehaha Falls,” Conor announced. “They’re frozen this time of year. It’ll be an adventure—we’ll just go sliding straight down the creek and then—”

“No, I don’t think so,” Sean said.

“Come on. Live a little,” Conor urged him.

“No way! We’d kill ourselves,” he said.

“Yeah. No kidding, genius. I was just joking,” Conor said. “Just trying to liven things up. Don’t worry, this hill is a little tamer than that,” he said to me as he shifted the sled from his left arm to his right.

“It’s a place where tons of people go, so we’ll probably run into some friends,” Sean said.

“Oh. Well, cool,” I said.

We trekked through a couple of crusty snow drifts, then crossed Minnehaha Creek, where a small kids’ bike was frozen into the ice.

“Is anyone else thinking of that Shackleton movie?” I asked.

“What Shackleton movie?” Sean asked, taking my hand and helping me up the steep bank. “Who’s Shackleton?”

“You know, at the science museum last year—or was it the year before? Anyway, it was really big on TV, too. The Antarctic survival thing.”

“Didn’t see it,” Sean said. “Never heard of it.”

“You’ve never heard of Shackleton?” I asked. “Are you serious? Do you live under a rock?”

“He does,” Conor said. “It crushed his brain.”

“Shut up.” Sean pushed him, and after wrestling for a few seconds, Conor went down headfirst into the snow. We left him there and kept hiking up the hill.

“I’ve read Endurance. It’s an amazing story,” Conor went on as he caught up to us, seemingly unfazed by being dumped into a snowbank by his brother.

The three of us stood at the top of a long hill. There were grooves in the snow from other people sledding here before us, and some large mounds that had been built up to make the sledding more exciting.

“Okay, so I just have one question before we get started,” Sean said with a grin. He dropped the plastic saucer he was carrying, while Conor set down the wooden sled.

“What’s that?” I asked. I figured he’d ask which way I wanted to slide—by sled or saucer.

“Do you have enough clothes on?” Sean said.

“What?” I laughed.

“I don’t want you getting all frozen after we go down the hill a few times.”

“Give me a break.” Conor sighed loudly, disgusted by the two of us, I guess.

“You know, you can go home anytime,” Sean told him.

“So can you,” Conor replied.

“Shut up.”

“You shut up.”

Since they looked like they might start duking it out at any moment, I decided to intervene. While they were busy arguing, I molded a couple of snowballs and tossed one at each of them. Then, once they were distracted, I hopped onto the saucer and started sliding and swirling down the hill. By the time I reached the bottom of the hill, laughing and yelling, I was turned all the way around and facing backward. I looked back up just in time to see Sean grab the sled from Conor and come hurtling toward me.

I jumped out of the way just as Sean tried to veer on the sled. He ended up flipping onto his side and coming to an abrupt stop.

“Nice driving,” I teased him.

“Oh, yeah? You try,” he replied, brushing snow off his jeans. He jogged over to me and promptly tried to stuff a handful of snow down my back.

“Nooooo!” I cried as the snow moved from my jacket collar right under my sweater and onto my skin.

“Benson! What are you doing to that poor girl?” a voice called out.

Sean turned to a group of figures heading our way in the dark. “Hey! What’s up?”

“Hey, guys,” Conor said as the group trudged closer.

Four guys stopped in front of us and I exchanged an awkward smile with a couple of them.

“You going to introduce us or what?” one of them asked.

“This is Kirsten. She’s visiting for a month or so,” Sean explained.

“Hey,” the group said, almost in unison, like they’d done this before and had a routine.

“Hi,” I said with a little wave.

“How’s it going?” one of them asked.

“Cold,” I said. I smiled as I saw that one of the guys was pulling a long wooden toboggan.

At the top of the hill, we all piled onto the toboggan. At Sean’s urging, I got on after he did, and as we shifted to get comfortable, I put my arms around Sean’s waist and draped my legs over his. This was very comfortable, as far as I was concerned. A little on the outer-flirt-edge of things for me, but I could handle it.

“Room for one more,” one of the guys announced.

Then Conor got on behind me.

Suddenly I was in the middle of a Benson Boys sandwich.

This couldn’t be good, I thought. Then again, it wasn’t all bad. Conor kept a respectable distance, just looping his arms around my waist very loosely, and acting like he hated every minute of it. At least I knew him, so it wasn’t like having one of the other guys that close to me.

We got a big push from one of the guys, and six of us went hurtling down the hill. The guy in front steered us straight over the biggest bump—and we capsized, all of us flying off into the snow.

I came down with a thud, right on top of Sean. We were lying face to face.

I smiled at Sean, who was grinning at me. Then I leaned forward and brushed his lips with a kiss.

He didn’t move at first, not that he could. I pulled back for a second and looked at him. He looked a little surprised, like he wasn’t sure about all this. So I leaned down to kiss him again, and he was just starting to kiss me back—

And my cell phone rang.

Cursed!