53 pages • 1 hour read
A Merry Little Meet Cute
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Symbols & Motifs
Christmas Notch
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of R-rated sexual content.
Christmas Notch, a small fictional town in Vermont, is the main setting of A Merry Little Meet Cute. This imaginary town is a popular film location for holiday movies for the Hope Channel and, as such, symbolizes bucolic sweetness, rural simplicity, and holiday cheer, the exact opposite of busy, cosmopolitan, sophisticated Los Angeles, where the characters normally live. This contrast highlights the tension between the supposedly wholesome entertainment on offer in Christmas Notch and through the movies of the Hope Channel and its “image and brand as a source of clean holiday entertainment for the whole family” (355), as opposed to the “raunchy” adult entertainment industry that Teddy, Bee, Sunny, and Luca participate in. As such, the town acts as a parody of the film industry and of the moral hypocrisies that that industry reflects and propagates.
The town also provides an incongruous and self-consciously fantastical setting for the protagonists’ meet-cute, characteristic of the romantic comedy genre. Nolan’s perceptions of Christmas Notch note its old-fashioned charm: “Nestled against the picturesque backdrop of snowy mountains and pristine forest, the small town was a pretty clutch of brick buildings, glass-fronted shops, and gorgeous Victorian houses” (22). Christmas Notch is described as staying in the Christmas season all year with decorations and music, as well as its nod to the season with the names of local businesses. The strong element of fantasy and fabrication in Christmas Notch offers a place for Nolan and Bee to act out their fantasy of being together, which is, at first, a form of wish fulfillment for both. In addition, the Christmas backdrop supports the novel’s examination of the meaning of the holiday and its conclusion that the season is about love and giving, a message that underlies the novel’s purpose as a romance.
Bee’s Sex Toy Suitcase
Bee’s suitcase of sex toys is featured in various points in the narrative. It is a symbol of Bee’s complex emotions regarding her work; as such, its meaning follows the dynamism of her character arc. At first, the suitcase provides shorthand context and exposition for her job as a sex worker, but, increasingly, it comes to symbolize the pleasure she feels at being with Nolan in a private, non-professional capacity. While the suitcases of sex toys are part of Bee’s Los Angeles life and first appear when she is packing for her trip to Vermont, she also brings some of her toys to Christmas Notch, indicating that Bee hopes for an opportunity to use them, either for her own private enjoyment, for performances for her ClosedDoors account, or both. This is a foreshadowing of the culture-clash tensions of the novel.
This symbol follows a similar dynamic in relation to Nolan. To him, the suitcase of toys initially signals Bee’s skill and experience as a professional performer, a synecdoche for the Bianca von Honey identity of which he is an enthusiastic fan. By the end of the book, when Nolan references Bee’s suitcase, the toys have come to represent the pleasure that the two take in each other as the real Bee and Nolan, not their performer identities. The toys illustrate the joyful aspect of sex between them, as the physical intimacy is just one aspect of the bond they’ve formed.
Conversely, the suitcase mirrors the emotional “baggage” that Bee carries about her work as Bianca von Honey. In particular, it represents the emotional weight of the need she feels to keep this identity confined to her audience and subscribers, in order to avoid censure or condemnation. Once her secret identity is assimilated, the negative element of this symbol is neutralized.
The Wedding Dress
Bee wears the wedding dress as a costume for her role as Felicity in Duke the Halls. It is a symbol of deep, long-lasting connection and aspirational hope or fantasy. For Bee, the dress symbolizes the fantasy that she is living out in her bid to become a mainstream actor and her hopes of developing a continuing relationship with Nolan. Similarly, the gown reflects Luca’s love and appreciation for Bee, demonstrated by the care with which he constructs the gown for her, and is representative of his own professional aspirations and skills.
These symbolic meanings are made explicit through Bee’s first-person perspective. She is wearing the dress during a sexual encounter with Nolan inside the chapel film location, at which point Bee finds the dress evoking the unspoken hopes she has for a committed relationship with Nolan. Thus, the dress foreshadows the novel’s romantic resolution and is the promise of a lasting relationship: This is borne out in the Epilogue, in which they have committed to living together. Bee and Nolan’s marriage opens the third novel in the series, A Jingle Bell Mingle (2024), delivering the culmination of the fantasy and the happy ending promised by the romance genre and, often, the holiday movie. This brings the wedding dress symbol to its ultimate conclusion.
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