“Oooh, I like this one.” Aunt Daisy playfully waves a cheetah print vest.
“Or this one.” Aunt Lily scoots out from the bottom of my closet with a tulle mint-green skirt.
And ladies and gentlemen, behind me is a sword, a cannon blast, a shoulder to cry on, a stroke of hope—my mom.
In a form-fitting black dress, long matte black nails, and dark rouge lipstick, Rose Calloway Cobalt stands pin-straight, her posture stiff and rigid. And cold. But she wields such deep love for me in her piercing yellow-green eyes.
I watch her through my vanity mirror. She curls my hair. Methodical and slow, but she snaps the curling iron at her sisters. “Don’t confuse her.”
It is all very confusing.
I’m about to meet Thatcher’s entire family. His mom, stepmom, cousins, uncles, and aunts. The only person missing in action will be his dad.
Pressure is a creature I know good and well, but I find myself caring about how his family perceives me, most of all.
I glance between the skirt and vest. “I like them both, really. They’d look perfectly un-matching together.” Which is what I love best.
“Wow, we’re like stylists,” Daisy says, giving Lily a silly grin and wagging her brows.
Lily takes a sip from a can of Diet Fizz. “Must be why I’m wearing…” She has to look down to remember what she’s dressed in today. “Leggings and…” She frowns as she inspects the Spider-Man T-shirt. “Uh, I think this is Lo’s? Everything gets mixed up in the wash.”
“So true.” Daisy plucks a cat-ear headband off my mirror and places it atop her head. Blonde hair chopped bluntly a little below her shoulders. She smiles at me, radiant like the sun.
My cheeks always hurt when I’m around all of them. But I’ve smiled far less today. Pressure keeps sinking my stomach.
My mom finishes my hair. “You’re done, gremlin.”
All three women turn to look at me as I stand and approach my closet door’s full-length mirror.
Brown waves cascade on my collarbones, frizz successfully combatted. More presentable for a meet-the-parents dinner. This is my best foot forward.
I untie my cotton robe, a little hot all of a sudden. “What if I’m so awfully verbose and I annoy them?”
My mom snaps a glare at me through the mirror. “You’re not too verbose. You’re words are an asset.” She speaks like it’s written in stone and blood and all indelible things. “And if they don’t like you, then that says more about them than you.”
I love that she doesn’t tell me they will love me and give me a false sense of confidence. She lays battle armor on my shoulders.
Sometimes I feel as though I’m the daughter of Joan of Arc. Ready for war.
I try to take a breath. Another insecurity rises. “What if they hate me?” A good portion of the world does, and I catch all three sisters glancing cautiously at each other.
I spin on my heels. “I recognize that I’m only fake dating Thatcher—it’s not serious between us.” Do I sound defensive?
My eyes bug.
I keep going. “We will break up soon. We will. It is in the stars.” My collarbones protrude, my eyes burn. “But his family is special to him, and he’s my bodyguard. I’d rather them not hate me.”
“If they judge you that harshly after one meal, you don’t want to be loved by them,” my mom retorts.
Lily nods repeatedly. “What Rose said.”
Daisy looks at my mom. “Didn’t you throw wine on your mother-in-law’s blouse when you first met her?”
My lips rise, remembering this story.
My mom sighs at the memory, then flips her hair off her shoulder. “And I prevailed.”
“See,” Daisy smiles at me. “You could throw wine on someone, and all could end miraculously.”
I breathe in their encouragements the best I can.
“How are you doing with the fake dating thing?” Lily asks. All of them thought the ploy was a good idea.
I remember the notes he’s been leaving me, and I smile. “It’s worked rather well.”
My mom crosses her arms. “Security told me it’s dispelled some potential stalkers.”
“It has.”
Only a handful remain. Thatcher and the rest of security are taking care of them.
“So it was worth it then?” Daisy asks, adjusting the cat ears. “Fake dating your bodyguard?”
I picture all the nights we’ve spent together. “Yes, I’d say so.” I sound more morose than I intend.
Lily frowns deeply. “You know, you don’t have to go meet his family. If it’d be easier, you could just come up with an excuse.”
“Like a cold or 24-hour flu,” Daisy offers.
That thought sends a wave of knives into my stomach. “Why would that be easier?” I take the skirt and vest from their hands.
“Because,” my mom says icily, “you’re going to be lying to them. All of them.”
I’m going to be lying to his family.
To their faces. None of them think this is a fake relationship. His family believes we’re really together.
I understand now. My aunts and my mom are concerned about me. They want to protect me from this deception. In truth, I haven’t felt like I was going over there to lie or fabricate some story.
I haven’t been nervous about that.
I’m just nervous they won’t like me.
And I’m already lying to the people in front of me. The ones I love most. Who have no idea that I’ve been intimate with my bodyguard.
But I’m not alone in this. Thatcher and I are ensnared, and that has a comfort all its own.
I force out the words, “I want to go. Even if it’s hard.”
42
THATCHER MORETTI
“Ah, you buncha loud mouths. Statazitt’! I’m tryin’ to make a toast here.” One of my uncles raises his brash voice above the other fucking brash voices.
Songs by Lou Monte play right on top of that. “Hey Gumbaree” blaring at the current moment.
It’s all an Italian earful. And it’s home.
Sunday family dinner is a weekly gathering at my Uncle Joe’s row house. Braggiol’ already eaten, dishes cleared—after the meal, the women stay clustered around the table drinking coffee and eating cream pie.
Jane is in sight while I hang around the kitchen with Banks and the other men. More wine bottles being uncorked and poured. But my gaze is gripped on her.
How she laughs with the women, talks breezily and bows toward every person at the dining table. Making all of them feel like they’re her sole focus.
Those women are deserving of her gaze.
And Jane doesn’t realize just how much she can make people feel loved in a single glance. My mom has a hand on Jane’s arm while they talk into brighter laughter.
My grandma’s rosy cheeks are in a perpetual smile, and Nicola, my stepmom, sees me watching and mouths, we love her.
I thought she’d fit in, but seeing it happen is something else. Surreal. Overwhelming. Conflicting—because I shouldn’t be emotionally invested in this picture.
It’s supposed to only happen one time. One fucking time.
That’s all we get.
My mom catches my gaze and shoos me with the swat of her hand. Her words are inaudible from the ear-splitting commotion around me. But I read her lips: Go, go.
I rotate. Just slightly. Standing near the coffee pot, Banks and I still tower but not as much here. Most men are tall and in occupations that require us to stay fit. Bodies built.
Multiple conversations are happening at once, and I tune into the closest one. Talking about car trackers. They think paparazzi bugged my mom’s vehicle.
“How else could they’ve known she’d be at the bank?”
Guilt tries to ride me like a fucking buck-toothed hitchhiker. Don’t let it. I knew the risks of going public.
I cut in, “Paparazzi probably followed her from the shop. Her job is public information.” My mom used to be a bookkeeper at an auto mechanic shop. Until they finally let her, a woman, work as a mechanic.
“Are we sure?” Uncle Joe asks.
Banks fists a beer. “I already checked her vehicle. I didn’t find anything.”