29. Maureen
Chapter twenty-nine
Maureen
I smiled at the elegant woman in the impeccably tailored pantsuit who reached forward to take my hand.
From behind me, I heard the shock in Will’s voice.
“Mother, you know Francesca?”
“Of course I know Francesca.” She dropped her hand, but the enthusiasm on her face remained. “I love her videos, and especially how she isn’t afraid to focus on fashion for women of a certain age.”
I fidgeted, running my hands over my hair. “Thank you for the compliment. It’s rare for me to run into a fan in the wild.”
Will stepped forward. “Maureen, let me introduce you to my parents, Iris and Andrew.”
“Pleasure to meet you.” I reached to shake Andrew’s hand. He looked like a silver-haired version of his son, only with a straitlaced accountant aesthetic as opposed to Will’s trendier vibe.
He gripped my palm and pumped his arm up and down a few times, but his expression remained blank. “We didn’t realize William was…dating someone. He never mentioned anything.”
“It’s new.” I bit my lip. Hopefully, this surprise didn’t affect the progress Will made today with his parents.
“Ah,” Iris hummed, leading her husband farther into the room.
“So, you two are seeing each other?” Andrew’s question, directed at Will, came across as an accusation. “We’re so far apart you hid a girlfriend from us?”
“Yes, we are dating. But I wasn’t hiding it. I absolutely want you both to get to know my…girlfriend.” Will smiled slyly at me. “Like Maureen said, it’s just early days. And to be clear, this falls under the category of things you trust me on.”
Andrew nodded at his son’s response, his shoulders relaxing. Will wore a subtly triumphant expression, which I interpreted as: Wow. I effectively communicated with my father .
Iris clapped her hands together in front of her chest. “Well, of course we trust you when we see this lovely young woman in front of us. This is the best news I’ve heard all week. I can’t believe you’re dating Francesca.”
“Remember—it’s Maureen. Francesca is a stage name,” Will said, wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling me to him.
“Maureen.” His mom spoke airily. “That’s pretty.”
“Thank you. Francesca is my middle name, after my late father, Frank.”
Andrew cleared his throat. “How did the two of you meet?”
“Maureen is James’s future sister-in-law,” Will said. “We’ve known each other for a while.”
Not a lie, although nowhere near the whole truth. I knew without asking that Will’s parents would never learn the full story of how I met their son. It was enough that Marley, James, Bren, and Chase knew. That would be the extent of the circle.
“You’re Marley’s sister?” Iris asked. “Was it you who took care of William last week, after his fall?”
“I helped. Along with my sister and James. I also drove Will’s car back to the city to spare him the long drive.”
“Oh, that’s right. You’re local. Francesca’s videos are in Seattle.”
“It sounds like this relationship is serious.” Will’s dad interjected, more in summation than as a question.
“We just made it offi—” I started.
“Very serious,” Will asserted. “Newly official, like we said, but very, very serious.”
“Well, Maureen—forgive me if I accidentally call you Francesca—I am happy to meet you, and to find out William is dating someone.” Iris turned to her husband. “I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of those videos I’ve watched, but this young lady does some wonderful man-on-the-street type interviews.”
Andrew looked at me. “I can’t say I ever watch the YouTube like my wife does, but if she says you’re good, then I know you are.”
“Father, it’s not ‘the YouTube,’ it’s just YouTube.”
As Andrew opened his mouth to reply, a sharp knock came at the door. Will answered, finding Bren.
“Hey, Will! Is Maureen here?”
Uh-oh. Bren had that excited puppy energy. Something was either very right or very wrong.
“Yeah. My parents are here too. What’s up?”
Bren barreled into the living room, sparing a few quick hellos for Will’s parents before thrusting her phone in my face.
“You hit a million views!”
“What!?” I pulled the phone out of her hands.
“Almost 1.1 million so far! It helps that Stone Caseman shared it first, but now other people are too. It’s just one of those weird things that’s going viral for the holidays. Like cats destroying ornaments or toddlers only being interested in the boxes. Not only that, but the video of your divorced friend is also getting a lot of hits. People like her attitude, and it doesn’t hurt that she’s a knockout.”
I smiled, thinking about how Katy would have appreciated Bren’s assessment.
I’d made a point to stay off my page all day. If comments were negative, or if the weirdos had come out to play, I didn’t want to know about it while I was busy dealing with Will. I’d barely had time to process that he loved me. That I was his girlfriend. Now I was meeting his parents and my YouTube channel—which had been flying under the radar for years—was suddenly blowing up. Talk about a Christmas to remember.
“I watched that video this morning.” Iris came forward and eyed the numbers on Bren’s screen. “A lovely little slice of holiday Americana.”
I pulled out my phone. There were hundreds of thousands of interactions with the video, and I’d received a flood of messages.
“Oh my goodness,” I said, after reading through the first few dozen. “A lot of these are from people asking me to do styling sessions with them. There are even some from other countries.”
“Makes sense,” Bren reasoned. “If they looked at your other stuff on the channel after getting lured in by your small-town, aw-shucks schtick, they’d see how awesome and positive you are. Country in the city, but not a total hick.”
I side-eyed my best friend. “Watch it.”
Bren pinched her index finger and thumb together, leaving a half inch of space between them. “Just this much of a hick. Mostly cool.”
I snorted. “Seriously. People are offering me money to look at their outfits and their closets.”
“Of course they are,” Will said proudly. “You’re amazing.”
I scrolled through more of the messages. But my initial enthusiasm faded as memories from Kolya’s flooded me. The store had offered a styling service. Most of the clientele had been wealthy people who wanted help choosing designer labels and pricey vintage pieces.
Will’s warm hand landed on my shoulder as he read my face. “I meant it when I said I’d help you with a business plan. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. Or work with anyone you don’t want to.”
“Yes. Listen to William. Because if anyone knows about turning down lucrative business in favor of following the whims of one’s heart, it’s him.” Andrew’s tone was dry, but his eyes danced.
I’d worried that Will’s parents might be too set in their ways to change. Obviously, the opposite was true. They were clearly trying to meet him on his level.
I surprised myself by realizing I wanted to get to know them better.
Everything between Will and me was moving fast, and while it felt good, I couldn’t risk another misunderstanding. It was comically past time to tell him about my decision to move to Coleman Creek. I needed to get him alone.
“Hey, Bren, thanks so much for letting me know about the video, but Will and I actually had plans to go out tonight.”
“Oh, sorry! I just got excited and wanted to tell you. I’m on my meal break anyway and need to get back to the bar.”
“No worries.” She headed toward the door.
Iris picked up her bag from the counter. “I’ve never been happier to have forgotten my purse.” She slipped it over her shoulder and turned to me. “I’m so glad my son had you to help him this week.” Eyes teary, she added, “I appreciate knowing someone else is in his corner. I didn’t realize how much I needed that until today.” She gave my arm a gentle squeeze.
“We’ll get out of your hair so you can enjoy your night,” Andrew said, briefly clasping Will on the back before the couple retreated into the hallway. “But we’d love to have you two for dinner soon.”
“If Maureen’s okay with it, I’d like that,” Will responded.
“Definitely,” I agreed.
After they left, Will shut the door and rested his forehead against it. “This has been a surreal day. In a good way.”
I circled my arms around his waist, resting my chin between his shoulder blades. “It has.”
“I’m feeling like I want to push my luck.”
“Huh?”
Will shifted to face me before leading us both over to sit on the couch. “I have a present for you. I was saving it for when you went back to Coleman Creek for Christmas, but that was before I realized this would be the day we made love for the first time, the day I told you I loved you, the day I made strides with my parents, the day they met you, the day your vlog took off.”
My mouth turned down. “But I don’t have anything for you. I haven’t had a chance yet.”
He hmphed. “Maureen, nothing you could give me could top today and everything you’ve already given me.”
Will reached into the small drawer built into the side table. He pulled out a rectangle wrapped in shiny green paper, about eight by ten inches, and handed it to me.
“I drew a picture of us,” he said, pulling me onto his lap.
I ran my finger underneath the tape. As I unfolded the edges, I expected to find a portrait-style drawing.
Instead, as the frame revealed itself, I found a picture of our hands. Only our hands. His scarred palm held softly in mine. The background was a kaleidoscope of grays, but the hands themselves appeared bathed in light. Even in the two-dimensional rendering, the features were so detailed, I could envision my thumb moving along his skin, as it had done so many times in real life. The drawing perfectly captured the roughness of his knuckles, the small hairs there, along with my fingers and nude manicure.
“This is us?” I asked.
“This captures how I feel when I’m with you.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“No one has ever made me feel as okay as you do. Five years ago, and especially now.”
I kept my eyes on the glass in my hands. “I love it.”
He sat up straighter and brushed my hair behind my neck, causing a shiver. “In high school, I drew a lot of my favorite characters from movies and books. It helped me escape the bullying, like a fantasy world I could retreat to. After my accident, I started drawing places from my childhood that meant something. I think that was my way of finding a bit of the old me in all the numbness. Last week, I felt inspired in a way I haven’t in a long time. I drew everything around me—Bambi, Oscar, James grading papers, Marley laughing, the Christmas trees. You. Art has always been a sort of therapy for me, not just a creative outlet.”
“I feel that way about Francesca.”
“I’ve always been compelled to draw things that feel like home, that make me feel safe.”
My breath hitched as I glanced down again at our hands in the frame. “Thank you,” I whispered.
“Look at the way you hold my scarred hand, Maureen. Look at the way you make me want to bring it into the light.”
He lifted his right hand and ran the three fingers across my cheek, underneath my jaw, resting the remains of his pinky and ring finger under my chin. I closed my eyes and leaned into the touch, tipping my cheek into his palm.
“Having you in my life is a gift,” he said quietly. “I won’t fuck it up again.”
I flicked my eyes upward as he leaned in to press his mouth to mine. His lips were soft and reverent as they worked against mine unhurriedly. He didn’t deepen the kiss. Instead, he pulled back, pressing his cheek against mine. He then added a kiss to the shell of my ear. “Merry Christmas.”
It had been an incredible day. The most perfect one I could have ever imagined.
I just hoped I wasn’t about to ruin it all.