Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
M om!” I called out when Frankie and I walked into my childhood home.
“We’re here.” I wandered through the clutter of furniture, knickknacks, and plants to find her in the kitchen singing Paula Abdul and dancing around with flour coating every free surface, her hands, and the once brightly colored flower apron she had owned my whole life. “You can make pasta?”
“Oh, Lily. Frankie.” She dropped the pile of fresh spaghetti into her pot of water and came to hug us.
Without cleaning up first.
I tried not to cringe away from my mom, but I must not have succeeded because she stopped and turned to the sink.
“I just learned from Alfonso. I met him at the farmer’s market. He had the cutest little stand selling homemade sauces. Oh, and that Italian accent,” she said a bit dreamily.
“Where’s dad?”
“Mm, Italians,” Frankie said, as we both took a seat at the island to help chop veggies for the salad.
“In his office, probably signing us up for cooking classes. You should have seen the look on his face when Alfonso offered to help knead the dough.” She giggled.
“Gross,” Frankie said.
“I don’t understand you two.” I just shook my head and focused on chopping a cucumber.
“I know, sweetie, but hopefully, someday, you will have someone special as well.” She walked around to me, and I tried not to cringe back from the flour still coating her.
I nearly fell off my seat trying to avoid it.
Thankfully, she didn’t hug me, but grabbed the cutting board with my chopped veggies on it instead.
“I don’t need someone special. I just need good sex.”
Frankie snickered beside me. “And you have a plan for that.”
“Plan? What’s this about a plan? You should be with someone special. I thought you had a hard time finding someone you can trust enough to be close to?” She stirred the pot of sauce, and the tangy and rich smell made my stomach rumble.
“Oh, she has someone special alright.” Frankie spun the tomato she was supposed to cut as she poorly concealed her laughter. I kicked her under the bar.
“I don’t need someone ‘special,’ whatever that even means. I just need someone I can trust. That’s why I’m going to have sex with Duke,” I explained in the most logical and straightforward way I could.
I plucked a few leaves from the fresh basil sitting on the counter under a grow light. The strong, spicy smell relaxed me, and I felt my shoulders drop at the comfort it brought.
A sharp clatter assaulted my ears, and when I looked up from the plant, my mom stared at me like I’d grown a second head.
“Did you say you’re going to have sex with Duke?
” Red painted the floor at her feet and splattered across the white cabinets and stainless steel.
She didn’t move, so I stood and walked over to clean the mess before it stained.
Or it drove me crazy. One of those was going to happen if I didn’t clean this up right now.
“That was my reaction,” Frankie said, still playing with the food she should have been cutting.
“No, it wasn’t. You laughed at me and then left me hungover and confused at the dining room table.” I rinsed out my rag and my mom finally moved to help me clean it up.
“Same thing.” She shrugged and finally started cutting that tomato.
“Yes, Duke and I are going to have sex. One month and we just go back to being friends.” I tried to be patient with them, but they didn’t seem to get it. “Do you think he wouldn’t want to have sex with me?”
Frankie snorted, but said nothing as she took her tomato slices to the salad.
“No, sweetie. No one thinks that. Of course, he would want to have sex with you. It’s just…
surprising after so many years of friendship between you two.
” She looked at me with pity. I think. I didn’t like the look.
It made me feel like I wasn’t… normal. I didn’t need that right now. Not from my mother.
“How can it be both surprising and perfectly logical?” I lashed out in my frustration. Why did no one see how perfectly reasonable this was?
“We just want to make sure you’re sure about this,” she explained, as if that made her reaction better.
“He’s not exactly discerning in his choice of partners,” Frankie chimed in from her perch on her barstool, not helping with anything again.
“Exactly,” my mom said, pointing the sauce spoon at Frankie and splashing more marinara—on the counter this time.
I didn’t know what to make of that. Were they implying I was ‘just anyone?’ That the only reason he would do this is because he didn’t care who he had sex with? A little worm of doubt started wiggling in me, but I pushed it down. I picked him because of his experience, not despite it.
“Look, I’m thirty years old and I’m not looking for anyone’s permission. I just thought I would share something big with the other women in my life. Isn’t that what we are supposed to do?”
I snatched my phone off the counter and stomped over to the couch, done with them for now, and admittedly doubting myself.
I stared at my chat with Duke and wondered if I should text him and call this whole thing off. What if he saw me as just another woman to have fun with?
lily
can you get tested?
duke
I regularly do. want me to send my latest results over?
lily
Yes
I have an IUD
duke
I had a vasectomy years go
lily
good no babies
Maybe I shouldn’t care. Maybe I should care and didn’t care enough. My grand plan didn’t seem so great right now, and anxiety warred with my previous resolve.
lily
what if this is a mistake?
duke:
then we stop
lily
right
We had an out. We could stop this at any time and go back to being friends.
duke
did something happen? are you ok? just say the word and I’ll shoot whoever is making you upset.
lily
you can’t shoot frankie and my mom!
duke
I assure you I can. I’m very skilled. bet I could do it in one shot too
I laughed and relaxed back into the old familiar couch for the first time since coming here.
lily
I would be sad
duke
I would comfort you
and aim for the leg. Easy healing
seriously though if you’re having any doubts we just don’t do anything
and I help you find someone else
lily
you would do that? why haven’t you offered before?
duke
I didn’t know you needed my help. you’re a beautiful, accomplished woman.
lily
you don’t need to flatter me. The sex isn’t dependent on that.
duke
someone needs to
“What are you smiling at?” My mom asked as she handed me water. She and Frankie had a glass of red wine, and I wrinkled my nose at the smell, even from here.
“Just a message.”
“From Duke?” Frankie asked, wagging her eyebrows.
“Yes.”
I messaged him all the time. I even smiled when I did. That shouldn’t have to change just because we were going to have sex. Why did they have to make this so… embarrassing?
“Lily! Frankie!” my dad practically shouted as he walked into the room, saving me further embarrassment at the hands of my supposed family and friends.
“Mr. Jameson! Lovely wine you have.” Frankie raised her glass to him before taking another large drink of it.
“Slow down. You drove,” I said as I eyed the almost empty glass.
“Looks like you’re going to have to put that useless license to work and be the one to drive.” She raised her glass to me before downing the rest.
“I’ll walk. ”
This was a regular conversation between us. Frankie happily drove me everywhere, but she didn’t understand why I wouldn’t drive myself. How am I supposed to explain that it’s overwhelming?
Finding the right pressure and just the right degree to turn the wheel and predicting what all the other drivers were doing and when the light might change to red and if that kid is going to run out in front of me or keep playing nicely in the yard and—it was just too much.
She rolled her eyes but agreed to limit herself to just two glasses, anyway.
“So how was it?” Frankie asked while my parents playfully bickered over nonsense in the kitchen while they set the table.
“How was what?”
“Did you kiss him?” She moved over to sit near me on the couch so we wouldn’t have to talk loudly, as if we were seventeen again. Not that we ever gossiped then. More like she told me everything, and I tried to keep up.
“Yes.” I blushed, thinking of it.
“And…”
“Obviously, it went well enough to have sex.” I whispered the last word. It was one thing to talk to my mom about it, but my dad was within hearing range.
She rolled her eyes at me and slouched back on the couch.
“This is one of those things where you tell me everything. How it felt, was he good, did he use tongue? We would have gone over this when we were teens, but well…”
“Yeah, yeah. Ok, fine.” I turned toward her and pulled my feet under me, trying to remember how they did this in the movies. “It was good. I sat on his lap. He put his hand on my hip and his other hand in my hair. He used his tongue.”
She stared for a minute. “We will work on delivery. You left out how it felt.”
“Right.” I closed my eyes and thought back to the kiss, trying to remember the feel of his lips on mine.
I knew she meant emotional feelings and not touch feelings, but I wasn’t good at that.
I needed a minute to gather my thoughts.
“I felt all woozy and happy, like, like I never wanted it to stop.”
“Ok, that’s good. You know if he ends up being, well, Duke. I’ve got your back,” she said so confidently, like she knew she could take on a bunch of Marines and come out the other side just fine.
“What does that mean? ‘Being Duke.’”
“You know.” She sighed. “Maybe you don’t. He’s a billionaire playboy. He’s used to getting his way and can have literally anything he wants.”
I thought about the Duke she described and tried to line him up with the Duke I knew. She wasn’t wrong, but she wasn’t right, either. He was so much more than most people saw.
“He’s also been there for me more than anyone else. He works hard and cares about people. He’s kind. He’s rich, sure, but why is that a bad thing?” I stopped myself from continuing with the thoughts swirling around my head and played with the tassels on the throw pillow I had pulled into my lap.
“I just don’t want to see you hurt.” She reached over and touched my arm, but I pulled back from her.
“Why does everyone think he’s going to hurt me? He’s never done anything to hurt me.” I tried to keep my voice low, but I didn’t like everyone speaking badly about him. Did they forget I care about him as my friend ?
“Well, that’s not true.” She gave me a look that I couldn’t read, but I knew what she was talking about.
“Bah, we were teenagers, and he apologized.” I waved away her concern. That was so long ago that it didn’t matter now. He’d never done anything like it since, and I forgave him for it a long time ago.
“I had to drive you home that night.”
“Drop it, Frankie. He’s not going to hurt me.” This was an old, tired fight between us, and I didn’t want to go over this again. Especially not if she was just going to use it against me—and him.
“Dinner’s done!” My mom called from the table, keeping her from saying whatever she had opened her mouth to say.
“I hope you know what you are doing,” she said as we walked to the table
“I always do.”
“Liar.”
We sat down in our chairs. The same chairs we have been sitting in for family dinner night for almost fifteen years now.
The routine of it relaxed me, and for the first time since stepping into my parents’ house, I felt close to calm.
Which is good, because my mom made a different sauce and still expected me to eat it with a smile.