Chapter 17 #2
“Getting piped regularly is nothing to be ashamed of. Take pride in your good fortune, Dani,” she responds, setting her bag on my coffee table and sitting on my couch with an air of grace that greatly contradicts the brazen words that often come out of her mouth.
All during our interaction, Quintin smiles as he watches, thoroughly entertained by the way we speak to one another.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Santana,” he says, crossing his arms and leaning against the wall, still smiling. I admire the way the short sleeves of his shirt hug his biceps as Santana starts to speak.
“I would say the pleasure is all mine, but…” she trails off, looking back at me with a grin. “So, why haven’t you answered my calls?”
I groan as the day’s events come barreling back into my brain, my hands covering my face. When I drop them, I shake my head.
“Can we talk about something else?” I plead, eyes wide, tears brimming. I can’t keep up with the volleying emotions. “Anything else?”
“What should I bring for Thanksgiving?” Quintin asks, still standing at ease, like he asked the most natural question in the world.
He doesn’t know he just saved me from curling up in a ball and sobbing.
Then I remember I never told Santana I invited him to Thanksgiving dinner with my family.
I squeeze my eyes shut a moment as I brace myself for her theatrics.
“You two are spending Thanksgiving together? Does Mami know?”
Oh, she thinks I’m not going home? I press my lips together in a grimace.
I open one eye to peek at her before twisting my lips and opening both. Her hands are on her hips, and she’s standing now, as if demanding an answer from me.
“Dani invited me to spend Thanksgiving with her family,” Quintin answers instead, but Santana doesn’t break her eye contact with me.
Only she and I know I’ve never brought anyone home to meet my parents before, not even Santana.
I met her through cousins of cousins. She kind of just came with the territory.
We don’t bring men we’re interested in home. It’s something she and I have never done.
But things are different now. I’m having a baby, and this baby deserves to know what it’s like to grow up with a strong support system, the way I did when Mami came here and created her own village.
So, in spite of my desire to keep Quintin around for as long as possible, I came up with the bright idea for him to meet my entire family on Thanksgiving. I may as well rip off the Band-Aid, right?
And pray they don’t scare him off.
“You’re going to Mami’s house for Thanksgiving?” she asks, raising her brows. Finally, a question that doesn’t require an answer. “Brave soul.”
“Santi,” I hiss, shifting my eyes toward Quintin. “She’s joking.”
No need to scare him before he’s even had the chance to meet them.
“I brought a friend over there last year, and he got wasted trying to keep up with her cousins. He ended up sleeping in the backyard.” She pauses. “I don’t think I ever saw him again, now that I think about it…”
Probably because he thought you were fucking nuts and realized you were friend-zoning him.
“Probably because you left him there, and Mami had a heart attack the next morning when she saw him laid out in the bushes. She thought he was dead.” A better answer, because sometimes, it’s hard to hear the truth about yourself.
Everyone knows Santana only brings straight men to family events as a scare tactic, often treating them like some sort of gay best friend. It’s all to rile up her mother, who has been nearly demanding a grandchild from her.
But she’s never brought home a woman. I hate to say it, but I think she worries about what her mother would think, not having shared that she’s bisexual.
It isn’t my journey, so I only offer my thoughts when she asks for them. When it comes to who she’s sexually attracted to, I’m rarely—if ever—asked for my opinion.
She already informed me she wouldn’t be celebrating with us this year, knowing her mother will be harping on her settling down even more now that I’m knocked up. Santana will be vacationing in Aspen with someone’s rich uncle while I bring a white man home.
“If you think this is going to scare me off, I’m actually more intrigued now,” Quintin interjects, still smiling.
“Suit yourself,” Santana says with a shrug. “But if you’re going to bring any food, I’d recommend dessert. Boricuas know how to prepare a feast.”
“ Bor —” He stops short, looking at me for guidance.
“It’s a term we use for Puerto Rican people,” I inform him, sighing when he comes up beside me and presses a kiss to my shoulder.
“I know that. I just want to make sure I pronounce it right.” I often forget that since he found out his biological mother was Puerto Rican, he’s immersed himself in the culture.
He practices saying it a few times, and I wrinkle my nose at how adorable he is. Once satisfied that he’s got it right—not a soft R in sight—he nods.
I watch as he heads into the kitchen, and I swear, he knows his way around there better than I do at this point.
I keep finding food in the fridge I know I didn’t buy, cut up fruit in containers with little notes on them, reminding me to eat.
I swear, you tell a man once you forgot to eat breakfast, and he treats you like you’re incapable of keeping yourself from starving.
But it’s cute.
“You ladies hungry?” he calls out.
“Food is his love language,” I inform Santana with a grin as I sit beside her.
“Well, this edible just hit, and I’m ready to devour anything Chef Bae makes,” Santana yells out, and I laugh, remembering I told her about his viral moment. I sit back, and she places her hand on my stomach. “How’s my baby doing?”
“Kicking,” I inform her. “They kicked for the first time yesterday.”
It was a big deal, made even bigger by the fact that it was after Quintin asked to speak to my belly and I agreed.
One word from him up close, and I got the shock of a lifetime.
“You didn’t tell me?” she shrieks, bringing her mouth to my stomach to speak muffled words into it. When I feel the baby kick, she shrieks again. “When is Mommy going to tell us your gender?”
I shrug, not wanting to think about it. I can see a life with either gender. It isn’t as important to me as their overall health.
Plus, something about not knowing feels appropriate to me. This baby was already a surprise. I may as well commit to the bit.
“I think I want to be surprised,” is all I can muster, not able to find the words to help her understand. In such a unique situation, you have to live it to understand.
“That’s fucking dumb.”
Way to prove my point, Santana.
“What’s dumb?” Quintin asks from his place in front of the kitchen’s interior window. He’s cutting up something, and I don’t recognize the knife he’s holding.
Is he moving into my kitchen? It is a little bigger than his.
“Not finding out the gender beforehand,” she hollers over the back of the couch, her focus and hands still on my stomach. “Tell her to grow up.”
Quintin grins, and I stare at him, wondering where he falls in this situation.
He isn’t the father, so he doesn’t really have a say in any of this, but he’s the one who’s here, serving food and orgasms in generous portions.
Taking care of me and asking me questions.
Coming to appointments and rubbing my feet at the end of the day.
Not letting me hold anything heavier than my purse. Bringing home snacks.
It makes me want to fuck him silly.
“Whatever she wants works for me.” His eyes twinkle with humor, and I catch his stare before glancing back at Santana. The smile on his face looks a little too sentimental, and I know I’ll spend the rest of the night trying to decipher what it means.
“Should we guess?” She sits up and looks at me, staring at me for a moment before shaking her head. “ Mami is so much better at guessing genders, but I think it’s a boy.”
“What makes you think so?” I ask, trying to picture having a son. Baseball games and toy trucks come to mind. Sticky peanut butter and jelly fingers and grass stains on his little knees. Toy cars, building blocks, and chasing him through the park.
“Just a feeling,” she says with a shrug before looking over her shoulder. “What do you think, Chef Bae?”
I hear his chuckle before he pauses, and when I look at him again, he’s watching us. I can’t make out his expression, but it’s a conversation we’ve never had before. I’m eager to hear his perspective.
“I don’t know.” He pauses again, stilling the knife on the chopping board the way he does—sharp point of the blade into the cutting board, hand still resting on the handle. “Either way, I’m excited.”
It’s the first time I’ve heard him talk about life beyond this pregnancy, and it stops my breath. When I blink and look away, Santana snaps her fingers to get my attention.
Relax , she mouths, placing her hand on top of mine to soothe my jitters.
Of course. Such an easy concept for the person high off her ass right now.