Chapter 5 #2
Brown eyes wide with equal parts hope and trepidation, she sucks her lips between her teeth, as if to keep her tongue on lock down.
In contrast, I open and close my mouth a couple of times, trying to process her brick of an opening speech.
“Wait. Your son asked you to marry him? That can’t be right.”
“Wait. What?” She looks up and to the left, her eyes flicking back and forth. Her mouth forms a circle of dismay. “Please. We must never speak of this conversation. My son and Haliford will never let me live it down. They would make memes. T-shirts and stickers. It would be a disaster.”
“Who is Haliford?”
“My fiancé.”
“I thought Johnny was your fiancé.”
Elf snorts so hard, she slips off the couch onto the carpet, laughter rippling through her. She rocks side to side, holding her ribs.
Each giggle feeds a blob of oh-no certainty growing in my belly. I messed up. I took a blind leap at full speed and pancaked onto the Spike of Wrong Conclusions.
Torn between giving into my own set of stress-induced snickering and banging my head against the wall, I settle for pinching the bridge of my nose.
All that angst.
Could have been avoided entirely if I’d stuck around long enough to finish the conversation. But nooo, I chose to run away like a ninny.
If I were watching this play out on a telenovela, I’d throw my shoe at the screen.
“Thanks.” Elf wipes tears from her cheeks.
“My mom’s getting remarried and milking the occasion for maximum drama.
Haliford is having fifth, sixth, and seventh thoughts about the home renovations Johnny is helping us with.
Arlo is moping after breaking up with his skanky ho of a girlfriend—may her next piercing go toxic—and perimenopause has been finding new ways to suck the joy out of my life on an almost daily basis. I was overdue for a good meltdown.”
“Perimenopause,” I intone, using my best “game show host shilling the fake-wood dinette set” voice. “Because puberty and forty years of periods weren’t bad enough.”
“It’s only funny because it’s true.” She maneuvers into resting on her elbows. “Listen, I will totally understand if you hit decline on the whole friendship request thing. I’m cute, but I’m also a lot.”
“How about we reframe that to ‘I’m awesome and sometimes folks need to wear sunglasses in my presence because I’m shining so bright.’?”
“As if I didn’t have a girl crush on you already.” She holds her arm up and I brace her as she regains her seat on the couch. “Thanks. I really am sorry, though, for interrupting before. It was my shift to run interference. I got distracted and, boom, he was gone. I panicked, big surprise.”
“Interference?”
“The whole family takes turns. Johnny’s a wedding unicorn. Successful, good looking, a widower with no kids at home. Has all his teeth. So, you know, a rare beast.”
“You might add funny, kind, and knows how to dance to the plus column.”
“See?” She gestures with her hands palm up.
“A unicorn made out of catnip wrapped in melted cheese. He has to stay in constant motion at these shindigs if he doesn’t want to be besieged by bugnuts women out to bag their next horn of plenty.
I tell you, it’s a problem. But if I’d seen who he was talking to, I’d have kept my distance. ”
“Why? I could be one of the crazy unicorn hunters.”
“Sure. But he’d let you catch him because—no, you know what? For once I’m gonna keep my lips zipped. If you’re curious to know more, you’ll have to ask Johnny. When you do, do me a solid, let him know I sent you. My ears are still ringing after he chewed me out for butting in the first time.”
Before I can ask any follow up questions, Elf’s phone erupts in an S.O.S. pattern of bird chirps.
“Great, the Mom Crisis Line is blowing up again. Consider my offer of friendship—I also make killer margaritas—and go find my cousin-in-law. Knowing my boys, they’ve probably left the poor man to fend for himself and he’ll be standing in a ring of ladies twenty deep. Hey, Mom, what is it now?”
Johnny’s cousin-in-law—not fiancée—holds her thumb and forefinger to the side of her face and stage whispers, “Call me,” before shooing me in the direction of the exit.
Leaving the ladies’ lounge dumps me from an alternate universe back to real life, but a crisper, brighter version.
Elf is a nickname, not a lover’s endearment.
Johnny is single.
Free and clear to be interested in anyone he wants.
Hopefully me for this one night.
A lighted path spools in front of me. The steps I need to take to salvage my plan to get loud tonight. To go bold. To live up to the fierce, fun, hot shade of pink decorating my toes by getting down, dirty and naked.
Step one: apologize for jumping to conclusions then acting like a neurotic weirdo during our dance.
Step two: proposition Johnny.
Step three: head to his room and commence adult—not adulterous—fun and games.
Alternate step three if I crash and burn at step two: change name, move to another country, retire with sweet doggo I get from the nearest no-kill shelter, take up tatting lace, and never show my face in public again.
Considering how crap I am at knitting, the object of my secret celebrity crush better be a forgiving sort or I. Am. Doomed.
A thousand butterflies take flight in my abdomen. A little queasy, I place a steadying hand on my stomach and breathe.
Staying home and drinking endless cups of tea is easy. I could stay in easy. Drop this out-of-character side quest right now.
Vanessa wouldn’t judge. She’d just find me a new “whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” mountain to tackle. Good people, my bestie.
But.
I would have to live with the knowledge that I gave up without trying. That’s old me. Old patterns.
New me isn’t going to settle.
Marshalling my butterflies so we’re all headed in roughly the same direction, I head off in search of a smoking hot unicorn.