27. Juno
CHAPTER 27
JUNO
I feel melancholy on the flight back to LA.
I clearly liked Gainesville more than I thought I would. I miss it already. And it goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: it is not my fake boyfriend that I’m moping about. Nope. It’s the city of Gainesville, and I’m sticking to that.
When I get home, I finally call Pearl back—she’s been trying to get an update on my “relationship,” so I have to very pointedly remind her that a) a lady doesn’t kiss and tell, and b) I’ve signed an NDA.
After Pearl lets me go, I prepare jugs of water with fertilizer in them. These are common tools of my trade, and I’ll need them to revitalize the pothos plants at the Smiths’ Family Estate—one of my key clients.
As I listen to my audiobook and take care of the plants, I almost manage to forget about what happened in Florida—the hot encounter in the kitchen, the terror of Lucius getting hurt, and how date-like all the hiking in the parks felt.
Fine, almost might not be the right word, but at least I don’t dwell on all those things every waking moment.
Only most of them.
I’m just about done with the Smiths when my phone rings.
My heart leaps.
Is it Lucius already?
Nope. It’s my mom.
“Hi, sweetie,” she says.
“Hi,” I say, doing my best not to sound disappointed. “How are things?”
“You’re on speaker phone,” my dad chimes in.
Hmm. This is rare. I wonder why?—
“Why didn’t you tell us you’re dating?” Mom demands.
“And someone famous at that,” Dad adds.
And there it is.
“Your grandmother saw you in a picture in a magazine,” Dad says.
“You looked so pretty in it,” Mom adds. “But you should have told us.”
How does “pretty” logically flow into “told us?” I cover the microphone so they don’t hear me sigh, then explain about the NDA.
“But how serious is it?” Mom presses.
“The NDA forbids me from saying,” I reply.
“Does he treat you well?” Dad demands.
“I wouldn’t be with someone who doesn’t,” I say. “And there, you’ve just made me break the NDA.”
The conversation—or rather, interrogation—continues in that vein for a while longer.
“How about you bring him over?” Mom finally suggests.
I nearly drop the phone. “Bring him?”
That’s the craziest idea I’ve ever heard. If Lucius were a real boyfriend, I’d wait a year so as not to spook him.
“What a wonderful idea,” Dad says. “That way, we can see what’s what for ourselves, and you won’t break the NDA.”
Sure. That’s assuming Lucius would agree to this madness, and there’s no way he would.
“Please, honey,” Mom says. “If not for me, do it for your grandparents.”
Great. Guilt trip masquerading as an argument. “I can ask him,” I say reluctantly.
“Promise?” Mom says.
“Yes.”
“Great. Let me know when. Bye.”
She hangs up before I can change my mind. So evil. Also, it’s just occurred to me that Mom implied my grandparents would be at this hypothetical get-together. That’s the sort of thing I’d put my boyfriends through only after we were engaged.
Oh, well. I don’t need to worry, as all this is moot. Lucius will obviously say no, and then my conscience will be clear. Or clearer, which is the best I can hope for considering all the lies.
“I don’t think he’ll call today,” I tell El Duderino after I finish my dinner and check his soil.
Dude. If you want to talk to this dude, why not call him yourself?
Hmm. Maybe I should. He’s injured, so I might not look so desperate if I inquire about his health.
It would even be the polite thing to do.
Dude. You’re overthinking this. Just call. The dude will be happy to ? —
My phone rings. I check the screen, then look at my cactus triumphantly. “It’s Lucius.”
Dude. You speak of this dude, and he calls. Just like that Devil dude.
I take a deep breath, trying to tamp down on my excitement as I pick up and say hi.
“Hello,” Lucius says.
No “how are you?”
I’m just going to assume that was implied, so I say, “I’m doing great. Got a chance to catch up on work. How about you?”
“My day was productive. The land is finally mine, and it’s perfect for Novus Rome.”
I squeeze the phone tighter. “I meant ‘how does your head feel?’”
“Then why didn’t you say that ?” he asks.
“Touché. How does your head feel ?”
“Much better. The worst thing about that whole mess is the endless stream of apologies from Elijah. I’m not sure if he’s going for irony, but I’ve got more of a headache thanks to that than from his gunslinging.”
“You poor baby, you’ve got a loyal employee who feels bad after he caused you bodily harm.” I look at my cactus with exasperation.
Dude. Easy on the sarcasm. The dude was mortally injured.
“Touché,” Lucius says. “But that’s enough about that.”
I walk over to my bed and sit on the edge. “Fine. There was something I wanted to ask you, actually. Or more like, I promised my parents to ask you, but I’m sure you’ll say no, and that’s fine.”
“Promised to ask me what?”
I bite my lip. “They’ve learned about us thanks to some magazine article and?—”
“Did the magazine use the photos from our shoot?” he asks.
“I didn’t ask that,” I say. “Because that wasn’t the point.”
“What was?”
I sigh. “That they think I have a boyfriend.”
“That’s implied.”
“And so…” I take a breath. “They’d like to meet you. But I totally understand if?—”
“Yes,” he says confidently.
“Yes?” I stare at El Duderino in confusion.
Dude. I totally didn’t expect this dude to agree to that either.
“Did you want me to say no?” Lucius asks, and I can picture him smirking on the other end of the call.
Yes. No. Maybe. “Why would I ask you if I didn’t want you to go?”
I fully expect him to say, “Because you promised your nosy parents.” Instead, he says, “It’s a good idea.”
Once again, I gape at my cactus.
Dude. I have no idea why this dude thinks it’s a good idea.
“Why?” I finally ask.
“Great practice,” Lucius says. “If your family buys the fartlek, so will Gram.”
Of course. Makes sense. So why do I feel so disappointed by his robot-like logic?
“It’s settled then,” I say. “We’ll do it when you’re back.”
If anyone learns about me meeting his grandmother and him meeting all my folks, they’ll assume we’re on the fast track to a shotgun wedding.
“Is there anything I should prep ahead of time?” he asks.
“Like what?” It would probably be prudent to have everyone in my family sign NDAs, but I’m not going to give him that idea.
“Are there any get-to-know-you questions we haven’t covered that they might raise?”
I sigh. “They’ll probably tell you the most embarrassing things about me, so out of fairness, maybe you could tell me yours?”
His sigh sounds a lot like mine. “Gram will probably tell you my most embarrassing stories also.”
“Like?”
He tsk-tsks. “I’ll only tell you mine if you tell me yours.”
I hesitate, but then I figure why the hell not. He already knows I’m dyslexic. Softly, I say, “I doubt my family will tell you this, but my most embarrassing moments all have to do with my reading woes. I had a sadistic teacher who always called on me to read out loud. Some examples of my mishaps include ‘vaginal ice cream’ instead of ‘vanilla’ and ‘period red’ instead of ‘Persian red.’ Everyone had fun at my expense, and kids being kids, they mocked me for months afterward.”
“Kids can be animals,” he says with feeling. “And it sounds like that teacher should’ve been fired… at the very least. What’s her name?"
“Oh, don’t worry, I got even.” I smile at the memory. “I snuck Krazy Glue onto her seat. It ended with a pretty embarrassing trip to the hospital for her.”
“Good.” There is a smile in his voice as he says, “I’d better not piss you off.”
“That’s right. And to that end, you now owe me something embarrassing—and not what your grandmother will tell me.”
Did he just curse under his breath?
“Fine,” he says with obvious reluctance. “But this is doubly covered by our NDA.”
“Sure.” I mentally rub my hands together. He’s obviously going to tell me something juicy.
“There was this bully who pantsed me in the cafeteria one time,” he says.
I grit my teeth. “He what?”
“Pulled my pants down,” Lucius clarifies.
I knew that, but I don’t interrupt again.
“Anyway,” Lucius continues. “I was wearing my Spartacus-themed underwear—and kids being kids, everyone laughed. But that wasn’t the end, or the worst of it. Somehow, Gram learned about what happened, and she showed up the next day at the school. I have no idea how she knew which kid was the culprit, but she shouted at him in front of everyone, then pulled down his pants before she left.”
I gasp.
“Yeah,” Lucius says dryly. “It’s lucky there were no security guards or teachers as witnesses, or else she’d be on some list. In any case, everyone called me ‘granny’s boy’ for the rest of middle school.”
Is it weird that I don’t disapprove too much of his Gram’s behavior? Her main mistake was that she did the deed publicly, thus embarrassing Lucius. She should’ve found the bully alone and then?—
No. Wait. What am I thinking? She pulled down a child’s pants. That’s wrong to do anywhere, but infinitely more so in private.
“You win,” I say. “If I had ended up with my pants down in my middle school cafeteria, I would’ve needed therapy for years.”
“I didn’t realize this was a contest.”
I chuckle. “Can’t you just accept your win gracefully?”
“I insist that you’re the winner of this contest anyway, but I can’t say why as I promised not to mention the event in question.”
I flush. Of course! How could I have forgotten? The most embarrassing moment of my life was peeing in that elevator, hands down.
“I’m sorry,” Lucius says, sounding genuinely contrite. “I shouldn’t have mentioned that which isn’t to be spoken about .”
“Yeah. That was a low blow, especially to make a point.”
He sighs. “I feel like I owe you another embarrassing story now.”
“At least.”
“Okay, here goes,” he says. “This was in high school. I was walking with my lunch and sneezed at the wrong time. My pasta ended up all over me. Of course, the girl I liked saw the whole thing and laughed.”
“That bitch.” Oops, that might’ve been an overreaction.
“Hey, in her defense, it was funny.”
I chew on the inside of my cheek, feeling irrationally upset. “Did you ask her out anyway?”
“No,” he says, a little too sharply. “In any case, now that we’re even, I’d better go.”
Okay. A bit too abrupt, but fine. “Goodnight.”
He hangs up.
Was it something I said?
Either way, the end of the conversation notwithstanding, that was kind of nice.
I hope he calls me tomorrow.
He does call, and our conversation goes much smoother this time. We talk more about our days in school, and he shares some stories about college. I also learn about his second passion after Ancient Rome: futurism. He and his fellow futurists love to ponder what new technological advancements are on the horizon, and how they will change life as we know it.
As we’re saying goodbye, he promises to call again tomorrow.
Once again, he keeps his promise, and the highlight of this conversation is my question about his first kiss. As usual, he forces me to go first, and I admit that mine was in kindergarten, with a boy I played marriage with. The kiss was the “consummation” of that union. After teasing me about being a married woman, Lucius admits that his first kiss happened after he made his first million in his early twenties—in other words, crazy late. When I probe as to why he took so long to get to that milestone, he gets uncomfortable, so I drop the topic lest he doesn’t call again.
The next day, our chat is downright pleasant, in part because I tell him interesting facts about cactuses, like how slowly the saguaro cactus grows, at a rate of only one and a half inches every ten years—yet, mind-bogglingly, the majestic plant grows to eighty feet tall. On his end, Lucius tells me so much about Ancient Rome that I feel like I’ve taken a trip there via a time machine.
And so it goes. Each day, our conversations get longer and longer, until they start to remind me of the way it was with my first boyfriend back in high school. Just like then, I often find myself with my phone in bed, talking until midnight, which is late into the night for Lucius on the East Coast.
We learn so much about each other that we could convince the CIA we’re really dating. Our families don’t stand a chance.
It’s great, but there’s one problem.
As the days go by, I begin to miss him. The calls, informative as they are, are no substitute for his magnetic presence.
It’s dumb, but I can’t help it.
Some part of me has clearly forgotten how fake our arrangement is.