Chapter Two
Five Earth years later:
The first thing I notice when my house comes into view is the tiny blue vase in the deliberately closed blinds of the window.
It’s a sign.
It’s the signal Isabel and I conjured up to notify each other of when we were home so neither of us jumpy women would be surprised that the other was there. But this last year, I’ve been living alone without her. For the first time in my life. The closest I’ve ever come to it was the two years in my aunt’s basement… but I wasn’t really alone. I had Sam, who’d hung out with me often. And then I moved in with Isabel and we were two broken strangers who’d slowly gotten to know each other.
But Isabel finally found her daughter, River, who lived in the commune. She’s been punished by the man who found her—and named her after the river that ran through his property—for humiliating him.
She’d refused to marry the prophet, who had to be seventy-five by now. Apparently, her father had promised her to him.
She was whipped within an inch of her life and rescued by the Britonians and the new aliens from the planet Pimeon. The ones who were in the Match Program. The leader asked her if she’d rather enter the program and she said yes. When she came home six months later to make her decision, Isabel snuck into the commune to see her. She’d been invited to go stay with her daughter. While on that planet, like all the other women, River returned to Earth to make her decision. She chose to go back, but remained here for one night. Isabel found a way to introduce herself, and both of them wanted to get to know each other. A new option was introduced to the program—women were allowed to take a close family member, so Isabel was offered a chance to go with her.
My stomach had dropped when I found out.
I had no idea how long she’d be gone, or if she’d ever come back. I had no one I could ask.
She came home briefly, rattling her keys outside the door and making a ton of noise to let me know she was with someone, and so I hid while she grabbed a bag and wrote a note. And from the note, someone had been standing with her when she quickly penned it because she couldn’t say anything personal, but left me account numbers.
My heart lifts at the sight of that little vase. I didn’t realize how much I would miss her, but I really have. She’s so sweet to have around, but she’s been gone for so many months now. Nearly a year.
I fling open the front door. “Is?”
The smile freezes on my face. It’s not just Isabel sitting in the living room. There’s another woman with dark hair—she must be River—and one of them.
The tentacled aliens.
“Luce!” Isabel jumps up from the sofa and throws her arms around me, giving me a big hug, then pulls me forward. “This is River,” she says. “And Sheesla.”
“You can call me Maman. All my girls do,” the woman says, not bothering to get up from the couch. Her tentacles are splayed around her like she’s a queen.
Her girls? Does that mean what I think? She looks a bit like the proprietor of a house of ill repute. She wears diamonds on every finger and her ruffled silk blouse plunges so low in front it’s practically only fastened at her belly button, which is adorned with a black diamond. Her nails are long and painted wine-red, of all colors.
Isabel giggles. “She’s our mother figure. You need one?”
“Of course, she does,” this person—Maman—snaps in a strange accent. “I just told you she’s one of my girls.”
River widens her eyes and giggles, which sets off Isabel too, but I’m too flustered to laugh.
“You-you’re not home to stay?” I ask Isabel.
“No, honey, we’re just visiting.”
“I wanted to meet my third daughter,” Maman says. I tilt my head, repeating the statement in my mind, sounding out the accent to see if what she said is what I think she said.
Isabel begins speaking rapidly. “I told the girls about you. About our little life here. I decided I’m staying there permanently—”
“Oh.”
“And you can have the house. I just want to make sure you’re okay.”
My lower lip trembles. “Of course, I’m okay.”
Isabel and River grow somber and Maman? She studies me carefully.
“What keeps you here? Have you signed up for that matchmaking program?” she demands.
“Maman,” Isabel says. “Lucy can’t sign up for it.” She reaches out and twines my fingers with hers. “She’s in hiding. Like I was, except hers is worse.”
“Hiding? From what?” Maman asks.
Instead of answering that entering the Match Program would expose me to Duke Milinazzo, or that entering the Match Program would force me to mate with a stranger—an alien—I answer in a milder way. “There are no guarantees that I would get matched if I entered. But what is guaranteed is that my name and address will be splayed on all the news vids. Everyone will know who I am and where I live. And if I get kidnapped before the match? I’ll be a wanted felon, just like the second matched bride was.”
“Surely there is some way for Lucy to visit Pimeon?” Maman asks.
Isabel shakes her head. “It has to be a family member coming with a matched bride.”
“Well, I’m sure we’ll figure it out. Shall we go ahead and make these machos that you both insist are so delicious?”
“Nachos,” River corrects.
She and Isabel head into the kitchen, arm in arm. Maman takes mine.
“Tell me, little Lucy, do you have jiggle-O?”
“N-No?”
She sighs.
“My dear girl, I expect you to stock the pantry before my next visit.”
I can’t help but grin because they’re planning to visit again. I’ve never had anyone actually want to visit me. It kind of feels… well, it feels like having out of town family. I like it.
“Maman has learned how to make Jell-O shots,” River says, opening the fridge. Her profile shows an intricate tattoo that swirls from her temple, down the side of her cheek, and down her neck.
I’m about to apologize for the lack of contents, but she begins pulling out items I’ve never seen.
Avocados. Cheese. Ground beef. Not the two-ingredient nachos I’m used to splurging on, these gals are going all out.
“Mikhail—the Britonian who brought us—gave us groceries.” Isabel winks, knowing I’d be appalled at the lack of food. The other two don’t seem to notice my circumstances.
I reach out and touch a beautiful red tomato, as gorgeous as the ones I grow in my garden in summer.
“Here, pretty Lucy, you chop the tomatoes, which we have on Pimeon, you know. We don’t call them tomato, but it translates to that in your language,” Maman says. She winks as if letting me know there are similarities between their planet and mine.
Isabel gets busy cooking up the meat and River works on mashing the avocados. I mash the beans and there’s so much food I wonder why we’re even calling them nachos.
Then Maman pops the bag of chips open, and we cheer at the noise it makes.
We heap our plates full and take them into the living room. Maman plops herself on the sofa and Isabel sits next to her. I join River on the floor across from them, sharing the coffee table to use for our plates.
“So, you pretend to be Isabel?” River asks.
I giggle. It is a little strange that Isabel barely looks older than her, yet she’s her mom. I guess they feel more like friends.
“I do. It’s kind of easy. Her hair is so dark that I just have to pull mine back so it’s not so obvious that it’s black.”
“Twinsies,” Isabel says softly, and at her words, River nudges my shoulder with hers. She has hair as black as mine, instead of it being lighter like her mom’s.
“It is odd to have black hair,” River agrees. “People in the commune used to whisper that I was cursed. Like a poor black cat.”
I laugh, aware of the ridiculous ideas that come from the commune. “Are you?”
To my surprise, she shrugs. “Probably. My father was the devil himself.”
“Your biological or your adoptive?” I ask.
“Both!” she and Isabel say together, and then start laughing. More proof that they’re friends… kind of like me and Isabel are. Strangely, I don’t feel like the odd man out between her and River. Instead, I feel a sort of kinship with River too.
I think it’s because River inherited Isabel’s generous, loving personality. Who else would take in a virtual stranger when she was ostracized herself?
I wonder if Maman ever feels like a third wheel with these two? By the looks of her wide grin—somewhat scary with those sharp teeth—it appears not. She totally feels maternal toward both of them.
I find myself longing for that. Sam had once snorted and said you couldn’t miss what you never had when she’d referred to her own mother, but I did.
“It helps that Isabel has a job cleaning in the evenings without a lot of people present. If I think someone’s going to be around, I have to stuff my bra.”
River and I start laughing again.
I can’t help but stare at her profile. She looks so familiar… I guess more like Isabel than I realized. I can’t quite place it. Her forehead is rounder, making her look somewhat regal. Her nose is straight. Come to think of it, I can’t really see her eye color or the side-smile she has that looks like Isabel’s so I’m unsure of what is so familiar.
I’m barely aware of Maman and Isabel watching us. I flush, knowing they caught me staring at River like a fangirl.
I turn my gaze down to my food. “Isabel and I made sure never to leave the house together. We left one at a time and traded outfits, so it looked like one person. Just in case the neighbors ever watched.”
“We made it fun. Like a game. We’d wear the same colors on the same day,” Isabel says, and her eyes are soft.
“Of course, your hair was darker then. It’s gotten really streaked now with as long as it is.”
It makes me giggle when Isabel twists her hair up to show me how lightened the ends are against her roots. She never showed her hair on Earth but she must be in the sun all the time on Pimeon.
“You and River are close to the same age, eh?” Maman says.
“I’m almost twenty-five.” I look at River, who nods.
Huh. Who knew I had so much in common with Isabel’s daughter? I remember the nights she’d come home and tell me about River; how she’d stolen a glimpse of her in church, or at the market. How she longed to tell her who she was but couldn’t.
My heart had broken for my friend.
“But tell us about your father, Lucy,” Maman says.
My eyes fly to Isabel. But her face is placid, calming as if she’s letting me handle this.
“He’s an evil man,” I murmur. “Got my mother pregnant and then left her. She died when I was two and the authorities brought me to my cousin Samantha’s house. Her mom was pretty wealthy and didn’t want the scandal of an illegitimate child in the family, so she gave me to the home. Thankfully, Samantha saw me. She was only twelve at the time, but she remembered. On the day she turned eighteen, she visited me. Told me when I aged out of the system, she’d hide me and find me someplace safe to live. She did.” I smile at Isabel.
“Well, good thing for you I am quite experienced at being a maman. I shall add you to my collection of daughters. I’ll never admit this again, but I longed for girls.” Maman sighs. “Closest I ever got was encouraging my sons to play with dolls. It worked for a while.”
“Probably Bronan played with dollies the most,” River teases, looking up slyly at Isabel. “He’s the one that wants the most kish.”
“I don’t know,” Isabel says mildly, but her eyes sparkle with mirth. “Tiran seems the most sensitive out of all of them. Probably he had the biggest collection.”
River snorts.
“Actually, it is my baby,” Maman says, and she kicks the other two with her tentacles. “My precious, tenderhearted Skiden.”
“Ahh, yes,” Isabel says. “I can see that.”
“Uh, huh,” River agrees, eyeing me. “Too bad you can’t meet Sky. He’s a hoot. Best brother-in-law a gal could ask for.”
“Agreed,” Isabel says quickly.
There’s an awkward silence as we all crunch our chips. I think it all dawns on us that Isabel and River are sisters-in-law… and mother and daughter.
“So, you have three sons?” I ask Maman.
Her eyes light up. “Yes! Three perfect sons. Bronan is the leader of our clan, Tiran is a prized hunter, and Skiden is the sensitive soul.”
“Well, to be fair—and I’m not naming any names—one of the sons is rather spoiled,” River says, still teasing Isabel, obviously.
Isabel looks affronted. “What?” Then she catches River’s grin. “Well, maybe,” she says slyly. “I won’t name any names either, but he’s obviously not old enough to know any better.”
River grunts, so I guess that Tiran isn’t as old as Bronan.
“Anyway,” Maman drawls out while glaring at the both of them, “my baby was blessed with a wicked sense of humor. If you’re ever having a down day, he’s the man to bring you right out of the dumps.”
I’m not sure why she’s sharing this, unless it’s just to stop the other two girls from arguing over who the best brother is.
“So, what does your little one want to be when he grows up? A leader like Bronan? Or a hunter like Tiran?”
There’s silence for a minute before River and Isabel start laughing. “Oh, no, Lucy,” River gasps. “Skiden’s not a teen! He’s a fully grown, adult man. Male.”
“Oh,” I say, somewhat awkwardly. I’m not sure why I assumed he was so young.