12. Rosay
Chapter twelv e
Rosay
E verything is already going wrong.
First, the flat tire, then the brain-scrambling kiss with Graham, and now I have to go inside Dad and Wendy’s new house and act like my heart is still whole inside my chest.
Graham waves his hand in front of my face. “Is your processor restarting?”
“Yeah, I’m just trying to get in the right mindset.”
He grips my shoulders and spins me around. “We’re gonna walk hand in hand into the lion’s den together. Your family will see how in love with me you are and—”
“You’re a jackass.” I chuckle and push him away. I despise how easily he’s able to bring me out of a funk. It’s like he can see me spiraling even when I try my hardest to hide it. “I can’t stand you.”
“Seriously though.” He extends his hand for mine then pulls me along as he walks toward the house. “We can survive four days with each other and achieve both of our goals.”
I’m glad at least one of us is sure we can pull this off.
“Okay,” I reply, trying to ignore the fact that we’re actually holding hands. My feet stop me at the bottom of the steps. “Was there anything else we needed to go over? Anything you didn’t tell me?”
He shrugs. “Nothing I can think of.”
“You’ re not secretly an axe murderer or anything? Weird eating habits? Oh no, you chew your medicine like a sociopath, don’t you?”
Graham wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me to him, our bodies flush as he speaks into the shell of my ear. “Close your eyes.”
Like he’s a genie wishing for it, I comply.
Birds chip in the distance, but all I can focus on is his hard body bound to mine like we were cast in the same mold.
Warm, cinnamon scented breath floats into my nose as Graham glides his fingers up my arm and cups my cheek.
Our foreheads meet as his thumb slides along my bottom lip, and my breath falters at the touch.
“Breathe,” he whispers.
I fight the urge to swallow, to show him that he’s not just calming me down but ramping me up in other ways. How Graham knows the exact way to put me at ease is beyond me, but at this moment, I’m thankful he pays enough attention.
I blow out a breath and pray the act dispels the anxious energy. When I look at him, I’m met with two dark pools of amber and the creeping sense that he’s not as unfazed by this chemistry as he pretends to be.
“Holy shit,” a familiar voice says, snapping me back to the moment.
We jump back from each other like we’re two teenagers caught making out and find Winnie standing on the porch with her hands on her hips.
Her long blonde hair is thrown up into a messy bun, and she’s dressed in her usual attire of a bohemian style blouse, denim jeans, and a pair of brown cowboy boots.
If my hair and skin tone weren’t two shades darker than hers, we could almost be mistaken for twins.
With a pasted on smile, I watch my sister descend the stairs. “Hi Win.”
“You dyed your hair blonde.” Her eyes are comically wide, mouth parted as if it’s the biggest surprise.
My hand s hakes as I slide it through my tresses. “Yeah. I wanted something new.”
“I think it looks beautiful on you,” Graham says, drawing Winnie’s attention.
“Oh my gosh, it’s you. We were taking bets to see if she was going to show up without you." She wraps me in a hug and says into my ear, "Rosie, the pictures don’t do him justice.”
“Pictures?” we both say in unison, though my stomach twists, still caught on the fact that they thought I'd show up alone.
“Where have you been hiding?” she asks Graham.
He winks at me as she wraps her hands around both of us and ushers us toward the door. “ Rosie’s been hiding me away at work.”
I scoff. “That’s not true. We both…work a lot. We value our alone time.”
“I would too,” she loudly whispers out of the side of her mouth.
The steps creak just as a vale of wind whips past us, nearly knocking me back. Graham secures my hips in his hands, safely pushing me forward just as Winnie yells, “Stop.”
He crashes into my back in the doorway and rights himself before we topple forward.
“What? I ask, gaining my bearings.
She points to the top of the door where some kind of leaf is hanging. I stare at her smiling face, confused, but it’s Graham’s voice that brings goosebumps to my skin and floats into my ear.
“Mistletoe.”
I have the insane urge to flick the wide grin off his face. “Why is there mistletoe on the door? Christmas is two months away.”
“Christmas is our wedding theme,” Winnie says. “You didn’t read the entire document I sent, did you?”
I stare a t her, dumbfounded that she didn’t just wait two months for the wedding. “Apparently not.”
She shrugs, gaze darting into the house as if she’s looking for someone. “I’ve been waiting for this day for years. Why wait any longer? Everything is so much cheaper before the holidays.”
“I guess that makes sense.” I step forward before I find myself unable to actually move. A glance down at my stomach reveals Graham’s arm banded around my waist. “What?”
“It’s bad luck to not kiss under the mistletoe,” Graham tuts, looking at my lips. “Right, Winnie?”
“Right!” she squeals. “No bad luck on my wedding weekend.”
Traitors.
I’m not sure whether it’s Graham and Winnie, or the muscles currently clamping down between my legs at the thought of kissing him again that I feel most betrayed by, but either way, I tilt my head up and allow Graham to kiss me.
His lips are firm yet pliable as they move against mine, and for a few brief moments, I can almost imagine this is our life, that he’s simply kissing me goodbye before work.
But this isn’t real. No matter how much I’m starting to realize I don’t quite dislike Graham as much as I thought I did, he’s still playing a part.
He made it clear before we walked in that my family would be convinced this is real.
That’s all this is, it’s not him wanting to kiss me but a part of the gig he signed up for in order to network at the wedding.
I pull back just as he tries to deepen the kiss, and I shield my feelings from him by stepping into the house.
My mouth falls as I stare at the expansive living room with fifteen-foot-high ceilings and a massive chandelier.
Light reflects off the crystals, casting a glow over the beautiful artwork on the burgundy walls and the dark leather furniture.
Pictures hang on the wall, drawing me toward them like a moth to a flame.
Are t here still pictures of my mom here…or any of me?
“When did you guys go swimming with the dolphins?” I ask, staring at my siblings, Dad, and Wendy covered in life jackets, giving kisses to the cute mammals.
“We spent a few days in South Padre this past summer.” She comes to stand beside me and points to the picture. “That’s right before one of the dolphins shoved their nose up Kieran’s butt.”
Graham chuckles, but my throat tightens at the picture of the family, sans me.
“I’m surprised you got Dad into the water,” I say, thinking about the man who refused to take me to the beach when I was young because he was afraid of jellyfish.
“It took some convincing,” she replies with a smirk. “He wanted to try a beach locally before we went on the cruise.”
“A cruise?” I try to temper the surprise I feel lassoing my eyebrows and pulling them to my hairline. “Why didn’t I know you guys went on a cruise?”
Graham lays a comforting hand on my lower back, his focus studiously on the photos of Dad at the most recent Master’s competition.
Winnie frowns, fingers twisting the hem of her shirt. “I guess we got so used to you saying you were too busy to hang out that we didn’t think to ask if you wanted to join.”
“Oh.” I dig my fingers into my sides to reroute the ache forming in my heart. She isn’t lying that every time they’ve asked me to go on some type of family vacation, I’ve been busy, but it still hurts to think that they’ve given up on even asking.
I guess it's true. Out of sight, out of mind.
“Makes sense,” I say.
“?Eres tú, mija?” My dad’s smooth voice floats toward me, breaking the awkward tension in the room.
He appears from the hallway dressed in a dark green button up and jeans with a smile on his face that quickly morphs into shock.
“Rubio?” he says, noting my blonde hair before he shakes away the surprise and says, “Welcome home.”
My teeth clench at the word ‘home.’ This isn’t my home.
The house across the field is home. The one where my mom taught me to ride a bike, to dance bachata, and chased me around the house with a sandal when I did something wrong.
Where there were pictures of me hanging on the wall because I was part of that family.
I push away the memories, toss my purse onto the table, and escape into his warm embrace. “Hola, Papa.”
He squeezes me tightly, and his inhale lifts us both.
I’ve always been a daddy’s girl, even when I was out raging against the world after Mom’s death.
He's never let me get away without talking to him at least once every two weeks on the phone—which makes it more surprising that he didn't mention the cruise—but being around him stills brings a forgotten sense of home. "Te extrano, mija. ?Cómo estás?"
"Bien, bien. ?Y tú?"
"No me puedo quejar." Winnie and Graham stand off to the side, their eyes volleying between us as we speak in my mom's native tongue.
Dad learned to speak fluently so that he could have a full conversation with my abuelo before he asked for my mom's hand in marriage, and growing up, it was the only language spoke in our house.
I've always been thankful that Dad never let me stop speaking Spanish, and now it almost feels like it's our thing.
Something that reminds me we're still a unit, even though that unit is part of a bigger whole now.
“?Tu prometido?” he asks, nodding to Graham.
Graham’s ready with his hand extended. “Nice to meet you, sir.”
“Hey, h ey, he’s formal,” Dad says, winking at me. “You been treating my daughter right?”