Chapter 25 Meet the Parents…of the Girl You’re Fucking
Meet the Parents…of the Girl You’re Fucking
A bitter, irrational part of me wanted to scream at Hudson.
This was why I didn’t talk about my parents, like he’d tried to do the day before at the mini golf park.
Because they were like uber-Beetlejuices.
They didn’t need to be invoked three times.
If I even thought about them for too long, they appeared out of nowhere.
Carol “Carrie” Love Porter was a short, spindly woman who lived in Chico’s petites businesswear.
She had an unfussy, blunt bob, which was always pinned back with two twin tortoiseshell clips.
My father, Bill Porter, was a tall, generically white man with bushy eyebrows and the disposition of a disgruntled bank manager.
Until I’d gotten my job at GalacticSolutions, my mother clerked for the local school board, and my father managed a small building and loan.
After I’d started working for Lloyd, they both retired early, lived off my salary (hey, they’d gotten me to a half-million-dollar-a-year job by the time I was twenty-four; I owed them), and enjoyed life in quiet and comfort in a Connecticut golf course community.
Once I’d been fired, they both went back to work but graciously accepted a portion of my severance and settlement package so they could do so only part time.
I loved them so much. They were my parents. But every time I saw them, I just felt like a failure. And seeing them here, now, rattled me back to square one. Why had I been trying so hard to expand my horizons again? Mom and Dad would not approve.
Standing in the entryway, neither of them looked at Hudson. Apparently, he wasn’t even worth their attention.
“Scout,” Mom said by way of greeting. “Aren’t you going to invite us in?”
“Of course! Sorry. Um, please—”
I gestured them inside, tightening my robe. Hudson took the momentary distraction to dash back to my bedroom. I knew it was so he could change, but still, I wanted to hiss traitor after his retreating form.
“Glad to see you’re keeping this place in good shape,” my dad said, picking up Hudson’s coat, which we’d left on the couch en route to the bedroom last night.
“I didn’t know you were coming,” I said. What, a girl can’t leave a few pieces of clothing hanging around without being treated like a slovenly college mess? “I would have tidied up a little bit.”
“Don’t apologize on our account,” Mom said. “I just can’t believe you live like this. All that settlement money and you can’t get some help in to clean for you?”
“I’ll have a look. I’m sure that I can find someone.”
Reemerging from our room in a perfect boyfriend outfit of jeans, a button-up, and a sweater, Hudson came to my side and gave me a little squeeze around the middle. His firm touch brought me back to earth.
“You really should,” Mom continued. “It’s so bad for your mental health. And dirt and crumbs can build up, you know, which could tank the resale value. Not that you’ll be selling, of course. I’m sure you want to keep that little job of yours for as long as humanly possible—”
“Carol,” my dad muttered. “You haven’t even said hello.”
She hugged me. As always, it was bony and angular. Like she’d somehow missed every session in how to have human contact class. “Hello, dear.”
“Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad.”
I hugged him, too. He was marginally better at it, but not much.
It then occurred to me how little physical contact I’d ever had. My parents were emphatically not huggers. I didn’t have boyfriends or partners or even casual hookups.
Hudson was the only person who’d ever held me.
Dad must have picked up on how quickly I returned to Hudson’s side, because he gestured at my general state of undress. “I see you’re keeping busy. Research for your work?”
“Uh, yeah,” I said, trying to ignore the disdain dripping from Dad’s tone when describing sex toys as my work. “A little. It’s not a big deal, though. It’s just—uh, this is…”
“Hudson Bailey. Her boyfriend.”
Matching his perfect meet the parents outfit, Hudson flashed them both a winning smile, took one bold step forward, and extended his hand like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Boyfriend,” my mom repeated, sounding as skeptical as I felt.
He didn’t let his demeanor falter, not even for a second. “It’s sort of new.”
You can say that again.
Neither of them stepped forward to accept his handshake, and I wanted to melt from embarrassment. He inched backward, away from the wall of indifference they jointly projected. “But yeah. It’s great to meet you. Scout talks about you both all the time.”
My mother turned on me, the wall of indifference crumbling like rubbled fallout all around my head. “You didn’t tell us about this, Scout.”
“You didn’t tell me you were going to be in town. If you’d told me, I would have filled you in,” I replied in what I thought was a mild tone. I should have known better.
Dad lashed out. “You’re talking to your mother that way?”
“I’m sorry. I’m still a little groggy after, uh—”
“You just woke up?” Mom crowed. “It’s nearly eight o’clock.”
“I know.” Get control of this situation.
You do it with awry experiments and tests all the time.
Get control of your variables. Taking a cue from Hudson, I slapped on a smile, pretending that I was excited to see them.
“But what are you two doing in town? I didn’t think I would see you until OFest in New York later this year. ”
Mom and Dad looked each other.
“Well.”
“Well.”
And then I knew. This was about fucking Lloyd Exeter. God damn him.
“Your father and I saw some chatter online. About you-know-who. We worried.”
“That’s so sweet of you…” I said through my clenched jaw. I didn’t believe them. I just needed a way to get my parents out of here. “But I’m really doing fine. You didn’t have to come all this way—”
“You’ve always been our first priority. Your mother and I know that this is a real ground shift. You need us.”
“We kept it to ourselves because you would have told us to stay home,” Mom explained.
There it is.
“You’re way too dismissive of our help. If things are a mess,” she continued, the implication clearly being that I’d caused another mess that my parents thought me incapable of cleaning up on my own, “then you’ll need us.”
Which, to be fair, was how I’d always thought of myself. A mistake made up of mistakes. That was why I worked so hard at BuzzCorp, why I had such a hard time letting go. I didn’t want to fail. Didn’t want to feel like I couldn’t do anything right except math and science experiments.
But…maybe that was changing. Maybe I was proving to myself that I wasn’t as broken as I’d always believed.
“That was…so thoughtful. Thank you so much for looking out for me. I’m fine, though.
I’m working through it. Hudson’s been a great help.
” I looked up at him, surprised at how true the words were.
But then, so they didn’t think that I was suddenly cured by his magical dick, I added, “And so have my friends at work. Everyone’s been so supportive. ”
Mom cast a cursory glance at Hudson. “Hm. You’ll do dinner with us tonight, yes? Mazziano’s? The usual time?”
“Yes.”
We always had dinner at Mazziano’s when they were in town. I hated the place, but I was always outvoted. Or I would have been if they’d let me vote.
What was different, however, was the guest list.
“Both of you,” she added firmly.
No. No, no, no. There was no way I was forcing him to endure dinner with my parents. “I can go, for sure, but I don’t know if Hudson—”
“I’d love to go,” he interjected. Then, with an ease and speed I’d only seen in the best hotel managers, he pulled off a feat I’d never been able to accomplish: He got them the hell out of my house without them getting angry.
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world. You two take care now.
Don’t have too much fun sightseeing. I’m sure you both have so much you want to do while you’re here.
Wouldn’t want you to miss a second. Mm-hmm!
Good to see you. Can’t wait for dinner. Yep, see you then! ”
My parents disappeared on the other side of my closed front door. It was a miracle, the silence that followed. No raised voices, no condescending tones, no are you going to talk to us that ways. Just Hudson, blinking across the room at me, the most worn-out I’d ever seen him.
“They’re…” His eyes turned to calculators, running scenarios about what would hurt me the least. “A lot, aren’t they?”
Understatement of the century. But I was more preoccupied with him. He’d gotten my parents off my back. “So are you, boyfriend.”
“Sorry. I just thought it sounded better than friends with sexual benefits.”
Long strides brought him across the room. He tipped his forehead down against mine. I held him tight. “You didn’t have to do that,” I said. “You didn’t have to agree to dinner just because she demanded it. Or because you thought it would make me feel better.”
“I know you think I’m just some weak-willed guy who will do whatever a pretty girl says,” he teased, dancing around my harsher assessment that he faked it for everyone, not just me. “But that’s not true. Sometimes it’s about you and wanting to do things for you, specifically.”
“Just seems like a lot of work,” I muttered. “For a fuckbuddy.”
His shoulders shifted, arms tensing around me slightly. “Fuckbuddy or not, just so we’re clear, it’s not a burden to care about you.”
I dug my face into his shoulder. “You’d be the first person ever to think so.”