Chapter Twenty-Two
My parents spend three full weeks in Bali.
During that time, Dylan and I edit our chapters of A Siren Calls according to Kate’s notes, and we move on to the next section of the draft.
While I still harbor resistance to fully embracing the heightened fantasy of the world, I can see her point, and Dylan’s.
The action flows more smoothly with targeted trimming, the emotional stakes feel stronger, and we find ways to embed a few key details into the world-building with a line here and there rather than a full paragraph of description.
Doing this kind of work reminds me of Dylan’s short stories and how much he was able to say with so little.
It’s a skill I never really appreciated and one I admire in him all the more now that I’m attempting to improve at it.
We also get our first look at the jaw-dropping new paint job and meticulous interior renovations on the Zephyr’s Revenge II, Dylan gets his motorcycle shed and peels every last scrap of wallpaper from the foyer and stairwell, and I prepare for my campus interviews with Idaho and Kansas, which will include detailed presentations on my research and publications, and teaching demonstrations that fit the syllabi for the classes I’ll step into.
It’s basically unpaid labor, like a lot of academia, but it is what it is, and I’m not about to get up in front of a room full of people scrutinizing my abilities and not do my absolute best.
The bus ride takes a few hours, and I use them to plot possible conversations about Grams’s series, anticipating plenty of quiet time with my parents after I arrive.
My mom swiftly overturns this notion when, after the briefest of greetings, she announces she has taken advantage of my visit to schedule bridesmaid dress shopping with my siblings.
I barely have a moment to drop off my suitcase in Riley’s childhood bedroom when I’m swept off to Portland Bridal.
Everyone else is there when we arrive: Haley and Eleanor from Augusta, Louisa from Freeport, Riley and Emil from Portsmouth.
As my mom points out in her usual I’m-only-teasing-so-you-can’t-get-offended tone, my siblings all travel more efficiently than I do since they can drive themselves here.
They’re sipping champagne and picking at a fruit plate, part of the deluxe package our mom booked for the next two hours.
She’s aflutter about having all of her children in one room, and for such a special event.
A trio of clerks plays along, though I’d put money on Eleanor taking control before we arrived, filling them in on the full situation.
Namely, that the only person present who cares about bridesmaid dresses is our mother, and the rest of us are along for the ride, as long as we don’t end up looking like macarons.
Our mom shows everyone a mood board dominated by hydrangeas. When Riley and Emil politely compliment the images, as expected, the clerks set off to gather dresses and hang them in two large dressing rooms, one for Eleanor and Haley, one for me and Louisa.
The instant Louisa and I are alone, she spins on me, her voice hushed.
“What are you really doing here?” she asks.
I gesture to the wall of blue and purple dresses. “Pretty sure you know already.”
“I mean in Portland. Because you are not here to hang with Mom and Dad.”
“I might be,” I say, but even I know I sound ridiculous.
Until I moved into Grams’s house, my family visits were on a strict twice-yearly rotation, in June and December.
Given the recent surprise setup, bullshit gift, and imposed realtor visit, all of which my siblings know about, it’s unlikely I’m seeking more quality time.
“Promise you won’t tell them before I do? ”
Louisa yanks a frothy chiffon gown off a hanger. “Tell them what?”
“Grams’s notebooks. Dylan and I found them. And we want to write the novels.”
Louisa shrieks with excitement, and I promptly slap a hand over her mouth.
“Everything okay in there?” a clerk calls through the slatted door.
“We’re really excited about this ruffled one,” I call back.
I remove my hand, and Louisa manages to restrain her shrieking. Sort of.
“You’re going to be an author!” she whisper-shouts.
“I’m already an author.”
“Yeah, but now you can be an author of books people actually read.”
I let this one slide. She’s not entirely wrong.
“Mom has to give us the rights,” I tell her. “She doesn’t own the notebooks, but she heads the estate that owns the intellectual property of the world and characters.”
This puts a damper on Louisa’s excitement.
She huffs in frustration as she changes into the chiffon dress.
It’s iridescent with a scooped neckline, a waist sash that ties in the back, and a full, ruffled skirt.
It invokes both hydrangeas and a 1980s prom.
I zip her up, and she sputters with giggles as she catches her reflection in the full-length mirrors.
“Put on the same one,” she says. “We’ll exit the dressing room singing ABBA.”
While I peel off winter layers, she twists up her long hair, using bobby pins provided on a small vanity, along with hair elastics, double-sided tape, a comb, a hand mirror, and bra pads.
“Maybe if we present a unified front,” she says, “the four of us can back you up. Get Dylan down here, too. I know Mom thinks he’s taking gross advantage by living in your house for free, but his hotness might fluster her, and she won’t be able to say a firm no.”
I shoot Louisa a look that suggests this is a highly unlikely outcome.
She waves off my look with a flick of her wrist and carries on with her hair while I slip into a dress just like hers.
It doesn’t escape my notice that this is my first time putting on clothing with color in a lot of years, and it’s something my mother picked out, which isn’t the way I want to emerge from my gray cocoon.
An issue I need to address. Soon. As the dress rustles into place, Louisa motions for me to turn around so she can help with my zipper.
I hold my low ponytail out of the way and she starts tugging, but she stops with the zipper partway up.
“What the—?” Without warning, she flings open the dressing room door, pounds on Eleanor and Haley’s door, and demands that they join us in our dressing room.
I peek around the open door, holding the half-zipped dress to my chest. “Lou?”
“Do you need a hand?” one of the clerks asks.
“No! Nope! Absolutely not. All good!” Louisa fires at her as she drags Eleanor and Haley into our suddenly crowded dressing room and slams the door behind them.
Eleanor’s in a simple taffeta A-line dress she looks great in, and Haley’s wearing a midlength Grecian cut over top of her jeans.
Not that I have much time to process what they’re wearing, because Louisa spins me away from them and brushes aside my ponytail. “You’re seeing what I’m seeing, right?”
“Are those . . . ?” Eleanor starts but doesn’t finish.
Haley leans in. “It’s been a while since I’ve had one on the back of my neck, but . . .”
“They are,” Louisa hisses. “They totally are. You little liar. You are sleeping with him.”
My entire body flushes, which isn’t a great look against blue and purple chiffon.
I open my mouth to deny the accusation, but it’s too late.
My body has betrayed me in more ways than one.
If I had any doubts about the matter, a quick glance with the help of the nearby hand mirror confirms that I have several distinctive bruises on the back of my neck and shoulders.
Also, my sisters might as well know, even though this wasn’t how I imagined telling them, and even though I don’t have good words yet for what Dylan and I are to each other.
“It happened after I saw you guys at El’s party,” I say.
“I’m so jealous,” Louisa says. “Don’t tell Reuben. I adore him, but he’s no pirate king.”
“Neither is Dylan,” I remind her.
“Whatever. You can still cosplay some ah-maaaazing sexual fantasies.”
Haley peers at my neck again while zipping me up. “Looks like they already did.”
Eleanor lets out a comically exaggerated sigh. “It’s always the quiet ones.”
I wave my sisters away, buying myself a few inches of space as my anxiety spikes.
“Just, I can’t . . . I don’t—” I press a hand over my breastbone and force myself to breathe.
“Holy shit.” Louisa’s eyes go wide. “You’re not just sleeping with him.”
I shake my head, unsure where this rush of emotion is coming from. My feelings for Dylan aren’t new, though this is the first time I’m fully, openly acknowledging them.
Haley wraps me in a side hug, tipping her head onto my shoulder.
“We’re happy for you,” she says. “You deserve this.”
“It’s complicated,” I say.
“All the best things are,” she tells me.
“I have an interview in Idaho in two days. Idaho. That’s practically the West Coast.”
Eleanor brushes a stray strand of hair off my forehead, always the family caretaker.
“Could he move out there with you?” she asks.
“I don’t know. Maybe. I think we’re both waiting to see what the options actually are before we talk about what they might mean. This is so new. And I might not get any offers.”
My sisters protest, but they barely get a word out before there’s a knock on the door.
“Everyone decent?” Riley asks.
“No!” we all call at once, even though we’re fully dressed.
“I’m coming in anyway.” He does, shutting the door behind him and backing into the corner, the only space not already occupied. “What’s going on in here?”
Louisa leaps right in. “Phil fell in love with the pirate king—who she’s having stupidly hot, kinky sex with, obviously, like I’ve been telling all of you for months—and now they want to finish Grams’s series for her, but You Know Who has to give them the okay.
Oh, and also, she might be moving across the country in a few months and leaving him behind. ”
A tense silence falls as my siblings all turn to look at me.
“It’s not a complete summary,” I say. “But it is an accurate one.”