10
Ivy
Valhastopullme away from a food truck selling fish and chips as we walk into Jubilee Gardens to meet Alex. We did just have lunch, but the smell took me back to dinner last night. And last night’s dinner was out of this world.
“Come on, we’re already late,” Val says.
I give her a look.
“What?” she asks.
“I’m still getting used to grown-up and responsible Val. Remember when you made us late for school, then when we got there you didn’t have shoes on?”
Val laughs. “I’ve come a long way in the last decade and a half.”
“You have.” I put my arm around my sister’s shoulders. “I’mproud of you.” And I am. Growing up with me as her mother, and our mother as an indifferent roommate didn’t exactly set her up for success.
Val smiles as she brings her arm around my waist and squeezes. “Now where were we supposed to meet your new boyfriend, exactly?”
I roll my eyes. She has been calling Alex my boyfriend all morning, despite my protests. “He should be …” My eyes search and land on Alex. He’s sitting on a bench behind a newspaper; still, I know it’s him. His disguise, once again, is subpar. He has on another ball cap, this one navy blue with some design I can’t make out from this distance. He looks up from the newspaper and catches my eye. He’s wearing his glasses. I’ve always had a thing for glasses. He folds his paper and walks toward us, his t-shirt and jeans looking like they were tailor-made for him. Maybe they were?
“Hello.” Alex aims a grin at me and then around at the rest of my family. “Planning to stick with your family today, Peter?” he asks with an especially large smile at my nephew.
Peter takes him seriously. “Yes, I do. They fussed at me for an hour about strangers and getting snatched.”
I was there and it was fifteen minutes at the most.
“Glad to hear nobody is getting snatched today,” Alex responds.
“Why do you want to go to the London Eye if you live here?I bet you come all the time and you’re tired of it,” Juniper guesses.
“I was born here, but I don’t actually live here, not often anyway. So it’s been a long time since I’ve been on it. I think it was in the year 2000, just after it opened.”
“Whoa. That was almost in the 1900s,” Juniper says.
“That wasn’t that long ago; all the adults here were born in the 1900s,” Micah says with a laugh.
Juniper is flabbergasted and Peter has mentally left, watching a squirrel scamper toward a tree.
“Hey, Alex. What is that animal?” I ask, pointing to the squirrel before it disappears.
Alex sees it, then turns, giving a knowing smirk. “It’s a sqwi-ruhl.”
Juniper and Peter burst out laughing and they argue with Alex as we walk toward the Eye.
“It’s a lot taller than the Ferris wheel at the fair.” Juniper is backing away. It’s nearly our turn to step into the bubble, or whatever you call it, we will ride around the eye.
“Ah, honey, it is,” Micah says, “but it’s entirely enclosed and look how well attached these things are to the circle.”
He knows all the technical terms, like I do.
“Dad. What if a bolt shears off while we’re at the top?”
Micah looks at his daughter and wife in confusion. “How?”
“We were looking at a broken lawn chair the other day and it had a rusty bolt that had been sheared off,” Val says with a smile. “Juniper’s smart.”
“I’m smart too,” Peter interjects.
