“Yay?” I tried.
She laughed. “The urge to relentlessly hint and then outright demand grandbabies is very strong, but children are a big decision and no one should be pressured into it. Instead, I tell everyone else about my urgent lack of little humans with that new baby smell, so I won’t bug my kids as much.”
Huh. Respecting other people’s decisions, or at least trying to. What a foreign concept.
“Seems like this went well,” Dad said, though it sounded sort of like a question. He was watching me warily, and I would be offended if that weren’t an incredibly warranted thing to do.
Yet, I don’t know. This was… this was kinda okay.
“Leave now and don’t ever come back,” I told her next. So much for all the okayness.
Dad actually looked relieved, now that the thing he was anticipating happened and he didn’t need to be on guard anymore, but then he looked sad at what I said.
I made a distressed noise. “What I meant was that you should probably leave now before this can stop going well.” About that… “It may already be too late.”
She only smiled. “Okay, then. Hopefully we’ll get to know each other later. For now, I’m Joanne Walsh. it’s nice to meet you.”
I reached my hand out quickly and nearly knocked over her takeout container but she caught it. She had fast reflexes. That was also good. She left and then my dad got that mythical silence thing he told me about before, which I thought he’d just been making up.
Except hey, we did have stuff in common besides our genes. Because getting what he wanted didn’t make him happy. Getting what I wanted was great and should happen all the time but then I push my luck and want more.
With Dad, he kept looking at me, shooting me worried glances as we ate. He wanted the silence, so he could choke on it.
Wait, no. I want my dad to always be not choking. Our food came and that was excellent because I could eat and not talk.
Joanne Walsh.
We might have a problem because she only lied about two things, and I lied about all the things but didn’t consider it lying because is it really false if you don’t fact check what you say and also don’t remember having said it five minutes later?
Her interests… Scrabble was eh, alcohol was overrated, and farming was something I knew nothing about and had no interest in learning. She seemed kinda bossy, even if she tried not to be, with the whole babies having babies thing. I was also bossy so that might be too much of a good thing. This could be bad. But…
The instinctual panic I once felt now that the Dad moving on thing became a reality instead of a possibility had faded more and more as time went on and I got more comfortable with the idea. That wasn’t to say I wouldn’t freak out and scream and question everything at some point, that was my way. Yet…
I don’t know. I had a good feeling. She looked me in the eyes when she talked, and she smiled at my dad when she looked at him. She seemed to have an open mind and a sharp one.
I think I like her.
No, that’s another lie.
I’m pretty sure I know I do.
Ugh. This would take some time. I wasn’t quite ready to go all in and say she was the greatest ever and we should get matching cats or whatever people got with other people they liked. I wasn’t even ready to say I liked her without saying maybe or I think or possibly but.
Possibly.
Was this another new experience? Something going right on the first try. Figured. Dad had great taste in women. Better him than me.
* * *
Luke
A lot of people in Lake Forest were the same. There were little differences, a quirk or two, but on the outside, everybody presented common characteristics to everyone else, afraid to be anything different. That hadn’t bothered me once. Fitting in, belonging, it felt good.
Until I realized there was a part of me that other people sometimes considered unusual or wrong.
There wasn’t a good way to say this, but having problems with people? That was new for me. I solved things with a confident attitude and a charming smile. People liked me. They used to.
Me and a bunch of guys from the team were near the baseball diamond. I arranged for us to meet and go running because we had to stay fit, even in the offseason. There were water bottles and gym bags scattered on the ground as guys chatted, stretched, and got ready to exercise.
