“Amen.” Granny Mavis raises a gospel hand.
My nails dig into my palms.
“I cannot for the life of me understand why my brother is trusting my reputation and that of my company to you.”
Just finish the contract, then you’ll never have to see him again.
Great-Granny Mavis fist-bumps McCarthy. “A fellow Nathan-hater, I see. This man is attractive and has good taste. You should have him get you pregnant,” she tells me matter-of-factly.
“Then you can move home, and we’ll help raise the babe!” Mom twirls around, her multitude of scarves flowing around her, then flies into McCarthy’s arms. “Oh, say you’ll father my grandchild!”
“Mom!” I say loudly, “I am not moving home. Ever. We discussed this. Please don’t touch him.”
“I don’t know. You might have to move when you get fired and Nathan can’t cheat on you anymore because you’re home all day.” McCarthy gives me a knowing look.
“Shut up,” I hiss at him. “Granny Mavis, can you go put your teeth in, please? We’re losing the light.”
She salutes.
“You can’t come here and immediately start working, Jenna-bug. Have tea and nourishment. It’s your favorite—hibiscus and pine bark.”
“I’m just here for work, Mom. I’m not staying to eat.”
“But I baked your favorite herb-and-cheese loaf. I just took it out of the oven. There’s fresh goat cheese, and Edwina even laid an egg,” Willow coos to the chicken glaring at McCarthy.
“The light…”
“The sun will come up tomorrow,” my mom says dreamily. “You can spend the night. Can’t she spend the night, Honeysuckle?” my mother exclaims as a very tall, very naked late middle-aged red-headed man appears on the front porch, his hands on his hips.
“Cover your eyes, McCarthy!” I wave my hands in front of his face. I have heartburn. Severe heartburn.
“Trust me, I am not looking.”
“Oh dear.” Zephyr, my latest stepfather, frowns. “I’m sorry, Jenna.” He grabs a threadbare towel hanging on the banister, wraps it around his waist, and knots it.
“Your mom said this was supposed to be an authentic photo shoot,” Zephyr apologizes. “That you wanted to showcase the community we’ve built.”
“So that's your dad.” McCarthy’s eyes are still closed, and his chin almost rests on my shoulder. “Explains a lot.”
“Oh, um, no, he is not my dad. Billy, aka Zephyr, is actually the latest in a line of randos my mom has hooked up with. My dad's a finance advisor who wanted to live on the wild side one night after high school graduation, tried acid, then ended up with a kid he didn't want nine months later.”
“Ah, then that really explains a lot about you—the glomming onto the shitty boyfriends, the lack of self-respect. It’s the daddy issues—the simplest answer is statistically correct the most often.”
“I don’t—”
Granny Mavis pokes her head out. “I dug up all the corpses and propped them up on the back patio for ya!” The old woman salutes from the porch as my stepfather waves us inside.
McCarthy’s gray eyes widen in alarm.
“They’re not really dead,” I say to him. “They’re just very elderly.”
“I got the dogs groomed, too, for you,” my stepfather says, loping barefoot into the house.
“I don’t think we’ll have the dogs in the photos.” The wood steps creak ominously under my heels. I just need a few shots and clips of McCarthy and Great-Granny Mavis.
“No, Jenna-bug, you need to show the world how we can have a new model to take care of the elderly. Can you believe it?” my mother cries to McCarthy, grabbing his arm and stroking him. “People abandon their elderly relatives to waste away in nursing homes. We thought we had to put my grandmother Mavis in a home. The doctors were saying that it was for the best. But what do they know? The first place we looked at was terrible. It hurt my soul.” She grabbed his hand and pressed it to her ample chest. “I just couldn’t bear to leave my grandmother there, so we took her home, alongwith any other resident that wanted to come. We’ve invited anyone who needs a warm, loving home to spend it with us here in paradise!” She spins around.
“Sure you don’t want to post the dogs? Everyone likes senior dogs,” Zephyr says to me while my mother channels her inner manic pixie dream MILF.
