Oh, this is bad, Nora. You need to back the fuck off and keep your distance.
I already knew it was bad, of course. I knew it the other night, when I kissed Cormac outside of that bookstore. He seems to have developed an unfortunate ability to wiggle past my walls without me even noticing.
I take a deep breath and remind myself that part of the reason I said that shitty thing to my mom was because she’s abloodhound, and I wanted to throw her off the scent. She can’t know anything happened between Cormac and me, because if she did?—
Honestly, I don’t have the slightest idea what she’d do or say. I don’t know what my friends would say either, given that I’ve been avoiding them.
Yes, that’s right.
Hannah, Briar, and Sophie have all texted and called me, individually and as a group, since we returned from Apple Ridge on Thursday evening, but I’ve put them off with half a dozen shitty excuses.
I’m not totally sure why. All of them have been involved in weird dating situations following our epically weird dating situation with Jonah. If anyone would understand, they would. Sophie is married to the brother of our communal ex-boyfriend, for God’s sake, and Hannah used to nanny for Travis before they got together. Then there’s Briar, who’s marrying Hannah’s brother, whom she started sleeping with after he started working for her. Relationships are weird and messy, andthey would get it.But I don’t want to tell anyone about what happened between Cormac and me the other night.
I can’t decide if that’s because I think my friends would tell me it’s a bad idea to get “for real” involved with Cormac, something I definitely know, or because I think they’d encourage me.
Stopping next to the dining room table, I clear my throat. My mother, who was murmuring with Mr. Peebles, looks up at me. Her eyes are slightly puffy, and I feel an uncomfortable surge of guilt. I don’t want to be the one who brings her down. She’s endured more than enough BS from other people. She’s finally happy, and she needs to stay happy.
“I’m sorry, Mom. That was a really shitty thing to say. Dad fooled a lot of people. He fooled me too.”
She gets up and circles the table, then wraps her armsaround me. An awful sea of emotion sloshes around inside of me.
God, I hate being reality-TV Nora.
When I pull back, Cormac returns from the front room with the wrapped gift and sets it down on the table with a heavy clack. “Dottie and Ann and the other Wise Elders really wanted you two to have this,” he says. “They went to great trouble to make sure you got it as soon as you returned home. Why don’t you open it?”
I smile at him.
“Oh, all right,” his father says with the token reluctance of someone who actually wants to do the thing being asked of him. But he nods to my mother. “You do the honors, Moira.”
She carefully unwraps the paper and then opens the box, revealing an enormous pink crystal shaped like…
I start laughing as my mother pulls it out. There’s a huge shaft with two round geodes clustered together at the base.
“Oh, how lovely,” my mother says.
Something tells me she hasn’t noticed that it very clearly resembles a dick and balls, but judging from the strained look on Cormac’s face, he definitely has.
His father coughs. “Yes, well, we can find somewhere special to tuck it away.”
“Tuck it away?” my mom says, and this time I gulp the laughter back, nearly choking myself. “We’ll do no such thing. This crystal deserves to be displayed prominently. We’ll put it in the sitting room.”
“Of course,” Eugene says with a strained expression, his cheeks flushing. “Whatever you want.”
Cormac clears his throat. “Unfortunately, I have to leave. I told Liam I’d meet him at the gym.”
“And I have to go too,” I add, not botheringto offer a fake explanation. They can’t possibly think I’d want to hang out with them and their crystal phallus by myself.
“Thank you for the sweater, Mrs. Applebaum-Peebles,” Cormac says, like the sweet suck-up he is.
My mom heaves a long-suffering sigh. “Cormac, I believe we’ve gotten to a point where you can call me Moira.”
“Yeah, I don’t think I can do that. Well, have a good night, everyone.” He glances at me pointedly before heading for the door and slipping his shoes back on. I follow right behind him and do the same.
Our parents trail us as if they’re a couple of corgis herding us. And they stand in the doorway, waving, as we step into the overly warm night that immediately makes the sweater feel insufferable.
I strip it off as I walk to my Fiat, and when I turn to look at Cormac, who’s standing next to his car, I find him watching me.
The hungry look on his face sends a rush of awareness through my body, but I shoot a fierce warning glare at him. Because I can sense our parents are still doing that thing parents do, watching us vigilantly, as if a masked kidnapper might roll up and steal us away.
