Page 113 of The Statistically Unlikely Reunion

And yes, I see what she did there.

“That’s so generous of you.” She has Brody taking notes, because nothing will be finalized. “And Lorelai’s job will be guaranteed?”

“What?”

The way Beatrice wields her words makes me want to be an English major.

“I mean as parents, we always hope our children will rise to the challenge. But if, and I’m sure you’ve trained her well, but if Lorelai struggles, is her position guaranteed for a certain amount of time?”

My father considers the words for a moment, and I do wonder whether he has an inkling. “I reserve first right of refusal on whether or not to hire Lorelai, and she gets thirty days’ notice, like any of my employees.”

Beatrice smiles as if my father is being generous, and because my father never stops to think about the potential ramifications, this is the agreement that is signed.

The official wording is that I can stay in school for as long as my grades are above a 3.8/4.0 and as long as I’m advancing toward a degree at a top-ranked university.

And yes, this is the moment I decide to apply to graduate school.

Because the contract never said when I had to stop. Just that my father had the right to hire me as soon as I stopped advancing.

Brody—and even his mother—hugs me afterward.

There’s a verbal agreement stipulating that my engagement to Tatum Huang, a man I still haven’t even spoken to since this all began, will be announced a week after worlds.

And for now, my father and mother will remain married, because apparently, such separate maintenance agreements are not only legal, they’re “not rare,” according to Beatrice. (“I’ve worked out several, mostly for women married to Chinese businessmen. I wear a short skirt, put on my Elle Woods ditz, and clean house.”)

Lucas’s investors, Lucas’s family, even Cal, Stan, and their not-porch, are all safe.

My mother and my sisters are taken care of.

What more could I ask for?

39

I WOULD ONLY ADOPT SENIOR CATS

PRESENT

Lucas apparently wins (again) at poker night, but none of the boys want to talk about it. Looking over the pictures during Project Elrond, I add it to the list of things to read more about later. For now, all that matters is how well the poker pictures, and our other plants, are propagating.

“There’s also less overall negative press, and the stories directed at Brody specifically have trickled to almost nothing. It’s still early, and I don’t know how the response will be to today’s batch of pictures, but my guess is we’ve potentially . . . weathered our fifteen minutes of fame.”

It’s a quick turnaround, but then, without a secondary event, these stories often are. When I was still training my models, I studied everything from the Murdaugh murders to Anna Delvey and the Tinder Swindler. Unless there were ongoing events to feed into or twist an existing narrative (the Murdaugh murders, for example, which really started with one son, then escalated to two murders, the suspicion of a housekeeper’s sudden death, and leaked Snapchat evidence), things always died down, usually within forty-eight hours.

“Happy newlyweds don’t sell as many papers,” Brody observes dryly.

Because we’ve already planned the day’s groupings, there’s no reason not to follow through. Lucas and I are technically in the same guided Koloiki Ridge hike, but he’s so much faster, and there are so many people demanding his attention, we barely see each other. He comes to check on me twice: once to offer a hair tie he somehow knew I’d be needing and was carrying, and another time to give me additional water, because I never hydrate enough.

Lucas doesn’t bother asking before coming over that night.

We don’t talk about anything serious. Instead, we catch up on everything and everyone else. He shares his mother’s newest town-council-level petitions, because not only is she not retiring, she’s been steadily increasing the sphere through which she advocates for her community. And I tell him about Wren, trying out for the school play and mispronouncing the word count in a way that led to unfortunate questions.

Yes, we argue about the role of AI in university learning, and we argue the details of a recent SIAM Journal on Applied Mathematics article, and then we devolve into arguing about subplots of a Becky Chambers book published just last month, and which we both read (me, because I’ve always been a fan, and Lucas, because he remembered . . . I’ve always been a fan). We pointedly stay away from anything that might be emotionally charged.

It’s amazing how easy it is, to fall into old rhythms, to how things were years ago.

How easy it might be if I could get over my own hang-ups, a little insidious voice inside me whispers.

“About that compatibility issue you were worried about.”