Page 26 of Naz & Roz

NINE

Roz barely noticed her brother sitting at the kitchen table talking with her mother and father as she entered the room. Although, it really wasn’t that unusual for her brother to show up at their parents’ place at all hours of the day and night. Well, according to what her mother said when they talked on the phone.

She partly blamed it on the fact Luca was a momma’s boy like nobody knew, but also on the fact her brother had just recently moved out. He wasn’t used to not having his parents around, and he couldn’t cook to save his life. He’d starve if it wasn’t for their mother and drive-thrus.

None of that really mattered, though. Her mind was on someone else entirely as she prepped a tea, and scrolled through the last couple of messages on her phone from Naz.

Be there by nine, his last text said.

“Roz, are you going to eat breakfast with us, or keep staring at your phone?” Katya asked.

She glanced up from her phone, and gave her mother an apologetic smile. “I’m heading out for breakfast, actually.”

Roz didn’t miss the way her mother and father passed a look between one another. Katya only smiled in her soft way, while Zeke’s gaze narrowed in on his daughter.

“Is that so?”

She shrugged. “Naz asked. I said yes.”

She didn’t miss the tic in her father’s jaw at that statement. “You didn’t think to ask me if that would be okay, or …?”

Roz laughed, and even Luca passed their father a look for that one. “Since when have you ever cared if I went out with someone for a date?”

“So, that is what it is, then.”

“What?”

“A date,” her father clarified.

“Zeke,” Katya murmured. “Relax. It’s breakfast.”

“Today, Katya. Today, it is breakfast. Tomorrow it could be—”

“Whatever he asks me to do, if I want to do it,” Roz interjected. “That’s kind of how dating works, Daddy.”

Zeke made a noise under his breath, but it was only the look his wife gave him that made her father turn to stare out the window in silence. Still, it kind of irked Roz a bit that her father was choosing to be difficult about something like dating now. That was new. Maybe because it was Naz?

She didn’t know.

“Aren’t you supposed to be practicing?” her brother asked. “Pretty sure I heard you on the phone this morning with … what’s his face.”

Roz rolled her eyes. “Kyle.”

“That guy—yeah.” Luca turned in his seat to look at her. “Isn’t that what you told him you were doing all morning? Practicing.”

“Why don’t you mind your own business, Luca? God knows you don’t need to be in mine.”

Ouch.

She couldn’t even try to hide the sharpness in her tone. No one at the table missed it, either, if the way they all turned to look at her was any indication.

“I told him what he wanted to hear,” Roz said, refusing to meet any of their gazes, “because he won’t leave me alone otherwise. I will practice when I get home. What difference does it make?”

Her brother shrugged. “Didn’t say it made a difference. I just asked a question.”

Mmhmm.

She believed that about as much as she believed the sky was fucking purple. She had no desire to call her brother out on his bullshit, and get in a verbal sparring match first thing in the morning, though, so she dropped it instead.