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Mia walked back to her apartment, desperately needing some alone time before she faced Jessie and her questions.
She felt raw and emotional, filled with self-loathing. Rationally, she knew that responding to him that way made her task easier and more tolerable. It would have been infinitely worse if she had found him repulsive or had to pretend to feel passion where there was none. However, the romantic teenager buried deep inside her was weeping at the perversion of her love story. There was no hero in her romance, and the villain made her feel things that she had never imagined she could experience.
After he had finished fucking her on the kitchen table, he carried her back to the bathroom and gently cleaned her off. He then allowed her to get dressed and go home, with a parting kiss and an admonition to be dressed and ready by 6:30 p.m. Mia had meekly agreed, wanting nothing more than to get away, her body still throbbing in the aftermath of the episode.
She debated how much to tell Jessie. The last thing she wanted was to drag her into this whole mess. Then again, Jessie was already involved through Jason, and one could argue that she’d made things worse for Mia by unintentionally bringing her into the anti-K movement.
Entering the apartment, she was surprised and relieved to find that no one was there. Jessie had to be out studying or running errands.
Sighing, Mia decided to use the quiet time to catch up with her family. The last time she’d spoken to them was last Saturday, which now seemed like a lifetime ago. Her parents likely thought that she was swamped with schoolwork, so they hadn’t bothered her beyond sending a couple of text messages to which Mia had managed to respond with a generic “things r good - luv u.”
She powered on her old computer and saw that her mom was already waiting for her on Skype. Her dad was in the back of the room, reading something. Seeing Mia log in, a big smile broke out on her mom’s face.
“Sweetie! How are you? We haven’t heard from you all week!”
If there was one thing that Mia was grateful to the Ks for, it was the impact they’d had on her parents and other middle-aged Americans across the nation. The new K-mandated diet had done wonders for her parents’ health, reversing her father’s diabetes and drastically lowering her mom’s abnormally high cholesterol levels. Now in their mid-fifties, her parents were thinner, more energetic, and younger-looking than she remembered them ever being in the past.
Mia grinned at the camera with pleasure. The worst thing about being in New York was seeing her parents so infrequently. Although she went back home every chance she got – flying to Florida for spring break was hardly a chore – she still missed them. One day, she hoped to move closer to them, perhaps once she’d finished grad school.
“I’m good, mom. How are things with you guys?”
“Oh, you know, same old – all the news are with you youngsters these days. Have you spoken to your sister yet?”
“Not yet,” said Mia, “why?’
Her mom’s smile got really big. “Oh, I don’t know if I should tell you. Just call her, okay?”
Mia nodded, dying of curiosity.
“How are things in school? Did you finish your paper?” her mom asked.
Mia barely remembered the paper at this point. “The paper? Oh, yeah, the Sociology paper. I finished it on Sunday.”
“You’ve had more papers since then?” Her mom asked disapprovingly. Without waiting for a response, she continued, “Mia, honey, you study way too hard. You’re twenty-one – you should be going out and having fun in the big city, not sitting holed up in that library. When is the last time you had a date?”
Mia flushed a little. This was an old argument that came up more and more frequently these days. For some reason, unlike every other parent out there who would love to have a studious and responsible daughter, her mom fretted about Mia’s lack of a social life.
Mia tried to imagine her parents’ reaction if she told them just how active her dating life had been in the past week. “Mom,” she said with exasperation, “I go on dates. I just don’t necessarily tell you all about it.”
“Yeah, right,” her mom said disbelievingly. “I remember perfectly well the last date you went on. It was with that boy from biology, right? What was his name? Ethan?”
Mia smiled ruefully in response. Her mom knew her too well. Or at least she knew the Mia she’d been prior to last Saturday, when her world had gone topsy-turvy.
“By the way,” her mom said, “you look really nice. Did you do something to your hair?” Turning behind her, she said to Mia’s dad, “Dan, come here and take a look at your daughter! Doesn’t Mia look great these days?”
Her father approached the camera and smiled. “She always looks great. How are you doing, hon? You meet any nice boys yet?”
“Dad,” Mia groaned, “not you too.”
“Mia, I’m telling you, all the good ones get taken early.” Once her mom got on this topic, it was difficult to get her to stop. “One more year for you, and you’re going to be done with college, and then where are
you going to meet a good boy?”
“In grad school, on the street, online, at a party, in a club, in a bar, or at work,” Mia responded by listing the obvious. “Look, mom, just because Marisa met Connor in college does not mean that it’s the only way to meet someone.” One could also meet an alien in the park – she was proof of that.
Her mom shook her head in reproach, but wisely moved on to another topic. They chatted about some other inconsequential things, and Mia learned that her parents were contemplating going on vacation to Europe for their thirtieth wedding anniversary and that her mom’s job search was going well. It was a wonderfully normal conversation, and Mia reveled in it, wanting to remember every moment in case this was the last time she would speak to her parents this way. Finally, she reluctantly said goodbye, promising to call Marisa right away.
Her acting skills must have drastically improved in the last few days, Mia thought. Despite her inner turmoil, her parents hadn’t suspected a thing.
