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“Mom’s at the store with Aunt Lita,” Gemma added. “Shopping for baby clothes.”
Giselle grinned. “A lot of baby talk going on around there, huh?”
Gentry and Gemma both nodded emphatically.
“It’s all anyone will talk about,” said Gentry. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m just as excited for my first niece or nephew as they are, but damn.”
“Imagine how it must be for Ginger,” Gemma said thoughtfully.
Giselle wrinkled her nose. “Yeah, ugh. Stuck in bed, with nothing to do but watch TV and try not to worry about pushing out an entire baby human.”
“Motherhood is beautiful, but… messy,” Gemma remarked, gentle with her words.
“And Ginger has to be the first one of us to do it,” said Gentry.
“That’s the downside of being the oldest cousin. You always have to go first,” Giselle giggled. “She’ll be fine, though. Do you two remember the summer when we found that old fort in the woods behind Grandma’s house?”
“And Ginger climbed that big-ass tree to get the ladder down for us,” Gentry filled in.
Gemma recalled, “She was so high up, I was scared she would fall.”
“Your mom would’ve had a fit if she caught Ginger climbing that tree,” Giselle laughed. “But she was fearless. Hell, we all were. For a bunch of girls, we sure ran that town as kids.”
“You more than anyone,” Gemma pointed out. “Cousin Giselle, the bad girl.”
“Cousin Giselle, the rebel. Cousin Giselle, the bad influence,” Gentry joined in, taking on a fake dramatic voice.
“Bad influence? Did Aunt Nancy say that?” Giselle gasped. “I wasn’t that bad.”
“I never skipped school,” said the youngest cousin.
“I never sneaked out my window at night,” said the elder.
Giselle snorted. “Okay, fine. I was a little bit bad.”
“As if you’re not still bad-ass now,” Gentry said. “How’s it going out there in Hollywood, by the way? You still rockin’ people’s faces off?”
“Yeah. Well, kind of,” she hesitated. She bit her lip, unsure if she wanted to get into it.
But her cousins were too astute. Gemma leaned in and asked, “What’s going on?”
So she launched into a detailed explanation of yesterday’s unfortunate events, with the cousins nodding and gasping at the appropriate times. Giselle felt her soul get lighter and found it easier to breathe as she unraveled her thoughts, feelings, and fears to the most supportive and responsive of audiences. They listened with rapt attention, and she could tell they were on her side. Actually, she knew that to be a fact.
Even on the grayest day of her adolescence, she could always rely on her beloved cousins to wrap her up in warmth and acceptance. Giselle had grown up just down the street from her cousins and spent a good deal of time hanging around at their house while her own parents were stuck at work. Despite the disparity in their ages, the girls were close throughout their lives, right up to the present moment.
“And then I just turned around and walked right out of there,” Giselle concluded her bitter retelling of events. There was a pause, and then the cousins jumped in.
“But then you called them back, right?” Gentry asked.
“What? No. They called me about a trillion times,” she replied.
“And what did you say?” Gemma prodded.
Giselle rolled her eyes. “Nothing. I didn’t pick up.”
“Oh my god,” Gentry groaned, shaking her head.
“What? They betrayed me! They ambushed me and told me my work is… immature,” Giselle lamented. “Bruce is trying to replace me in my own band.”
