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Sadie’s forehead crinkled. “With guests?”
“No, with each other.”
“Well, I already knew that. It doesn’t bother me. It’s cute.”
“You think that.” I knocked on the door and took a step back.
“What’s this signal you’re going to give me?” Sadie asked.
“Oh, I’ll… squeeze your hand.”
“Denver, you do that all the time without even thinking about it.”
The door opened, and my mom’s eyes lit up at the sight of the two of us standing there together.
I squeezed Sadie’s hand.
Shoot, she was right. It was like a reflex.
Sadie poked my side.
“I know, I know. False alarm.”
“Come on in, you two.” Mom held the door open wider and gave me a hug before turning to Sadie. “I’m Abigail. It’s so nice to meet you. Ed’s in there.” She led the way into the kitchen.
My dad slid off of a stool and came to say hello, shaking Sadie’s hand and giving me his usual bear hug that just about broke my back. Buster circled around us until I stopped to say hello to him as well. My mother’s decorating had extended to him. He was sporting a festive bandana covered in candy-corn print around his neck.
I noticed Sadie’s curious perusal of their house, and of them, although she tried to hide it. My parents were completely down-to-earth. Heck, my mom was a third-grade teacher. But she didn’t look like one. She got her hair done on a schedule. And her nails. And her eyelashes. She did fillers, had perfect makeup every day, and while she was dressed in jeans and a blouse, they were boutique pieces. She looked put together in a very intentional way, and she outfitted my dad to match. It was just how they were.
It was not how Sadie was. I hoped she knew I didn’t expect it or even want it from her. If Sadie wore an oversized, ugly T-shirt every day for the rest of her life, I’d still think she was the most beautiful and wonderful person I’d ever started out hating and learned to love. Or like. No, I loved her, dang it. And I couldn’t tell her anytime soon, no matter how much I felt the truth of it. My dad always said men fell in love first. I thought it was something he said to make my mom blush and smile. Maybe it was just true. I squeezed Sadie’s hand again, and she gave me the side-eye.
“Do we need to feed you two first?” Dad asked, already heading for the fridge.
“No, we ate.” I assured him. Sadie nodded. The kitchen had been converted to pumpkin painting headquarters anyway.
“Sadie, how are you with craft projects?” Mom handed her an apron and put one on herself.
“I’m not creative but I can follow directions.” Sadie put on the apron, and I tied it in the back for her.
“I love that answer. Come over here.” Mom led her to a spot at the table where she had a line of pumpkins on a drop cloth. “This is one of the school fundraisers we do every year. We have a pumpkin raffle, and the more we get done, the more we bring in. I usually do themes. These ones are going to be Starry Night. All I need you to do is coat them in this navy color, but leave the stems unpainted. Denver, are you going to help her?”
“Of course.”
I grabbed an apron off the hook and went to sit by Sadie. My mom sat across from us, doing her thing, which was taking a pumpkin which already had its basecoat on and turning it into a masterpiece. Sadie and I got to work, but we got distracted watching what my mom was doing.
“You’re amazing, as always.” Dad leaned down and kissed her cheek. He sat down next to her and took a pumpkin which had been painted green, turning it around in his hands before deciding which side he liked best.
“My dad does the ones with faces,” I explained to Sadie.
We all worked in silence for a few minutes, with my parents occasionally pausing to study Sadie, and Sadie doing the same with them.
“How did you two meet?” Mom finally asked with feigned casualty. I could tell she was trying to hold back, but she knew practically nothing except that Sadie must be important to me if I was bringing her over to meet them. Okay, that wasn’t actually true. Mom and Dad knew a lot about her. Sadie was the girl who had made herself my roommate, the girl Makayla wanted to be friends with. And last they heard, the girl I’d have to work with at my new job. This was bad. Worse than Makayla-giving-us-her-congratulations bad. I would have squeezed Sadie’s hand in a real-emergency way and retreated to explain all this to her, but she was holding her pumpkin in both hands, tilting it up so she could paint the bottom.
“It’s kind of a long story,” Sadie said, oblivious to my internal freak out. “We work together at GoWithFriends. But we knew each other before that through my roommate Jenny.”
“The Jenny who lived with you briefly?” Dad asked me.
“Yeah,” Sadie looked up and smiled. “Denver told you about that?”
