AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Mentally, I’ve been preparing for John and Clare. I’m ready for them.
I’m not ready for John, Clare and John’s mama.
I’msonot ready for John, Clare, John’s mama, and my freaking parents.
Fuck my fucking life. FuckJohn’sfucking life. He brought the goddamn cavalry. What a little rat. Oh my God, I could strangle him. I could strangle myself; that would be far more pleasurable than what’s about to happen.
When a hand slips into mine and grips tightly, almost painfully, I glance at my tight-lipped, red-faced sister. I’m not entirely privy to why Willow left the way she did. If there even was a big, dramatic why, or if what I saw was enough to drive her away quickly and without a backwards glance.
A kid constantly being punished for being a kid. Continuous verbal beat-downs for having a personality that didn’t align with what my parents wanted. A handful of slaps that made me flinch then, make me nauseous now at the thought of ever raising a hand to my child. It was an awful thing to watch, undoubtedly even worse to experience, and it’s why I’ve never held a grudge against Willow and her absence.
John knows all of this—long before he got me in bed, our families were friends, close enough that our parents didn’t hide their fuckery from each other and were more than comfortable reaming their children with an audience. He knows exactly what he’s doing. He knows it’s not just me he’s fucking with, and he’s hoping it’ll work in his favor, I’ll bet. Weaken part of my defense.
Simultaneously, silently, Willow and I decide we’re not going to let his tactic work. Clutching each other tightly, we stand strong, stoic, straight-faced as our worst fucking nightmare strolls towards us. We’ve faced them off just the two of us before; we can do it again.
Except it’s not just the two of us.
Hell, we’ve got a calvary too.
It’s not unusual for the whole family to turn up at a tournament. Nor is the determined air everyone sports; a competitive nature is practically a prerequisite. What is unusual is the synchronous way they surround Willow and I.
An arm links through my free one, drawing my attention to a grim smile and serious green eyes. Behind Amelia, Nick stations himself, their girls tucked against his side. Kate takes up the far end, balancing Matthias on her hip while the toddler does his best to leap the short distance into Ben’s arms. Luna takes a leaf out of Amelia’s book, interlocking her and Willow’s arms, her free hand held hostage by her baby-cradling husband, tension holding Jackson’s forearm taut as though he’s physically holding Luna back. Winona parks herself in front of them and Isaac stands vigil beside his sister, arms crossed and a face like he’s ready to kick some serious ass, and it makes me wonder how much, exactly, his new best friend has told him. August slings an arm around my shoulders, and a different, darker hand slides across my stomach, fingers locking with mine.
I tilt my head back as Cass bends down to kiss my forehead. “It’ll be okay,” he murmurs, and when he says it, when I take stock of everyone looking ready to go to war for me and my kid, something in me really, really wants to agree.
* * *
I doubt anyone was expecting a loving reunion but if they were, they’re sorely disappointed. It’s a painfully awkward spectacle. Like two teams facing off, Team California versus Team Texas, and it’s horrible.
Horribly hilarious, in some ways, because God, the Twilight-obsessed teenager inside me can't help but compare this to that final fight scene in Breaking Dawn Part Two.
“August,” John’s mother is the first to speak, to break the awful silence. Like I always have, I hate the patronizing, coddling way she addresses my kid. “You don’t wanna say hi to your Grammie?”
My kid, bless his little heart I love so much, holds me tighter. “No, thanks.”
Mrs. Shay—I never was awarded the great honor of calling her Carol—flinches. She frowns. She clucks her tongue before speaking in the exact same tone she uses on August. “Quite the gentleman you’ve raised, Sunday.”
“Must take after his father.” It’s a bit early for things to get ugly but hey. She started it.
If she was wearing her pearls, I imagine she’d clutch them in horror. Instead, she fingers the silver cross hanging heavy around her neck, presumably silently asking our Good Lord why, oh, why she was cursed with me? With her other had, she yanks her son close, more than likely whispering something like ‘don’t listen to the hedonistic little slut’—she did actually call me that once, although in her defense, she didn’t think I could hear—before forcing a smile. “Let’s try to be civil, hm?”
I don’t make any promises. God knows I’m not feeling particularly accommodating—it’s not fair that I’m the one expected to play nice when they’re the ones stirring shit up.
I wish I could say I’m not very aware of my parents, even more unaware of exactly where their gazes are laser-focused but that would be a lie. Clutching the hand holding mine a little tighter, I survey the people who raised—in the loosest sense of the word—me for the first time in… four years? Five? Somewhere in between me, for the last time, refusing to marry John and his and Clare’s engagement party, we stopped speaking. Those two things were the last in a long string of offenses, and apparently the most unforgivable.
They look the same. Perfectly dressed, perfectly postured, yet so, so far from perfect. When I was younger—more naive—I used to hate that I didn’t particularly look anything like either of my parents, that I was a blend of both of them, favored neither. Now, I can’t describe how glad I am that if we were in a room together, no one would think we were family.“Hi, Mama. Daddy.”
Managing to tear their gazes off my belly, my parents adopt those tight, grimacing smiles that’re so popular amongst our group right now. “Hello, Sunday.”
That’s it. Two words. Nothing else. No acknowledgement of anything else. Not of their grandson or their impending granddaughter. Nothing, and I don’t know why, after all this time, I still let it get to me. I still gaze at my daddy the way I did when I still had a glimmer of hope that he was a good man. Before I learned he was just as judgmental and nasty and heartless as Mama; he just hid it better.
Eyes I inherited flit to the woman beside me. “Willow.”
My sister stiffens. “Mama.”
Mama looks from Willow to me to Cass to August to my belly and back again. “I ought to have known you were involved in this somehow.”
“Yeah.” Willow rolls her lips together, the anxiety rolling off her in waves making way for irritation. “Held Sunday down and knocked her up with a turkey baster myself.”
