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When she pulls away, I note the red “Hers” on the black apron, and I try not to let it throw me.
Holidays without my dad feel strange, wrong even. But this is the new normal. Just like old Barrett is gone, life before my dad died is not the life I have now. And I can be sad about it, and miss him, but I can’t let it ruin what I have in this moment.
“Come into the kitchen. Rett and Laura beat you here, and Mee-Maw will be pulling up any time now.”
I watch Barrett look around my mother’s glossy, high-end home. It’s not as casual as my cabin. Mom has good taste, and she loves to decorate. I don’t think someone who didn’t know him would be able to tell that he is checking out the details, but I can tell because his eyes aren’t on me, and as we walk down the hallway toward the kitchen, he’s not focused on my mom either.
I make a mental note to ask him later if he’s mapping an escape route, and then we’re in the kitchen. Rett and Laura are both coming off the bar stools, ready to hug us.
Laura is Rett’s newish girlfriend. She’s only twenty-four, a fellow teacher at his school, and I think she’s adorable. Pink hair, wire-rimmed glasses, and a little pixie face. She’s sweet and energetic, and she seems to adore Rett.
Turns out, Barrett is a decently ardent baseball fan, so when Rett starts chattering about obscure baseball stuff, Bear can bat the ball right back. They hit it off better than I could have dreamed, and Laura, Mom, and I work on the food until my Mee-Maw shows up from the assisted living complex she’s been in since she broke her hip last year.
We have a peaceful afternoon, and I feel so thankful. Barrett holds my hand under the table, and instead of being awkward about his combat the way I had worried he might be, he seems to enjoy regaling the table with tales of his exploits. He tells a story about feeding an injured owl food from his MRE, and then another one about him and some people from his “unit” going skiing with the president.
“Oh my goodness! Which one?” my grandma asks.
“President Obama,” Barrett says between chewing his turkey.
“That man… I’m a big fan,” my Mee-Maw says. “I’ve got the bumper sticker.”
Barrett and I haven’t really gotten too much into politics. I say a silent prayer he’s not a Tea Party conservative, and if he is, he won’t mention it to Mee-Maw. She’s got a pacemaker, after all.
As it turns out, he and Mee-Maw get drawn into a long political discussion. Mom and I exchange nervous glances at first, but Barrett takes things issue by issue and point by point, so careful even I can’t tell exactly what his politics are. By the time that portion of our discussion ends, everyone is still happy. I stroke his leg under the table, veering up to brush between his legs. He hooks his foot behind my ankle and rubs his leg against mine.
“Who wants dessert?” my mom asks.
Things roll on at such a cosmically wonderful pace, the conversation good, the spirits bright, I can’t help thinking that Dad is watching over us today. After the food, Mom shows us her newest sculpture. At this stage, it’s just a woman hunched over. Mom tells us her plans for it, and Barrett watches her with what looks like awe.
He asks several insightful questions before I remember, belatedly, his own mother was an artist. And Barrett carves, or whittles. So of course he would care.
I take his hand as we go back inside, and he and I drift upstairs to the study.
We kiss and touch each other gently.
“Doing okay?” I murmur.
“More than okay. This has been…nice.”
“Mom likes you. I think they all do.”
“I like you,” he says. “And them.”
I relish the warmth of his skin under my hands as I trail up and down his sides under his shirt.
“You better not try that here.”
I giggle. “Not game at my mom’s house?”
“Fuck, no.” He chuckles and stands up. He casts his eyes downward and sighs, and I laugh.
“Down boy.”
He rubs his big hand over it, and I groan.
“I’ve got something that will help.” I pull him over to a portrait of my dad, and we spend the next half-hour talking all about him. Barrett stands close to me the whole time and takes my hand when we move from the library into the guest room that I use as mine.
After a while we go back downstairs, say bye to Mee-Maw, who’s trying to get back home early to spend some time with her new boyfriend, Herbert.
