The Boyfriend

by Abigail Barnette

  The pain in my chest eased a little. “Let me talk to Neil and El-Mudad and get back with you.”

  She nodded cautiously. “Sophie...I don’t want to be cruel. I really don’t. But the rest of the family—“

  “Wouldn’t understand. I know.” I would never even attempt to let my extended family, especially not my grandmother, find out about my unconventional immediate family. “Trust me, we’re planning to keep it under wraps. El-Mudad is going to visit his daughters in Paris the week of your wedding.”

  She didn’t breathe a sigh of relief, but her posture certainly changed. “I’m sorry to even ask.”

  I shrugged. “Look, we know there are going to be challenges. We’ve spent a long time talking through them. Trust me to know what’s best for me, okay? And trust me to think things through in a smart way. I’m not a little kid anymore.”

  “No, you’re not,” she agreed reluctantly. “I hate that, but you’re not.”

  “You could always have another kid,” I joked. “Women are having babies into their sixties now.”

  “Oh, they are not.” She waved a hand. “Don’t believe everything on the internet.”

  Said the woman who had sent me at least three Snopes-debunked articles about terrorist threats in the past six months. But I let it slide. Things with mom weren’t suddenly, perfectly cured. But they were somewhat better than they had been before.

  I would take it.

  * * * *

  “Is this shirt all right?” El-Mudad asked when he entered the kitchen in his navy Versace polo shirt.

  “You look fine. You know how much I love blue on you,” I reassured him.

  “I don’t think he was asking if it was all right for you,” Neil observed from where he crouched behind the island, taking something out of the warming drawer.

  “Exactly. I was wondering if it was all right for dinner with Tony and Rebecca.” El-Mudad let out a long, slow exhale. “I don’t think I’ve ever been this nervous over dinner with someone I’ve already met.”

  “That’s because this is the first time you’re meeting them as our partner instead of as a good family friend,” Neil pointed out, cursing as he dropped a pan of roasted brussels sprouts in a honey glaze onto a large trivet. The pan slid sideways, and I hurried over to right it while he dove for the sink and turned on the cold tap.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, careful not to burn myself, too, as I carefully centered the pan with a kitchen towel wrapped around my hand.

  “I’m fine.” He clucked his tongue in annoyance. “I can’t believe I’ve done that.”

  “Perhaps you’re a bit nervous, yourself?” El-Mudad suggested, coming to stand at his side. He carefully turned Neil’s hand over in his, taking it out from under the stream of cold water for just a second. “Look. Not so bad. It probably won’t even blister.” He dropped a kiss on his finger just as Olivia charged through the door.

  “Oh no! You kiss Afi’s boo-boo?” she gasped as El-Mudad stepped back quickly. “Afi, let Olivia see. Let Olivia see it.”

  “There isn’t much to see, I’m afraid,” Neil told her, holding his dripping hand down to her level.

  Her face crumpled in disappointment. “Why you’re not bleeding?”

  “He’ll try to do better next time,” I said with a laugh.

  El-Mudad picked her up and kissed her chubby cheek. “It’s just a little burn. Let’s go away from here before you get one, yourself.”

  “Olivia doesn’t like burns,” she said very seriously. She’d once reached out and grabbed the flame of a candle on Neil’s birthday cake, and he’d been emotionally punishing himself for it ever since. He winced at her declaration, and I shook my head fondly.

  El-Mudad put Olivia on a chair on the other side of the island, but he remained standing. He practically twitched with nervous energy.

  “Hey,” I said softly, trying to pull him out of his thoughts. “It’s going to be fine. Everything is going to be fine.”

  He gave me a grateful, if disbelieving, smile.

  The bell rang. Neil glanced over at me. “Are you expecting someone?”

  “Just my mom.” I frowned and went to the kitchen door. I peeked around the edge of the Roman shade, expecting to see some strangers there. But it was my Mom and Tony. And they’d...respected our privacy?

  I threw the door open wide. “Wow, I didn’t know you knew how to use a doorbell!”

  “Very funny,” Mom said with a roll of her eyes.

  “I think Becky learned her lesson on that one,” Tony said with an uncomfortable cough.

  Mom handed me the foil-topped pie-plate she carried. “Dessert.”

  “Sugar free?” Neil asked, trying and failing to keep his tone light and non-judgmental.

  “No, I thought I would send my daughter to the hospital,” she said with a breezy wave of her hand.

  “Everything was baked with Splenda,” Tony assured us.

  “That’s why it’s so flat and runny,” Mom added. She nodded to El-Mudad. “Hello, only person in this kitchen who hasn’t criticized me yet.”

  “I would never do so,” El-Mudad swore. “Unless you’d like me to.”

  “Oliva is here!” Olivia announced from the table, and Mom hurried over to her.

  “Yes, she is. And I’ve missed her!” Mom kissed her cheek until she wriggled away.

  “No, no, no. Olivia is too big,” she insisted, and Mom backed off. We’d all agreed that it was super important for Olivia to know she could turn down hugs and kisses. We also all agreed that she was definitely too big. The time had flown, and her fourth birthday was just around the corner.

  “Is this my party?” she asked, sounding concerned and a little disappointed.

  “Your party is next week,” Neil reminded her.

  I nodded in agreement. “At Serendipity Three. So you can have frozen hot chocolate.”

  One of the greatest injustices I’d ever experienced was finally getting around to visiting the confectionary cafe after being diagnosed with diabetes. Nothing would ever get me over that particular unfairness. But it would be worth going to watch Olivia absolutely demolish a year’s worth of sweets in a single day.

  The kitchen table was going to be too cramped for all of us, and it was such a nice day that we’d decided to eat on the patio outside the dining room. El-Mudad and Tony went downstairs to unload the food from the dumbwaiter while Mom and I loaded it up and Neil kept Olivia occupied; she was always angling for a ride in the damn thing, which had necessitated a combination lock on both ends.

  “So far, so good?” I asked Mom nervously. I’d gone from an acceptance of her disapproval and problem with my relationship to desperation for her approval in a few short days.

  She shrugged. “I haven’t really had time to figure out if it’s going good or not, have I?”

  “No, but...” But what? But I wanted her to hurry up and get on my timeline for acceptance?

  She closed the door behind the last dish and hit the button to send it down. “It isn’t like I hate him. He’s a very nice guy.”

  “Um, you really didn’t like him before. Like, when he stayed with me to help me when Neil was in the hospital. Or at Christmas,” I reminded her, in case she felt like she could gloss over all of that as we moved forward.

  “You’re right, I didn’t. But I also thought there was something fishy going on at the time.” Her expression softened. “And I want to apologize to you for that. It wasn’t fair of me to accuse you of cheating on Neil. I know you better than that. I know you’re a better person than that.”

  “You sure didn’t seem to think that when you walked in on us,” I pointed out.

  “What was I supposed to think? That there was a rational explanation behind you cuddling, half-naked, with a guy who isn’t your husband?” she asked.

  “Okay. That part’s fair. But you thought it before, so I’ll accept your apology for those times.” I turned and walked away. “Especially since something fishy was going on.”
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br />   Just not in the way she’d thought.

  Our dining patio sat nestled in a carefully designed and landscaped sunken area partially shaded by a balcony above and surrounded by the gentle ridge of a man-made hill. A fieldstone hearth stood woefully unused near a wet bar with an outdoor television and blocky modern furniture that we rarely got around to sitting on.

  “We should have more parties out here,” I observed as I sat at the long, slate-topped dining table.

  A fountain set into the retaining wall burbled cheerfully, and Neil had to herd Olivia away from splashing in it. He dried her hands with a napkin before he took his seat. “We’re about to have a rather large party in a few weeks. Are you ready, Tony?”

  Mom jumped in before he could answer. “What the hell does he have to be ready for? I’m the one who’s going to be up at the ass crack of dawn getting my hair and makeup done, wrestling into a thousand foundation garments—“

  “Getting your makeup and hair touched up after you work up a sweat struggling into those foundation garments,” I supplied for her. At her warning look, I added, “What? I’ve had a wedding. I know how it goes.”

  “Hopefully I won’t hyperventilate and throw up like you did before yours,” Mom said with a laugh.

  Neil looked positively stricken. “You threw up before our wedding?”

  “Nerves about the ceremony,” I reassured him. “Not cold feet. I didn’t have any doubts.”

  He picked up my hand and kissed it. “Neither did I. But I must confess, I did feel a bit dizzy when it was time to actually stand at the altar.”

  “There wasn’t an altar at your wedding,” Mom said, all passive-aggressive and Catholic. “And there wasn’t a priest, either.”

  I reached for the basket of bread in the center of the table. “Let it go, Rebecca.”

  El-Mudad had been very quiet, and I didn’t know if that was because he hadn’t been to our wedding—we had been on a bit of a hiatus with him while he’d worked out divorce and his custody agreement—or if he was simply uncomfortable around my mom now. I didn’t blame him either way. But I did appreciate it when he finally entered the conversation. “From what I’ve seen of the plans for your reception here, it seems you’ll have a lovely day.”

  “Where’s the tent going to be again?” Tony asked, twisting in his seat. “Becky told me, but I couldn’t quite imagine it.”

  “The tent will be on the lawn, near the path to the beach,” I explained.

  “And the path will be lined with posts and string lights,” Mom added.

  Now this, this was a subject I could hold forth on forever. Both of us could, probably. “And there are going to be floating candles and flower arrangements in the pool.”

  “And you’ll have the television on some kind of sport down here, I presume,” Neil said dryly. “For your male relatives.”

  “Absolutely,” I agreed. “And a bartender. There’s going to be another bar on the secondary terrace, too.”

  “The requisite silly photos booth will be inside, near the changing rooms for the pool,” Mom said, and frowned. “Do we have a plan for the little ones, since there’s water everywhere?”

  Neil cleared his throat. “Yes, security will be discreetly monitoring the pool areas and the beach. Out of uniform.”

  “You’ve really thought of everything,” Tony said, his eyes wide.

  “Do you feel as though your wedding has been wrestled from your hands?” El-Mudad asked with a wry laugh. “That’s what mine felt like.”

  Tony nodded. “It’s good that I’m not particular about that kind of thing. All I want is to be married to Becky. She can pick out all the stuff that goes with making that happen. Of course, I don’t think I could have stopped the wedding planning train if I’d wanted to.”

  “I didn’t let Sophie get away with any of that nonsense,” Neil declared proudly. “I refused to be shut out of floral decisions.”

  “That’s because I couldn’t give a shit about flowers.” I’d come to terms with my husband’s weird flower obsession. Apparently, his mother had been very fond of roses and they’d spent a lot of time in the gardens at Langhurst court, so I chalked it up to childhood nostalgia and not something that might indicate he would be a serial killer on a personality test.

  The conversation hit a lull that suddenly felt excruciatingly uncomfortable. The wedding had been a safe topic, but we’d somehow reached the end of the organic flow.

  “So, El-Mudad,” Mom began, picking up her fork and spearing a bite of steak. “How did you meet Sophie and Neil?”

  I glance at him, hoping he could pick up my telepathic message. Please don’t say in a Parisian sex club. Please don’t say in a Parisian sex club.

  He wasn’t stupid. I should have given him more credit. “We met in Paris. Neil and I are members of a social club there.”

  It was such a good way of phrasing it without having to lie. I needed to get some lessons in that.

  “Fancy,” was all Mom said.

  “That was...oh my, that was six years ago, wasn’t it?” Neil asked with a chuckle. “What is it about that particular increment of time?”

  “Neil and I got together six years after we first met,” I explained to Tony, since Mom and El-Mudad already knew all about it. My throat went a little dry at the realization that our flight delay tryst was now twelve years ago.

  “This is nice symmetry, then,” Tony said.

  “As long as you don’t pick up another person in six years,” Mom joked, shocking the hell out of me. Her having a sense of humor about my romantic life so soon after the bombshell that had dropped was about as likely as two lunar eclipses in one week.

  “Sophie, are you building a cult of devoted worshippers?” El-Mudad teased.

  “She’s been trying to pull that off since she was two years old,” Mom said, never batting an eye at his comment about being my devoted worshipper. It felt too easy, too normal. Maybe I would never trust the feeling of relief that briefly flickered through my consciousness.

  “Well, I must admit, I am devoted to your daughter,” El-Mudad said, making bold eye contact with my mother. “Completely. And I look forward to many happy years with her and with Neil.”

  Then he reached over and took Neil’s hand, right there in front of her.

  My stomach twisted. An open display of affection? Right in front of God and my mom and everyone? Suddenly, I felt like I was trying to defuse a bomb.

  She didn’t even blink at it.

  El-Mudad smiled slowly. “Rebecca, you could be a professional poker player.”

  Neil laughed, and then, to my utter shock, Mom did, too.

  “Look,” she began, holding her palms out perpendicular to the table, her big silver bangles jingling. “I’m not going to pretend I’m totally comfortable with all of this. I’m not a liar. And I never, ever want any details about anything that goes on...intimately.”

  “This should stop you from bursting in our bedroom on Sophie’s birthday next year, I presume?” Neil said.

  She went on without acknowledging his snark. “But if you’re all happy, and if Olivia is happy and taken care of, that’s all that matters. I just ask that your grandmother never know, Sophie.”

  “Never,” I promised. My extended family didn’t even know I was bisexual, a fact that I sometimes felt guilty about. Then, Neil or El-Mudad or Holli or Deja would remind me that queer people had no obligation to be “out” in situations that would make us uncomfortable.

  “And I know you’re going to be busy with your daughters that week,” she began with a shaky breath, as though she’d resigned herself to an unpleasant idea. I glanced at Tony’s face; he studied her carefully. Clearly, he’d had a hand in whatever she was about to say. She exhaled and said, “But Tony and I want you to know that you are invited to the wedding.”

  El-Mudad immediately called her bluff. “I would be delighted. I will be...circumspect. But delighted. I can easily move my visit with the girls back a day or two.”
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  Neil tried to hide his amusement in his water glass but ended up laughing anyway. He choked and Olivia said, “Put your hands up, Afi. Shake them! Shake them!”

  It was a trick I’d taught her for choking on liquid. I had no idea if there was any science behind it, but we’d always done it in our family, and it seemed to work.

  Neil, however, was not about to throw his arms up and start flailing around like a car dealership inflatable man.

  Mom’s eyes narrowed. “Or, you could bring them here. I would hate for them to feel excluded. Since they’re family now.”

  The fact that my mother would go to such lengths to spite my husband over an ill-timed laugh didn’t surprise me. What did shock me was how easily the dinner had worked in our favor.

  “Well,” Tony said, wiping his mouth with his napkin. “What do you know? Miracles happen.”

  Epilogue

  The morning of the wedding brought clear blue skies and warm—but not unbearable—temperatures. One of the second-floor guest suites had been converted into a bridal command center, mostly because it had a built-in, lighted vanity with trifold mirror. I’d been bugging Neil since we’d bought the place to manage somehow to move the whole set up into our bedroom, but I was glad he hadn’t; I wouldn’t have wanted basically all of my female relatives crowded into my closet.

  Aunt Marie stood behind Mom as the hair stylist worked on an elaborate but sophisticated updo, not crowding so much as hovering in judgment. “I still think you should have gone with the extensions and leaving it down.”

  “I want something classic. Something not...mutton dressed as lamb.” Mom’s eyes flicked to Marie’s in the mirror, annoyed. “Besides, keeping my hair down would have covered up the back of the dress.”

  “And her skin is glowing,” I stated emphatically. “Marie, you have to go for a full Korean body scrub while you’re in town. You will never feel so soft.”

  She shook her head and moved over to the side table, where pitchers of mimosas and crystal glasses had been set out by the caterers at first light. She refilled her glass. “No thanks. I’m not showing my big bare butt to a bunch of strangers. Sophie, you sure you don’t want any?”