“Thanks. That was sweet of you.” I ripped off a fried onion petal and plunged it into the orange-colored sauce. “I know tonight probably isn’t going how you expected, but I’m glad my mom twisted your arm.” I caught sight of his broken wing. “Sorry, that was insensitive.” I squirmed in my seat. “What I mean is I think you and I can be friends.”
Cuddy let out a rush of air.
“Why are you so relieved?”
He smirked. “You aren’t the only one with a secret.”
“You’re gay?”
The waiter stood with pad and paper. However, after I blurted the question, he flipped around and fled without giving us a chance to order.
“I have a feeling he isn’t as enlightened as me.” Cuddy laughed. “I don’t think we’re getting any steak tonight.”
I nearly spewed onion bits all over his face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to out you at Outback.” The words took hold. “Out you at Outback.” I broke into a fit of giggles.
He laughed with me.
I dabbed my eyes with a napkin. “This has to be the worst blind date in history. The birthday surprise. Homophobic waiter.”
“I don’t know. I’m having fun at least, and just so you know, you didn’t out me.”
“You aren’t gay?”
“Nope.”
“Then what’s your secret?”
Cuddy cupped one side of his mouth. “I can’t tell you. That’s why it’s called a secret.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re pulling my leg.”
He blinked several times, moving his head side to side. “I’m not. I swear.”
“Then tell me,” I begged.
He rested on his forearms. “Maybe, maybe not. Only time will tell.”
I bit into another onion piece. “Fine. Be that way.”
“I’m protecting you. I’m not the kind of guy you really want to get close to.”
I examined his soft eyes, uneven and large ears, and small stature. “What are you? A bank robber? No wait, a pimp? Hit man?”
He shook off each accusation, laughing. “What are you going to do about your mom?”
“What do you mean?”
“Are you going to tell her? As they say, honesty is the best policy.”
“Are you insane? She won’t take it well. And this coming from you, who won’t tell your new bestie your deep, dark secret.”
“We’ve moved to best friends already? How do you know your mom won’t take it well?”
I motioned to him. “Are you forgetting she called you to set up a date?”
“I’ll never forget that. I briefly wondered if she’d threaten my life.”
“That’s why you agreed.” I nodded. “She’s made me fear for mine on occasion.”
“She wasn’t that bad, really. Besides, I needed an excuse to get away from my grandparents. They don’t trust my friends. Your mom convinced them to let me out for a night.”
“My mom spoke to your grandparents?” I shielded my eyes. “Jesus, she’s one step from offering a dowry.”
He laughed. “I could use the money, and I’m jealous of Gemma.” He eyed my chest.
I rolled my eyes.
He feigned waving a flag of surrender. “Kidding. And you may be missing something important.” He chewed on a bite of onion, glancing at the ceiling. “Maybe she’s worried for you.”
“Worried I’m gay?”
“Or just worried and wants you to be happy.”
I scrunched my face.
“I know it may not seem that way, and quite possibly she’s going about it completely wrong, but at least she’s trying. My mom gave up on me years ago.”
“What do you mean?”
“Just that. She doesn’t try. Both my parents only care about their fantasy world. They spend more time at conventions than with me or my siblings. That’s why I’m staying with my grandparents this summer. The moment I walked across the stage to get my high school diploma, I was practically shoved out the door with the implied message I should only stop by on Christmas to say hello.”
“I take it this isn’t your secret.”
“You need to put in a lot more friend time for me to spill my guts.”
“Couldn’t you fake liking your parents’ Hobbit-world?”
“Couldn’t you fake being straight?”
Not wanting to explain I was bi, I said, “God, that’s awful. I’m sorry, Cuddy.”
“I doubt my parents even remember my birthday. So, while your mom isn’t the best, she’s not the worst. The grass is always greener.”
A waitress appeared. “Can I get you anything else?” She pretended it was completely normal to take over our table for her homophobic colleague in the middle of dinner.
“How much money did my mom give you?”
He pulled out some twenties from his pocket.
I turned to the waitress. “Two of your most expensive steaks. It’s my birthday after all.”
“Now you’re talking. No reason not to enjoy the evening.”
The waitress left smiling, probably calculating her take of the tip.
Cuddy leaned over the table, cradling his bad arm. “I may have problems cutting my steak.”
“I’ll help.” I tapped the side of my glass. “Tell me about your grandparents. Besides them not wanting to let you hang out with your friends, do you get along?”
His face grew serious. “They’re okay as long as I follow the rules.”
The way he said it made me question what happened when he broke them. “Do they beat you?”
“Oh no, that leaves marks. They keep dog kennels in the basement…”
“They lock you up in a dog kennel?” I said much too loudly.
Several heads turned and gawked.
Cuddy held his side with his uninjured arm from laughing.
I scrunched my face. “You’re a jerk.”
“You’re easy pickings!” His face was turning redder.
“Am not.”
“If you say so. But would you mind if we pick up a bag of dog food for my brother on the way home? Bilbo’s been locked up since Christmas.”
“Yeah, right. I don’t believe anything you say.” I lobbed part of the blooming onion at his face.
He caught it with his good hand and popped it into his mouth. “Thanks, but you forgot the sauce.”
“You’re funny… as in funny looking.”
“How come we never met before? Just think, we grew up twenty minutes away from each other, lived in the same dorm, and we didn’t meet until the accident.” Cuddy made horror film sound effects.
“Life’s a mystery.”
“Life’s a bitch.” His voice bordered on serious.
“Then you grow up and marry one.”
He laughed. “True in both our cases.”
“A fact I don’t intend on telling my mother.”
“Ever?”
I shook my head.
“If you did, though, what’s the worst that could happen?”
“You mean besides buying me shirts that show off my ta-tas so she could set me up on a blind date on my birthday with the hobbit who ran me over with his bike?”
He stared at me wide-eyed as the waitress set our plates down.
Recovering some, he said, “You really have impeccable timing for putting your foot in it. It’s like a disease with you. And, so you know, you aren’t the first to call me a hobbit. Totally unoriginal.”
Something made a vibrating sound, and his good hand dove into his pocket.
I swallowed. “I’m almost afraid to ask what’s shaking in your pocket. It’s not a…” Was BDSM his secret? Wow! I’d been reading too many of Bernie’s books if my mind went right to that.
“Yes, I always bring a vibrator on blind dates.” He revealed a pager, moving it side to side.
I’d never met anyone with a pager before, except for my dad’s friend who was a doctor.
“Do you need a pay phone or something? Is that your secret, Doogie Howser? With your new haircut, I see a resemblance.”
“So funny. And to answer your question, I don’t need to call back. It was just my grandmother.” Cuddy tucked it away.
“They really do keep you on a tight leash.”
Chapter Five
The following morning, the birds chirped, sunshine streamed through the white lace curtains, and wafts of sizzling bacon tickled my senses.
I bolted upright in bed, tossing my pale-yellow pillow onto the floor.
Bacon.
It couldn’t be. Not at Mom’s house. I made my way downstairs.
“Morning, sleepyhead. How was your night?” Mom poured pancake batter onto the hot griddle.
“What’s this?” I waved to the spread of fresh strawberries, hash browns—extra crispy just the way I liked them—pancakes, and there it was, the bacon I’d been smelling. Greasy, crunchy, meaty goodness. We hadn’t had bacon in our house for years.
“Your birthday breakfast.”
“Which was yesterday?”
Mom shrugged. “No reason why we can’t celebrate all weekend.” She dried her hands on a dish towel. “How was your date?”
Before I could lay into her about setting me up, Dad stepped inside from the deck.
“Hey, ladybug.” He displayed a sheepish grin and sleepy eyes, like he recently woke and put on wrinkled clothes he’d worn the previous day. “Happy birthday.”
Did he stay the night? I thought he’d been flying. Was that a lie so they’d have alone time? Was that the real reason she’d called Cuddy? To get me out of the house. If that was the case, did she suspect Gemma and I were bumping uglies or not? Of course, Gemma’s pussy wasn’t ugly, and it pained me not being able to taste her. I shoved the emotions to the side for the moment.
“I know Glen’s birth, or due date, is a bit hazy for you rebels, but mine has always been firmly fixed.” I scarfed a piece of bacon before I woke from my dream. The scene playing out before me couldn’t be real.
Mom laughed, a good indication she had gotten lucky the night before. My stomach roiled.
“Your father couldn’t be here yesterday, so we’re celebrating today.” Mom scooped a pancake off the griddle. The larger golden-brown circle had two Mickey Mouse ears. The oval-shaped pancake piece meant to be his nose fell off. “Oops.” She laughed again.
Witnessing my mom acting girlish and sweet and my father looking ragged after a their likely one-night stand made my mind spin. Could divorcing parents have one-night stands with each other? I’d heard of makeup sex and had benefitted from it with Gemma, but was there such a thing as impending divorce sex?
“Let’s go outside.” Dad grabbed the tray.
“Coffee?” Mom held a carafe. “You got in late last night. You probably need it.”
I nodded, trying to weed through all the clues since the accident. The only explanation was an alien invasion. The people in my house were alien imposters, and my parents were on Xanadu or someplace being subjected to medical tests.
The phone rang.
“Would you get that? I think it’s for you.” Mom added cream and sugar to my coffee, without even asking. Sugar, the silent killer.
“Hello?” I said with suspicion. Had Mom arranged for another boy to ask me on a date?
“Hola, baby sis. Happy birthday!”
Dear God, even Glen had been kidnapped by aliens.
“Glen?”
“Do you have another older brother I don’t know about?”
I almost blurted, “Considering you’re a bastard, the chances are high.”
“See you outside,” Mom whispered, smiling.
I covered the phone and peered out the kitchen nook window. My parents sat at the table under the leafy oak tree, conversing like they enjoyed each other’s company.
“Glen?”
“Still here.”
“You have to come home, and you have to come now.” I gripped the cordless phone to my ear.
“What?” His voice sounded more like the surly brother I had never appreciated until this moment. Surly was normal. I liked normal.
“Mom and Dad are acting weird.”
“How so?”
“Dad spent the night,” I whispered. “And Mom made me Mickey Mouse pancakes, bacon, and hash browns. I can’t handle this. Not on my own.”
“You used to love Mickey Mouse pancakes. Mom made them all the time before aerobics took over her life.”
“You aren’t listening to me. Dad stayed the night. And they’re getting along all of a sudden. I’ve never seen them like this—like teenagers.”
“He does pay for the house.”
“But they’re getting divorced. There are rules, aren’t there?” I whispered into the phone.
Glen laughed. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. One night doesn’t mean a thing. Go enjoy your breakfast, and try to have a good birthday.”
He hung up.
How could he?
Mom’s laughter spilling into the house sent tremors up and down my body.
“There you are. Come on. Don’t let your food get cold. Your father was just telling me about Park Guy.”
“Park Güell,” Dad corrected. “With two dots over the U.” He mimed adding the dots.
“Yes, Güell in Barcelona.” Mom shifted closer to Dad.
“You’d love the park, Tegan. Antoni Gaudí, an architect, designed it and it’s filled with his quirky style. All of Barcelona has his imprint. At the entrance of the park is a large mosaic salamander, known as the dragon. And the views are wonderful. Next time I go, I’ll pick up a book for you.”
I poured maple syrup over my pancakes and took a much-too-large bite, calculating an empty mouth would be dangerous. One stupid comment could cause everything around me to shatter into a million pieces.
“Good?” Mom asked.
I covered my mouth and mumbled, “Delicious.”
“Your father and I thought we should go to Barcelona.”
I forced pancake down my throat. “You two? Go on a trip together? To Spain?”
“No. The three of us. Four if we can convince Glen.” Dad sipped coffee from his Denver Broncos mug.
A trip to Elitch’s was the extent of our family travels as of late, and the amusement park in Denver was less than an hour away. My mother had always pooh-poohed travel, even though my dad was a pilot.
I made a silent prayer that the aliens who had abducted my parents and replaced them with these models would never return the Rick and Sally Ferber I’d grown up with.
Barcelona? Really? That was so much cooler than Yellowstone.
***
“Don’t forget sunscreen,” Mom admonished before heading out to teach an aerobics class followed by her time at the church to do one of her goody-two-shoes thingies that she told me about ad nauseam, but I managed to block most of the minutia out.
Two more days. Two more days and I’d be moving into the summer sublet with Gemma, Jenny, and Bernie. I wasn’t so psyched about living with Jenny and Bernie. Even as a child I had always preferred my own space. Glen used to joke I lived in the west wing of the house and had invisible Secret Service agents guarding my room.
The two-week break from work and school had been nice, but I was starting to get antsy with so much free time and was ready to start my volunteer stint at the hospital and movie theater job.
Outside on the back deck, not a soul could be seen. No houses abutted the property and the chance for a passerby was less than nil unless they were out for a hike or horseback ride in the sun-crusted dirt and scrub brush. Most out here preferred trekking through the hogback or in the foothills to the west, not the ridge behind our home.
Slipping out of my tank and shorts, I settled onto the lounge chair in the bikini I’d purchased a little over a week ago. Since the nail gun accident that occurred in high school had left a scar on my back, I’d s
worn off bikinis in public places. However, Gemma had convinced me that the mark was minimal at best, and I trusted her. At least at my parents’ house there’d be zero witnesses. Even my mother hadn’t made a snide remark about it when she came home early the day before and smeared sunscreen on me so I could cook my backside.
The sky was a cloudless deep blue, and the temperature hovered in the upper nineties. The burgundy cushion on the lounger scorched my skin in a pleasant way. What I wouldn’t give to live in a warm place like Southern California or Miami year-round. Maybe then I could have a tan. For seven days straight, I’d been sunning for several hours a day, and so far, the result was a slight browning with a hint of pink. Did I have Irish blood in my family tree?
I cracked the spine of the library copy of Interview with the Vampire and settled in for the day. It didn’t take long for my eyelids to become heavy. This was the life. Reading, sleeping, and sunning. The only thing missing was my beautiful redhead, and she was on her way back to Colorado.
***
“Tegan!”
I stirred, confused why a man was saying my name.
Someone patted the top of my head.
“Daddy?”
“What? No!”
I pried my eyes open. “Josh?” I yanked the towel off the chair next to me and covered myself. “How did you get in?” While I’d been asleep, clouds had rolled in.
“I bumped into your mom at church, and she gave me the garage door code. She said you probably wouldn’t hear the doorbell.” He shook a large box with Christmas wrapping paper and a silver bow. “Happy birthday.”
“My birthday was last week.” I reached for my tank top, easing it over my bikini top. Josh, of course, had seen me naked in the past, but that was before I started dating Gemma. Josh and I hadn’t communicated at all since the breakup. Why was he here now?
“I know, but I was still in Texas. I wanted to give you the gift personally.”
Confused, I tore the paper off. “A teddy bear?” I shielded my eyes to look at him, forcing the urge to tell him I wasn’t five into the pit of my stomach.
Girl Love Happens Boxed Set: Books 0-2 Page 32
