by Bijou Hunter
“No, probably not,” I mutter as we pull onto the main road toward the college. “Of course, basic reading and math are all we know, and we both graduated.”
“Man, high school was hard. I didn’t understand anything.”
“No, but people like us don’t need to understand that shit.”
“Do you need to be smart to be a plumber or mechanic?” she asks, staring at me with her owl eyes.
“No, probably not, but you can’t be dumb either. Probably one of those in-the-middle things.”
“I bet Haydee would be a good mechanic. She’s always pulling shit apart and putting it back together.”
“I fixed the radio,” Haydee announces. “After I broke it.”
Laughing, I roll my eyes. These are my people, and we’re such fucking losers. When I think of us from the point of view of someone like Lily, I don’t know how she doesn’t tear her hair out from our stupidity. When I compare us to other Mullens, we’re at the top of the fucking class.
“Can you keep a secret?” I ask Sissy as we pull into the south quad parking lot.
“No.”
“True, but I’m telling you anyway.”
Sissy looks me in the eyes and takes my hand tenderly. “Is it syphilis?” she asks before bursting into laughter over a word she likely can’t spell. She’s just fucking with me, though. We both know my dick hasn’t known a woman besides Lily in years.
“I wish. A shot and that problem would be fixed,” I say, playing along. “No, it’s more long-term.”
“Eww,” Sissy teases, pulling away her hand. “You need to use condoms, Dash.”
Glancing at her kids in the rearview, I consider reminding Sissy how she only has two because Lily finally got her on long-term birth control. If not for her secret best friend, my sister would have a fucking basketball team by this point.
“Lily’s preggo,” I say, shutting off the car. “While I deliver shit, you can call her and make a big deal out of it.”
“Why aren’t you happy?”
“I didn’t want kids.”
“Not even with Lily?”
There are many moments when I want to knock Sissy upside the head. She needs shit so utterly spelled out that I can almost understand why our temperamental father uses her as a punching bag. I’m not him, and hitting people never makes me feel like a big man. Besides, if socking stupid people in the head made them smarter, my family would be full of Mensa members.
Ignoring Sissy’s question, I turn to grab my supply pack.
“Can we go?” Hart asks, staring with his big blue eyes so similar to Sissy’s.
“No go. Be good while I’m gone.”
“What do we do while you’re gone?” Sissy asks.
Lighting my cigarette, I mutter, “You’re starting to piss me off.”
“Why?”
“You kept the kids home. You whined your way into doing this job, and then you were too clueless to go alone. Now we’re here, and you can’t even sit in the car patiently.”
“I can sit patiently. I just don’t want to. Also, we’ll look less suspicious walking around as a family rather than you being a creep with your beard and bag of drugs,” she says and reaches into the back seat to unlatch the kids. “And if the campus police look at us, the kids can scream and distract them.”
“Well, aren’t you a savvy bitch?” I say, giving her a wink.
Sissy snorts at my amusement. Hurrying to get the kids out of the SUV, she covers their heads with the “Sesame Street” knit beanies she and Lily found at the Wanamaker Goodwill. Burt Haydee and Ernie Hart proceed to follow us in the classic kid combination of bouncing, swaying, nearly falling, running, and almost tripping before dragging their feet until they nearly trip again. My favorite is when they run in front of us before immediately becoming fascinated by something and stopping suddenly. Sissy runs right into them—having been too distracted to notice they were distracted—and her ass ends up in the grass. Talk about the dumb leading the dumb.
“Remember when you met Lily on campus and she’d dress like one of them grungy people?” Sissy asks after cleaning the leaves from her butt.
Smiling, I think back to when New Hampton College provided a relatively safe space for Lily and me to be together. She’d put on her “Grunge Delta” persona with a hoodie or beanie over her lush hair and used flannel shirts to hide her curvy chest. Somehow, people didn’t recognize her. Pastel-loving Lily Johansson turned heads with her corn-fed, Americana smile. Any deviation from that particular look was enough to throw off people. And since her father figured she was safe on campus—and properly spied on by the staff—he didn’t send his club boys to follow her around. Just like that, we were free to hang out in the open.
Lily was different back then. She still had goals, though they seem to change rather frequently. Then she figured saving money was better than working toward a degree she didn’t want. So she dropped out, got a job, and started running in place. Jay was her one attempt to move forward, but she didn’t want him. I’m not really sure he wanted her either. Not the real Lily, since I doubt he knew about Grunge Delta who smoked pot, wrote terrible poetry about her tits, and claimed flossing was the work of the devil. No, he most definitely never saw that side of his secretly-schizo fiancée.
After they broke up, Lily returned to her holding pattern. Working at a mind-numbing job, living with her parents, and sneaking around to see Sissy and me. The first time she met me after the end of her engagement was right here on the south quad next to the giant willow tree.
“I didn’t want him,” she told me. “I want you, and I don’t care what anyone thinks.”
Except she did care. My father terrifies her only slightly more than her own. Besides, Lily has an image in Ellsberg, and she wasn’t ready to ditch it.
Now, apparently, she’s prepared to face everything she successfully avoided for the last eight years.
I study my nephew riding on his mom’s back and my niece bouncing around them. Lily wants this madness in her life. Not just figuratively with the family, but she craves these weirdoes—including me—in her day-to-day existence.
First, she found her home, and Victorian-style houses in Ellsberg are no dime a dozen. Then, she dropped her birth control. Now, she’s cooking a mutt in her oven.
No longer hiding, Lily Bear will either get everything she’s dreamed of or finally come to grips with how Mullens and Johanssons don’t mix.
THE PRINCESS
My quirky sister, MJ, is the first to arrive at my home. She immediately proceeds to complain about the smell of the meats I’ve prepared for the party. She opens a window, squats on the floor next to it, and inhales the cold air.
“It might be a pregnancy thing,” she mumbles. “Or your food is gross. I haven’t decided.”
After resting a cup of green tea next to the chair she’ll no doubt sit in after dealing with her nausea, I say, “It’s my first fondue party.”
“I don’t know what any of that means.”
“Not even the words ‘it’s my first’?”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
When MJ smiles at me, I can’t help noticing how much more she grins now that she’s in love. Quaid is a good influence on her. Just the other day, she offered to go to an antique fair with me. Fortunately, I talked her into staying home instead since I planned to ditch the fair and hang out with Sissy and her kiddos. Still, MJ’s offer was as sweet as she’ll get with me.
“You’re not knitting my baby anything, are you?” she asks, still sniffing cold air.
“You said not to.”
“I might want a blanket for Little Quaid Baby. I saw the one you made Audrey, and I got to wondering why should her baby get something cool while my baby doesn’t?”
“You really thought the blanket was cool?” I ask, beaming from ear to ear.
“Can my baby have a green one?”
“Of course.”
My shivering sister inhales deeply befo
re announcing in a quick burst, “Quaid likes the color green, and he did all the hard work of making the baby, so I think he’ll want a green blanket.”
“Do you need to throw up?”
“No, but I might dry heave a little. Don’t be alarmed. My stomach is a rock, and I would never vomit on your fancy floors.”
Smiling again, I am oddly proud to hear my sister refer to my floors as fancy. My family hasn’t been particularly impressed with my new home. Colton called it a horror movie house. Pop claimed the electric and plumbing likely sucked. Mom worried I’d fall on the narrow stairs. Audrey said I might have gone too wild with the color blue. MJ mainly wanted to know how a duplex worked and if my renters could bust through the walls and kill me. The one time Gram visited, she complained, “This place is too grandma for you, and I say that as an actual grandma.”
So MJ’s compliment has me flashing a big smile. She notices me grinning at her and inches away. I know she doesn’t like people staring at her, but I’m happy.
And nervous. Telling Dash about the baby went about as well as I expected. Sissy was thrilled, but I can impress her with pretty much anything. My sisters will be a huge practice test for telling my parents this weekend.
My petite little sister, Audrey, enters the house complaining about the weather. “The farther north I get, the colder shit gets.”
“Thank you for coming,” I say, ignoring her asinine statement.
“What’s that smell?” she asks while removing her jacket.
“I have meats, cheese, fruits, and veggies for us to eat.”
“Why?”
“It’s a fondue party.”
“Why can’t you just be normal?” Audrey asks, patting my cheek before kicking off her shoes and walking to the couch. “Why are you sniffing paint, MJ?”
“I’m breathing cold air to settle my stomach. Where’s your baby?”
“At Mom and Pop’s house.”
“By itself?”
Audrey glares at MJ who smirks just enough to reveal she’s messing with her.
“So why are we having a fondue party?” Audrey asks after resting her sock-covered feet on my rustic blue coffee table.
I look at my sisters and wish we were closer. I’m afraid of their responses, but maybe I shouldn’t be. They understand motherhood and love, and they are family.
“I’m pregnant,” I announce.
“When’s the wedding?” Audrey asks.
“I’m not getting married.”
MJ inhales deeply from the window crack before asking, “Does the man know he’ll likely be murdered by Pop?”
“Pop doesn’t need to know who the father is,” I say, still too afraid to throw out Dash’s name.
Audrey cocks an eyebrow. “You do know who the father is, don’t you?”
“Of course,” I grumble.
“Don’t go all ‘of course’ on us, young lady!” MJ cries, standing up. “You’re the one living in sin with a secret man, or possibly you’re a lesbian and used a sperm donor. Either way, for shame, Lily Johansson. For shame.”
“Are you done?”
Sitting in a chair and reaching for her tea, MJ shrugs. “No, but I should let Audrey have a chance.”
My youngest sister crosses her arms and gives me a squinty frown that I assume is meant to mimic our pop’s.
“Does the married man know you’re carrying his child?”
“He isn’t married,” I say, walking into the kitchen to make myself a plate. A good serving of food will distract from their inquisition. Pregnancy hasn’t ruined my appetite so far, and I’m looking to comfort myself.
“No one will buy that lie, Lily!” Audrey yells, assuming a wall between us means I can’t hear her. “Come up with something better! Hey, why not say he died in the war?”
“What war?”
“It doesn’t matter. People are always sad when someone dies in a war.”
MJ makes a loud gasping sound, and I enter the room to find her glaring at Audrey. “My man nearly died in a war, bitch.”
“Yeah, and see how I’m sad?”
MJ sets down her tea and joins me on the couch where I have food. Apparently, the meat is less disgusting when on my plate.
“I’m not saying he’s dead,” I tell Audrey.
“No, because lying and sneaking around is beneath you, princess,” Audrey mutters. “Hypocrite. All this time you judged me for being an out-of-control whore, and you were the true shameless whore all along.”
Accustomed to Audrey’s wild accusations, I quietly reply, “I’m not a whore, and I never said you were one either.”
MJ stops picking at my food long enough to ask our sister, “Yeah, weren’t you a virgin before the giant man?”
“Yes, I was.”
“Then what in the blazes are you talking about?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” Audrey says, shrugging. “I’ve been so moody since I gave birth. For nine months, I was hormonal for two. Now I’m moody for one and—” Audrey looks around the room before asking, “Wait, what are we talking about?”
Her mouth full, MJ shrugs. “I think we were guessing the father of Lily’s bundle of bastardly joy. Oh, is it that pharmacist guy you’re always talking about?”
“Al is sixty-seven years old,” I deadpan.
MJ doesn’t miss a beat before replying, “Exactly. Older men have it going on. And I should know,” she says, rubbing her baby bump.
“Quaid is in his thirties.”
“And just imagine how much sexier he’ll be when he’s sixty?” she cries. “I can’t wait to get my hands on an older version of my wise lover.”
“So no on the old dude,” Audrey says. “Oh, gross, is it one of the Rogers? They’re like family, and pseudo-incest isn’t an approved Johansson vice.”
“Why does it matter who the father is?” I ask before popping a cheddar cube into my mouth.
“Because there are three main questions people always want to know when they learn you're pregnant,” Audrey explains. “The first question is when the baby is due. The second is do you want a boy or girl? Be careful since that one’s a trick question. Always lie and say you don’t care. Finally, the third question is who knocked you up. That one only works for women without obvious lovers like me and this one over here,” Audrey says, gesturing toward MJ now devouring all my cheeses.
“I’m a private woman,” I explain while watching MJ stuff herself, “and I plan to remain one despite everyone thinking I should blurt out my every inner thought.”
Audrey shakes her head. “Pop will get the info out of you. Might as well tell us so we can help you when he loses his fucking mind.”
“I’m a financially secure adult woman who made the choice to have a child. He’ll understand.”
Of course, I expect Audrey to laugh. She’s always been a little on the rough side, and marrying into the Hayes family certainly worsened her temperament.
MJ, though, usually won’t laugh in people’s faces. She prefers mocking them behind their backs, yet here she is laughing at me.
“Pop is going to kill you,” Audrey says, wiping tears from her eyes. “Figuratively, of course.”
“Why won’t you tell us?” MJ asks, finishing everything on my plate and resting her head on my shoulder like the family dogs are prone to do when they want more food.
Audrey gasps. “Hell no! Please, no, not Rudy Roche.”
“Of course not,” I balk. “How could you even suspect such a thing?”
“He likes you, and you’re embarrassed about the baby daddy.”
“I’m not embarrassed. I just don’t want him to get in trouble, and you’re right about how Pop won’t handle the news well.”
“It’s someone gross, I think,” MJ tells Audrey. “She’s lonely, and an ugly guy came along. Maybe he got her a little loaded on cheap wine and she couldn’t stand another night alone. I don’t know if Lily she-bops. She was probably desperate for human contact.”
“Oh, stop already,”
I grumble. “Heavens, why do you two insist on making everything so dramatic?”
“It’s an ugly guy,” Audrey says, giving MJ a nod. “Might be a druggie.”
“It’s Dash,” I blurt out, having taken all I can of their babbling.
“Who?” Audrey asks.
“No,” MJ replies, clearly knowing the answer.
“No, what?” Audrey asks. “Am I supposed to guess?”
MJ shakes her head and sighs. “It’s a Roche.”
“No, not a Roche,” I mutter, ready to slap the both of them. “Dash Mullen.”
Frowning, MJ seems confused. “Oh, that’s the other shitty family.”
“No, no, no,” Audrey says. “You can’t have the baby of a Mullen. Oh, Lily, why?”
“Is he the one Colton always torments?” MJ asks.
“No, that’s Cy.”
“And which one is your baby daddy?”
“If you’re not even going to listen, why am I talking to you?” I grumble and walk into the kitchen.
“I was listening!” MJ cries out, also assuming the wall between us makes me deaf. “I just don’t know who anyone is. Plus, don’t forget how I got shot a few months ago.”
Poking my head out of the kitchen, I sigh. “Yes, in the arm.”
“True, but I could have very easily fallen down after getting shot, and maybe I hit my head.”
Audrey snorts. “It’s always you and your damn head.”
“You’re a tiny woman,” MJ replies.
I return to the living room in time to find Audrey narrowing her gaze at MJ before remembering to focus her irritation on me. “The Mullen family is gross, and your baby has their nasty DNA. Oh, Lily.”
“I happen to like Dash. Sissy too.”
“She’s so dumb,” MJ says and then snickers. “Of course, dumb chicks rock.”
“That family is nasty,” Audrey continues. “Not a respectable level of redneck nasty like we are. Their bloodline is nothing but psychos, addicts, idiots, and a combination of the three. That’s what your baby has running through its blood now.”
“You’re mean,” MJ tells Audrey. “I know I’m mean too, but this is Lily we’re talking to, not some dud on the street.”
