Kevin shakes his head at his dad and our cousin, tells them he isn't as dumb as they look and heads over to stand beside me by the fire.
My uncle starts to pass the flask to Kev and I reach out to intercept. His mom will be the cause of this year's emergency room visit if her son comes in smelling like whiskey.
Josh, on the other hand, does not have a job, does not have a car, but does suddenly have a girl to impress.
"30 bucks to walk across the field?" He inquires as he looks over at the frozen surface of the particular field in question. "Just walk across it?"
Randy looks Josh up and down with new consideration, pulls out his wallet and removes another bill, "run and I'll add another $20."
I cringe.
It's warmed up to about 11 degrees out here. We don't have snow on the ground right now, but anything that was wet last week has been frozen for days. The puddle in the field is solid ice. If any of us were fool enough to still own skates, we'd be 3 quarters and a couple of bruised tailbones through a hockey match right now.
In my mind's eye, I see California born and raised Josh getting a running start at the ice, falling on his ass and less than gracefully sliding right into the tree that marks the property line.
But fuck! For 50 bucks, I'm tempted to show the kid how it's done-- of course, I grew up here, I can keep my footing on a puddle of ice without the ambulance ride.
That's what I tell myself as I take another swig of whiskey and pass it to Uncle Chuck, bypassing Kevin. It's easy to believe I still have the mad skillz of my 11 year old self as long as I don't try to prove myself right.
Leah leans on her pool cue.
The younger kids must have been playing up in the barn loft on the old table that no doubt needs new felt and releveling by now.
I haven't seen Leah in a few years. She must be at her grandparents' for the holiday and snuck over her to hang out with the kids her own age.
She doesn't look like the scrawny tom boy I remember her as. Nope. My parents' neighbors' grand daughter is looking entirely too grown up to be playing pool with a teenage boy up in the loft without either a grown up or a kid under 10 to keep them from getting any ideas about being teenagers.
"Make it across the ice without falling and I'll double the pot," I hear myself saying as I reach into my own wallet.
Maybe I want to make sure the kid gets some sugar from the hottie next door. Maybe I want to make sure his arm is too broken to spend any more of the weekend alone with her in the barn. Maybe I just want to contribute to the family tradition and I happen to have cash in my pocket and no kids of my own to bribe into stupidity.
Leah straightens up and shoots Josh the kind of smile that inspires country western songs. Josh makes sure his tennis shoes are tied and takes off toward the patch of ice in the field. 7 grown ass men stand around a fire in a metal barrel behind a barn, and cheer the kid on as he hits the edge of the ice.
My life flashes before my eyes as I watch my cousin's youngest son start to slide. We all go silent as Josh's feet start to slide further from each other, his arms out at his sides.
I pulled similar moves a hundred times before I got old enough to remember what pain feels like. Some times I made it, sometimes I fell on my ass, once I spent 6 hours in the emergency room with a broken arm.
I never made a cool hundred dollars for it though, and I can't remember ever getting the girl either.
Looks like Josh is charmed.
Almost.
The crowd goes wild from the sidelines as Josh holds his stance and manages to make it to the far side without hitting the ground. Problem is, he's not prepared for the sudden stop to the slide, so his feet hit the uneven patch of frozen mud and he goes tumbling right into the elm tree, shoulder first.
Leah's the only one with a notion to run out there to check on him after he falls back on the ground and lies there without moving.
The rest of us just keep watching. Tim's recording it on his phone.
"Think he's OK?" Kevin asks his dad.
"Prob'ly" Dad grunts.
"Mom's gonna kill us if we hold up dinner," My brother in law mumbles.
He's right too.
In all the family Christmases I remember since I was 4 years old, dinner has had to wait no less than 12 times because one of the boys-- and that includes anyone in our family with a penis, no matter how old-- got hurt doing something dumb while we were waiting for dinner to be called.
"Serves her right for making us wait so long to eat," Dad tells him.
Leah cradles Josh's head on her knees and brushes her fingertips along the top of his head.
"Lucky fucker," Randy curses, "I never got a girl that hot when I was his age."
"You never got a girl that hot, period!" Tim reminds him.
"Not for making a damn fool of himself, that's for sure," I throw in.
"Kid just made a hundred bucks," Uncle Jay reminds us, "she's no dummy, she knows he ain't got no one else to spend it on."
We all groan in acknowledgment.
The kids make it back to us and we hand over the cash to a slightly wobbly, but grinning Josh who eagerly accepts his prize while his other prize lets him lean against her for support.
From the house we can hear dinner being called and we start the journey back in 2 groups; one of men engaged in various conversations, and a smaller one of two teenagers reluctantly saying goodbye till they can sneak out and hook up later.
I mentally note that that's not my problem.
"So you heard about Sammi?" Randy asks as he catches up to me and my brother in law, Don.
"Doctorate," Don nods, obviously impressed.
"Married," Randy emphasizes.
I roll my eyes. "Yeah, Mom and Betty were talking about it," I tell him.
"Guess who else is getting married?" Randy tosses into the conversation.
"Who?" Don asks, like he actually gives a shit about this stuff.
Randy doesn't say a word and after a beat, Don and I both stop and look back at him.
My goofy cousin, all 26 years of him and 3 years younger than me, stands rooted in place with a big ass grin on his face and a ring box in his hand.
"No shit?!" Don's all high fives and congratulations while I stare at Randy like he just grew another head.
Randy nods, "I mean, I'm gonna pop the question official-like after dinner so we can make the announcement before everyone leaves but..." he opens the box and shows us the ring. I hear myself match Don's whistle.
"That's a really nice new Mustang you got there," Don says.
"Don't want a Mustang," Randy whispers reverently as he looks down at the engagement ring he plans to present to his long time girlfriend, Bev, a few hours from now. "I just want to spend the rest of my life with Bev and raise a family."
And that's when I feel something inside me snap.
My cousin Randy was about to propose to the girl he'd been stringing along for 5 years. Goofy, never-takes-anything-serious Randy was standing out in the back yard at my mom and dad's place with a fucking engagement ring in his hand that probably really would have put a nice new muscle car in his garage. And not only did he not buy the muscle car-- he's standing here saying he'd rather have a wife and start a family.
And Sammi's getting married too.
Don and Tanya are about to have their second kid.
Everybody's younger than me and they've already found the person they want to spend the rest of their lives with.
I can't even seem to find a woman I want to go on a second date with.
I offer my cousin a smile and give him a hard slap to his shoulder. I fall behind the rest of the men as we finish the walk back to the house, keeping my thoughts to myself.
It's not fair, I think. It's not like I haven't been looking for something real of my own. I want a family too, a good woman to give my mom and dad some more grandkids to spoil. Someone I can share my life with and grow old with and spoil grandkids of our own with someday.
B
y the time I make my way through the back door and take my seat at the table I've started my list of new year's resolutions-- first order of business?
I'm getting married.
Courtney
"So what's the big news?" Kelly mixes wasabi into the tiny dish of soy sauce at an alarming ratio.
"You're pregnant!" Mom giggles as she refills her Saki cup and I start to wonder if taking them out for sushi was the best idea.
Maybe I should have done this at my place? Just gotten some sandwiches and locked up the liquor?
"I'm not pregnant, Mom," I groan.
Mom shrugs and checks off half a dozen items on the menu.
"That's a lot of sushi, Mrs. B," Kelly observes.
"Daddy hates seafood," she tells us with a shrug, "raw seafood makes him turn green so the only time I get it is when I come to see Court. She's the only one who'll eat it with me."
"Will you share that one with me?" Kelly asks, pointing at Mom's check list with the end of a chop stick.
"Oh just get whatever you want and we can just pick at it," Mom tells her.
The waiter stops by and picks up our orders, refills our water glasses, and asks Mom if she needs more Saki.
"With the food, thank you," Mom tells him brightly and then, after he leaves she turns and tells me, "I know you're not pregnant, you're not supposed to eat raw fish when you're pregnant."
I swear my mother winks at me.
This is going to be harder than I thought.
"So you're not knocked up," Kelly tells me, "and you're not getting married cuz you're not even seeing anyone right now..."
"You haven't changed jobs..." Mom helps my bestie tick off the list of possible reasons I would have insisted they come out to lunch with me today. Especially since Mom had to fly in to town to do it. So they know it must be big.
"Are you joining a cult?" Kelly asks.
"You're didn't have me fly all the way out here so I can put all your things in storage for you, did you?"
Now they're just having fun at my expense.
"Guys!" I put my hands up to silence them, trying not to let their playfulness scare me out of what I have to say. "I need you to be serious for a second. I have some--" deep breath, Courtney, "--something really important to discuss with you."
Mom and Kelly take the opportunity to start eating under the pretense of listening, but neither of them really pays attention to the website open on the screen of my phone as I set it on the table where they can see it.
"I'm getting married."
That makes them both snap to.
Mom's chopsticks hit her plate while Kelly chokes slightly and grabs for her water.
"Who?" Kelly manages between gasps and gulps.
Mom looks at me suspiciously and I can tell she's mentally checking the calendar to see if today's the first day of April.
I tap the screen on my phone to wake it up again and also to draw their attention to the site I have open.
"Guys, I'm serious," I tell them sternly and tap more intentionally.
Finally, Mom's and Kelly's eyes follow the sound of my nail hitting the tempered glass screen protector.
Mom reaches for her purse and pulls out her reading glasses. In the time it takes for her to put them on, Kelly's eyes have reached a cartoonish size, her mouth has fallen open in a silent "O" that makes her look like a blow up sex doll, and she has snatched my phone out from under my fingertips and is skimming through the site as fast as she can.
"What is that?" Mom asks Kelly, leaning over and trying to read over Kelly's shoulder.
"I--I'm...not sure?" Kelly's finger slides over the surface of the touch screen while her eyebrows come closer and closer together in a deep groove over her nose.
"You're going to be a mail order bride?" Mom whispers loudly, as if I'd just revealed my intentions to move to a foreign country and become a prostitute.
Making an attempt to snatch my phone from my friend-- and failing-- I growl at my mother. "Oh my gosh, Mom! No, that is not what she does!"
Instead of handing my phone back to me, Kelly hands it to Mom. She slams her elbows up on the table forcefully enough to make the glasses shake and me want to rub my elbows in sympathy pain.
"Courtney?" She's also whispering loudly, "What the fuck are you thinking?"
Mom looks totally confused. I decide to leave her that way while I deal with the bestie; I can only handle one hysterical, loud whisperer at a time.
"I'm thinking that I am sick and tired of the dating game," I tell her rather defensively. "I'm sick of dick pics and requests for nudes of myself from men who haven't even met me yet. I'm sick being ghosted by guys I really thought had potential. I'm sick of going home after a first date and feeling like I am never going to meet a guy that wants the same things I want."
Mom's half reading and half listening to me with her glasses all the way down on the tip of her nose. He lips are pressed together tightly, but there's a slight pucker to them that let's me know she's thinking all this over-- not about to dress me down in the sushi restaurant.
Kelly's expression has softened sympathetically, but her body language still makes her look like a tiger about to pounce.
"I don't understand?" Mom finally ventures, "This woman-- Raven Swann? Who would name their child after 2 different birds?"
"I think 'Raven' is like a color, Mrs. Barnes," Kelly uses her super nice voice to talk to my mom, "You know, like a black swan? I don't know, I think it sounds hokey but your daughter wants her to pull a name out of a magic hat so she can marry some rando, apparently." She finishes with a healthy dose of sarcasm, just in case I haven't picked up on the fact that she is not a fan of this idea I have.
"Oh," Mom turns toward Kelly with a thoughtful expression, "You think it's like a stage name then? Something she picked on purpose?"
Kelly quirks an eyebrow at Mom, "'Raven Swann?' Seriously, it's so phony."
Mom looks slightly disappointed.
"So Sweetie," Mom suddenly remembers she was talking to me, "why do you want to buy a husband off the internet? Couldn't you just meet a nice boy at church or something?
"You know Marilynn Newman's son met a woman on the internet and she moved all the way from California to live with him and--"
"And she turned out to be a batshit crazy drug addict that stabbed him 7 times and set his car on fire in the garage. Yes, Mom, I've heard the story." I'm getting impatient. Maybe this wasn't the best way to do this.
"Oh my God! Mrs. Barnes, is that for real? You know someone that happened to?" Kelly, however, has apparently not heard the story.
I take a short recess to enjoy some of my own lunch while Mom fills her in on the home town's biggest gossip since Elvis ate at the diner, like 50 years ago.
"No, Courtney," Kelly says in a voice so stern I expect to get grounded next, "you are not hiring some wacko fake match-maker online to tell you who to marry. She's probably going to set you up with her own boyfriend--"
"--or pimp," Mom interjects somewhat less than helpfully.
"--who's going to pretend to be everything you checked off in your application and then he's going to steal your identity and vanish. I'm not going to let that happen."
Kelly sits back and crosses her arms like she has had the last word.
Mom quietly hands my phone back to me and continues with her meal without adding another word.
I put my phone back in my purse and also finish eating.
I'm trying to think of a new strategy. Mom's only in town for 3 days but Kelz is leaving town in 2. That gives me till Thursday to get them to actually read Raven's site and hopefully sit down and do a video call with her personally while we can all be together for it.
Given the reaction from the people I'm counting on to meet Raven's requirements for a personal "team" for the matching process, I have my work cut out for me.
I decide not to mention Raven's fee-- or the deposit I've already put down-- at all.
Like maybe never, I think as
I notice Kelly refusing to touch the rest of her sushi. She won't even look at me. She just keeps staring across the room and shaking her head.
Maybe I should have told her I was joining the cult?
Blake
"So you want us to what?" Tim pulls the darts out of the board, picks up his beer as he walks back to the table where I'm sitting with my brother in law, Don, and cousin Randy.
"He wants us to pick a wife for him," Randy laughs.
"Oh, that sounds easy enough then," Tim turns and peers into the front room where the bar stretches across the wall just past the beaded curtain that supposedly makes the private room private.
"Do you like 'em blonde, blonde, blonde, or really fucking blonde?" He asks with a shit-eating grin on his face while he peruses the options in the other room.
"Just get him the bartender," Randy tells him, "at least if he marries an employee down here, we'll get to drink for free."
I have no idea why I picked these guys.
Don has been deeply engrossed in the website I opened on the laptop for them to check out for about an hour now. At least my brother in law seems to be seriously checking up on my story.
Tim and Randy, however, stopped hearing anything I was saying after they saw the picture of the marriage broker on her website. Then they broke into 15 minutes of all the ways they'd "destroy" her and suggestions I just marry the "hot match maker."
After that they started playing darts and talking more shit which, I have to admit, is what they're best at.
"Says here that your team should represent the people from your personal life that you think have good relationships themselves or, at least, are most in sync with your own relationship values and goals." Don paraphrases from the site, completely ignoring the cousins.
"You sure you have the right candidates for this?" Don looks up and nods his head in the direction of Tim and Randy as they race each other to the bottom of their liter beers to see who buys the next round.
Tim belches loudly and Randy gives him a fist bump.
Yeah...Don has a point. My cousins do look like everyone's idea of perfect match material.
A New Resolution: A Modern Match-Maker Romance Page 2
