by K L Hughes
“You realize I haven’t had a girlfriend in more than two years, right?”
“You’ve been busy with school.”
“My vagina is a stone.”
Michael quietly began to hum a familiar tune. It took a moment for Fiona to recognize the well-known score of Chopin’s “Funeral March,” and as soon as she did, she whirled on the toilet seat and sucker-punched Michael in the gut. “Hate you.”
A grunt escaped as he clutched his stomach. He then wrapped an arm around her and grinned as he led her out of the bathroom, laughing. “Hate you, too, kid.”
The McElroys’ kitchen was the size of her whole apartment back in St. Louis, and once Fiona saw the entire family stuffed into the space, she understood why. Michael’s siblings crowded around the kitchen island while Rosie cooked breakfast. Together, they made the enormous space appear much smaller, more like a walk-in closet with a stove than an actual kitchen. The room smelled divine, like smoky, sizzling pork and fresh-baked bread. The sheer goodness of it was overwhelming, and Fiona’s mouth began to water. Her stomach rumbled. She imagined it had always been like this in their house—redheaded kids screeching and squealing and scrambling about while the divine scents of a Southern smorgasbord wafted around, room by room. She smiled as an image of a tiny Michael stuffing his face popped into her mind.
“Mike!”
The eldest sibling, Charlie, stood from his stool. He was tall and lean-muscled, though not as tall as Michael, and sported short hair that was mainly gray and a smile Fiona could only describe as contagious. The green John Deere T-shirt he wore was weathered and so faded that the large logo in its center had nearly disappeared.
“Hey, man, get in here.” He yanked Michael into a hug and clapped him on the back. “Good to see you.”
“Yeah, Mom told us all about your new girlfriend, Mikey.”
Another brother, whom Fiona assumed had to be Brian since Jack couldn’t be there, stayed seated. He was stockier than his brothers, shorter overall, and thicker around the middle and in the face. His buzz cut appeared in sharp contrast to the shaggy, short styles of the other two, and his face was further distinguished by a dense cluster of freckles just under his right eye. “We thought you might be too busy to come down to breakfast, if you know what I mean.”
Fiona snorted when Rosie smacked Brian on the back of the head with a dish towel. She wore the same forest-green robe she’d donned the night before. “Stop teasing your brother.”
“You’re right, Mom. I should respect my elders.”
“Watch it,” Michael said, then tugged Brian into a quick embrace. He kissed the top of Grace’s messy head where she sat beside her twin. Fiona could tell it was Grace by the small rose-gold hoop in her slightly upturned nose. She kept her hair short, a pixie cut that had yet to be tamed for the day, and wore a purple T-shirt with University of Washington printed across the front in gold lettering.
Grace patted the side of Michael’s face as he leaned over her. “Hey, Mike.” Her voice was low and sweet until he stole a sip of her mimosa. Her tone flattened as she waved toward a glass carafe full of spiked orange juice in front of her. “Oh, yes, please drink my drink instead of pouring your own. It’s not like there’s an entire pitcher on the counter or anything.”
It was only then that Fiona noticed what sat beside the carafe: a massive, almost perfectly round orange ball of fur occupied a good portion of the island countertop. Fiona frowned and stared, but no one else in the room seemed even the slightest bit bothered by its presence, so she did her best to ignore it. When Michael patted it, however, the giant ball suddenly unfurled itself to reveal a fat, angry-looking cat with a flat, punched-in face.
“Hey, big guy,” Michael said, but the cat didn’t seem interested in responding. He stretched out his front legs, tiny sharp nails popping out momentarily, then put his butt to Michael and jumped off. He hit the floor soundlessly and curled around Rosie’s leg as Michael scoffed. “Fine, then, Otis. Be like that. I didn’t want to pet you anyway.”
“Oh, he’s just sleepy,” Rosie said, adopting the most ridiculous baby voice Fiona had ever heard. She bent, lugged Otis up into her arms, and squashed his flat face against hers. “Isn’t that right, little Oti-pootykins? Yes, he’s just tired. Yes, he is.” She blew on his face, then kissed him, loudly. “You love your bubby, don’t you? Yes, you do. Yes. Yes, you love all your bubbies and sissies, don’t you?” Another loud, smacking kiss, then she sat him back on the floor and squirted a dollop of hand sanitizer into her palm from a pump bottle on the counter. “He’ll let you love on him later.”
“Yeah, right. He hates everyone but you and Grandma.” Michael took another sip of Grace’s mimosa, then set the glass back on the table. “Where’s Soph? And Lizzie?”
Charlie waved a hand to indicate the rest of the house. “Somewhere wrangling my children, most likely.”
“Because he can’t do it himself,” Brian said.
“Incoming!” The familiar voice drew Fiona’s attention toward the door a second before one tiny strawberry-blonde girl in pink leggings and a green sweater zipped by her. A second later, another, dressed in what appeared to be a cross between an elf costume and a pair of footy pajamas, barreled into Fiona’s legs. The little girl stumbled, teetered over, then got up and took off again as if nothing had happened at all. Lizzie was on the latter’s heels. Her hair flew out from her head as she gave chase, and her goofy smile made Fiona’s stomach stir.
“Sorry,” she said, nearly knocking into Fiona as well. She steadied herself by latching onto Fiona’s arm, and the two of them were suddenly sharing the same thin space again. They stared for one tense moment, then Lizzie dropped her hand and carried on after the girls, disappearing into another room.
“Girls, say hi to your Uncle Mike,” Charlie called after them, but they were already gone. He looked at Michael. “Sorry, man. They like Lizzie better than you.”
“So do I,” Brian teased, and Michael whacked them both on the backs of their heads.
A sudden presence behind Fiona startled her. She turned to find a woman with eyes the muted color of a cloudy sky and the same contagious smile as Charlie. She was taller than the other McElroy women, closer to her twin’s height, and her long, auburn hair was pulled back in a low bun. “You must be Fiona,” she said and held out a hand. Fiona shook it gently. “I’m—”
“Sophie.” Fiona hadn’t memorized their names and faces for nothing. “Yeah, I recognize you from Michael’s family picture.”
“Oh God. It wasn’t the one with the awful Christmas sweaters, was it?”
“Actually, it was exactly that one, yeah.”
Sophie groaned. “Well, plus side is you’ve now seen us at our fashion worst, so we can only improve from there, right?”
“Says the thirty-five-year-old woman wearing pajama pants covered in cartoon frogs,” Brian said.
Sophie looked down at her pants and shrugged. “If you can resist Maddi and Lily’s faces, then you tell them you don’t want to wear whatever cartoon-themed clothes they probably got you for Christmas this year.”
“Who says they got me anything cartoon-themed?”
“Have you met my kids?” Charlie downed the last of his mimosa and poured himself a bit more. “I mean, if you think cartoon frogs are bad, you’re in for a rude awakening.”
“Anyway.” Sophie rested a hand on Fiona’s arm. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Yeah, Fiona, it’s nice to meet—Oh, wait! I haven’t actually met you yet,” Brian said, then elbowed Michael in the ribs.
Michael bent over, clutching his side, and grimaced. “All right, all right.”
“You make it so easy, man.”
“Really, Michael,” Rosie said as she set a cover over a pan of sizzling bacon, “don’t just leave her standing in the doorway.” She smiled at Fiona over her shoulder. “Come on in, hon. No
need to be shy.”
Fiona took a few steps into the room, and Michael awkwardly wound their hands together. “Uh, well, guys, this is Fiona Ng. Fiona, this is my family.”
“Who have no names, apparently,” Grace said with a kind smile.
“I know all your names, actually.”
“Yeah, she made me quiz her on the way here.”
Heat flooded Fiona’s face. “You weren’t supposed to tell them that part.”
Michael quickly called out the names of his siblings, and one by one, they waved, except for Jessie, who didn’t even bother looking up from her phone. She sat with her thick, curly orange hair crowding her face, her rail-thin body swallowed by a sweatshirt three sizes too big for her, and grunted in acknowledgment. Only when the others threw napkins at her did she put her phone down long enough to say, “Michael’s got a girlfriend. Cool. What do you want, a trophy?”
“And, of course, you’ve already met—”
The bang of body to table echoed through the room as Lizzie suddenly slid into the kitchen on her socked feet. “Son of a—”
“Lizzie,” Michael said.
Lizzie rubbed her side. “What about Lizzie?”
“I was just saying you and Fiona have already met.”
“Oh yeah.” Lizzie squeezed past Charlie to snatch a piece of bacon from a paper-towel-covered plate on the counter. She crunched it down quickly while dodging her mother’s swatting towel. “Sorry again about tackling you in bed this morning.”
Jessie’s eyebrows shot up over her phone. “Whoa.”
At the same time, Rosie exclaimed, “Elizabeth Dawn, you did what?!”
“Relax, people,” Lizzie said. “It’s not what it sounds like.”
“It’s actually exactly what it sounds like,” Fiona said, and Lizzie bit her lip to fight a smile. The sight made Fiona’s face hot again. She ignored the feeling and turned toward Michael, releasing his hand to lay hers, instead, on his upper arm. It wasn’t exactly intimate, but Fiona figured it looked endearing enough. “Apparently, Michael and I make similar-looking bed lumps.”
Rosie huffed out a laugh. “Elizabeth, I swear.” She thrust a basket of silverware toward her daughter. “Go set the table up.” A stack of empty plates went to Brian next. “Come on, now, all of you. Time to eat.”
“Where’s Dad?” Michael asked as he took a plate piled high with bulging, grease-speckled sausage links from his mother.
“Oh, he ran down the road to pick up Grandma, but you know it takes her a while to get up and out since her hip surgery.” Rosie handed the fried potatoes to Fiona and patted her shoulder. The act made Fiona smile. She hated all the awkward hovering that usually accompanied the experience of not knowing anyone. Thankfully, Michael’s family wasn’t the type to let anyone linger in that space for too long. They were the kind to pull you in and make you one of them. It felt almost familiar, as if Fiona had been a part of their family for years.
A heavy, handcrafted oak table occupied the center of the formal dining room and ran nearly its entire length to accommodate the McElroy clan. Seats were squashed together with barely enough room for elbows, and the chattering began before a single one was filled. Fiona followed Michael in with the last of the breakfast dishes and took the seat beside him. She was surprised when Lizzie plopped down next to her, close enough that their arms touched and Fiona could smell the lingering scent of conditioner in Lizzie’s hair. Apricots.
“Hey.” She snatched a yeast roll from a basket and took a huge bite, chewed once, then stored the bread in her cheek so that she looked like a redheaded chipmunk. “Mind if I sit here?”
Fiona shook her head. “It’s your house.”
“Correction.” She swallowed the bite of roll and choked. “Used to be my house.” The instant the words were out, she began to gag and cough.
“For God’s sake, Elizabeth!” Rosie reached over and whacked Lizzie’s back hard enough for the thud to echo around the dining room. “If you’d take the time to actually chew your food before swallowing it, you wouldn’t risk killing yourself every time we have a meal. Put your arms up.”
Lizzie threw her arms up over her head as Rosie whacked her on the back again. When the coughing fit passed, Lizzie took a drink of orange juice, then stuffed another massive bite of roll into her mouth. “Can’t help it, Mom,” she said around the bite, ducking under Rosie’s stern glare. “It’s too good, and I’m a starving artist, remember?”
“Your baby-fat cheeks say otherwise,” Brian teased.
Lizzie curled her top lip at him. “That’s the roll, jackass!”
“Language, please.”
“Yeah, yeah, Mom. He started it.”
“He’s mean as a striped-tail bug, I know, but there’s no help for it. He’s the Devil’s child, that one.”
Brian snorted and bit off the end of a fat sausage link. His fingers were already coated in grease. “Ah Mom, you’re going by The Devil now? It’s so formal.”
“She doesn’t claim you, Beelzebub.” Lizzie held her fingers up in a cross formation and hissed at him. “No one does.”
Fiona couldn’t hold her laugh in any longer. Her shoulders shook as she turned to Michael. “Is it always like this?”
“Unfailingly.”
“What did your mom say? Mean as a what kind of bug?”
“Oh, the rare striped-tail bug, hailing from the seventh circle of Hell. You haven’t heard of it?” He laughed. “The imaginary kind, Fi.” He then dropped a couple spoonfuls of scrambled eggs onto his plate. “You want eggs?”
“Of course she does, honey.” Rosie passed a heavy bowl of thick white gravy to Charlie. “She’s thin as a pole. We need to fatten you up a bit, Fiona. Little meat on your bones is good for you.”
“Oh, I’ve always been small,” Fiona said. “It kind of runs in my family.”
“Well, this one’s that way, too.” Rosie pointed her fork at Jessie. “Though for the life of me, I don’t know how. She’s eaten enough for four since she hit puberty. Her daddy’s downright convinced she’s got a hollow leg.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being thin, Mom,” Michael said.
“I know that, silly. I just think a woman ought to have a bit of cushion on her. Keeps her warm.”
“Just in case you’re planning on hibernating and living off your stored fat anytime soon,” Sophie said, causing an uproar of laughter around the table. “Right, Mom?”
“Oh hush, you,” Rosie said, though she wore a wide smile of her own. She waved a hand at Jessie impatiently. “Lizzie, hon, pass down that plate of potatoes, will you?”
“I will if you get my name, right,” Jessie said as she held the plate of fried potatoes hostage.
Rosie closed her eyes for a moment and shook her head. “Jessie. Good grief. You knew what I meant.”
“Sure, Dad.”
“Hush, you rotten egg.” Rosie picked up her napkin and swatted at her youngest. Jessie, however, was out of her reach, so she only managed to hit the table. “Hand me the damned plate already.”
“Language,” Lizzie chirped at her, only to receive an identical napkin swat a second later. This one successfully nailed its target.
Brian shoved a huge forkful of syrup-laden pancake into his mouth. “Well, I don’t know about you guys, but I fully plan on hibernating for at least an hour after this breakfast.”
“Guess that would explain the ten sausage links you’ve eaten in the time it’s taken the rest of us to pass the plates around,” Jessie said from Michael’s other side. She sipped orange juice through a bendy straw and casually clapped Grace’s hand in a quick high five.
Brian’s response was lost to Fiona as a nudging elbow distracted her. She turned toward an insistent Lizzie and found two interested eyes pinned on her, one blue and one green. “So,” Lizzie said, “how are you liking your first McElr
oy family meal?”
But Fiona had just taken her first bite of food, a mouthful of gravy-covered biscuits, and Lizzie’s words seemed like a distant memory as she closed her eyes and moaned. She opened them again when the entire room went quiet. The moment she did, however, every single person at the table burst into a fit of snickering.
“It’s the gravy,” Michael said. “Every time, without fail.”
“This is not gravy.” Fiona greedily licked her lips. “This is the nectar of the gods.”
Rosie beamed and nudged the gravy bowl, which had made its way around to her again, back toward Michael. “Give her some more, hon.”
“What’s in this?”
“Oh, little of this, little of that.” Rosie winked at her. “Recipe’s been in my family for generations.”
The warm press of a leg against hers distracted Fiona. She leaned back just enough to cast a subtle glance under the table. Lizzie’s leg rubbed slowly up and down against hers, though deliberately or by accident, she didn’t know. She looked up at Lizzie but was greeted with an eyeful of frizzy hair. Lizzie was leaning over the table, focused on Jessie, the two of them trading barbs about their musical tastes across the space Michael and Fiona both occupied. It was as if neither were there at all. No lusty glances sent Fiona’s way. No cute little lip-nibbling as if to say, “Oops. Is my leg brushing your leg? Gee, how awful.” There wasn’t a wink in sight. No way had it been intentional.
The voice in Fiona’s head scolded her. Of course it wasn’t intentional. That girl doesn’t want you, Fiona. This is an innocent family breakfast, to which you were kindly invited by the best friend you’re supposed to be helplessly in love with, remember?
“Get it together,” Fiona muttered under her breath.
“Hm? You say something, babe?”
Fiona tried not to frown as she turned toward Michael. Babe? Really? Once she saw his strained expression, however, her effort to keep from frowning became one to keep from laughing. “No, just, um, a song stuck in my head or whatever,” she said. “Can’t stop singing it. You know how it is. Right, babe?”
