by Nikki Mays
I blink and then jump like a little bitch when some of the bacon grease hits my arm. “Fucking dickweed.” I yell out. I ignore the snort behind me as I drop the spatula that I was holding and rush to get my arm under some cold water.
“You okay?” Is giggled without even an ounce of actual concern.
“Yessss.” I say as the burning sensation doesn’t go away quickly enough.
A half chuckle half cough clips from her mouth “You sure?” She bursts into giggles. “Want me to check on the dickweed while you’re nursing your boo-boo?”
I turn my head to give her a nasty look that only makes her laugh harder. “I’m glad that my pain amuses you.” I sniff so well that my mother would be proud.
“It does, it really does.” Says the evil woman who hasn’t figured out that we’re living together.
I shut the faucet off and grab a towel to pat my arm dry. I look at my forearm and hope that this doesn’t leave a blister. I bring my arm closer to my face. “Are my fucking arm hairs singed?” I mutter to myself. I twist it a few times and sigh in relief. “No, just still wet. I’m okay.”
“Are you talking to yourself now?” She has not moved from her seat. She’s leaning back with her legs crossed and coffee cup firmly planted in her hand.
I frown down at her. “Would you have at least moved if I was on fire?”
“Of course.” I start to smile before she continues. “You were standing right in front of where I keep my fire extinguisher.”
“Remind me again why I like you so much?” I grumble before turning back to the bacon.
“Because I’m awesome with a bomb booty?” She smiles over the rim of the cup that she’s holding.
I give her a smirk. “Aren’t you too old to be saying stuff like that? I thought it was only teenagers who spoke like that these days.”
“Don’t forget Grandpa, you’re the old one in this relationship, not me.”
“I’m not that much older than you.” I mumble before turning around so that she doesn’t see my smile at her finally admitting that we’re in a relationship. Christ I’m turning into a chick.
I hear her cluck her tongue. “Eight years is definitely a big gap.” She pauses for a moment. “Well, not as big as Noah and Elle when he finally stops being a douche. But yeah, all you Ross boys seem to be cradle robbers.”
I would love to refute what she’s saying but she kind of has a point when I think about it. I mean, hell, even Mason is like four years older than Kellie. Shit, are we actually cradle robbers? Nah, we’re good.
“Oh my God!” She giggles. “I can practically see a little thought bubble on top of your head wondering if you guys are some creepy sugar daddies or something.”
I turn back around to face her after turning the bacon off. “No,” I say slowly, “that wasn’t one of my thoughts. But thanks to you, it definitely is now.”
She gives me a little shrug. “Eh, at least you guys are hot and not fat, balding and soon to be wearing a diaper.”
“Where the hell would you even come up with that?” The picture she just painted is gross and beyond disturbing.
“Social media.” I raise an eyebrow in question. “Follow some chicks on Instagram who are like early twenties and seem to have these lavish lifestyles. Those bitches are sugar babies to fat, old dudes who have way too much money.”
“It’s incredibly sad that a woman would rather put herself through that, than just get a job.” No amount of money could be worth that.
Jess lifts her sweat pant clad leg up onto the chair and rests her arms on her knee. “For real. Even when I was living in a trailer with my parents, I still wouldn’t do that shit for money.” She looks down and snorts into her coffee cup. “Shit, I wouldn’t even become a stripper just because of all the gross assholes that go in there and gawk at women. No thanks.”
“Good to know.” I chuckle as I plate up our food. I walk it over to the table and set the two plates down.
She looks at her plate and tilts her head. “Why is there only bacon and pineapples for breakfast?”
I grab my own coffee cup before sitting down across from her. “Because we need to go grocery shopping. We’re out of pretty much everything.” I grab my fork and stab a piece of pineapple with it.
“Oh.” She grabs a slice of bacon and bites into it. “I’ll have to go sometime this weekend.”
I nod. “We can just go tomorrow.”
“Are you stupid?” Her face a mask of horror.
I pause my fork midway to my mouth and frown at the delectable woman insulting me. “Not that I’m aware of.” I say slowly.
“You must be if you think that it’s any sort of a good idea to leave the house tomorrow, especially to step foot in any kind of a store.”
I roll my eyes and take bite into the pineapple. “You’re being ridiculous. It’s the grocery store, not Target or something. There won’t be anyone there, trust me.”
She rolls her tongue across her teeth and gives me an extremely skeptical look. “We’ll see.”
“Anyway,” Time to change the conversation, “the reason that I’ve been in such a good mood is because it’s Thanksgiving. The best day of the entire year.” I say happily.
“Ah, that’s Christmas.”
“Yeah, most certainly not.” I scoff at the crazy, delusional woman. “Christmas is Thanksgiving’s ugly step-sister.”
She drums her fingers against the wood table. “There was so much wrong with that sentence. But let’s just talk about ugly step-sisters for a sec.”
“I have nieces, okay? I’ve obviously watched a shitload of princess movies over the past few years.” I defend. I knew the second that I said that step-sister shit, that I shouldn’t have.
She purses her lips like she’s trying not to laugh. “Right. Anywhoooo, Christmas is the best day of the year. The whole day is like freaking magic. It’s the one day a year that people aren’t assholes, that in itself is a miracle.”
I put my fork down to give this discussion the attention that it deserves. “Who cares about that? Thanksgiving is a day just for eating and watching football. All you have to do is seat and eat. There is nothing better than that.”
“Who the hell cares about eating and watching football? I want to sit by a Christmas tree while drinking hot cocoa. The lights, the music, the warm chocolatey goodness.” She closes her eyes and sighs. “It’s absolute perfection.”
“Who doesn’t want to sit around eating and watching football? Are you even human?” My eyes are bulging.
She opens her eyes and narrows them on me. “Is that a trick question?”
“No.”
“It must be. Because there is no way that I would ever trade the magic of Christmas for football and some turkey.”
“Even after weeks of you not giving me a full chance, this is the first time that I’ve ever second guessed us being together.”
She gives me a droll look. “Your mother’s right, you are over dramatic.”
I let that insult roll off. “You’ll see today after having my mother’s Thanksgiving dinner, why it’s the best holiday in the world.”
She gets a funny look on her face making me uncomfortable. I’m going to bang my fucking head against this table if she tries to get out of going and saying that we’re not together.
“So, today might be a little weird.” She hedges while using her fork to move the food around on her plate back and forth.
I make sure to wipe any emotion off of my face. “How so?”
She puffs out her cheeks like a chipmunk and blows the air out. “I meant to tell you a few days ago that your mom came in and got her hair cut.”
“Okay?” I’m not seeing the big deal. Jessie has been doing Ma’s hair for years now or some shit.
“We were talking about Thanksgiving and who’s going to be there today.” Her voice sounds so strange that it’s making a weird tingle run up my spin.
“Still not seeing a problem.”
“Your mom i
s having Mac come to dinner.”
“Okay, that’s not really a big deal.” I mean it will be a little weird having someone that’s not Dad by her side but she deserves to be happy.
She licks her lips slowly and if it wasn’t for my utter confusion, I would be throwing her over my shoulder and running to her bedroom. “Noah still doesn’t know.”
I nod. “Yeah, I know, Mase and I haven’t said anything… awe fuck.” Well this won’t be good.
“Yup.” She says accentuating the p at the end. “And she also told me that you boys aren’t allowed any hard alcohol.”
“I mean, that’s probably for the best. But shit, Mason won’t be with us this year, he’s with Kellie.” My mind is racing wondering how I’m going to keep Noah calm. I snap my fingers. “I’ll still have Marc, so it should be okay.”
“Have you dropped any clues about your mom’s boyfriend?” She sips her never ending cup of coffee.
I grimace. “No, he’s been being less of an asshole lately and Mason and I didn’t want to rock the boat. I mean shit, he’s even been really nice and cordial to Elle even. In hindsight, we probably should’ve started leaving him clues.”
She snorts. “Ya think?”
I give her a nasty look that doesn’t faze her in the least. “How was I supposed to know that Ma would fucking bring him to Thanksgiving dinner?”
“Do you think that he’ll really be that upset? I mean it’s been years since your dad passed away, right?” She asks gently.
I rub the back of my neck with my right hand. I can feel how tight my shoulders and neck are becoming. With my luck, I’ll end up with a fucking tension headache on my favorite day of the year.
“Yeah, it’s been years since Dad died. And Mom took it hard.” She gives me a small, encouraging smile. “Honestly, we were pretty worried about her for a while there. She seemed like a shell of the person that she used to be. But slowly but surely, she came back to herself.” I give a little chuckle. “Hell, she might even be worse than she was before.”
“I don’t doubt that.” Jess says good naturedly.
I sigh and continue rubbing my neck. “But Noah being the oldest, well he took it upon himself to take care of everything and everyone. He went from wild and free, to serious and weighed down. Him and Dad were close until the end, even with him partying and whatever. But I think that he’s always felt guilty about running wild and leaving the majority of the business up to Pop.”
I look over at Jessie and she’s focused solely on me. “So, will he be upset, yeah probably but it won’t really be because Mom has a boyfriend. But that’s how he’s going to play it most likely.”
“Sounds like a super fun time.” She deadpans.
I give her a smirk. “It won’t be boring, that’s for sure.”
By three-fifteen in the afternoon, I was definitely sure that the day was not going to be boring and Noah wasn’t even here yet.
Kayla, Marc and the hellions pulled up at the same time Jessie and I did. To say Marc looked giddy was a fucking understatement. I’m guessing that Kay found out about Mac from Ma and tried to tell her giant of a husband to be nice. She would’ve been better off doing us all a favor and not saying anything to him. Giving him extra time to come up with horrible ideas was just a bad decision. I could see it in his dancing eyes when we all greeted each other.
His only words upon seeing me were “I can’t wait for us all to sit down and eat.”
I just shook my head and walked inside. It’s better to not encourage him at all. You would think that as a police officer he wouldn’t start as much trouble as he does. It’s like he really can’t help himself some days. It’s exactly one of the reasons why he’s one of Mom’s favorites and I’m not even mad about it. Troublemakers seem to stick to their ilk.
I’m not going to lie, it was strange seeing Mac in there with Ma instead of Dad, but it is what it is. As long as she’s happy, I don’t care about anything else. And considering that she looks like she’s glowing and has been fluttering around non-stop, I would venture to guess that he makes her happy. I just don’t even want to know how he’s making her happy… ever.
The little hellions are in the living room watching one of the new Avengers movies or something. I lost track of them after the fortieth one that came out. The rest of us are sitting around the table making weird small talk. None of us have mentioned Noah. We all know that we’re waiting for him to get this shitshow started.
The doorbell rings, startling us all. I look around the room in confusion. “Why is Noah ringing the bell?” I ask out loud.
Marc looks at me and shrugs. “Maybe he’s got his hands full and needs help.” He says while making absolutely no attempt to get up and help, not that I am either, but still.
“Or I invited someone else to dinner tonight as well.” Mom says in a huff while getting out of her chair to answer the door.
We all give each other side-eyed, terrified looks. Kayla does a half shrug. “I mean the only other bad thing she could’ve done is invite Noah’s ex.”
My eyes bug out and I creepily turn my head to Mac who raises his hands up in surrender. “Son, I have no idea who your momma invited. But I doubt that she would be inviting someone who broke one of your hearts. She’s too spiteful for that.” He chuckles.
We all nod our heads, except for Marc who gives him a conning look. “How long have you two been dating again? I don’t remember you guys saying.”
Mac looks over at Marc with a dead stare. “We didn’t.”
I would laugh if I didn’t see who my mother was walking into the room.
“I was wrong.” Kayla mumbles. “His ex wasn’t the only one that would piss him off.”
“Thank you so much for having me.” Elle says in a sweet voice.
Marc looks over at me with a cheesy ass grin on his face. “It’s almost like Christmas came early. The only thing missing is a video of the nail sticking out of Mason’s ass.” He says happily before frowning. “Fucking Kellie.” Is muttered but not low enough for the rest of us not to hear.
Kayla elbows him in the ribs. “Will you knock it off already!” She hisses out of the side of her mouth. “What’s done is done. Stop acting like such a little baby about it. I mean really, the kids act better than you do some days.”
He looks down at her with a glare. “Pixie, you knew exactly what you were getting yourself into when you married me.”
She rolls her eyes and elbows him again. “I mean it Marc, you better be on your best behavior.”
He blinks at her with false innocence. “When am I not?”
“Didn’t you push someone in front of a car?” Mac questions.
Without missing a beat. “No, that was an act of God.” Marc replies casually.
Mac’s lips twitch. “That so?”
Marc takes a swig of his beer and nods his head thoughtfully. “Apparently, karma will always come for you if you’re an asshole.”
“Or just dating someone that karma’s friend is interested in.” Kayla states sarcastically making us chuckle.
“Karma works in mysteriously ways Pixie. I don’t make the rules, I just live by them.”
“Will ya’ll be quiet with your nonsense for a minute.” Ma breaks in as she wraps an arm around Elle’s shoulders. “Now sugar, I don’t know if you know everyone. You obviously know Kayla and Ben.” Kay and I both smile at Elle. “This big guy sitting next to her is her husband Marc.”
Elle waves. “We met at Declan’s one night.”
Marc gives her a genuine smile. “Nice to see you again.”
My mother continues on. “This pretty girl who’s looking like Ariel is Jessie.” Jessie gives her a smile and wave. “Her and Ben are living together.”
“No we’re not!” Jessie exclaims before looking at Ma with a frown.
“Sugar the fact that you haven’t figured out that my son has all but moved in with you worries me. You need to pay more attention to your surroundings.” We all chuckle at the confus
ed and put out look on Jessie’s face.
She looks at me with narrowed eyes and leans in close. “We are discussing this later.” She hisses.
“Discussing what?” I say quickly before looking back at my mom.
I can feel the death stare that I’m on the receiving end of. But if Ma has taught me anything, it’s to pretend that you don’t notice shit. Although keeping a straight face with Marc giggling to himself is becoming harder.
“Anyway,” Ma gives us all a dirty look that has us all sitting up and paying attention. None of us want to piss off the woman feeding us. You never bite the hand that feeds you. “This is Mac.”
“Her boyfriend.” Marc supplies unnecessarily. “Or is it boy toy? Biker in leather? Her motorcycle man?” He’s drums his fingers against the table like he’s actually having trouble sitting still.
Kay places her elbow on the table and face palms into her hand. “You just can’t help yourself, can you?” She grumbles.
“Let’s face facts, none of you, except maybe wrapped in chaps over there, is really surprised.”
Mac looks him up and down. “Shit boy, with what I’ve heard about you, I ain’t surprised either.”
Marc holds his hand palm up towards Mac. “See?”
Ma is just shaking her head, but I catch her lip twitching. I swear, Marc can do no wrong when it comes to her. I mean, can’t blame her, he did take a bullet for one of the kids and almost died. But shit, he can literally get away with anything.
“Right. Well darlin, why don’t you have a seat and I’m sure that between tweedle dee and tweedle dumb over there, someone will get you a drink.”
I blink and look at Marc who smiles at me. It’s in this moment that I know he is truly one of my brothers. “Ma, you shouldn’t talk about the girls like that.” We both say in unison.
“I wasn’t.” Mom drawls.
We chuckle while we studiously ignore the looks from two of the four women in this room.
“Like I said,” Ma gives both of us a pointed look. “I’m sure that one of them will get you a drink while we wait for Noah to arrive.”
