by Liz Botts
“We’re glad you finally decided to come out of hiding,” Harlow said. “But if all you’re going to do is snap at the people who care about you, then just go back to your cave or under your rock or whatever.”
I gritted my teeth. Typical Harlow. “Thanks for the advice, sis. I think maybe I’ll take it.”
She grabbed my arm as I moved to stand, and pulled me down beside her. “Look,” she said. “Everyone’s been really worried about you. Grandma doesn’t mean any harm and neither do I. I’m just saying you should lighten up a little where Grandma is concerned. She’s always been like this.”
Grudgingly, I nodded. Grandma hadn’t changed, I had. There was a time not so long ago that her blatant references to sex or her strip club act simply made me blush and stammer. That was before: before sex became routine with Josh, before I let myself get caught up in the minutiae of our relationship, and before I had lost myself to the everyday life of being someone’s girlfriend.
“How is it that even my grandmother thinks that sex is no big deal?” I muttered, mainly to myself, as I stared at my hands knotted together in my lap.
From the corner of my eye I saw Harlow lean forward. The sofa springs grumbled as she moved. “Did you and Josh finally do it?” she asked. I pursed my lips, unsure if I wanted to have a sisterly bonding moment. Harlow continued, “That’s it, isn’t it? Why you’re so mad at Grandma right now? Is that why you and Josh broke up? Did he…?”
Something about the way she trailed off, the insinuation of something dark or nasty about Josh made my skin bristle. I was allowed to be mad at him and say stupid things to him, but no one else was.
“You know Josh is a perfect gentleman,” I said. “We made the decision together. But…it changed everything in a lot of ways. I don’t understand why I’m such a freak.”
Harlow was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “If you didn’t enjoy sleeping with Josh that’s one thing, but sex complicates a lot of lives, and a lot of us can’t just move on.”
Britney. Britney was Harlow’s complication. Of course, I’d always known that but she seemed…happy, so I guess I’d always dismissed the difficulty it had caused her.
“I love Britty more than anything, but do you really think I wanted to be a single mother at twenty-one?” Harlow asked. “I had big dreams. And I was so full of myself. Plus, I was on birth control. So what could go wrong? The day I found out I was pregnant, Christian left. Who can blame him for being freaked out, right? We’d only been dating a month. I just thought he needed some time, but he never came back. I called him when Britney was born. You know, to let him know he had a daughter. You know what he told me? Not to expect child support.”
“He’s a jerk,” I said, reaching out to touch Harlow’s arm.
Unshed tears made her eyes shiny and too bright. “You know what else he accused me of? Getting pregnant on purpose, so he’d stay and marry me.”
We sat in silence for a long time. Thinking about Harlow’s situation made me dizzy. When I told Josh about the pregnancy scare, his immediate reaction was that he’d marry me. But then, I always pictured us married anyway. How could I have taken that for granted?
“I just…lost myself,” I said finally, helplessness settling over me and leaving a bitter taste in my mouth. “Why couldn’t I have just kept enjoying things the way they were?”
“You’re a lot more serious than me or Hayley. Things aren’t really casual for you,” Harlow said with a shrug.
“Things have never been casual with Josh. I just didn’t want to end up like…” I broke off, shocked that the words had nearly left my mouth. Shame flooded me, heating my face. I looked away.
“Like what?” Harlow asked softly. “Like me?”
“No, of course not,” I said too quickly.
Harlow snorted. “Yeah, right. It’s okay. I get it, you know. But why did you guys start in the first place?”
The question still stumped me. “It seemed like the natural evolution of the relationship. We’d been together for five years. We had a future planned. Everyone else was doing it.”
I thought back on that first night with Josh and hesitated. In so many ways, it had been wonderful. He was attentive and patient with me. Afterwards, he’d held me and told me how much he loved me. He’d even given me the promise ring shortly after that.
But in other ways, it was the start of our downward spiral where sex was…expected. I had always been physically attracted to Josh. So much so that sometimes I thought we might burst into flames, but the flames had ebbed into embers over a couple of months. That was what made me think that maybe sex wasn’t the best thing for us. It was suddenly our focus. Instead of playing a game of basketball together, we were in bed together. Instead of going out to dinner, we ordered delivery and never left his apartment.
One could rationalize that if we couldn’t handle sex during dating, how would we sustain a marriage for fifty years? I think that the sheer idea that my sister had gotten pregnant before she was ready had me coming up short. Not to mention that we weren’t anywhere close to being able to afford a baby. And it just felt wrong to be doing something I’d been raised to say no to until my wedding night. What was the purpose of marriage if I didn’t wait? I loved Josh on every level and I knew he loved me. But this consuming doubt and hesitation I felt wasn’t okay. And it wasn’t fair to Josh.
Harlow arched an eyebrow. “I’ll be honest I never saw it as a big deal. Sex was just sex, you know? And then Britty came along. But, I mean you and Josh would have ended up married anyway, right?”
“I…I really thought I’d wait until I got married,” I finally admitted.
Harlow wrinkled her nose. “How…religious of you.”
“It’s not just about religion,” I said with a frown. “It’s about doing what’s right. Pure. Doing what Mom and Dad raised me to do.”
“Pure? Who talks like that?” Harlow asked. “But seriously, when did religion become such a big thing to you?”
“Religion? What are you talking about?” Confusion made me stop and backtrack through our conversation. “Josh and I have been going to church with one of his roommates, but wanting to wait until we were married didn’t have anything to do with that. At least I don’t think it did.”
“Then what did it have to do with?”
Irritation flared again. Harlow never really changed. She liked to push my buttons. “I’m done with this conversation,” I said, standing up.
Harlow shrugged. “Suit yourself. I’m just trying to understand where you’re coming from. And you know what? I don’t even think you know where you’re coming from. You should figure that out before you ruin your relationship even more. Unless that’s what you really want.”
And that was it. Somehow Harlow had the last word. She picked up the remote and clicked on the TV, effectively dismissing me. I hovered on the brink of indecision for a moment before slinking back to the kitchen. Hayley and Mom were still fixing dinner, and they both gave me acknowledging nods as I entered. Dropping into a chair at the kitchen table, I brooded about what Harlow had said. Could she be right? Could things actually get worse than they were now?
When I had made the decision that I needed a break to clear my head, find myself again, things had seemed so straightforward. Sex had complicated things between Josh and me. I didn’t recognize the person looking back at me in the mirror. So if we stopped having sex, I could start dealing with myself again.
And everything I had said to her was the truth. I really wished we had waited until we were married. In my mind’s eye, I could still see the wedding night I had been picturing since high school. The bitter taste filled my mouth again, and I picked up a napkin to blot at my eyes. Tearing away tiny pieces, I began to make a napkin mountain as I thought about Harlow’s last insinuation.
Did I want to be done with my relationship with Josh? Is that why I was so certain that a break was the right thing for us? Normally I would have dismissed anything Harlow said, but the past fe
w months I had taken every opportunity to blame Josh for my feelings. Could it really have been me trying to push him away so I wouldn’t have to do the breaking up?
A life without Josh was unimaginable to me. We’d grown up together. He was my first love. But was it a real, forever kind of love? My heart sped up as I pictured Josh’s face, his goofy grin, the way he held me in his arms. And at that moment, I knew that I needed to find my way back to him, right after I found my way back to myself. And I needed to do it before I was too late. Even a guy like Josh wouldn’t wait around forever for me to get my act together.
Dinner started before I could think through anything else. Mom pushed a large mound of mashed potatoes onto my plate before smothering them in gravy. A sarcastic comment sat on the tip of my tongue, but the smile on my mom’s face made me swallow it back down. Clearly she wanted to take care of me.
“Would you like one piece of chicken or two?” she asked.
“Just one, please.” I took the plate from her with what I hoped was a grateful smile. My heart squeezed as I realized how much worry I had caused her lately. Hoping to change her view of me as a fragile individual, I said, “Hey, did I tell you guys that my senior project got approved?”
“Oh, honey, that’s wonderful,” Mom said.
Dad blinked at me. “What project was that again?”
“I’m working with a friend. We’re staging a one-act musical, not that we have the script ready or anything. We’re working on that in February. But, yeah, it’s going to be a kind of cabaret show. I’m really excited.”
“Excellent,” Grandma said. “I would be willing to make a special guest appearance if you need me to.”
My eyes widened, and I choked on my chicken. “Um…”
“You’ve never seen my ‘Lady Marmalade’ routine. I could get some of the girls from the club to join me. It could be the highlight of your show,” Grandma said, smiling happily at her suggestion and leaning forward, exposing way too much boob for a lady her age.
“Um…” I said again. “We’ll see?”
“Hear that, Duke? I’m going to be in a serious dramatic production. Now maybe those old biddies at the club will stop tormenting me.” Grandma reached under the table and Duke winked at her. My stomach heaved at the implication.
Mom started to cough, sputtering out water, so I guessed she caught the gesture too. “So, um, Mom, did you say that you and Duke are getting another animal?”
“Hmm?” Grandma asked. “Oh, yes, we’re adopting a llama. It’s amazing how quickly the animals have become our little children. Can’t have too many now, can we?”
“A llama? Where will you keep it?” Mom asked, looking both perplexed and dismayed.
Duke shoveled in a forkful of mashed potatoes and said, “Didn’t we tell you? We bought a farm south of town. It’ll give the little ones plenty of room to roam.”
Flecks of mashed potato sprayed out of Duke’s mouth, enhancing the absurdity of his statement. Luckily the conversation turned to the purchase price on the property and renovations Duke and Grandma planned on completing themselves.
Just as I thought things were winding down, Grandma smacked the table, making us all jump. “I know what I forgot to tell you,” she said, then waited for all of us to give her our full attention. “I’m going to be a TV star.”
“What are you talking about, Grandma?” Harlow asked, her voice tight as she handed Britney another spoonful of mashed potatoes, which the little girl pushed away.
Grandma smiled in Harlow’s direction, but her smile seemed off to me. Sort of a combination of triumph and condescension. “If you’ll recall, girl, you can’t bring me down,” Grandma said. Hayley gasped, and I wondered if she was remembering Grandma’s bridal shower. I was pretty sure that’s where all the animosity between the two of them had started. “I have been hired to star in a car commercial for Hoyt Toyota. My besties, Ethel and Millie, will be in the commercial with me.”
“Besties?” Harlow muttered. “What are you, thirteen?”
“Mom, that’s so exciting.” My mom shot my dad a pained look. Her eyes seemed to say what we were all thinking: now Grandma would be unleashed on the tri-state viewing area. “Let’s have dessert to celebrate.”
“Oh! I almost forgot,” Grandma said. She leapt up from the table and hurried out of the dining room. For an octogenarian, my grandmother was remarkably spry.
Hayley and I exchanged worried looks. So far Grandma’s career announcement coupled with her ‘volunteering’ to be a guest star in my senior project had frazzled my nerves. Anything else might push us all into the range of insanity.
Dad cleared his throat and leaned toward Duke. “So, um, what might Wanda want to share with us?”
Duke smiled, displaying his perfect white teeth. Tonight they looked really shiny. So shiny that I felt captivated by their glossiness.
“How do you get your teeth so shiny?”
Everyone looked at me, and I realized I had spoken out loud. Before I could react, though, Duke clapped his hands, apparently delighted.
“Thank you so much for noticing, Hannah,” he said. “I have been using Vaseline. I think it really makes me stand out, don’t you?”
My jaw dropped. I could feel it unhinge. How do you answer a question like that? I might have shrugged or possibly nodded in response, but I was doing my level best to keep any comments to myself. I did not want to be the center of attention tonight, and I did not want to get into a conversation about shiny teeth with Duke.
Still grinning, Duke dropped his voice and in a confidential tone, he said, “You should use it for your next show. It totally helps keep your lips from sticking to your teeth too. Take Grandpa Duke’s word for it.”
Hayley choked on her drink and started to laugh. A moment later she was laughing so hard, pop sprayed out her nose. “Ow, it burns,” she said between gasps of laughter.
Across the table, Britney stared at Hayley with wide-eyed wonder. Oh, that poor girl, growing up in this family, I thought.
Duke didn’t seem to mind Hayley laughing at him, presumably because he thought she was laughing at something he had said, not actually at him.
Before anyone could say anything else, Grandma came back into the dining room holding a small bundle. Whatever was wrapped in the hot pink blanket was alive because it squirmed in Grandma’s arms.
She peeled the blanket back to reveal the snuffling snout of a pig. “This is Fenwick,” she announced, gazing down fondly at the creature. “He’s our newest baby.”
Mom came back in from the kitchen at that moment, and let out small shriek, dropping the tray of cookies in the process. “What is that?”
Grandma snuggled the pig closer to her face. “Him’s a potbellied piggy, that’s what him is,” she cooed at the pig.
“Wanda found him on Craigslist,” Duke said, his shiny grin back. “He gets along great with Noodle and Strudel.”
“Um…who are Noodle and Strudel?” Hayley asked.
“Our ferrets, silly goose,” Duke said.
“It’s, um, nice of you to bring your pets,” Mom began.
“Baby,” Grandma replied. “Fenwick is our baby.”
“Fenwick?” Confusion colored Mom’s face.
“The pig,” Harlow supplied.
“Oh. It’s nice of you to bring Fenwick to visit, but why is he at the table?” Mom asked. I could hear the tension coiled in her voice.
“It is time for his bottle, of course,” Grandma said, reaching into her purse and pulling out a baby bottle.
“Of course it is,” Mom said. “Oh dear.”
Mom and Dad exchanged glances. Mom sat down at her seat, and pursed her lips. “Mom,” she said, “is everything all right?”
Grandma looked up, surprise clearly evident on her face. “Of course, why do you ask?”
Mom frowned. “Chuck and I are worried about this…obsession you seem to be developing.”
“Obsession?” Grandma laughed. “Whatever are you talking
about?”
Mom gestured at the pig slurping happily from the baby bottle. “This obsession with getting animals. Odd animals.”
“It’s not an obsession,” Grandma said firmly. “It’s a choice that Duke and I have made together.”
“We can’t have kids,” Duke said. “So this is how we’re expanding our family. It might be a little non-traditional, but it’s fun. And we’re happy.”
Why did Duke and Grandma make everything, even their crazy choices, seem so simple? For a moment, everyone was quiet, perhaps feeling slightly chastised for judging Grandma’s choices. Then Britney said, “Piggy drink.” She grinned at Grandma, and grabbed her own bottle. “Me piggy.”
She popped the bottle in her mouth. We all laughed, and unbelievable warmth bloomed in my chest. Everything felt almost so right. The only thing missing was Josh, and the fact that I wanted him there made me feel better for some reason.
Chapter Five
A week later Hayley came crashing in to my room some time after midnight. A sharp stream of light bit through the darkness, making my eyes water as they tried to adjust. My sleep-addled brain tripped over itself to figure out what was going on.
“Get up,” she said, rushing over to me, and grabbing my arm. “Grandma’s commercial is going to be on in like two minutes. She just texted.”
I stumbled out of bed, my foot tangling with the sheet and causing me to trip and bang my knee against the bed frame. As I hobbled to the living room, I tried to focus, but my exhaustion made me crash onto the couch, groaning unintelligibly.
Suddenly the bright logo of Hoyt Toyota flashed across the screen. The next thing we knew Grandma and her “besties” were writhing around on the top of a convertible, doing some bizarre choreography to the Hoyt Toyota jingle.
“This can’t be real,” I said. Horror did not begin to convey the emotions zipping through me. One glance at Hayley’s face told me she felt the same way.
My phone started to buzz. I grabbed it. “I’m going back to bed,” I said. Hayley barely nodded at me, but kept staring at the screen in dismay.