Watching the three of them together is enlightening. Rocket has a big, easy smile on his face as he comes out of the studio and waves. Giving each of them a warm, guy hug, shows another side of Rocket. Snatching me by the hand, he pulls me under his arm as he smiles and introduces us.
Gary says, “James, Rocket found himself a pretty one. I hear that she’s a teacher.”
I’m not sure what to say since I don’t know if I’m supposed to respond to that.
His dad looks around, then says, “Son, you look good. I’m glad you got your road fixed.”
Gary continues with, “James, it looks like Rocket is finally getting regular haircuts. This little Jennifer is a good influence.”
Gary looks around; it’s obvious he doesn’t approve of the Winnebago, though he doesn’t say anything. Rocket heads everyone into the studio.
“You’ve been busy,” James says as Rocket shows them what he is working on. Both his dad and Gary look over the latest sculpture, discussing what he’s doing and why he’s doing it.
Rocket had turned on the big forge, mostly to get the room warm. He pulled the table out into the center of the studio. Before taking my shower, I set it, creating a centerpiece out of branches from local trees.
While they continue to talk about his current sculpture, I get everyone a drink and take the food out of the big refrigerator. Rocket cooks the sandwiches using the forge. The three of them chat comfortably together; I can see what dinner must have been like in their house.
At some point, the conversation turns to me. Gary asks me about my family, what my parents do for a living, and how I was raised. They didn’t realize I was from Hawaii. Rocket told them I was there for Christmas; they thought I was on a family vacation.
Gary then asks me, “What do you think of how our Rocket lives?”
I’m sure it’s a loaded question, but I answer it honestly. “This place is starting to grow on me. When I first met Rocket, I was horrified that he lived in an old Winnebago up in the mountains.”
We catch each other’s eyes. I’m sure Rocket’s thinking of what I said last month.
“The funny thing is, I find myself looking forward to coming here. It’s really nice and peaceful.” Looking around the studio, I continue, “This place is fantastic. Rocket and I have so much fun here working together. It’s my favorite place in the world.” I catch Rocket’s eyes again. This time they are warm. I look back at Gary and his dad, “The only thing I don’t like is when it rains, I can’t figure out which is noisier, the studio or the Winnebago.”
I catch his dad shooting Gary a look. It’s the same look Rocket just shot me.
After lunch, Rocket has me show James and Gary my projects. They’re both supportive. Then we take a hike around Rocket’s large property. Gary keeps pointing out locations where Rocket can build a house.
Rocket finally says, “Buying this lot and setting up this studio has been expensive. I’ll build a house when I can afford it.”
“Your grandfather left you some money.” Gary responds.
Rocket bristles, “I’ve got a job. I can do it on my own.”
One more piece to the Rocket puzzle. It confirms what I thought; Rocket’s an independent guy who’s serious about supporting himself and living within his means. Which is cool. I can respect that.
Serving them all the desserts I baked, along with coffee from my family’s plantation makes the afternoon special. At some point, they leave, confirming when our dinner reservations are. Watching their car disappear around the hill Rocket pulls me into his arms and says, “I knew they’d love you. What’s not to love?”
It’s the first time he’s used the word love around me. I’m not sure if he said he loves me, or it’s a turn of phrase. As we head into the kitchen to clean up the dishes, my head spins because I think I might be falling in love with him, too.
Chapter 33 – Dinner with Dad
Rocket
Jennifer gets dressed up all pretty in a fancy little skirt and high heels. My idea of dressing up is to shave and wear one of the new shirts I got for Christmas. We almost don’t make it out, since looking at Jennifer gives me too many ideas.
We beat Dad and Gary to the Michelin two-star restaurant Gary chose. Jennifer and I hang at the bar. When Gary and Dad finally show up, it’s obvious that they’ve embraced Jennifer, as they warmly greet her.
Of course, Gary looks me over and says, “James, I told you Rocket would look nice in that shirt. And look, he even shaved.”
Leaning over, I tell her, “These are my easy parents. Wait till you meet my mother.”
Her eyes get wide in surprise.
Of course, Dad hears that comment and starts in on me for not calling mom. My parents might never have been in love, but they have always been very supportive of each other.
Gary can’t let anything go. He says, “James, you know as soon as Lisa hears we met Jennifer, she’s going to be up here.”
Leaning back in my chair, I joke, “She can’t make it up here to see her only child?”
“Don’t be so harsh on your mother. She works hard. She always put your needs first, and as a teenager you were a little shit. None of us ever thought we’d survive those years.”
This gets Jennifer’s ears all perked up. Gary notices as he turns to her and starts filling her in on my teenage years. “As a teenager, we had to send him to two different private schools. They kicked him out of the first one for fighting, or was it after the police picked him up for defacing public property? James, who was it that caught him with drugs? I can’t remember. He and his ratty looking friends were always getting into some kind of trouble.”
Dad pulls the conversation back by saying, “I’m saying, you put your mother through a lot. You should call her. She shouldn’t have to find out what’s going on in your life through me.”
“How much did I put her through? I moved in with you and Gary when I was fourteen. You’re the ones who had to deal with everything.”
“That’s because you already were turning into a juvenile delinquent. I still don’t know how you pulled good grades with the shenanigans you were up to,” Dad says.
A strong teenage memory comes back to me. “I was a pain in the ass. School was always too easy, never a challenge. I remember having all this energy. I never liked organized sports. I liked the thrill of doing what I wasn’t supposed to, and, of course, speed and air—skateboarding in the city and in the drainage canals, mountain biking in the hills, snowboarding in the winter.”
“I had a personal relationship with your principal,” Dad kicks in.
“Yeah, I know, I wasn’t an easy kid.”
Jennifer asks, “If you had to raise you, what would you have done differently?”
Thinking about it, I say to dad, “Definitely moving me from Mom’s to your place was the right thing. She had no control over me. You guys were always in my face, which pissed me off at the time. I liked working with you in your shop. Remember the summer we rebuilt that car?”
Dad smiles and nods.
“That was fun. There were so many dumb shit things I didn’t do because I knew the blowback wasn’t worth it. Gary, you were always there, foiling my plans. Though you two know only a small percentage of the shit I got into.”
“Kids think they’re sneaking around, but they’re so bad at it, you would be surprised at what we knew. We both worked. It was hard working and trying to keep you in line at the same time,” Dad says.
Gary nods in agreement. “James, thank God Lisa didn’t want a second kid. I don’t think I would have survived if we had to raise two like that.”
When Jennifer gets up to use the ladies’ room, Dad says, “Nice girl.”
Gary adds, “James, this one’s a keeper.”
It hasn’t been two years since my divorce. Having no interest in jumping into another mess, I tell them, “Don’t get ahead of yourself. She’s twenty-four. I’m in no rush to get married again. Let’s see where we are next year.”
Jennifer
For Valentine’s Day, Rocket surprises me. Driving into my apartment complex after work, I think I see his truck. Rocket emerges with a big bouquet of red roses and a heart-shaped box of chocolates. Who’d think that Rocket would do something so traditional? I can’t help but jump up and down and clap my hands. Rocket heads to me with that cocky half-smile of his.
Is he really my man?
Thank my lucky starts I didn’t screw up.
He looks good, all shaved and dressed in one of those nice shirts his parents got him. When he reaches me, he picks me up, swings me around in his arms, and gives me a big, sweet, wonderful kiss.
As we head up to my place, he tells me, “You need to put on one of those sexy skirts and high heels of yours; I made reservations at a nice place.”
Looking in the mirror after changing, I tell my reflection, he’s better than any of the other guys I’ve dated.
***
We invite Juliette and Nate to Rocket’s for the afternoon and dinner. Rocket works at the big forge in the morning, so all the bricks are hot, making it easy for him to use it as a pizza oven at night.
Since I’ve been with Rocket, I haven’t hung with my friends on the weekends. I’ve only met Nate a few times, most notably at Isabelle’s cabin over New Year’s. It’s interesting to see Juliette with him. She’s a lot different with Nate than she was with Stephan, or her previous boyfriend, Chris. With Nate, she seems more relaxed, happier, more herself. I always felt like she worked too hard to be who Stephan wanted her to be.
After the four of us come back from a hike, Juliette and I head to the kitchen where she helps me with the salad, leaving the guys to make the pizza.
“You’re out here a lot. How are you adapting to mountain life?” Juliette asks.
“The first time Rocket drove me here, I was shocked. I’m a city girl, and look at this place. He lives in a broken down Winnebago.”
“He’s a lot different than your previous boyfriends. I can’t see the two of you going to croquet parties at the club.”
“Yeah, when we first started dating, I thought he was my little rebellion. But now, every weekend feels like a mini-vacation.” Then in a whisper, I tell her what I feel deep down in my soul. “Rocket gets me in a way that no one has ever gotten me. He’s gotten me to push my boundaries, and the art. It’s amazing spending my weekends with him. Oh, and you’ll love this, he even got me on a mountain bike.”
“You? And how’d that work out?”
“Yeah, as well as you would have expected. If you were his girlfriend, you’d have him put you on a training schedule, though I don’t know which one of the multitude of sports you’d have to drop. Me, yuck, I got all dirty, and it was really hard. He made me ride up this hill, well, really I pushed the damn bike up the hill, and then he had me ride down the hill. It was so scary I had the brakes on the whole time. I screamed so much I think I woke the dead. Then the stupid bicycle ran into this branch and I fell off. The ground was muddy; I got covered. I was so mad at Rocket. I told him riding was a sucky sport and he should take off riding with his friends and leave me out of it.”
“This reminds me of Memorial Day weekend last year, when Isabelle and I took you on that hike up in Tahoe. You got mad at us, too.”
“That wasn’t a hike, it was a death march. Why would anyone want to do that? It was at Squaw Valley. I was pissed when we got to the top and found out they had a tram. If the goal was to get in their hot tub, we should have taken it up. Anyway, enough about me, how are things with you and Nate?”
“His old girlfriend’s in town.”
“What!” I say in alarm.
“She’s been blowing up my phone.”
“Why?”
“She wants to meet with me.”
“Why would she want to meet with you?”
“The only reason I can think of is she wants to tell me to get my hands off of her man.”
“Did you tell Nate?
“She sent me a text, I didn’t know who she was. I asked him if he ever heard of this person.”
“What did Nate say?”
Juliette gets a real worried look on her face. “He says that was over a long time ago. He’s made his choice and it’s me.”
“Then why do you look so worried?”
“He was engaged to her. She broke his heart, and now she wants him back.”
Knowing Juliette, she’s been spinning on this for a while. “What are you going to do?”
“What can I do? He’s with me…but—”
Rocket calling my name breaks the conversation as I yell back, “Almost done in here.”
Turning back to Juliette, I give her a hug. Then I wonder out loud, “What do you think they’re talking about?”
“Our relationships,” she sarcastically says.
We both look at each other. At the same time we say, “Never.”
At dinner, Juliette tells us about some crazy politics at work that she’s tangentially associated with. Nate’s jaw muscle flicks as she tells the story about how some manipulative blond is spreading malicious rumors about her. It appears that the blond has her eye on one of the executives and thinks he has his eyes on Juliette. Juliette thinks the blond is being ridiculous. Though I can tell by the look on Nate’s face, he’s not convinced.
Juliette then says, “Hita and I have a plan.”
“Hita? What is she going to do, cook for your nemesis?” Nate says.
I explain to Rocket, “Last year some guy broke up with Hita after she poisoned him with her cooking.”
Nate still looks worried as he says, “At least it’s not Kelly you’re scheming with.”
***
A few weeks later, as I’m grading papers, I get a text from Hita. Did you hear the news?
Texting her back: That’s rather vague
She texts me over a link to TechCrunch. Bringing up the website, the first article is about a young company that was bought for $1.3 Billion dollars by Google. I’m wondering why she sent it to me, when my eyes graze over the picture accompanying the article and see Anil, the guy Hita poisoned with her cooking, and my former boyfriend, Carter. Not the guy with all the shoes, the guy before that, the one who thought I wasted my education on teaching and told me crafting was fine for preschool children. He’s the one that looked down at Rocket when we went for Chinese food.
I gasp, I think my heart stops, and my blood pressure drops. Carter will get a huge bonus from this deal; he’ll now be considered a rainmaker. Carter dreamed of living in a big house in the hills, with a membership to the best country club, traveling first class to exotic places. It looks like Carter is getting his dream. Was that my dream, too? Or was I influenced by his proximity? Bringing myself back to the moment, I call Hita.
“Shit, can you believe those guys did that?”
“Shit, that guy liked me,” she says.
“Shit, that guy liked me, too,” I repeat.
“Shit, we could be living in the hills with a fancy car and a black credit card,” Hita says.
“Shit, we could be traveling anywhere, buying anything we want,” I tell her.
We both stay on the phone; I can hear her breathing. Neither of us says anything. Hita breaks the silence by exclaiming, “Shit I’d be married to a humorless guy who doesn’t get me.”
Nodding, I finally say, “I’d be married to a guy who thinks my career is nebulous and beneath him.”
“I’d be miserable,” Hita says.
And then the reality hits me. Even with all the things I always thought I craved, I would be miserable, too. “Yeah, so would I.”
“Man, for about three minutes my brain went into overdrive thinking of all the possibilities wealth would bring,” Hita says.
“Yeah, so did mine.”
“I could do so much with that money,” Hita says.
“Yeah, not just for me, but there are all kinds of programs I could fund.”
&nbs
p; “Think of all the lives you can change.”
“We’d be another Gates foundation, saving the world,” I tell her.
“Yeah, what could have been?”
“Too bad we really didn’t like those guys.”
“But, can you believe that we actually knew guys who made it big? You read about people that make it big. But we actually went out with them,” Hita says.
“Yeah, it kind of blows my mind.”
Maybe those are someone else’s dreams.
***
As I start to adjust to the reality that Rocket is really my boyfriend, my brother shoots me an e-mail. He’ll be in Silicon Valley for work and would like to fly in early to get together. Calling him back, he asks to meet, “this boyfriend of yours.” This was definitely ordered by mom. After many questions about Rocket, I finally sent her the selfie I took at Halloween. She keeps on asking for more pictures, but I don’t want to send any that she can see Rocket’s piercings and tattoos. Knowing there’s no way around Nick’s visit, I spend a restless night thinking. It took Tristan to get over Rocket’s looks. But my family, they’ll freak. If Mom sees a “real” picture of Rocket, she’ll schedule an intervention.
At Tuesday’s dinner with the other princesses, I bring it up.
“My big brother is flying in for work and specifically asked to meet Rocket.”
Juliette gives me a knowing look, while Meredith asks, “And the issue is?”
“Judgment,” I say.
“Yours or your brothers?” Hita says.
“What does that mean?” I respond.
“Do you have issues with Rocket’s looks and lifestyle, or are you afraid your family will be judgmental? If they don’t like him, what will you do? Will it change your relationship?” Meredith asks.
“My family won’t approve of the tattoos and piercing.”
“The real question is, what do you want, and how do you present him to your family?”
I nod my head. I never realized how wise my friends were.
Jennifer and Rocket (The Princesses of Silicon Valley Book 6) Page 15