by Linda Seed
A surge of dread swept through Rose’s chest. “Mom? Are you … Is anything wrong? You’re not sick, are you?”
“I’m fine.” Pamela waved a hand dismissively. “But I’m not going to live forever, dear. Meanwhile, it appears that you’re not even dating.”
Rose thought about telling her mother she was through with men. Because, after all, she was through. But if she did that, she’d have to explain why, and that would mean she would have to tell Pamela about Jeremy, and that just seemed like an exhausting prospect.
So instead, she lied. The lie came out so quickly and easily that Rose hadn’t even known she was going to say it.
“I am dating someone.”
Pamela’s eyebrows rose. “You are?”
“I … um … There’s a guy I’ve been seeing for a few weeks now.”
Pamela eyed her keenly—it was a look Rose remembered from her childhood, employed whenever Pamela wanted to extract information from her. Seeing it now made Rose wonder if the lie had been a terrible mistake.
“And who’s your suitor this time?” Pamela inquired. “Motorcycle gang member? Tattoo artist? Marijuana farmer?”
“He’s a graduate student at Stanford!” she blurted out. “He’s getting his doctorate in biology!”
Pamela froze for a moment, and it was clear she didn’t know what to make of it.
“Does this gentleman have a name?” she asked, rallying.
“His name … is Will Bachman.” Since she was going there, she might as well go all the way. “He lives here in Cambria. At Cooper House.”
“Hmm,” Pamela said. “I’ll look forward to meeting him.”
Rose felt a pang of guilt, but then she rationalized that she and Will already had an established history of pretending to date one another in order to appease others. This would be no different. She’d done Will a service by pretending to be his date in front of Chris. Now, Will could just return the favor.
She’d expected him to be annoyed when she told him, but he seemed more bemused than anything else.
“So, we’ve been dating for a few weeks, and it’s getting serious. Serious enough that you … well, let me apologize in advance about this, but … you have to meet my mother.”
“Huh,” Will said. He was at Ryan and Gen’s place, helping to finish up the back deck, and she’d come out there to fill him in. She’d just gotten off work, and the early evening sky was beginning to darken. The air, which carried a light breeze, was full of the scent of pine trees and salt water. “Have I gotten to second base yet?”
“Of course you have.” Rose waved a hand airily. “We’re getting serious enough for you to meet my mother. Do you really think I wouldn’t have let you feel me up?”
“Well, that’s good to know,” he said.
Will had a hammer in his hand and had paused in the act of building stairs leading up to the deck. Ryan was a few feet away, working on the railing.
“Are you guys getting pretend married, too?” Ryan wanted to know. “Because we could just add you in to the ceremony. Make it a double kind of deal.”
“No.” Rose waved him off. “Or, wait. That could be … No.” She shook her head to clear the idea away.
“Well, you did it for me with Chris. And you’re going to do it again at the wedding. I guess playing it up for your mom is the least I can do,” Will concluded.
“That’s what I thought,” Rose said. “I have to warn you, though. She’s going to examine your every pore with a microscope, and then she’s going to judge the crap out of you. It’s her hobby. Kind of like knitting, but with the systematic crushing of souls.”
“Ah.”
“Oh, shit. Now you look scared,” Rose put in. “I don’t want you to look scared, because then you’re going to back out. And you can’t back out.”
“I, uh … no.”
“Make sure he doesn’t back out, Ryan,” Rose said.
“Well, I guess I’ve got to keep him in, because there’s bound to be entertainment,” Ryan said.
“You have no idea,” Rose agreed. “Okay, thanks, Will. I’ll get in touch. I’ve got to go before you … I just have to go. Bye.” She rushed toward him, pressed a kiss to his cheek, and hurried off to her car, her short leatherette skirt swishing, her sapphire hair tousled in the breeze.
Will watched her go, still feeling the spot on his cheek where her lips had been.
“So, when are you going to tell her that all this fake dating isn’t fake on your end?” Ryan wanted to know.
Will shrugged, placed a nail, and hammered it in. “As soon as I win her over.”
Ryan grinned. “When do you think that’s going to be?”
“Sooner rather than later, I hope.” Will set another nail in place, then missed it with the hammer and almost hit his thumb. With the memory of Rose all over him, he was distracted. Hammering was a bad choice when you were distracted. “Might help if I make points with her mother.”
“I’m not so sure about that.” Ryan put aside what he was doing and leaned against the side of the house, his arms crossed. “I mean, Rose’s whole adult life has been about defying her mother, right? If her mother likes you, you might never get to second base.” He waggled his eyebrows.
“Well, that’s an interesting point.” Will put down the hammer and pushed his glasses up on his nose.
“On the other hand,” Ryan speculated, “if she’s got a hidden, burning need to get her mother’s approval, which she’s never gotten so far, then I could be wrong.”
“Well … what am I supposed to do, then?”
Ryan went to an ice chest he had sitting on the back deck, opened it, and took out two cold, sweaty bottles of beer. He handed one to Will.
“Well, hell. When all else fails, be yourself.”
Will screwed off the top, took a deep drink, and nodded. “Yeah. I can do that.”
Chapter Fifteen
Pamela had met most of Rose’s friends on her last visit to Cambria a couple of years earlier, so there was no need to introduce her around. Still, it seemed to Rose that there was a kind of insulation in numbers, so she invited everyone for a get-together at Pamela’s rental house. That would account for at least one evening when Rose wouldn’t be expected to deflect her mother’s criticism or respond to an interrogation about the status of her life.
She’d wanted to invite everyone to her own cottage, but Pamela had insisted that the place was too small, too run-down, too dark, too far from town—pretty much too everything, and not enough of everything else. Although Pamela was horrified by her little rental house’s size and décor, at least it had an ocean view, and a fairly decent back patio looked over a vacant lot next door that was carpeted in green grass and colorful wildflowers. Pamela admitted, grudgingly, that an afternoon cocktail party outdoors might be acceptable.
Picking a date and time that worked for everyone was tricky, but Rose settled on a Monday at five p.m. Monday was the slowest business day for the shops, so Rose, Kate, and Gen were able to get away. Jackson didn’t work on Mondays, and Will, Ryan, and Daniel, who pretty much did their own thing, found the timing was good for them as well.
Pamela had imagined a sedate, dignified gathering with cocktails and canapés, and that’s what she had prepared for. So she was both surprised and flustered when Ryan and Gen arrived with cold beer, Kate showed up with chips and salsa, Daniel came in hefting a couple of pizzas, and Jackson rummaged around on the patio, pulled the canvas cover off the gas grill he found there, pronounced it acceptable, and then left in his truck to get some steaks and corn on the cob.
“He’s going to barbecue?” Pamela hissed to Rose once Jackson had backed out of the driveway. “I planned a cocktail party, not a … a hoedown.”
“Relax, Mom,” Rose told her. “Jackson’s the best chef in Cambria. If he’s going to grill steaks, believe me, you’re going to want to eat one.”
“Well,” Pamela replied, skepticism in her voice.
Pamela had prepped for the
party not only by purchasing hors d’oeuvres and a selection of high-end liquors and mixers, she’d also systematically removed everything she considered tacky from the little house—except for the Barcalounger, which was too big to hide in a closet. The end result was that the cottage looked stark and plain without the garden gnome greeting visitors and without the various signs that declared BEACH THIS WAY and THIS HOME IS BUILT ON LOVE AND SHENANIGANS. Rose had liked it better the other way, but she thought it best to keep her opinions to herself.
Rose’s friends greeted Pamela warmly, and received polite acknowledgments in return. Then they all fell into the easy, comfortable banter of people who had known each other long enough not to have to impress one another, or worry what anybody thought. All except for Will, who hadn’t arrived yet.
Rose wondered if maybe he’d backed out, and it occurred to her that she wouldn’t blame him if he had. She wished she could get out of it somehow herself, but since she was the cohostess, that seemed unlikely.
“Where’s this gentleman of yours?” Pamela asked once everyone else had arrived, Jackson had left for the food, and Lacy was moaning happily while the shiatsu setting of the Barcalounger worked its magic on her.
“That’s a good question,” Rose said. She was just about to reach for one of the beers Ryan had brought, but she decided she’d better call Will first.
He picked up on the first ring.
“Where the heck are you?” Rose asked without preamble. She ducked into the cottage’s single bedroom and closed the door for privacy. “My mother’s asking about ‘my gentleman,’ and I haven’t had time to get drunk yet. I can’t handle her grilling me about my love life until I’ve had a chance to get drunk.”
“Sorry,” he said, sounding flustered. “My car broke down.”
“That’s a likely story,” she said. “If you didn’t want to do this, you should have—”
“No, really. I’m stranded on the side of Highway 1.” She heard the sound of traffic in the background.
“Oh. Shit. Okay, hang on. I’ll come get you.” She got the details of his location and went out to get her purse and her keys.
“Wherever are you going, Rosemary?” Pamela wanted to know.
“Will’s car broke down. I have to go get him.”
“Sit down and relax. I’ll do it,” Ryan offered.
“No, no.” Rose saw her chance to get out of her mother’s immediate vicinity, and she wasn’t about to let it get past her. “I’ve got it. You’re drinking already.” She pointed to his beer, the contents of which hadn’t gone down more than half an inch. “I haven’t had anything, so it’s best if I go.”
“Are you sure?” Daniel asked.
She stood on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to Daniel’s cheek. “You’re sweet, and very gentlemanly, both of you, but I’ll do it. I won’t be a minute.” Hopefully, there would be a tree down in the middle of the road, and she’d be much, much longer than that. One could dream.
Rose found Will just north of the Cambria limits, parked at a rest stop overlooking the beach. She got out of her car and stood there appraising Will’s old Volvo sedan, which would have looked okay had it not been for the black smoke still drifting out from under the hood.
“That’s not good,” she said.
“That was my expert opinion, too,” he admitted. “It started sputtering out on the highway, and I just managed to limp over here. Had to push it the last twenty feet.” He ran a hand through his sandy-blond hair and gave the car a stern look as though he could shame it into behaving.
“Huh. What do you want to do? Call a tow truck?”
“Nah. I’ll do that tomorrow. For now, it’s okay here. Let’s just go to the party.”
Rose gaped at him. “Really? This is our out. I mean, your out.”
“I don’t want an out. I want to meet your mom.”
Her left eyebrow, adorned with a silver barbell, shot up. “What the hell for?”
He grinned at her. “A deal’s a deal. One fake date is entitled to another. I’ve got to pay my end.”
“But you don’t have to—”
“Let’s get going,” he said, and went to her car and got in.
“Thanks for coming to get me,” he said as they got onto the highway and headed back toward Cambria.
“Think nothing of it. If you hadn’t had an emergency, I’d have had to invent one.”
“That bad?” He winced in sympathy.
“No. Not really. I mean, yes, but …” She shrugged. “She acts like everything’s beneath her! The rental house, the garden gnome, the damned Barcalounger.”
“The … Wait. I don’t—”
“It doesn’t matter.” She blew a puff of air upward to move the bangs out of her face. “It just gets annoying sometimes.”
She’d said it didn’t matter, but Will thought that it certainly did. Because Rose’s mother’s disapproval didn’t stop with garden gnomes and Barcaloungers—whatever those particular items had to do with anything. Will suspected that Pamela Watkins disapproved of a great many more things, her daughter among them. He thought of his own parents—steady, reliable, supportive. How much would it hurt if nothing he did was good enough? He felt a rising tide of sympathy for Rose, and something else: an anger, an indignation, that anyone would treat her that way.
“It’s her issue, you know,” he said after a while, with the blue water passing by on their right as they moved south on Highway 1.
“What?”
“Your mother being critical of you. It’s her issue, not yours. Parents—they bring a lot of their own baggage. I don’t know what your mother’s baggage is, but she’s got some. Otherwise, she’d be able to accept you the way you are.”
Rose shot him a quick look of surprise, started to stay something, and then stopped. She looked back at the road in front of them.
“I keep hoping, you know?” she said after a while. “Hoping that my relationship with her will somehow magically heal itself. It’s stupid. What kind of idiot keeps hoping for something that’s never going to happen?”
“It could happen,” he said.
She glanced at him. “You think?”
“Yeah. But if it does, it’s going to be because she changes, not you. Because she’s the one with the baggage.”
She let out a bitter laugh. “Yeah, well, I’m not gonna hold my breath for that.”
They got off the highway and headed down Ardath Drive toward Marine Terrace. He’d been trying to think of what to say to her, and he finally just settled on the truth.
“Rose?”
“Hm?” She looked at him briefly before settling her gaze back on the road.
“She should be proud. To have a daughter like you, I mean. Your mother should be proud.”
They arrived at Pamela’s rental house, and Rose found a parking spot on the street and turned off the car. Then she faced him, hesitated, and suddenly leaned forward and kissed him.
She smelled like lavender and vanilla, and she tasted like ripe promise. The sudden release of all of his tensions felt like his body sighing. Everything he knew vanished and became this, this moment, this one kiss. His hands moved up and buried themselves in her hair.
“Rose,” he groaned when she separated herself from him.
“This is just …” she whispered. “Just a thank you. For what you said.”
“Is that all it was?” His voice sounded too loud in the confines of the car, in the confines of this moment, and he softened it to a whisper. “Just a thank you? Because, to me, it feels like more.”
“No, no.” She shook her head as though clearing it. “I’m not … I’m …”
“You’re done.”
“Yes.”
“I know. You told me. Except, the thing is? I don’t think you’re really done. And when you realize that you’re not really done, I want to be the one you’re not done with.” He felt nervous, tingly, the rush of the kiss still pulsing through his veins. He hadn’t meant to declare himself—not
now, not when she wasn’t there yet—but he couldn’t seem to help himself. And now that it was out there, he was glad. “You’re not ready yet, and I get that. And we can just go on and do our pretend dating until you are ready. But you should know that for me, it’s real.” He leaned forward, gave her a chaste peck on the lips, and got out of the car.
He came around to the driver’s side and opened the door for her. She was still sitting in the same position as when he’d kissed her, immobile.
“Rose?” he prompted her. “You coming?”
“I … uh … yeah.”
He held out a hand to her and she took it and climbed out of the car.
“All right,” he said brightly. “Let’s go convince your mother you have a suitable boyfriend.”
She simply nodded, the power of coherent speech apparently still eluding her.
Chapter Sixteen
“So, here’s the thing,” Rose said as she and Kate moved around the tiny kitchen of the rental house, Kate gathering plates and silverware and Rose putting a salad together from ingredients Jackson had brought from the market. “You were right. Will wants to date me—you know, for real.”
“You don’t say.” Kate’s delivery was deadpan.
“How did you know about it before I did?” Rose demanded.
Kate shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe because it was ridiculously obvious.”
“What? No, it wasn’t! I thought we were just … you know. Putting on a show for the various judgy people in our lives. I never thought—”
“You didn’t? Even when he was kissing your face off?” Kate smirked at her, a load of plates and napkins in her arms.
“That was all part of the act!” Rose insisted.
“Hmm. How many of those kisses have there been?”
“Three,” Rose said. “Well, now four, including the one just now in the car.”
“And how many of them actually happened in front of other people?” Kate still had that damned smirk.