AllFreeNovel
Share Us
This is real. No matter how it started or what we expected.
My heart does a few somersaults and then a few cartwheels thinking about our call tonight. When we might—finally—be honest about our feelings.
Unless … that’s why he’s playing poorly. Why he looks off and distracted. Because it’s a bad conversation coming. Or he changed his mind.
I tell myself that’s really stupid.
Maggie pats my knee. I’m almost knocked over by a wave of guilt for the basket of lies I’ve woven for her. “Maybe he just misses his wife.”
Or maybe he isn’t sure how his wife really feels about him because she’s kind of a coward.
“I don’t think missing me is the reason.”
“Are you kidding?” Annie tosses a handful of popcorn my way. And even though I’m not in the least bit hungry, I eat it. Mostly to save it from Doris, who is well on her way to developing a popcorn addiction. “You two are disgustingly adorably perfect for each other.”
“Are we?”
It’s probably the question that gives it away. Something shaky in my voice that has both Annie and Maggie swinging their gazes in my direction. They make eye contact first—something passing between them I can’t decipher but very much fear is something like,Liar! She’s a lying little liar!
When I swallow, my throat catches and I have to try again. “What?” I ask.
Maggie purses her lips, but it’s not an annoyed look—or disappointed. It’s—wait. Is she holding back a laugh?
“You know we know, right?”
“Know?”
Annie flings popcorn at me, and this time, I don’t stop Doris from launching up into my lap to scavenge the pieces. “We know about you and Eli getting married for his visa.”
My stomach drops to somewhere in the vicinity of the earth’s core as I chew the inside of my cheek, wishing my words wouldn’t choose this moment to disappear.
“I wasn’t sure why at first,” Maggie says. “But then I looked up the timing of his visa, and his sudden rush to get married made sense.”
“Oh,” I manage, already mentally calculating what it will cost to have my things moved back out when Maggie asks me to go, wondering if my old apartment has been rented or if maybe I should stay in a hotel. At least until I figure out my next steps.
Then I realize she isn’t asking me to leave. Not accusing me of lying. And she doesn’t look disappointed. She looksamused.
“You aren’t upset?” I ask.
“Heavens, no,” Maggie says. “I don’t care how my children find love. I only hope they do.”
“And you’re clearly in love with him—for reasons I can’t fathom, being that he’s my brother and all.”
Yeah, it is pretty obvious, huh?
Maggie takes my hand and gives me a soft squeeze. She no longer looks amused but tender as she says, “And he’s clearly head over heels for you.”
“You think?” I whisper.
Maggie nods, smiling with tear-filled eyes that make my chest suddenly constrict.
Annie rolls her eyes. “Can you seriously not tell? He’s a smitten kitten.” She pauses with a piece of popcorn halfway to her mouth, blinks rapidly, then drops her hand. “Oh, my gosh—you don’t know.”
“I—” The one syllable chokes out of me, and I can’t continue, shrugging instead.
Maggie drapes an arm around my shoulders and pulls me close, the move so familial, somaternalthat it shakes something loose inside of me. “Oh, sweetie. Has he not told you how he feels?”
“To be fair,” I say, my voice finally returning, even if it’s wobbly. “I haven’t told him either. We’ve been talking around it. Are you—are you not mad that we lied? ThatIlied?”
