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“Let’s chat about this during dinner,” Mom offers. “Bryce, can you help me bring the food to the table, please?”
“I’ll help you,” Aunt Maeve chirps. They head to the kitchen with Uncle Matt, who refuses to let anyone else toss his precious pasta salad.
“I was telling Ana about the navigation issues you were working on tonight.” Grandpa shepherds everyone to the dining table. “The robotics tournament is in Nashville next week,” he further explains to Ana.
Grandpa never got an engineering degree, but he’s the reason I’m on this path. There isn’t a better guy for mechanical issues. Actually, there isn’t a better guy. Period.
He takes his place at the head of the table and invites everyone to sit. I slip into my regular spot on his immediate left. He gestures for Ana to take the seat to his right, across from me.
“Ana is on a robotics team in her high school and finished first in their division.” Sergei brims with pride when he takes a seat beside his sister.
“Second,” she corrects.
The blush that rushes up her cheeks makes her glow. Seriously, it’s like she has her own lighting crew.
The exchange activates a few synapses in my brain, enabling me to process the following information:
First, she’s in high school. I am fighting the impulse to ogle at a teenager. That’s gross.
Second, I will not disrespect Sergei by checking out his kid sister. I’m not stupid.
Finally, and most damningly, she is asking about the very thing that made me late. The last-minute tweaking of our navigation system did not go well.
My eyes stray to the ceiling and then to the kitchen entrance, anywhere except Ana’s large brown eyes behind a curtain of thick lashes.
When Uncle Matt brings the pasta salad to the table, I force myself to count all the olives I can see.
“I was just reading about range variation,” she continues with glee, exposing dimples so stark against her fair skin they might have been drawn with a heavy pencil.
“Range variation isn’t the issue,” I mumble.
From the corner of my eye, I notice her slump back and tilt her head. I am acting like a dodgy jerk, but my choices are to deter her attention or… what?
Describe the robot’s deviating pose estimation that my team can’t seem to resolve?
Go on and on about accumulated errors in sensor measurements?
Explain loop closures when the robot can’t recognize its previously mapped location?
Or maybe I should openly admit I didn’t think it was possible for skin to look that flawless.
Perhaps I ought to ask if her hair is as soft as it looks.
Nope. Nothing I say right now would be appropriate. Therefore, I count olives.
Mercifully, the rest of the meal arrives. We bow our heads as Grandpa says grace.
“Thank you, Lord, for this gathering of family and friends,” he begins. “Bless our food that will nourish our bodies and minds. Help us welcome Ana and Sergei into the family. I mean dinner, not like family-family. Although that would be fine, too! You know what I mean. Anyway, um. Amen.”
“Amen,” we all echo, barely stifling laughter.
“Nailed it,” Uncle Matt mutters with a snicker before letting out an “ouch” because Aunt Maeve probably kicked him under the table. The sight of my uncle’s discomfort draws amused snorts from me and Dad.
“I hope you don’t mind that we’re having a rainbow for dinner,” Grandpa says. The rest of the MacElroy clan cringe, knowing a corny dad joke is about to drop.
“What do you mean?” Ana asks, affection for Grandpa clear as day.
“Because I’m trying to eat light! Get it?” he guffaws, pointing to the chicken breast in front of him.
