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She tilts her head. “Your dad mentioned you were going to school. Is that not true?”
“It’s true,” Richard says, breaking his silence sharply.
“I was in school,” Riley says. “But it wasn’t working out, so I stopped going.”
“Schooling isn’t for everyone,” my mother says diplomatically. “Learning happens in all sorts of ways.”
“I agree,” Riley says.
Richard doesn’t reply, opting to sip at his drink instead.
“Riley makes a great amaretto sour,” I say. “Very tasty.”
“Oh, I love a good amaretto,” Mom says, then laughs. “Do you remember last summer? On the water?”
I crack up. “How could I forget?”
She touches Richard’s arm. “Last summer, for Tish’s twenty-first birthday, we rented a paddle boat on Deep Lake and snuck a whole bottle of the stuff out there with us.”
“It seemed like a better idea at the time,” I say. “But we didn’t anticipate exactly how… unstable paddle boats can be.”
“I’ve never felt so nauseous in my life!”
We laugh. Riley does, too.
Richard, however, offers a stiff smile, his hand still resting on hers. “Well, now that the introductions are out of the way, how about we…”
My mother’s head swivels toward him. “Now?”
“Why wait?”
She hesitates. “Well…”
“Wait for what, Mom?” I ask.
“We just sat down, Richie,” she says. “Maybe we should wait a little longer? Have our drinks first?”
“Sober, drunk. Won’t change the good news!” Richard moves his hand to her back. “Let’s tell them now.”
“Tell us what?” Riley asks.
Blissfully won over with a simple wink and a smile, my mother turns forward. They sit tall, both of them looking at us over the table, the moment crackling with strange anticipation.
“We…” Mom pauses, swallowing hard. “We’re getting married.”
Married?
They’regetting married?
My insides knot and twist. Part of me leaps with joy; the devoted daughter in me wanting nothing more than to see my mother happy.
But then there’s the woman in me, too. The young woman who just spent an incredible night with a man she just met, a man she wants to see again and again.
“Married?”I ask. “When?”
“In two days,” Richard answers.
Riley laughs.
