“Love?” My sister turns to me. “Can I talk to you in the next room for a sec?” She curls her finger and I follow her to the living room, trying not to laugh because she’s about to spaz out. “You RSVP’d for one. We don’t have a place setting for him. And what’s he going to eat? Fish or chicken?” Pulling her phone from her back pocket, she shakes her head and presses her mouth flat. “I’ve got to call the caterer now and the wedding planner. We’ll have to redo the seating arrangements at some of the tables.”
“Cam.” I place my hand over her arm. “Just relax, okay? He’s really cool and laidback. He won’t care where you put him or what you feed him. He’s just happy to be here.”
I sound like I’m describing a puppy.
Cameo exhales, her arms dropping to her sides.
“I know you’re stressed,” I say. “And I know you’re sad that Dad’s not here. But everything’s going to be fine. Perfect probably. Knowing you. So just smile and let’s try to have a good time and not worry about the little things, okay?”
She manages to smile before wrapping her lithe arms around my shoulders. The number of times my sister has hugged me I could count on two hands. Dad would be elated if he were seeing this right now—and I like to think he is.
As soon as she pulls away, she pats my shoulder and says, “Why don’t you come and help make centerpieces?”
Just like that, she’s back to her original form. My tiger-striped sister will never change her tiger stripes.
Heading back to the kitchen, I peek down the hall but I don’t see Jude.
“Where’s Jude?” I ask. I’m still not comfortable using the word boyfriend because this all happened so fast. I feel like a label like this needs to be broken in a bit, like new leather shoes. Maybe one day it’ll feel natural. Until then, I’ll refrain from calling him anything besides his given name.
“He’s out on the patio with the guys,” Mom says, wearing a dopey smile. She’s either been hitting the Fuzzy Navel wine coolers or hitting the Xanax. Probably both. “They’re smoking Cuban cigars.”
“The doctor had them imported just for the wedding,” Cameo says to my aunts. “They’re engraved with our monogram.”
“Oh, how nice,” Grandma Berta says, though I’m not sure if she can even hear the conversation from where she stands.
I head over to say hello before making my rounds small talking with Aunt Clarice, Aunt Sheila, and Aunt Rosemary.
The patio blinds are pulled back, and from here I can see Jude standing outside, one hand on his hip and the other one lifting a thick cigar to his lips. If Hunter were here, he’d be in the next room, checking his email on his phone or making calls. Jude seems comfortable, at least from what I can tell from here. He’s smiling and nodding and laughing and now he’s talking, saying something to the doctor.
I hope he introduced himself as Bob Emsley and not “Doctor Robert Emsley the Third” or “the doctor.” Bob is nice, but he can be just as uppity as my sister sometimes. It’s why they’re perfect for each other.
“So tell us about your boyfriend,” Mom says. “We had no idea you were seeing anyone.”
Neither did I.
Everyone stares at me, sending a quick flush to my cheeks. I haven’t even thought about “our” story, how this all came to be. All I know is that I met him outside my apartment, he chased me, he caught me, and now here we are. Any other details I could share wouldn’t exactly be rated G for General Audiences.
The patio door slides open and I glance up, making eye contact with Jude, who briefly bites his lower lip before smiling. My heart revs.
“Jude, why don’t you have a seat,” Mom says. “Cameo, can you grab an extra couple of folding chairs from the garage?”
Cameo’s jaw falls, as if my mother had just asked her to scrub toilets in her wedding gown.
“I’ll get them,” I say. When I return, everyone’s laughing except Jude. He wears a polite smirk. “What’d I miss?”
“Your sister was just telling me about that time you were performing a clarinet solo in middle school and you fainted in front of the whole school and knocked one of your front teeth out,” Jude says.
“It was hilarious,” Cameo says, clapping her hands. “Bet you never knew she had a fake front tooth, did you, Jude?”
He looks to me, offering a wink. “Never would’ve guessed.”
Jude comes toward me, taking the chairs from my hands and setting them up for us, and when I take the spot beside him, he rests his hand on my knee under the table and gives it a squeeze.
“There was this other time when Love was supposed to go on a date with this boy but she went to the wrong house because it was one of those streets where every house looks the same,” Cameo says, waving her hand as she talks. “Anyway, she showed up at this house. The dad answered and said she was there for a date with their son. He tells her to come in and have a seat. A few minutes pass and out comes his son. Only it’s Gerald Poppitt, literally the nerdiest kid in the whole school. Looked like a twelve-year-old, thick glasses, whiny voice. But Love was too embarrassed to admit she was at the wrong house, so she ended up going on a date with him.”
“I wasn’t embarrassed, I just didn’t want to hurt Gerald’s feelings,” I say.
Jude nudges my arm. “That was really kind of you.”
I can sense the weight of Cameo’s stare, and I don’t know why she’s making it her personal mission to try to rouse up as many embarrassing childhood stories for Jude as she can, but I’m two seconds from shutting this down in front of everyone if she continues.
“Oh! Mom, do you remember that time Love—”
My lips part, but before I can begin to put Cameo in her place, Jude lifts his hand and just like that, it’s as if he pressed the mute button I never knew my sister had.
“All due respect, Cameo, I think I’d rather hear these stories from Love,” he says, “whenever she’s ready to share them with me.” He squeezes my hand under the table. “Did you guys know Love is opening a not-for-profit in Brooklyn?”
Cameo sits up taller, elbows on the table and hands clasped beneath her chin. “I wasn’t aware, no.”
“It’s called Agenda W,” I say. “I’ll be helping women find jobs and eventually financial independence.”
“Isn’t that cute,” Cameo says, returning her attention to the lace bows she’s tying.
“I think it’s pretty amazing,” Jude says, turning to me.
Aunt Edie tells the group there’s rain in the forecast for Saturday, and Mom clucks her tongue while Grandma Berta says rain on a wedding day is good luck and Aunt Sheila tells us not to get Cameo more worked up than she already is, which only serves to send Cameo flitting into the next room, leaving us to finish her centerpieces.
This is such a shit show and my crazy sister is center stage.
“So, Jude, what is it that you do for a living?” she asks. “You’re in New York, right? I never did like the city.”
“You’ve never been there, Mom,” I say under my breath.
She rambles on, not giving Jude a chance to answer. “Too many people. All bumping into each other, yelling at each other. And I heard it stinks. I heard it smells like sewer gas, rotten eggs, and stuff. And everything’s so expensive. Eight dollars for a cup of coffee, are you kidding me? They’ve lost their damn minds. I bet it’s all that air pollution—what do they call that? Smog?”