Page 53 of Just Is Not Enough

“Mom, this is Kaden, my partner.”

“Oh, I didn’t know you and Gabe took on another partner for the restaurant. When did that happen?” I can tell her feigned ignorance is more of a prompt for me to explain further.

“No, mom. Kaden is my partner, as in a loving, committed personal relationship.”

“Nice to meet you , Kaden.” Her nodding and addressing Kaden doesn’t surprise me. She doesn’t like being perceived as blatantly rude.

“Alright, enough of the pleasantries. Give your aunt a birthday hug and let’s get some grub.” Brenda takes the moment to break up the awkwardness of all that’s occurred.

“Happy Birthday, Brenda.” Kaden embraces Brenda like they’re old friends and I can’t help smiling at his obvious disregard for my parents but lovingly greeting my aunts. I’m not the only one that notices by the looks on some faces around us.

I greet Brenda and clasp my hand around Kaden’s walking to meet with our group of friends that arrived before us, not sparing any more of my attention on my parents. Brenda and G join us in support.

As expected, our friends ignore the exchanges they witnessed and carry on with their conversations as we join in seamlessly. All of these people have become more important to me than I ever thought they would. From our outings at The Garden, to the nights we just sit around one of our apartments, we’ve all grown close over the past couple months. Even moody Ender and I have been getting along well.

The backyard starts to fill up with some of my aunts’ friends. Dakota’s parents showed up at some point without any of us noticing, including Dakota. Maybe because Faith is paying attention to him today and looks like she’s actually enjoying his company instead of the usual tension between them.

“I’m going to get a drink. Do you want another?” Kaden sneaks up on my side, startling me. He had disappeared with Lanie and G a little while ago.

“Hey, babe.” I softly peck his lips. “Yeah, I’ll come with you.” We link hands and head towards the beverage table and coolers.

I tense up a little when I see my uncle standing by the beer cooler talking with someone. I try not to make eye contact, so I don’t have to bother pretending to like talking to him.

“What do you want? Beer, water, or a real drink?” Kaden asks at the same time we hear, “Luke, how’s it going? You haven’t been around in a while,” upon approaching the table.

“Hi, Jack. Nice to see you.” I put on the best fake smile I can stomach making.

“What’s going on up in the city life for you?” Jack eyes Kaden curiously without introducing himself, to which I’m not surprised at all.

“My new restaurant opened last month. It’s doing really well.”

“Yeah, looks like a bunch of new things happening up there, huh?” He looks from Kaden to our hands, then finally looks at me.

The average person would react differently than I feel the need to in this situation. I don’t grant him the reaction he is looking for, or any for that matter. Instead, I pass Kaden’s hand to my free hand and move my other hand to his back. “Let’s get that drink.” Guiding Kaden to the other side of the table without responding to Jack at all. He isn’t worth the time or effort to educate on how awful of a person he is for many reasons. It would fall on deaf ears. I won’t subject Kaden to any of his behavior, either.

We grab our drinks and are able to walk away without Jack bothering us further. “I don’t want to tell you to ignore his bigotry because you may only be experiencing it for the first time today. I don’t want to invalidate anything you’re feeling. Do you need or want to talk about it now or later?” Kaden knows the right things to say, and I couldn’t love him any more than I do in this moment.

“No need. His opinion means nothing to me. Let’s enjoy the rest of the day.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine Part One

One Thing Always Leads to Another

Kaden

WhileLukeisattemptingto have fun and act like nothing is bothering him while we continue socializing with everyone at the party, I know him better than that. I’m trying to comfort him every chance I get without drawing attention to us.

Luke suddenly clasps my hand and leads me inside the house. We stop in the empty kitchen where he wraps his arms around me and rests his forehead on my shoulder.

“Bug, talk to me.”

“I’m trying not to think about them and their bullshit, but I keep catching them looking at us. I truly don’t care what they think. I’m just trying to not ruin the party by telling them how I feel about them and how they treat us all. I’ve always been too scared to tell them how I really feel. It’s hard to keep my mouth shut for once in my life.”

“You need to relax a little. As much as I would like to see you tell them off, now is not the time or place.” I massage his shoulders attempting to loosen the knots that have formed. It doesn’t seem to be helping much, though.

I look around and see no one is in the house. Thinking of a quick solution, or I at least hope it will be, I lift his head and kiss him softly.

“C’mon,” I say as I lead Luke to the bathroom down the hallway from the kitchen.

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