Page 1 of Marriage (Red, White &) Blues

Chapter One

“Bye,” I called out to Pen and Ant, who stood in their doorway waving goodbye to me. They had that ridiculously gorgeous, ridiculously cute couple thing going on. Given the breeze tonight, Pen’s chestnut brown ponytail kept whipping him in the face, while his dark hair had just enough length to ripple like water. I laughed, taking them in because Ant kept swiping her hair from his mouth as they stood out on their stoop waiting for me to reach my car. Our other best friend Sierra already made it to hers.

Although Ant and Pen lived in a highbrow neighborhood in Grosse Pointe Shores, they always stood out on their stoop until Sierra and I made it to our cars and locked the doors. I never understood why. They lived in one of the safest neighborhoods in Michigan. In this case, money equaled security. And let me just say, they had a lot of…security.

Please don’t take me wrong, no sour grapes on my part. I loved my friends and wished them nothing but the best. Just—sometimes it hit me how different our lives were and I felt like by this point inmylife, I should’ve somehow been further ahead in everything like my career, romance, and travel. Having a roof over my head, and food on the table every night courtesy of mystable job, I had a lot. I gave thanks to the universe nightly for all my blessings. Just… having my best friends come from the kind of money that most of us only dreamed about sometimes got to me. It made me sound whiny and ungrateful. I got it. But we all had character flaws and this happened to be mine. For instance, I wanted to be a part of the cool car club.

Ant drove a Jag.

Pen drove a Merc.

Sierra drove an Audi.

I drove a Subaru Outback. Yes, a Subaru happened to be a perfectly acceptable car. Yet, one of the first times I’d driven in this neighborhood, a neighbor stopped me to find out my reason for being there. Pen and Ant were furious when they’d found out but furious or not, it didn’t change the fact that one of us didn’t belong here—guess which one? They never tried to make me feel inferior. My friends were all great people. It just came along with always being the poor friend. The girl who usually tried to back out of events due to lack of funds, but ended up going because friends paid my way. They insisted, Iswear.

A little backstory: We’d met at a private school I’d thankfully been smart enough to get scholarships to attend. Then Pen and Ant had gone to Brown after high school. Sierra had flown off to Princeton. I’d gone the U of M route. A great school that again, I’d earned a full ride to attend. Unfortunately, even with a U of M degree under my belt, I didn’t earn enough to buy a Jag, a Merc, or an Audi.

My job was okay. I worked in HR for the Social Security Administration. That meant I didn’t have to deal with angry customers, only angry employees.

I drove the thirty minutes back home, where I lived with my mother in a modest home in Beverly Hills—the Michigan town,notthe star-studded California odyssey.

When the garage door opened, I found the garage empty. Mom should’ve been home this time of night. Since Dad passed from cancer right after I’d graduated high school, she rarely left the house for anything other than work or grocery shopping, despite how often I tried to get her to go out with her old friends. That was the whole reason I’d stayed in Michigan and gone to U of M instead of attending the myriad of other prestigious schools that wanted me out of state. I’d received full-ride offers all over the country. But Mom needed me close. Could she have finally taken my advice or did I need to panic?

After parking and exiting my car, I walked into the house through the utility room.

“Mom?” I shouted, just in case she’d taken her SUV to the shop or something. Hmm… no answer.

I pulled my phone from my purse to call her because what if she needed me? But before I pressed her contact button, I found an unread text from her from earlier this evening.

Mom:Gloria, I finally took your advice and am out with a friend from work tonight. Have fun with Sierra and Penelope.

Wait—what? Talk about being gobsmacked. My mom had actually taken my advice and gone out with a friend from work again. I hoped this meant she finally started healing.

A couple of hours of watching Netflix passed when I decided to go to bed. Tomorrow, being Saturday, meant a busy day volunteering down at the animal shelter. To be nice, I left one light on for my mom so she didn’t walk into complete darkness when she came home.

The next morning, I showered and dressed, then went down to the kitchen to grab a bite to eat before heading to the shelter. Mom forgot to turn the kitchen light off. Momforgotto turn thelight off? She never forgot. She must’ve had a good time last night for that to happen. I switched it off for her, then went to the garage… which still only housedmycar.

Maybe she’d had too much to drink and a friend drove her home? But surely if my mom had been drunk last night, she’d have woken me up from all the noise she made trying to be quiet on her way up to her room. The woman rarely drank more than a glass of wine on a holiday thus, she couldnothandle her liquor. So, if not too drunk to drive home, then where in the hell was my mother?

Cue the panic.Five… Four… Three… Two…Andnow. I raced back inside the house up to my mom’s room, throwing open the door to be met by an empty bed. One that clearly hadn’t been slept in.

No, no, no… Scenes from horror movies started playing out in my head. Irrational? Possibly—but this was my one remaining parent. I couldn’t lose her too. I checked my phone for eerie voicemails or ransom calls—yes, I realized no one would kidnapmymother for ransom but remember, panic. Sure enough, I found another text from her.

Mom:Gloria, sweetheart. I won’t be home tonight. Carl asked me to go home with him… and I agreed. I’m so nervous. Love you, sweetheart.

Carl? My mom’s “friend from work” was named Carl, and he’d asked her home and she’d felt comfortable enough to sayyes? Just how long hadCarlbeen a friend?

Still feeling upset by the whole situation, I hopped in my Outback to head to the only place that I knew would make me feel better.

As always, it worked, taking my mind off my troubles for several blissful hours.

After spending the day taking care of all things furry—young and old—I went home, walking in to find out my mother and Carl had apparently been close friends for a while. I mean, if the way they were making out like teenagers on the sofa meant anything.

“Gloria?” My mom startled. Uh, I lived here, so I couldn’t see getting so surprised. A tall, broad-shouldered African-American man pushed up off my mom, and when he turned around—whoa! Carl was hot, to boot.Go, Mom!

“Gloria,” Carl said, approaching me with his hand out. “It’s good to finally meet you. I’ve been trying to get your mom to introduce us for the last year.”

I’m sorry, did he saythe last year?

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