Page 81 of Hooked
Stay with me.
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Chapter Eighteen
Thursday morning,Tayla was sitting with her parents in the morning room, eating a silent breakfast and wondering why she was there. She should have just gotten a hotel room. Her father was reading the financial section, and her mother was tuned to a small television on the buffet. Tayla was staring out the sunny window, watching the boats sail across a crystal-blue bay.
The color of your beautiful eyes.She remembered her father saying that to her when she was a girl. When had his interest in her waned? When she’d started developing a personality? They asked her nothing about her life in Metlin. Probably they assumed it was a phase like pink hair or the peasant shirts and Birkenstocks she’d worn for a solid year in college.
It was an experimental year.
She took a drink of the weak coffee their cook had brewed that morning. “So, I’m seeing someone in Metlin. It’s kind of a regular thing. His name is Jeremy, he climbs mountains, he’s really fun, and also he’s black.”
Her mother looked up and blinked. “Are we supposed to be shocked? This isn’t 1980, Tayla. And your father and I don’t see color.”
So muchto unpack there, but she didn’t have the time that morning. “Just wanted you to have the correct mental picture because sometimes people assume everyone in small-town California is white, and that’s really not the case.”
Her father didn’t look up from his paper. “What does he do?”
“He has a degree in finance from UCLA.”
Her father raised one eyebrow.
“But he hated LA and hated working in finance, so he runs a comic book shop in Metlin and takes care of his grandfather.”
Her father’s eyebrow went down and the newspaper went up.
“I thought you said he was a mountain climber,” her mother said.
“He only does that on the weekends.”
She looked confused. “But you hate camping. We tried to send you to a summer camp in Lake Tahoe one year, and you called a cab and stayed at the Ritz-Carlton for a week.”
Ah yes, summer camp. Tayla had dozens of fond childhood memories of the lakefront view and the room service. “I still hate camping, but I like Jeremy. So… I might try it. If he really,reallywants me to.”
Her father put the paper down. “You have a second interview with the international fashion company this afternoon, correct?”
“Yes.”
“So is this young man interested in moving to the city with you and running his comic book shop here if you get the job?”
Tayla felt the color drain from her face. “I doubt it.”
“So why did you bother telling us about him?”
Because he’s important to me. Because I want you to know I have a life outside your tiny orbit. Because I want you to care.
Tayla didn’t say any of those things. It wasn’t worth the effort. She’d tried in the past to start fights with her parents to see if they cared.
They didn’t.
Her mother just drank more and her father would go to his office.
Tayla stood. “I’m going to get more coffee.”
“We have staff for that.” Her father rang the crystal bell in the middle of the table.
“He sounds very nice,” her mother said. “Would you like to bring him up to the city for a visit?”
