Page 2 of My Stepbrother's Wedding
Only it wasn’t really my family at all. It was a failed social experiment masquerading as a family. Elizabethwasn’t my mother, and Will was certainly not my brother. Please don’t mistake me for a drama queen. How would you feel if one day you had to move in with a bunch of near strangers and play Brady Bunch? When I left for college, I thought I’d escaped all that. Now it was sucking me back in for an international disaster waiting to happen.
“Can I get a water?” Lori asked, waking me up from my solo pity party. She had long blond hair like me, but her lifeguard body made me secretly hate her. The boys drooled over her like dogs begging for table scraps. I’d be lucky to get any attention, and when I did, it was from guys who liked “thick” girls, whatever that meant.
“A dollar fifty.” I handed her a cold bottle and typed on the register.
She handed me a bill. “Why so glum?”
“I just found out I can’t go to Fort Lauderdale.” I sighed, returning her change.
“What? Why?”
“My stepbrother’s getting married.”
“Will?” Lori froze, then nodded. “Good for him.”
“This is terrible!” I said, louder than I meant to.
Lori furled her eyebrows, giving me a long look. “Why so touchy? I figured you’d be glad for him.”
“Why would I be glad for him? He’s ruining my summer. My parents are dragging me overseas when I’m supposed to be living it up in Florida.”
“Oh yeah, he moved to Czechoslovakia, didn’t he?”
“Malegonia, but yeah, I think it’s over there somewhere.”
Lori tilted her head to one side and frowned. “Wini, I think you’re undervaluing an opportunity to see a new part of the world.”
I moaned and frowned. The conversation was getting on my nerves. Lori didn’t know my dysfunctional family like I did, and flying a hundred hours to visit some postcommunist hellhole was low on my bucket list.
“We’re not going anywhere fun. He’s getting married in one of those countries where you can’t drink the water and they have a revolution every five years.”
Lori shrugged. “Still, it sounds more interesting than Florida. You might have a great time.”
I gave her a fake smile as she returned to the lifeguard perch so all the boys could gawk at her. Of course Lori would think that. She could show up anywhere and men would crawl over one another to make her happy. I, however, would be stuck playing tagalong while everyone piled accolades on mydegenerate stepbrother. The more I thought about it, the worse my headache got.
***
After work I went to see my best friend, Karen. If anyone would understand the despair I was dealing with, it would be her. I parked in her driveway and walked up to the front door. Her dad stood in the yard, mumbling to himself and watering the petunias, with his white socks pulled up to his knees.
“Is Karen home, Mr. Dankenfaartz?” I asked. One of the reasons Karen and I got along so well was because we shared the misfortune of having a terrible name.
Karen’s dad looked up, glassy eyed, like he’d just been awakened. “What? Yeah, just go on in.” He briefly glanced at me and went back to mumbling to himself.
I opened the door and found Karen curled up on the living room couch, with a novel in hand. She looked up at me through her horn-rimmed glasses and brushed aside her purple-tipped hair.
“’Sup, kiddo?” she said.
“Hey, Karen, what are you reading?”
“The Raunchy Wrangler.” She held up the book. The front cover showed a shirtless cowboy with perfect abs kissing a scantily clad farm girl. “Instant classic. I’ll let you borrow it when I’m done.”
I plopped onto the couch next to her and groaned.
“What’s wrong?”
“I have to go to Will’s wedding in Malegonia.”
“Someone’s gonna marry Zitto?” she said, wide eyed.
