Page 13 of Just the Tipsy
“It’s loud out here!” Jada protests, adjusting her glasses. “What if you didn’t hear me?”
“Has there ever been a moment when I haven’t heard you? Ever? Since third grade?” he teases. Jada’s eyes narrow, but she smiles too. “Exactly.”
“Excuse my sister. She’s only semi-feral,” Jeremiah says to me.
“Rude, I’m mostly domesticated. Like a house cat.” Jada tucks some of her locs behind her ear. They’re cut right at her shoulders and are dyed pink at the ends.
“Aren’t semi-feral and mostly domesticated kind of the same thing?” Jeremiah asks, taking a sip of his drink.
“Whatever, it doesn’t matter.” Jada turns to smile at Bianca and extends her hand. “Sorry, I swear I’m an actual human with actual human manners. I’m Jada, that’s my twin brother Jeremiah, and Waylon didn’t say a damn thing about him bringing adate.”
She seems amused, thankfully, and not overly suspicious.
“Nice to meet you. Both of you. I’m Bianca.”
“Bianca.” Jada studies me, tilting her head to the side a little, like she’s trying to figure me out. “So, where’d you and Waylon meet? And when?”
“We met arranging things for Sadie a few weeks back.” I move my bag so Sadie will pop out, but she’s still napping. “She’s asleep.”
“Sadie is pretty much always asleep. She’s the chillest Pomeranian on the planet,” Jada says. “Anyway, so are you and Waylon…?”
I kind of appreciate how straight to the point she is, even though I need to look to Waylon to answer the question in the best way.
“It’s casual,” he says, resting a hand on my lower back again. It’s warm and grounds me from flying off into an anxiety spiral.
Jada and Jeremiah look at him, then each other, seemingly speaking in an unspoken language. It’s a little unnerving, but I’d prefer to be in the dark about whatever they’re thinking.
“We’re just surprised,” Jeremiah says. “But not in a bad way.”
“Oh.” I nod because I don’t know what to say to that. Plus, I can feel Jeremiah’s skepticism already. Unlike his sister, he’s much less cheerful.
But Jada already looks like she’s moved on. She and Waylon quickly catch up — she’s getting her PhD, though I don’t know in what, and her and Jeremiah’s family run a historic hotel where she gives tours. Jeremiah is a high school math teacher, which sounds hellish, and the school’s football coach.
I try to file every little detail away just in case. I’m keeping quiet in the conversation but I don’t want everyone to think that I’m zoned out. Every once in a while, a dog wanders up to Waylon, tail wagging, and he pets them before they move on. It’s like a processional where they’re all getting a little blessing from the dog pope. Is this man like Snow White, just summoning dogs?
Soon Waylon brightens a little more when a pit bull mix comes trotting up to him.
“Hey, Murphy,” Waylon says, squatting down and putting his forehead to the dog’s big blocky head. He glances up and nods in greeting at someone behind me.
“Hey.” I follow Waylon’s gaze and spot who I’m guessing is Wes, based on the photo wall. They’re fraternal twins, so I can see the brotherly resemblance without them looking the exact same.
Behind him, holding his hand, is who I assume is Rose — a petite black woman with long braids and a nose ring. She gives off cool girl energy, genuinely cool girl energy and not the manufactured stuff so many people try to create on Instagram. Like she knows where the good bars and restaurants that aren’t overrun with people are.
Everyone greets each other before Waylon introduces me to Wes and Rose. Wes’s eyebrows shoot up for a second, but he smiles and shakes my hand.
“This is pretty damn new, isn’t it?” Wes asks, not taking his eyes off Waylon’s.
“Yeah.” I hope my hands aren’t too sweaty. I shake Rose’s hand too.
“Things just sort of clicked,” Waylon adds.
Rose and Wes don’t push it — they just invite us all over to eat with them.
The party has a ton of guests, and there’s more than enough food for everyone to take home leftovers in a sectioned off area of the yard. The dogs that followed us stand outside of the barrier, looking forlorn that they aren’t allowed to eat all the human food.
“Since this was kind of last minute, I was only able to find out what stuff is dairy free versus having something made for you. And I wasn’t sure if you were just dairy free or if you were vegan,so I asked about both,” Waylon says. “There are a few options, but not a ton when it comes to desserts or anything.”
I only briefly mentioned I can’t eat dairy to him, but he thought to mention it to whoever arranged all this food? Kyler literally never remembered, even though we had a lot of moments where I accidentally had dairy and broke out in horrible cystic acne that took weeks to clear up.
