Page 45 of Sweet & Salty
“Romancan sleep on the floor,” I reply. “AndLyrais going to remember thatRomanis not anyone to get excited about. He’s just…” I grunt. “A friend. I guess. A person I do not hate, at least.”
She nods, slowly. “Right, right, right, right, right. A person you do not hate. Who you’re having a weekend away with. And introducing him to your family. He’s justthat, but definitely not someone you would only one bed with. What a silly cousin I am being.”
“I’m notintroducing him to my family,” I snort. “He’s already met Sol a bunch of times. They’re friends.”
“Well, you’re introducing him to me, your favorite cousin, which seems like kind of a big step.”
“You’re acting like I’m taking him to meet the parents.”
“I’m offended,” she gasps. “I’mwaymore important than your parents.”
Well, she’s got that right. Love my mom and dad, but they’re off doing their Midwestern empty nester thing, and when they weren’t empty nesters, we weren’t exactly close. Don’t get me wrong, they’re good parents… basically. They always remembered my birthday and they showed up to almost all of my recitals, but they were alsopeople, you know? They view the world through their own lenses, and they weren’t always the best about trying on someone else’s glasses, no matter how much I may have begged.
Unfortunately for me, their worldview, while well-intentioned, did not lend itself to knowing how to raise a girl like me. My dad definitely didn’t know what to do with a wild, fearless little girl. He worried about me constantly, but left my handling mostly up to Mom. Mom being a person who felt little girls should be proper, polite, and—most importantly—quiet.
Yeah. Little girl Elodie didnotjive with Mother Sage. Nor did teenage Elodie. And adult Elodie? Well, there’s a reason we live in different states. I love my parents, and they love me, but that love is best felt from a distance. A week or two at holidays is more than enough for us.
All of that to say, if I were to bring someone home to “meetthe parents," it probably would be Lyra and Sol that I brought them to. Their opinions of my potential happily ever after mean a lot more to me than my parents by a long shot.
Still. Roman? He’s not that person. He’s just… He’s Roman.
“You’re the most important,” I tell Lyra. “Right next to Sol. And Ruby. And, you know, that rabbi I met at that furry convention that one time. He was really nice.”
Her eyes roll, but she laughs, and I laugh too.
“I miss you,” I say. “I’m so happy I’ll get to—”
I stop as the front door opens and Roman walks in. “Sweet!” he calls, eyes on his phone. “Did you see this email?”
I resist the urge to hang up my video call as Jove’s curious—and, still,hot—face squeezes in next to Lyra’s on the screen. If they’re going to meet him in five days anyway, there’s not much point in continuing my efforts to keep the cousin ribbing to a minimum.
“I’m right here,” I reply using my inside voice. “No need to yell.”
Roman looks up, lips downturned as he takes me in. How dare I belivingin the living room, I guess.
My eyes narrow, daring him to say something stupid.
His eyes, in turn, zero in on my laptop and the two people urging me to turn my screen so that they can see him too. “Is that your cousin?” Roman asks, dropping his cell into his pocket and approaching the couch. “You were right. All those things you said.” He stops behind me, hands settling on my shoulders as he leans down to put his face in frame next to mine. “She looks like you,” he whispers too low for the mic to pick up. Then, to the screen he says, “Hello, I’m Roman. You must be Lyra and Jove.”
Lyra’s eyes dart back and forth between us, a giddy grin stretching her lips as Jove stares, blank, then hums a confirmation.
Roman smiles politely, and my shoulders ease. No need to berigid, El. It’s just your family meeting your housemate, landlord, technical boss, and bestie’s brother. So chill, this scenario.
“I heard you slash people’s tires,” my housemate-landlord-technical-boss-bestie’s-brother says, and I freeze, head slowly turning in his direction so that I cankill him with freaking laser beams from my eyeballs.Has helosthis mind?
“Yep,” Jove replies, unoffended. “Lyra, too, sometimes. It’s fun on a date.”
My head whips around, laser beams forgotten, so that I can gape at my cousin. My adorable, sweet, wouldn’t help me egg my high school boyfriend’s house the summer he broke up with me cousin. “Lyra!”
“It was Ted,” she defends. “Ted’s way worse than any person you’ve ever asked me to help you exact revenge on.”
“And your mom,” Jove cuts in. “That one time.”
I gasp. Shot the heart. “You slashed Aunt Irene’s tires without me?” I whine. “What is this? Hatred?” Aunt Irene sucks. She deserves to have her tires slashed five thousand times for the way she treated Lyra growing up. AndIdeserve to have a part in the slashing. “I can’t believe you would exclude me this way,” I sniff. “Does my love mean nothing to you?”
“Have you been hanging out with Will?” Roman asks. “These dramaticsscreamWill.”
I shrug. “Who can say? The only thing I’m certain of is that my dear, dear cousin hates me.”
