‘Mm-hmm,’ I answered absentmindedly, handling the hot bowl of mashed potatoes as if they were made of pure gold.
Dad snorted. ‘You’ve got a wee bit of drool on the corner of your mouth.’
‘No, I don’t.’ I slapped the mash on my plate gleefully and passed the bowl to him, then immediately reached for the gravy.
‘What’s with the cartoon hungry eyes? You not been eating right?’
‘I’m on a stupid diet,’ I muttered.
I felt my dad tense next to me. ‘What the hell for?’
‘To torture myself. I’m a masochist now.’
‘Liv, you know I don’t like those fads. There’s nothing wrong with you.’
Oh, no. My confession had probably just bought me one of my dad’s famous food-shopping trips. When I was at college, he’d turn up at the dorm every once in a while with brown paper bags loaded with food even though I had nowhere to put it. ‘I have a full fridge at home, Dad. Don’t even think about it.’
‘Hmm, we’ll see.’
I took a forkful of buttery mash and closed my eyes in sweet relief and said, ‘So good, I don’t even care,’ except I said it around a mouthful of potatoes, so it came out more like ‘Mu muu, u mmu mmm mmm.’
‘Mick, is Dee going to the wedding with you?’ Elodie asked from the opposite end of the table. ‘Last time we spoke you said she wasn’t sure.’
I glanced at my dad, wanting to know the answer to that question too. I had to admit, even though I was a grown-ass woman of twenty-six, it was still weird seeing my dad with someone who wasn’t Mom.
About four months ago, Dad started dating Dee, an attractive artist in her late thirties. Dad had reopened his painting and decorating company in Edinburgh, M. Holloway’s, and hired Jo. He’d already built up a great reputation and had recently hired two more guys to join their team. Back when it was just him and Jo, they took a job for this wealthy young couple in Morningside who’d bought their first home. It was a fixer-upper. There they met Dee, a friend of the couple who had been commissioned to paint a fairy-tale mural in the nursery. Dad and Dee hit it off. She was the first woman he’d dated seriously since Mom died.
I was very much aware that I should be grateful to Dee. Since her appearance, Dad had less time to worry over me, which he did. A lot. When we decided to settle in Edinburgh, I made a point of getting my own apartment. We’d been in each other’s pockets for a long time, and I really needed my space – I loved my dad to pieces, but sometimes his concern made me feel like there really was something wrong with me. The addition of Dee was at once confusing and a relief. I guessed I should get to know her a little better, because all I knew at the moment was that she was nothing like Mom. My mother was a dark-haired beauty with sharp cheekbones that hinted at the Native American heritage in her blood. Her fantastic bone structure and her dark hair were the only interesting physical attributes she gave me. Somehow a merciless God had not deigned to bestow upon me my mother’s beauty. It was her beauty that caught my dad’s eye, and then it was her dry, often twisted sense of humor – which I did inherit – and then it was the calm around her. Mom could soothe any room just by being in it. She was this incredibly peaceful, relaxing person, and it emanated from her to every one around her. It was a gift.
Despite her faults – her inconsiderate choices as a young girl – Mom was unfailingly kind, compassionate, and patient, which was why she’d made a great nurse. She’d handled her illness with a grace that always brought a lump to my throat whenever I let myself remember. She was a pretty reserved person, not overly confident, but not insecure or shy. Just quiet. Innately cool. You can’t teach that kind of cool. I should know because I’m pretty sure she tried to teach it to me and it clearly didn’t stick. I had no intention of trying to browbeat my inner geek for the chance to be cool. No, thank you. Me and my inner geek were loyal to each other. We had been ever since I was eight years old and my mother told me it was okay to be whoever I chose to be.
‘Mom, Arnie Welsh keeps calling me a geek. He says it like it’s a bad thing. Is being a geek a bad thing?’
‘Of course not, Soda Pop. And don’t listen to labels. They don’t matter.’
‘What are labels?’
‘It’s an imaginary sticker people slap on you with the word they think you are written on it. It doesn’t matter who they think you are. It matters who you think you are.’
‘I think I might be a geek.’
She laughed. ‘Then you be a geek. Just be whatever makes you happy, Soda Pop, and I’ll be happy too.’
God, I missed her.